New Gear Alert: Ozone 9 by iZotope, Kali Audio’s “Project Independence”, Reason Studios & M-Audio Join Forces & More

iZotope announces the release of Ozone 9.

iZotope continues to shape the future of mastering with the highly-anticipated release of Ozone 9.

Ozone 9 builds on a 17-year legacy in audio mastering, bringing balance to music with never-before seen processing for low end, new realtime instrument separation, and lightning-fast workflows powered by machine learning.

With features such as its expanded Master Assistant, creators can deliver the exact vibe they are looking for—from warm analog character to transparent loudness for streaming. Ozone 9’s Tonal Balance Control can now talk to more iZotope plugins in the session, and plugin performance is improved for faster work, smoother metering, and resizable windows, helping you get rid of any uncertainty on whether music is ready for release.

Key features of Ozone 9 include (but are not limited to): Master Rebalance, Low End Focus, Improved Tonal Balance Control, Expanded Master Assistant, Match EQ module, Vintage Modules, an updated GUI and much, much more.

Ozone 9 comes in three tiers: Ozone Elements is priced at $99; Ozone 9 Standard is priced at $199; Ozone 9 Advances is priced at $399.

Kali Audio announces the IN-8 3-way coincident studio monitor.

Kali Audio introduces their next line of studio monitors, “Project Independence”, with the IN-8.

Nicknamed “Project Independence”, the IN-8 shares its port tube, woofer, tweeter, and much of its amplifier with Kali’s popular LP-8 studio monitor. In place of the LP-8’s waveguide, the IN-8 has a 4-inch midrange driver, which acts as the waveguide for the tweeter.

The woofer is crossed over to the midrange at 330 Hz, making the IN-8 an acoustical point source. This configuration eliminates lobing in the vertical axis, giving the IN-8 a highly-detailed soundstage. The midrange driver also unburdens the woofer and tweeter, allowing for substantial system-wide improvements in total harmonic distortion.

The midrange is profile-optimized for its role as the tweeter’s waveguide, and peak excursion is limited to 1mm, thereby avoiding intermodulation distortion, which can be problematic on coaxial designs.

The IN-8 is powered by a 140W Class D amp with 60W going to the woofer, and 40W each going to the midrange and tweeter. Boundary EQ settings, like those found on Kali’s Lone Pine monitors, are accessible on the back of the speaker, along with a quick reference guide printed directly onto the speaker itself.

The IN-8 will be available starting November 1, 2019 in the US, with worldwide availability soon to follow; MSRP is $399.

Reason Studios announces partnership with M-Audio.

Reason Studios and M-Audio team up to deliver an attractive offering for owners of select M-Audio products.

Reason Studios has announced that they are partnering with M-Audio to offer Reason Lite with select M-Audio controllers. Reason Lite gives access to Reason’s famous workflow, an assortment of legendary instruments and effects, intuitive and essential recording tools, and studio-grade mixing tools.

Reason Lite offers eight instrument and/or audio tracks with the same workflow, instruments and effects, and recording and mixing tools as Reason Intro, but does not include Reason Rack plugin support.

Reason Lite is available for free with the purchase of select hardware products, including M-Audio’s Oxygen MKIV, Code, and Keystation MK3 series products. Owners of these qualified M-Audio products simply need to register their product at M-Audio.com to get their free Reason Lite license.

This offer ends December 31st, 2019.

Focal ships “Solo6 Be 40th” special anniversary monitors.

Focal commemorates their 40th anniversary by releasing a special edition of their popular Solo6 Be 2-way studio monitors.

Focal’s Solo6 Be has been dressed up with a new black finish and stamped as a special edition. This 2-way monitor which, from the moment it was launched, surprised users with its size and extended frequency response in the bass ratio, its woofer’s combination of neutrality in the midrange, its fullness in the low-mid, and its bass control. It provides transparency and an unmatched degree of definition and precision of the stereo image for this price category—that is why Focal chose to showcase this model to celebrate their 40th anniversary.

Solo6 Be features a Beryllium inverted dome tweeter, capable of reproducing high frequencies with an unrivaled degree of purity and transparency, and a bass/mid driver composed of a “W” composite sandwich cone. This cone optimizes the response from as early as the design phase and gives the loudspeaker incredible sound neutrality. Finally, the bass/mid power stage in Solo6 Be 40th is fine-tuned using BASH(r) technology, which delivers class AB sound quality combined with the efficiency of class D amplifiers.

For more information on the Solo6 Be 40th, including pricing, click here.

Steinberg announces new Electric Bass instrument for HALion.

Steinberg introduces the Electric Bass virtual instrument to HALion—sure to cover all of your low end “basses”.

Steinberg’s Electric Bass for HALion 6 has been conceived and designed to offer a bass sound tailored to suit every song and style. With seven articulations and various parameters, such as tone control and different amplifiers, Electric Bass gives you the freedom to shape the bass sound as freely as needed.

With Electric Bass, you can easily hand-pick exactly the right bass sound that you need for your song. From soulful 70s jams, through classic jazz vibes, to that big bass sound that can cut through every mix, you can combine your chosen sound with the included bass amp, lots of effects, and different playing styles.

Check out a walkthrough video of Electric Bass’ features here.

Electric Bass is available now for $129.99, and works in nearly every DAW compatible with VST 3, AU and AAX formats; it requires HALion 6, HALion Sonic 3, or the free HALion Sonic SE 3.

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