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6 discs…

live on
“yourself presents!”

mike salud performs live with amiga desktop tracker software on san diego public access television.
i’m taking notes. via channel 53

it seems bob from zeal has been on a similar journey rediscovering old 8-bit video game themes recently. bob is currently digging the 1986 nintendo game labyrinth, which was of course based on the bowie-in-spandex movie of the same name. head to bob’s blog for a ridiculous 8-bit version of magic dance…

LUDO FRIEND

hey bob! check this out!

i myself grew up on the c64 version of labyrinth. i could never get very far in it though - this was a pretty recurring theme for me playing commodore 64 games. i was not a good gamer. i tended to give up when things got hard, which is a philosophy that i have tried hard to carry over into my adult life. things would be much easier if david bowie visited me in a freaky dream

last week, i talked about commando, my favourite commodore 64 video game theme… well here it is, as its meant to be heard:

one thing i had forgotten was how the melody of the track dropped out whenever you triggered a sound effect - ie by throwing a grenade, or powering up. so cool. i had also forgotten that the game had only, like, three levels. so it only takes 3 minutes to sit and watch reinhard blast the hell out of all the pixelated military sprite dudes..

andre duracell - a one-man 8-bit band.. a drummer who uses drum triggers to play step sequencers synchronised with his frenetic, hardcore drumming.

how does he describe himself on myspace?

Sounds Like: Lightning Bolt & chiptunes :p

duracell plays bubble bobble live in san guistino, italy:

duracell plays space harrier and turrican:

bbc collective interview with duracell:

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bigger font. why? i’m going blind. and i’m bored.

my knowledge of computer game music is far from encyclopaedic, in fact its barely even a footnote on a random page of the great book that is computer game music, it is more like a barely legible scribble in the margins, in greylead pencil, that reads something like “you don’t know shit about computer game music”

but a couple of things have happened this week that makes me think i need to get my head back into that.

first up, while preparing to interview luke disasteradio - yes, theres that name again, he pays me in virtual synths every time i mention his name on this blog - i rediscovered my favourite commodore 64 computer game theme, commando. if you ever played c64, you probably played commando. when we played it during luke’s interview, one of the other announcers came in to the studio saying “i’ve played this game… what is it?!” its a song that never leaves you. this game i played a lot when i was a kid, though i could never get past the first few levels. i didn’t realise it at the time, but now i’m positive, that the reason i kept going back to it despite the fact that i was so shithouse at it was obviously just to hear rob hubbard’s amazing theme song over and over and over:

MP3: Rob Hubbard - Commando

what is amazing about this track, and i guess about all computer game music from this era, is how the composers could make such compelling and innovative songs using only the barest of building blocks. they were under such restrictions in terms of the sounds at their disposal - they were literally constructing music out of the tiniest shards of electrical noise. so they squeezed everything they could out of melody and rhythm. recently several groups have rather infamously started transposing the old commodore 64 game themes into orchestral arrangements.. eg the c64 orchestra… but there is actually something about the original distorted proto-digital sound that i find really inviting and comforting. but i guess thats all about memory, as most things tend to be, that really its just the way this song evokes so vividly a piece of my childhood, thats why it gets my rocks off so severely.

the second thing thats happened - and i see this to be some marvellous confluence of mystical energies that led these two things to happen in such temporal proximity - or perhaps it was a coincidence - it actually happened just a couple of hours ago when i got an email from marcus asking me about my EP changes (i hope he doesn’t mind me quoting some of his email here):

Incidentally, have you ever played the video game ‘Secret Of Mana’ or heard the soundtrack? The first time I heard Changes on the radio it immediately reminded me of a song from that game, which is why I like it so much. Listening to the rest of the EP, it sounds like it was very ‘Secret Of Mana’ inspired. Is this the case, or is it a fluke that they have similarities?

this is seriously one of the coolest things i’ve ever heard about my own music! i’ve managed to do a little bit of googling and tracked down some info about secret of mana, which i’ll be honest i haven’t played before. i think it was a super nintendo game - i never hooked into that generation of consoles to be honest. for me it went C64… xbox… neverwinter nights. and not much in between. except for civilisation. railroad tycoon 2- that shit is hot! but i digress. secret of mana:

The game’s soundtrack was composed by Hiroki Kikuta, and is perhaps his most famous work[citation needed]. It is known for its variety of tunes which tend to focus on the use of percussion and woodwind instruments, ranging from a lighthearted dwarves’ polka to a somber, wistful snow melody to a tribal-like dance.

my music sounds like a dwarven polka! if only! though i will admit - “tunes which tend to focus on the use of percussion and woodwind instruments” - this is not so far from the mark given the liberal doses of sampled drums and flutes that litter the track “changes” and also just most of my stuff in general. anyway, thanks so much marcus for making my day!

the secret of mana soundtrack can actually be downloaded in its entirety from this website. i’m just starting to give it a few spins and some of it is great stuff. here are a couple of samples to whet your appetite:

MP3: Hiroki Kikuta - Dancing Animals (Goblin Theme) (from Secret of Mana)

MP3: Hiroki Kikuta - Into the Thick Of It (from Secret of Mana)

so much great stuff i have just gotten to hearing. wow.
lets get into it.

principles of geometry have a full length out on tigersushi. apparently their album has been censored on itunes. because it has boobies on it. this mix they did for website allez-allez is possibly the best mix i’ve heard in ever. “their upcoming album on tigersushi ‘lazare’ is an ambitious album synthesis of decades of electronic music incorporating influences like john carpenter, terry riley, wendy carlos and the aphex twin. this hour long mix gives an idea of the sounds that have influenced them. put simply it is stunning.” allez-allez.co.uk

burial is so hot right now.

MP3: Burial - Archangel (Leif remix)
picture of leif | myspace of leif

this clip from wellington NZ’s disasteradio is guaranteed to make you feel awesome, but the coolest thing about his brand new album visions is not necessarily the andrew wk meets moroder pick-me-up power pop songs, but the hot fairlight/commodore 64 instrumentals! check this out!

MP3: Disasteradio - Stairdancer

buy the album visions on mp3 format here. do it now, you fools!

(artwork by cailan burns, member of pretty boy crossover)

these tracks you’ll have to track down your bad selves. please do.

Pretty Boy Crossover - A Different Handwriting myspace
Paper - Mountain myspace
Joakim - Rocket Pearl myspace
Harmonic 313 - Arc Light myspace

TOO MUCH GREAT MUSIC! MUSIC IS THE BEAST THING EVER HEY GERARD

playing zork on commodore 64 was one of the most exhilarating and frustrating experiences of my childhood. calling zork an “interactive fiction computer game” is really just a lame way of trying to sexy up what is on paper a very bland and simple concept - its a text game. it reminds me of those early computer psychologist programs, where they tricked people into thinking that their computer-facilitated therapy was being conducted by a real person when it was actually just an evil computer program called eliza.

hands down the best thing about this game is that there were very limited instructions that came with it - you weren’t given an exhaustive list of text commands, so most of the fun in the game came from trying out different verbs and seeing what it did and didn’t respond to. i never got very far with zork, i didn’t have the patience for it. but the concept excited me so much. i wanted to design my own text adventures.

you can play it online here, or (if you want to get serious) you can download it to your computer here so you can play it anytime, save your game etc. you know i think i had eliza on my commodore 64 too, actually… she warped me, i guess