Fiver Friday #550: AIRTEQ, SHABOOZEY & A BOOK WORTH OWNING

550 of these now. CRAZY!!! 10+ years! Still five things a week, still whatever actually caught my ear, what I found on the interwebs. Let’s get into it.

1. Plugin

CRAZY SH***t. Modartt just dropped Airteq and it doesn’t sound like anything else in your folder. These are the people behind Pianoteq, and instead of faking a pipe organ with samples, Airteq actually models air moving through virtual pipes in real time. You build your own instrument out of that airflow. Drones, breathy pads, weird tuned wind textures that don’t come out of a synth no matter how hard you try. I’m already thinking about what this could do for transitions and ambient beds on imaging. $99, free trial if you want to poke at it first.

Check it out: https://www.modartt.com/

2. Inspiration

Radio Ink ran a piece this week from John Shomby called “Does Your Station Have Integrity.” His point is simple. A station earns trust the same way a person does, by being predictable in the best way. Not perfect, not polished, just consistent. He put it this way: when listeners trust you they forgive mistakes, when clients trust you they renew, and trust compounds. That’s the whole business right there. Love it!

Read it here: https://radioink.com/2026/09/15/john-shomby-does-your-station-have-integrity/

3. Music

Shaboozey’s new one, “Let ’Em Know,” is exactly the kind of country I want in my ears right now. Real grit in the voice, nothing polished off it. Holler named it one of the best new country songs of the week and they’re not wrong.

Listen here:

4. Web/Social/Whatever

Tape Op just put out an actual book. “Making Music: Conversations With Record Producers” pulls thirty years of their interviews into one collection, Brian Eno, Finneas, Mark Ronson, the people who actually built the records we grew up on. This is the kind of book I want on my desk, not my phone.

Get it here: https://www.akashicbooks.com/catalog/making-music/

5. Imaging

Fresh off our SoundCloud, the brand new CCM composite for September. Warm, tight, exactly how this format should sound when it’s done right. Ketch at his best!