With absolutely no modesty, the innovators at Sugar Bytes have announced “the most complete guitar software of all times.” And watching the video below…they might be right!

The actual guitar player has been transformed into a step sequencer system that allows you to control playing styles, chord progressions and song structures. Guitarist can be played live as well, with just two fingers you can combine chords and patterns easily. You can choose from factory chords or just create your own chords on the fingerboard. The Action Section allows you to tweak the sequence in realtime and apply timestretch, looper or other crazy effects. Guitar players, keyboarders, producers, Absolutely convincing guitar riffs, combined with amps, wah pedals and effects, Guitarist is positioning itself as the perfect solution, when your track needs guitar and your bandmate is off shagging birds.

Features:
» Pattern Sequencer
For each 16 steps you can dictate if a chord is triggered, which strings are played and if the strum goes up- or downward. The playing style (normal, dead, damped) can be determined and the strum speed can be made slower or a double strum ca be triggered. Slides,bends, vibratos and portamentos can be made and strings can be stopped at any time.

» Chord Sequencer
For each 16 steps you can create chord-progresions from the factory chords or selfmade userchords. Each step of the chord sequencer can be repeated up to 16 times. That way you can create long lasting compositions and change chords also earlier or later.

» Animation
Each finger can be moved up or downward by 3 seminotes on the animation sequencer. You can use it for little melodies and alternating chords and it brings immediate beauty and life to your riff.

» Song
On 16 steps you can combine the 24 available patterns to create songs or complex riffs. Each step of the pattern sequencer can be repeated for up to 16 times, that allows long pattern progressions and pattern changes also at uneven times.

» Action Section
Here you get some realtime action to tweak the pattern with just pressing a button! Quickly apply a Looper, Timestretcher, slow the sequencer down or force dead- or damped notes!

» Amp
Two wonderful sounding amp models are available as well as a direct out mode for your favorite amp-amulator-software..

» Effekts
Two effect-units with 10 effect altogether provide the colors you are looking for. Additionally there is a multimode Wah Pedal that provides a classical wah, talk wah and volume pedal/thremolo mode.

» Guitar
Each finegr on the fretboard shows its note name, which makes it easy to identify, alternate and create chords. Twenty-four chords can be saved on the “Chord Board” to be called with the Sequencer or with your keyboard.

» Keyboard
Here the sequencer is triggered and the 24 Userchords and Patterns are called for playback and editing.

Sugar Bytes’ Guitarist is available now for $249 /€199 and comes as standalone, as well as in the VST/AU Plug-in flavors for Mac and PC. More information on Sugar Bytes Guitarist.

Dr. Dre, P. Diddy and now Q…
Harman International has announced the Quincy Jones Signature Headphone Line by AKG. The new line includes three models: the Q701 reference-class premium over-ears, the Q460 portable on-ear mini headphones and the Q350 in-ear headphones.

Musician, artist, humanitarian, Quincy Jones is a true original. His productions, which include the best-selling album (Thriller) and single (“We Are the World”) of all time, have garnered him an unprecedented 79 GRAMMY nominations and 27 GRAMMY awards, more than any other living artist. His list of notable achievements is unrivaled in the music industry. The list of legendary and contemporary artists with whom he has worked includes Aretha Franklin, Mary J. Blige, Ray Charles, Duke Ellington, Michael Jackson, Ludacris, Paul McCartney, Frank Sinatra and Usher, among many others.A share of the proceeds from every set of headphones sold in the Quincy Jones Signature Line by AKG will go toward the Quincy Jones Musiq Consortium, a foundation dedicated to making music education an ongoing part of the lives of American children.

The phones come in black, white and neon green. You can just hear the marketing discussion: “We need a snappy color for the kids! How about that puke green color that Skullcandy uses? Brilliant!!!”

The AKG Q701, Q460 and Q350 headphones will be available in October 2010 at prices ranging from $149.99 to $479.99. More information on the Quincy Jones Signature Headphone Line.

Sean Costello has announced ValhallaShimmer, an algorithmic reverberation plug-in for Mac and PC that is designed to produce BIG sounds, from concert halls, to the Taj Mahal, to the halls of Valhalla.

There are several reverberation modes available, to allow the user to dial in the preferred initial sound. By adjusting the Feedback, Diffusion and Size controls, the attack, sustain and decay of the reverb signal can be fine tuned. The modulation controls can be set to produce subtle mode thickening, glistening string ensemble-esque decays, and the distinctive random modulation of the older Lexicon hall algorithms. Two tone controls and the Color Mode selector allow the timbre to be adjusted from bright and glistening to a more natural dark decay, similar to that produced by air absorption in large spaces.

In addition, ValhallaShimmer has the ability to pitch shift the feedback signal. There are 3 pitch shift modes available:
» Single, where the feedback is shifted up or down by the Shift value.
» Dual, where the feedback is shifted both up and down (in parallel) by the Shift value.
» Bypass, which turns off the pitch shifting (useful for “standard” reverb sounds).

By setting the Shift amount to +12 semitones, and the Feedback to 0.5 or greater, the classic “shimmer” sound is produced, as heard on Eno / Lanois productions for U2 and others. The resulting algorithms allow for the classic shimmer effects to be generated with ease, as well as a variety of pitch shifted, evolving ambiences.

ValhallaShimmer is the end result of several years of research, and is highly optimized:
» The core pitch shifting algorithm uses randomization to avoid the comb filtering artifacts that can be heard in simpler pitch shifters.
» The code has been optimized for SIMD processors, in order to allow the complex algorithm to run while using a small fraction of modern CPUs.
» The reverberation algorithm has been designed to work in conjunction with the pitch shifting, to allow for high levels of feedback without compromising stability.

ValhallaShimmer will be released for OSX (VST/AU/RTAS) in early September 2010, with Windows plugins (VST/RTAS) to follow shortly thereafter. No pricing has been announced. More information on Sean Costello’s ValhallaShimmer.

Artificial Audio has released Quartz, a modulation effect plug-in for Mac and PC.

Quartz is a unique multieffect plug-in that turns the simplest sounds into ever evolving rhythmic soundscapes. It is also a source of creative modulation which can be used to control parameters outside of Quartz such as software instruments, plug-ins or even external MIDI equipment.

Artificial Audio’s Quartz is available now for PC and Mac in the VST/AU flavors for €79. More information on Artificial Audio Quartz.

To celebrate their 100th Anniversary, Denon has announced seven special editions including the DP-A100 turntable and the AH-A100 Headphones. Both elegant and attractive models will be available for a limited time.

More information on the Denon 100th Anniversary Edition Products.

TubeOhm has released PURE D16/24 Grain, a virtual synthesizer VST plug-in for Windows.

Grain is an experimental synth that employs Grain synthesis. You can load you own Samples into the synth, drive through the sample, modulate the grain or stop the Grain on a position in the sample. After the Grain oscillator you can use VCA, VCF, CHORUS, DELAY, REVERB and a GATE function to manipulate the sound further.

Features:
» One Grain Oscillator – static/dynamic mode
» Three LFO, mono, poly, host sync, pwm, phase
» Use your own samples
» Two different samples can generate one grain
» Gate function
» Multi-mode filters
» Multi-stage envelope for grain manipulation
» VCA / VCF ADSR
» Effects unit with delay, chorus, reverb, arp
» Distortion
» MIDI Learn

TubeOhm’s PURE D16/24 Grain is available now for €59. A demo is available for trial. More information on TubeOhm’s PURE D16/24 Grain.