It’s no secret that the majority of the electronic music we hear in 2025 is made on a laptop. It’s easy to see why: working solely with a DAW and plugins is fast, convenient and more affordable than running a hardware-based set-up, and everyone from bedroom producers to Grammy-winning engineers have wholly embraced the accessibility of software, along with its near-limitless creative potential. But when we go completely in-the-box, do we sacrifice something in the process?
The answer to that question can be heard in the music of Ela Minus, a hardware-obsessed electronic musician that makes an irrefutable case for the necessity of knobs, buttons and analogue oscillators. Minus’ debut album Acts of Rebellion was composed with a rigorous commitment to recording “live electronic music” - an assortment of synths and drum machines were recorded with no edits, no overdubs, and no in-the-box processing - and while its follow-up, this year’s DÍA, saw the artist adopt a more flexible approach that allowed for a handful of effects plugins and some DAW-based editing, Minus remains a hardware devotee. Like the sound of her chosen machines, Minus’ music is raw, direct and at times unpredictable: it’s the musical antithesis of arranging Splice loops on the Ableton timeline.
