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"8-bit"


Stripey

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What's the big attraction with so called "8-bit" music? Almost everything I've heard which jumps on that particular bandwagon is a badly executed travesty. I suspect it's an excuse for a lack of skill that allows people with limited abilities to say their wack synth programming is cool because its "8-bit".

Are people like duracell, who just chop up old computer game music and retrigger it in a misstimed mess of irritating sound merely cashing on the naivity of the younger generation and their pathetic love of all things supposedly retro/80's/ironic?

Hexstatic, for example, were doing this almost a decade ago with vastly more skill, care and sophistication than any of the ball-less wet-blanket casio vltone waving SID emulator whoring morons of today.

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What's the big attraction with so called "8-bit" music? Almost everything I've heard which jumps on that particular bandwagon is a badly executed travesty. I suspect it's an excuse for a lack of skill that allows people with limited abilities to say their wack synth programming is cool because its "8-bit".

Are people like duracell, who just chop up old computer game music and retrigger it in a misstimed mess of irritating sound merely cashing on the naivity of the younger generation and their pathetic love of all things supposedly retro/80's/ironic?

Hexstatic, for example, were doing this almost a decade ago with vastly more skill, care and sophistication than any of the ball-less wet-blanket casio vltone waving SID emulator whoring morons of today.

EDUCATE!

TESTIFY!

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I love the sound the SID chip and other 8-bit/16-bit computers produces. That is why I like it.

I recently got the 8-Bit Peoples 50th release compilation and the C64 Turrican 1-3 game music, and both are fucking excellent.

Just because the hardware is old, it doesn't mean it can't be a part of fresh and exciting music. For those who can program these chips on the hardware it was built for is a technical achievement in itself - probably much more than simply using software to sample and tweak everything (yes I do know that many chiptune composers use a wide variety of such software), and I'd consider myself a huge admirer of such skill.

Having said that, I think there is a LOT of shite chiptune/8-bit influenced artists out there. I think Duracell would be interesting to see live, but I wouldn't buy any of his music.

Also, there is no real need to slate Stripey's musicial ability, as I don't see any mention in the first post of comparing 8-bit to his compositions.

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Swingin Ryan, Thurisaz, if don't have anything useful to say which is relevant to the topic, don't bother posting. :love:
Okay. DUracell is probalyu the most original idea ive ever seen. Especially when he does improv stuff live. simply because its "8-bit" is hardly a reason to say its shit because "oh, retro is now hip". you're the one always going on about new music and stuff, well, your music is the same old tripe as has already been done, at least some of this 8-bit lot, ESPECIALLY Duracell, have an original approach to it all.
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I love the sound the SID chip and other 8-bit/16-bit computers produces. That is why I like it.

I recently got the 8-Bit Peoples 50th release compilation and the C64 Turrican 1-3 game music, and both are fucking excellent.

Just because the hardware is old, it doesn't mean it can't be a part of fresh and exciting music. For those who can program these chips on the hardware it was built for is a technical achievement in itself - probably much more than simply using software to sample and tweak everything (yes I do know that many chiptune composers use a wide variety of such software), and I'd consider myself a huge admirer of such skill.

Having said that, I think there is a LOT of shite chiptune/8-bit influenced artists out there. I think Duracell would be interesting to see live, but I wouldn't buy any of his music.

Also, there is no real need to slate Stripey's musicial ability, as I don't see any mention in the first post of comparing 8-bit to his compositions.

I'm not saying that it's anything to do with the hardware being old, just that it's incredibly easy to make it sound terrible.

The synth capabilities of the SID chip for example and the sounds it can generate are easily recreated with just about any modern subtractive synth (VST or hardware), infact it's far easier to make these bleeps and so on with a modern synth than it is to put together more sophisticated sounds, which is why I think so many people are using "8-bit" sound as a crutch to hide their inability to produce proper synth patches as they try to get a grip of modern hardware and software.

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Okay. DUracell is probalyu the most original idea ive ever seen. Especially when he does improv stuff live. simply because its "8-bit" is hardly a reason to say its shit because "oh, retro is now hip". you're the one always going on about new music and stuff, well, your music is the same old tripe as has already been done, at least some of this 8-bit lot, ESPECIALLY Duracell, have an original approach to it all.

