Game Boy Australia

4ZzZ Chipmusic Podcast with Dot.AY and K808

2009-07-16T14:42:00.003+10:00

On 14th of June 2009, I was lucky enough to be asked to guest program a slot at Brisbane Community radio station 4ZzZ. It turned out basically being myself programming an hour and a half of my favourite Chip music and talking in between with the host K808. There is also a featured pre-record interview with Little-Scale that was recorded in Adelaide earlier this year.

Finally this show is available in its entirety for your listening pleasure (please note some of the information is old and very possibly incorrect)
Remember a lot of the artists played will be playing at Sound Bytes tomorrow night so come to Melbourne already...

direct mp3 links (right click "save link as")

Part 1 49min 36sec

Part 2 58min 21sec

>>>>>>>>>>>Playlist<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
PART 1:
Quarta330 - Ahirskew
Derris-Kharlan - Exigence
Little-Scale - Come Back to Me
*Little-Scale Interview
IAYD - Between Multiverses
HelloStereo - Hokkaido Noon '09
Bubblyfish - Half Moon Lake

Part 2:
Nordloef - I Know
Maddest Kings Alive - Cagey Negotiators
cTrix - Wednesday Chip
minikomi - Skip for Love
godinpants - liphe
Starscream - Gravity in terms of Spacetime
Goto80 - Love Crime (qwertypack remix)
Saitone - Overlapping Spiral
Trash Can Man - One Wave Tsunami
Bit the Medusa - Dimbo Dimbo Lets Go!
Cag - Set Nathan on Fire
*Qwerty Pack - Pimp My Grime --- (K808 Fail wrong track) -----
Ten Thousand Free Men - Duty (now available for download from 8bc)
Meneo - Papi

The Sounds of SB4! (As posted on DPAD)

2009-06-29T18:29:00.004+10:00

Hello!

It's 10k here, with the fabulous task of gathering some samples of the music you can expect to hear at Sound Bytes 4. I have heard and seen all but one of these artists before, and I am very, very excited to say the least. This is in the order on the poster (exceptions: I cannot find an 8bit Talkshow Boy recording and Able Archer is playing but not on the poster). Just click the links, which are the song names, if it wasn't obvious.

little-scale

Music sample: Come Back To Me
Seb is amazing. Pick a console and he has made music with it.

More: Blog / 8bc / Releases

dot.AY

Music sample: Default To Paranoia

(ph)Alex writes Game Boy glitch/grime which is interactive and brutal. He has been known to tear up the mic too.

More: Home Page / 8bc / Myspace

Maddest Kings Alive

Music sample: Sleepy Kisses
Fenris is half of Perth's Chrism & Fenris, go figure. He weaves beautifully rich and dynamic songs on anything from a GBA to a C64. Glitchy and brutal in a way that you would not expect.

More: Home Page / Live at SB3

Derris-Kharlan
Music sample: Luna

Nathan is a real badass. Period. He writes game soundtracks - if the game was "Mars Volta: Rush to the Court of the Crimson King". He plays live with a guitar, check the link for SB3 to check that out!

More: 8bc / Live at SB3

Astro Zombies

Music sample: All New Heights

Darcy is win. Really young dude, with bright, happy and awesomely danceable tunes. He went down like a smooth criminal at the last Sound Bytes.

More: 8bc / Myspace

Able Archer
Music sample: My Heart Will Goon (Titanic Go On!)

A wild fan-boy appears! Aaron has been at every Sound Bytes (right?). He is looking like he will be rocking out with his cock out, oh, and a guitar and the LOLs.

More: 8bc

Talkshow Boy

Adrian has done a Sound Bytes set before - but not like this. He has been a fan of Chipmusic for a long time and now he is performing some of his own! Some of you may know Talkshow for his role in Melbourne's "Keith! Party", or even better his own breakcore/rap/mashup tunes.

More: Myspace (rap)

Visit: dpad.com.au

Low-Bit Gamelan Compilation [2009]

2009-06-22T14:15:00.002+10:00

I thought I would mention this here because it features three Australian artists and was orgnised by yours truly.

The Low-Bit Gamelan Compilation – a release of five original tracks with a strong influence from the beautiful music of Indonesian gamelan! Thanks to all who submitted tracks - I'm very happy with this compilation.

Track Listing
01. Derris-Kharlan: Sarin
02. little-scale: Monsoon
03. Baron Knoxbury: Pilo Hau Gamelan
04. Red Robin: Pemanasair
05. The Listrix: Rock the Gamelan

Download this compilation here!

whit3nois3 vs Soundbytes

2009-06-17T09:46:00.001+10:00

Melbourne institution whit3nois3 is back and ready for battle. Enemy lines have been drawn for a one night Battle Royal, facing off against the insurgents, Soundbytes.

For the creatures of the night who love dark, grinding noisy noise you wont be disappointed.

So bring your lo-tech arsenal and choose your allies wisely, for there can be only one.

Retrotech soldiers such as DOT.Ay, 10k Freemen & Their Families and Celsius will be fronting the assault. $10 will get you unlimited plays.

Soundbytes - Round 4 is ON!

2009-06-15T09:08:00.001+10:00

Twitter

2009-06-14T22:48:00.005+10:00

Game Boy Australia accounts and associated acts:

@SoundBytesOz - DPAD's gig arm!

@ninjaspew - Maddest Kings Alive.

@littlescale - The one, the only.

@Dot_AY - GBA Co-founder.

@10kfreemen - Me.

Others well worth following:

@8bitdaily - New track for your ears every day.

@calmdownkidder - James, founder of CDK.

@nieldlr - aka Sparkyboy, the honorary Australian.

