Make tuning your guitar a thing of the past by picking up a new model with Gibson Min-ETune. This clever, battery-powered robot tuner can tune all six strings in just seconds, and delivers over 75 tunings per charge. To do so, it tunes your physical strings — as opposed to digitally, which can result in degraded tone — and gives you access to 12 common alternative tunings, including six that you can program yourself. Available on a wide range of Gibson SG and Les Paul guitars.

GIBSON MIN-ETUNE [Uncrate]

Create your own recycled guitar picks quickly and easily with the Pick Punch. Turn expired credit cards, old gift cards, hotel key cards, and other thin plastic into perfectly-shaped guitar picks.

The heavy-duty Pick Punch features a steel head that can cut through materials up to 1mm thick. An open bottom makes it easy to see your pick punching material and precisely punch out your design.

Imagine generating sound using colors instead of any conventional instrument! The Audible Colors project does just that! It is an audio-visual instrument where sound is generated based on the color detected by a web cam connected to a computer. Musical notes correspond to certain colors (red, green and blue). And just like the color wheel, when you mix the primary colors, the secondary colors produce different notes.

The Listening Chair is a physical chair, traveling about, asking people the question ‘What is the song that still needs to be written?’. This concept, by singer Imogen Heap, guides you through the experience on screen, there are speakers either side of you with volume control, integrated camera, microphone and even LED strips that come on when you hit record.

Once recorded, if you choose to make it public, it’ll pop up onto this website and join other’s thoughts, for all to see. There’s a possibility you could end up in the music video or making of documentary, so select private if you’d rather just keep it private. Ideas uploaded directly and made public from the chair can be seen on the video wall and you can filter videos from the chair and videos submitted from elsewhere.

Though not the first tech tool for making music on the go, the Mixtape Alpha may be the most endearing. This pocket-sized 8-bit synth resembles the iconic mixtape, right down to its label-maker-inspired logo. The Alpha boasts an impressive range of capabilities for its size: four voices, four effects, and five notes allow a decent breadth of experimentation. Intrepid music-makers can hack the device to yield other, weirder sounds in an acknowledged ode to circuit bending. Users can record songs directly onto the synth and listen via headphone output—meaning the practice of trading tangible mixtapes may be on the verge of a comeback.

Bites of 8-Bit [Cassandra Daily]

The gTar Kickstarter project is touted as a full digital experience that makes it easy for anyone, regardless of their music experience, to play the guitar. To use the instrument, you simply dock an iPhone in the body, load the iOS app, and an array of interactive LEDs along the fretboard will show you how to play.

The gTar Brings Guitar Playing To The iPhone Masses [AppAdvice]

MusicAlight is a sleeve with LED lights that wraps around the guitar neck underneath the strings. It has special cut holes to allow the standard frets to be used. LED lights are attached near each fret of the guitar. As you begin learning, the LEDs light up below the string you should hold to play the correct chord in a song. The tempo can be turned up or down to allow you to learn at the speed you want. Each song or chord can be added seamlessly through our website or directly from your computer. MusicAlight has also programmed a guitar tab parser that allows you to convert standard text tabs into a custom format so you can start learning your favorite songs instantly.

Concept Albums are making a comeback, and the music industry is searching for a new business model. Enter ‘Soul Delay’ by The Mischief Engine, which is free in a standard version, or available via iTunes as a concept album.

Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead and others have offered “special editions” of their free albums for a price. These usually take the form of hard copies with extensive printed material, and perhaps a signed poster or t-shirt.

‘Soul Delay’ by The Mischief Engine takes this business model a step
further. In this case, the special edition unlocks the secrets within the free version, contextualising each song as part of a narrative.

You can obtain the “economy class” version of Soul Delay for free. Its eleven tracks are standard radio-friendly length.

The “business class” version is available via iTunes. It’s a concept album, telling a story from beginning to end. It features extended mixes, additional tracks, a revised track order, and narrative interludes which connect the songs.

Tipped by Stuart. Thanks!

Trendwatching: Moodagent automatically analyzes and profiles a user’s music collection, and then creates playlists of their favorite tracks to suit their mood, distinguishing songs by sensuality, tenderness, joy, aggressiveness and tempo.

Innovation Extravaganza [Trendwatching]

Swissmiss: The Dow Piano audiovisualizes the ups and downs of 2010 into musical notes. Using a five-note scale spanning three octaves, pitch is determined by the daily closing numbers of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The variance in volume mirrors the trading volume changes throughout the year. The notes are clustered in series of five, representing Mondays through Fridays. The weeks are punctuated, separated, and started by drum hits. Follow along with the graph to experience the market in a (somewhat) musical way. Created by Bard Edlund.

Dow Piano [Swissmiss]

technabob.com: Alyce Santoro’s Sonic Fabric line of neckties not only look cool, but they should hold a special appeal for New Yorkers: they’re made using 50% colored thread and 50% cassette tape, and the latter has been recorded with “loops and samples collected on and under the streets of NYC.”

Recycled cassette tape neckties: audible wear [technabob.com]