Amiga Music Preservation -

Interview

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TLb. ,dMP' all rite, now you get the chance to read

TML.dMMP some facts about some of the major amiga

,nmm`XXMPX musicians. read about their history in

,#MP'~~XNXYNXTb. the scene and their plans in future.yes,

,d~' dNNP `YNTb. that's meant to be read while listening to

,~ ,NN' `YNb their modules. read 'em over and over and over..

dNP `Yb.

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Handle:

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Group:

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Date of birth:

1-How did your interest for computers start? Which year was that?

Phew, that was when I was 9 or 10 - 1987 I think.

2-What machines did you previously have? What did you do with them?

My sister got a Commodore 128 for her Confirmation, but I was the one that used it most. When
she later got one of the first PC's out there, I just took over the 128. I did a lot of playing
on it, and also began coding some basic. I remember coding a drum patern directly in basic with
the built in 3 track sound command. That was my first stab at making music :-) Later I found a
drumtracker with more real drum sounds for the C64 part of the C128. Had a lot of fun with that.
For my own confirmation I got an Amiga 500+, and quickly started fooling around in Protracker.
Later I got an A1200 with harddrive and the works. Then a Pentium PC a few years later when I
moved to Fasttracker. Been with PC ever since, but abandoned the "creative arts" a few years ago.
I played a lot of games on all of them, but also did a lot of raytracing. Nothing really came
out of it though, other than some pretty pictures for myself.

3-For what specific reason did you end up making music rather than gfx, coding?

Well, I found out that it was easy for me to make music, in the sense that it gave me satisfaction
quickly. I never got the hang of coding and it just seemed so tedious... I actually did do a lot
of 2 and 3D-graphics, and actually I work part time as a layouter for a magazine now.

But with music I could express myself, put in hidden messages, be extremely creative, while
mucking about in the tracker like a little autistic child. It was instant gratification!

4-Which composing programs have you been using? Which one in particular?

Started with Protracker on the amiga and went over to Fasttracker on the PC which I used the most.
I've tried starting with Skale, but I just don't have the time anymore...

5-With which module did you feel you had reached your goal?

That would be "Simplicity Explained". I worked for a long time on that one, and it was the
first to come out of the high-def, multichannel Fasttracker. I realised that there were so
many possibilities with so many tracks, so I really put a lot into that track. I kept coming
back to it, and it was over a year after I started it that I felt it was finished. There was
such a huge leap from the old crappy Protracker to what I could do with Fasttracker!

6-Is there a tune you would like not to remember? For what reason?

Lol - LOTS! I've saved most of the very first stabs at tunes from my very early days - they
are HORRIBLE (like "Dismal Atmosphere")! Even the ones I thought were good at the time were
really bad. I was under the influence of german Thunderdome - really bad trash-tekkno, so that's
my excuse. Problem was that I was mostly serious about those tracks, so that's even more embarasing.

7-In your opinion, what's the value of a music in a demo, game?

I'd say 30%... But bad music can really ruin more than good music can save. (if that makes sense :-)

8-At present, are you still composing? For professional or leisure purposes?

No, not at all... Haven't got the time. I've been wanting to get a synth and hook it up to some
software. But that costs money, which I don't have as I'm still studying medicine.

9-What do you think of today's pieces of music such as mpeg,wave,midi,etc...?

Well, even this scene has to evolve, but in that, it looses some of it's magic. The fun of it
used to be, that you had the actual construction of the artwork. A mod is like open source
software - you can go look at it in coding if you like! And you also know that the composer used
a specific set of rules to make the tune happen - and you can check to see how he bent them to
his own will (does it show that I've just been watching The Matrix?). I remember one Protracker
mod that scrolled so fast and made jumps all over the place, that cool patterns and effects
emerged in the tracker window. That was so amazing that to this day I can't believe someone
actually managed to pull that off. That magic is lost in a MP3... Still, some of the good
trackers have to move on and begin making actualy produced music, and you can only do that
with MP3/wav. Also, some of the new formats allow for 7.1 ch surround which open up a whole
new field of music! Haven't heard any of that yet, but it's bound to happen some day :-)

10-Could you tell us some of your all times favourite tunes?

Most everything Rh!no (David Newman) did is a favorite of mine. Especially "Blur" and "Aura".
Closer from CNCD's winning demo at TP5 was also a piece of art! And Iøve got a mod called "Aumax"
from a demo that really hits the spot (don't remember the name of the demo, composer or anything...)

11-Are you planning to make an audio cd with some of your music remastered?

Nope...

12-What bands are you currently listenning to?

Lemon Jelly, Lemongrass, Red Snapper, Royksopp, Tortoise, The Underwolves, Wagon Christ,
Zero7, Arcade fire... to name a few...

13-What does/did the amiga/c64 scene give you?

It formed my creativity and gave me the selfasteem to try and create things myself. I wasn't
really very much part of the scene, as I only contributed to very few (3-4) very small productions,
but that was fun while it lasted. But the fact that people would come and ask to use my stuff
was great - they actually thought it was good! It also tought me a great deal about composing
music - something that made me understand the music I listen to today much better.

14-Are you still active in the scene these days?

no, never really was much of a scener :-)

15-Anyone to greet? Anything left to say? Feel free...

Greetings to Slide/Polkabrothers! He introduced me to the Desk Top Publishing (for the high
school mag at the time) and tought me a lot about music.

And thanks to AMP for keeping track of all this! :-)

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please note: this interview is ©opyrighted in 2008 by crown of cryptoburners

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