[PD-ot] VentureBeat article about Pd app

[Scott Hildebrand]

http://venturebeat.com/2009/12/16/rjdj/

The
future of the music album?

Check out RjDj’s Little Boots appIn an age
when tracks can be copied or streamed at virtually no cost, what extras
can musicians add to make a living?

A London-
and New York-based startup called RjDj is experimenting with one
answer. RjDj is taking albums from electronic artists like  Little
Boots and  Air and creating reactive music experiences from them
through iPhone apps. RjDj launched one this week with Little Boots, a British electropop artist who made her name by posting  YouTube videos of herself playing experimental instruments like the Tenori-On.

What’s
reactive music? It’s a type of music that’s different every single time
you play it. The phone’s microphone picks up sounds from your
environment while the accelerometer takes in the movement of your
phone. RjDj’s app can incorporate both into the track, making each time
you play a song entirely unique. The startup launched its own free app
last year that offers an ever-changing variety of tracks and effects.

With
the Little Boots collaboration, RjDj tooks three tracks from her
already released album and turned them into a $2.99 app where you can
apply effects to each song. One track focuses on accelerometer movement
and sounds more agitated depending on how fast you’re walking or how
much you’re shaking the phone. Another takes in sounds from your
environment, like chatter from people around you in a cafe, and infuses
them into the song. The effects range from being almost indetectable on
some tracks to being completely transformative on others.

In the same way that sites like YouTube and social networks
have handed people the tools to create experiences rather than
passively consume them, RjDj is trying to allow music fans to influence
the tracks they’re listening to. Fans can share unique instances of the
generative Little Boots track and upload them to RJDJ’s site.

The
company has also done its own take on headphone parties, where
attendees listen to RjDj tracks while a person dubbed the “reality
jockey” plays with different effects.

echelonAlthough RjDj is
working with well-known electronic artists to create apps, the company
doesn’t see them as their only business model. RjDj is pioneering the
use of PD (or  PureData), a graphical programming language, and
applying it to music composition to create reactive sound tracks. Composing music
with PD looks like the rather intimidating flowchart to the right. RJDJ
is working on software with a more consumer-friendly user interface
that may be released next spring. (If you’re interested, here’s a
tutorial on how to hack RjDj’s software with PD.)

The company is the brainchild of Last.fm
co-founder  Michael Breidenbruecker and boasts funding from former
Last.fm chairman  Stefan Glaenzer and Seedcamp founder Saul Klein.

At
this point, RjDj caters to more of a niche community, but its thinking
may contain several hints about the future direction of the music
industry.


      
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