Another Mad Weekend

I'm going to be accused of this being a non-HE blog soon! But this past weekend has been music filled with no children. So thats what I'll blog about.

Thursday we got in the car and drove down to Wimborne to drop the girls off. Had a couple of hours to kill at Avon Country Park, bought a new card game there Animal Match, but found out )the hard way) it was way too windy to play it outside, so sat in the car playing it for a while. Did some climbing and stuff (well, they did while I sat and drank coffee) then dropped them off with K. I drove back to Ipswich and went over to Ms where he had a few houseguests.

A couple of weeks ago we went up to Buxton for a gig, and this wednesday they all came down here to return the favour. They had done a gig in Bury (At The Grapes) Wednesday night, and appeared on ICRFM Thursday night.

Friday during the day we drove to Felixtowe had a wander around the arcades, got very wet as it was raining a fair amount and ate terrible chips.





Then we were supposed to have a party Friday night, but since so many people texted to say they couldn't come, and at least one guest was ill so we went to town instead. Although once we got to town M then felt ill also, so M and I went home early. Which worked out for the best, as two party goers arrived, two people I hadn't met before, and turned out to be really lovely. We sat up talking and drinking and chatting until the small hours, which always suits me far more than a party does anyway. Then the others returned rather drunk having sampled the delights of Harry Palmers (a terrible indy night) and eventually we all went to bed.

Saturday we got up had breakfast in town




and M was playing at the Respect Festival at the local college. Now you have to give them top marks for effort, and wanting to create an event highlighting the great community groups and support and equal opportunities and all that in Ipswich. But it is so badly advertised, that you get there, and there are lots of stalls, but not many people. They were running rather late with the music, so M didn't start his 30mins set until about 2pm and we had to be back at ICRFM at 3pm. But it was worth it to see the bemused looks on peoples faces as we shouted and heckled and cheered him from the back of the pretty empty room, and he put out lots of chiptune music. He followed a blues band, and was followed by a dub DJ, so lots of variety there. That done, we then had to walk fast through town to ICR where they appeared on Susanne's show. Then back home via the joke shop, where they all purchased various animal masks, I haven't had quite so much fun walking through town in a long time, harrassing young girls, and older ones, and generally causing a (loveable) nussicence - "What, you've never seen a rabbit before?"



A bit of chill out time, before getting down to The Drum and Monkey for that nights gig - VENT, which bearing in mind was the first time we've put on an electronic night there (and we had a bunch of mad nutters from t'north) went really well. I danced like a lunatic. Must remember I am no longer 17. Today my back and neck are aching a lot. Was great fun though.

There was loads of other stuff that happened. Just can't remember it all now. Had a fantastic time though.

Hidden Fortress New Release

So not strictly about home-ed, or any of my usual blog topics he he.

Hidden Fortress
Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, Select, Remix Volume 1 (September 18, 2006)





http://www.archive.org/details/upupdowndownleftrightleftrightbaslectremix


The new release from the prolific Hidden Fortress is the first volume of remixes of chiptune artists (It's titled derived from an infamous cheat-code). A brief run down of what chiptune is may well help here! Chiptune is music written in sound formats where all the sounds are synthesized in realtime by a computer as opposed to using sample based synthesis. During the mid 1980's to early 1990s sound chips were the only widely available means for creating computer based music. Because early computer sound chips had only simple tone generators and noise generators, the complexity of the sounds available were fairly limited, giving the music a distinct sound.

But to scoot back to using soundchips to make music for a purpose (rather than just for the pleasure of the music) you have to step back to the 70s and the rise of video-games. As arcade machines were developed so was the means of producing a digitally created sound, where a specific computer chip would change electrical impulses from computer code into analog soundwaves on the fly for output on a speaker, creating either music or sound effects to enhance the game. The music then would usually be monophonic loops used mostly at the start of a new game (think of the beginning of pacman) or between game stages. Including music in a game meant it would need to have code written by a computer programmer, who would often not have any musical experience. This was then developed through the 80s, and the newer chips allowed for more channels at once, whereas the original chips could only produce 2 channels (ie. two sounds at the same time) arcade chips could generate 8 or more channels, vastly improving the depth and flexibility of music creation. By the mid 80s home consoles, like the NES, could produce 6 channels. By this time technology was able to sample sounds to use, but the file size of these sounds was far more than the computer generated sound, so even then when used, it was often very small looped samples.

Anyway, to get back to the music, by the end of the 80s game music was being developed by musicians rather than computer programmers, (Some of the chips used were sound chips like the analog-digital hybrid Atari POKEY on the Atari 400/800, the MOS Technology SID on the Commodore 64, the Yamaha YM2149 on the Atari ST, AY-3-8910 or 8912 on Amstrad_CPC, MSX and ZX Spectrum, the Yamaha YM3812 on IBM PC compatibles, and the Ricoh 2A03 on the Nintendo Entertainment System or Famicom) and so the quality of the music, and the popularity rose.

Now chiptune music is written simply for the artistic value of the sounds created, rather than only having those sounds as a limitation of the technology. Generally chip tunes consist of basic waveforms, and basic percussion often generated from white noise going through an ADST envelope controlled synthesizer.

Historically chiptune could refer to any style of music. Modern computers can play a variety of chiptune formats through the use of emulators, although not always 100% accurately. This means that there is new chiptune music being written, and also some artists are revisiting and reworking classic video-game tracks.

Phew, got there in the end. Onto the album.

Hidden Fortress’ aim was to collect together a bunch of chiptune artists and work their own brand of magic on them.

Taken from their download page:

“…Our main aim was to bring the wonderful and varied sounds of chiptune to our friends and to further connect the world of chip tune artists with each other…..”

Which they seem to have done pretty well. I'm not that familiar with the artists they have remixed, and I haven't heard the originals of the tracks to really know where they've come from, but overall the album provides a cohesive journey through a wide variety of tracks, leaving you with that kind of uplifted feeling, that seems to fit very nicely with the autumn season we are moving into. I was sat in my car, the early autumn sun bright into my windows when track 6, FOR N TO EQUAL 80 (a remix of GOTO80’s Stag 3) came on and seemed to provide the perfect soundtrack for the journey. Upbeat, with a catchy bass riff to get stuck in your head, it seems to summerise the feel of the whole album, with just that hint of darkness Hidden Fortress seem to exploit so well. Followed by Hexidecimalover (remix of Schotastic's The Binary Walls Between Us) another feel good, happy dance tune. Other tracks to note are the opening track I Need A Quater (remix of Kidd Video's 25 Cents), a great pop song you'll find yourself singing along to. Along with the more pop like sounds, there are more classically video-gaming sounding tracks (such as Baby Buggy remix of Pixelh8's Baby Carrier and Blitx Pixel remix of MSX Crew's Pixel Addict), and some chilled out reflections notably Immobilizer (remix of 8 Bit betty's And I know That You're Happy) leaving you pondering just what volume 2 will bring!

I think this album should appeal to chiptune, electronica and dare I say pop lovers alike.

Hidden Fortress can be seen at various gigs around the south over the next few months, including The Drum & Monkey in Ipswich on the 23rd September 2006.

References:
www.wikipedia.com
www.myspace.com/hiddenfortressmusic
http://www.archive.org/details/upupdowndownleftrightleftrightbaslectremix