Attacking my music just because you disagree with my opinion and have no intelligent reply to it is pathetic.

Anyway, triggering chopped samples with a drumkit or otherwise is an approach which has been around longer than you've been alive - doing it badly with old video game music isn't original atall and doesn't particularly appeal to me, from a technical point of view or an aesthetic point of view.

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Attacking my music just because you disagree with my opinion and have no intelligent reply to it is pathetic.
I attack your music regardless of your opinion. I always have. Cos its shit.
Anyway, triggering chopped samples with a drumkit or otherwise is an approach which has been around longer than you've been alive - doing it badly with old video game music isn't original atall and doesn't particularly appeal to me, from a technical point of view or an aesthetic point of view.
well,g o and give me some examples, cos id love to hear them. all Ive heard is Duracell.
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I'm not saying that it's anything to do with the hardware being old, just that it's incredibly easy to make it sound terrible.

The synth capabilities of the SID chip for example and the sounds it can generate are easily recreated with just about any modern subtractive synth (VST or hardware), infact it's far easier to make these bleeps and so on with a modern synth than it is to put together more sophisticated sounds, which is why I think so many people are using "8-bit" sound as a crutch to hide their inability to produce proper synth patches as they try to get a grip of modern hardware and software.

That is understandable, and I can completely see your point on the simplicity of generating these sounds on modern equipment being much easier, however, if you wanted to program something and wanted to write it in assembly, should you use a high-level language instead just because it is easier?

Many people are extremely interested in learning the fundamentals and logic behind programming these chips, and thus they choose to avoid applications such as SID emulators because they aren't gaining as much out of it as they would discovering the hardware for themselves - placing them in the same position as those composers who were consulting their C64 manual for the first time out of the box.

There are of course those who aren't as involved as that and instead use the sounds in a way which exploits the so-called "8-bit" style, but it is such a pathetically coined term that you have to ask yourself - should I really care? In 30 years time, will there be a "192kbps-bit"? I love my game soundtracks and my chiptune. That's all that matters to me.

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What's the big attraction with so called "8-bit" music? Almost everything I've heard which jumps on that particular bandwagon is a badly executed travesty. I suspect it's an excuse for a lack of skill that allows people with limited abilities to say their wack synth programming is cool because its "8-bit".

Are people like duracell, who just chop up old computer game music and retrigger it in a misstimed mess of irritating sound merely cashing on the naivity of the younger generation and their pathetic love of all things supposedly retro/80's/ironic?

Hexstatic, for example, were doing this almost a decade ago with vastly more skill, care and sophistication than any of the ball-less wet-blanket casio vltone waving SID emulator whoring morons of today.

When will you ever accept that different people are into different music, just because its not what you are into doesnt make it shit/crap/bad/ or the people performing it stupid/morons/pathetic etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc.....

You are the most narrow minded person I have ever come accross on these boards.

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This thread is based on you attacking people's music because you disagree with other people's opinion that it is good. There are people on this board that make the kind of music you're having a go at.

No, this thread is a debate about 8-bit music. What have you got to say about it? Have you got anything useful to add? If not, stop posting.

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This thread is based on you attacking people's music because you disagree with other people's opinion that it is good. There are people on this board that make the kind of music you're having a go at.

Not really. I am not offended at all by Stripey's input. I just like discussion, and I am genuinely interesed on what he thinks on the subject. If you can't contribute to the purpose of the thread then you shouldn't post.

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Don't post in this thread if you've got nothing useful to add to the debate, cheers.

Well, I agree with you mostly. It's a pretty limited medium, but it's not the tool that matters, it's what you do with it. It's not worth writing it off just because you've not listened to enough of it to find anything good.

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If there are newer devices to do 'the 8 bit sound' (whilst having many more capabilities) just as good as whatever was being used whenever then I would have thought people would use the newer things and make stuff interesting by blending 'old' with 'new'.

Something like that. :D

Yeah exactly, that's what hexstatic were doing (see the two videos above).

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