@Disasterpeace - The amazing.

@blipfestival - Worth following for the festival season.

Happy tweeting.

Sega Master System Music @ ACMC2009

2009-06-14T11:24:00.000+10:00

I've got some Sega Master System music in this year's Australasian Computer Music Conference in Brisbane. Not sure about the dates and times of the concerts yet, will be within the period 2 - 4 July. Details are still forthcoming.

4ZzZ Chip Music Radio

2009-06-14T10:03:00.002+10:00

From 8-10pm AEST tonight I will be playing a whole bunch of my favourite Chip Music tracks on 4ZzZFM. If your in the Brisbane area you can as always tune into 102.1FM everyone else can listen to the live stream here

As always I will promise it will be podcasted and then it won't be and you'll miss out so just listen to it live or whatever...

Progfest CD Online

2009-06-12T12:19:00.002+10:00

Hey all,

If you want to be part of the biggest prank chiptunes have ever played on progressive rock, buy this CD.

Minikomi Creates Metrodub

2009-05-19T16:44:00.004+10:00

Elusive jungle, breaks, beat maker Minikomi who comes from Adelaide but currently resides in Tokyo, has recently acquired LSDJ and made some incredible Dub style tracks as part of the launch of Metrodub.

Apparently the next artist up is Japanese guy Shex... definitely something to look out for

Also while your there have some fun on the Metrodub site rearranging the letters like I have :D

Australian Chipmusic Directory - CONTRIBUTE!

2009-05-05T00:23:00.001+10:00

The Australian Chipmusic Directory (http://aussiechip.milkcrate.com.au/) has received an update. The major part of the update is that there are now options for contributing information - such as artists, releases and compilation tracks - making it easier than ever to add something.

So do your part, and contribute!

Game Boy Australia was on TV

2009-04-07T09:49:00.002+10:00

OK so I finally got my arse into gear to write this and it has already aired......

I am of course referring to the following
The popular ABC2 video game TV show Good Game will have a segment exploring the Australian Chipmusic scene, first screening at 8:30pm (AEST), Monday April 6 on ABC2 and 11:50pm, Friday April 10 on ABC1. It is also available as an online stream and as a direct download (WMV and MP4).
This includes music and interviews from 10k Free Men, Little-Scale and Dot.AY. As well as footage from the most recent Sound Bytes event in Melbourne with a special interview section with Jim Cuomo.

I feel it was a great segment the only criticism I have heard is that for newcomers and people who have never heard of it before it is never actually explained what we do or how we do it. This I believe is a minor flaw compared to the regular Chip media cock-ups, because it was left up to the musicians to discuss it with no outside interviewer comments it refrained from using language that regularly annoys us (mariorave, donkeykongdisco, hacked gameboy, soldering iron on stage). The fact that a lot is left unexplained just means that people that become interested are going to go looking for answers. I have already received a number of emails, comments and questions. Leave you with some other discussions on the show....

GM4ALL
Good Game Forums (lolcomment by sci_fi_chicky: "Ciptune: WTF?? are you serious? what a GEEKFEST!! where did you find these people?! i'd need a chastity belt if i went to one of those parties lol")
8Bit Collective

10k - Shows to report!

2009-04-01T22:40:00.006+11:00

Facebook events: bang and bang.

Note: I was a very late edition to the first bill, though, I will say I was invited to play by members of the last two bands, I didn't MAKE them put me on the bill. Believe me please.

Beach Party 2009 Results!

2009-03-31T15:31:00.003+11:00

"First up, a huge thank you to all who turned up to the party, and particularly to all those who participated in the competitions.

Allowing remote contributions to the competitions will continue to be a feature at future Beach Party events, so if you're interstate or overseas with few local parties or you just have an experiment you wish to unleash on a bunch of willing sceners, keep us in mind!

For those of you unfamiliar with the rules of Beach Party, we had a bonus system in place. The bonus system was so that the barrier to entering a compo is quite low (ie. videos or flash demos in the demo compo), but also so that traditional demoscene and oldschool productions are encouraged and rewarded."

- Quoted from the results page.

Results can be found here! (I can second in the Chiptune comp mofrockers!)

Game Boy Australia Turns One!!!!

2009-03-30T16:15:00.005+11:00

OK so this kind of slid by all our attentions, I believe because so much has been going on. Game Boy Australia has been online for a Year since the 18th of March. A whole lot has happened in a year and this year already is shaping up to be huge.

To celebrate head over to this page to download sets from 10k, Derris-Kharlan, Maddest Kings Alive and Jim Cuomo from the most recent Sound Bytes party. Astro was there too (proof).

I also played a gig on Saturday and made some awesome contacts, so have more shows and a VJ lined up in the near future. So lets hear it for the one year old Game Boy Australia and hopefully this second year I will finally release something worth listening too.

LSDJ Microtuning

2009-03-23T23:03:00.004+11:00

(Taken from a thread on 8bitcollective. Abrasive is one of the DPAD boys in Melbourne.)

James developed a script that takes an LSDJ ROM, and rewrites the tuning table (and optionally the note names) into a new copy of the ROM. Frequencies can be manually specified (all 108 notes), or generated in equal temperament, cent steps, cent series or ratio series.

The latest version of the script (works with LSDJ 3.9.9) can be found at
http://bur.st/~abrasive/lsdj_tune/

Some examples:

24-tone equal temperament
12-tone ET, manually
Wendy Carlos' alpha scale
Pythagorean 13-tone

Jim Cuomono @ 303 Northcote

2009-03-17T19:53:00.005+11:00

JimCuomo.com 8-bit and electric sax - one night only
Concert : 303 Northcote 25 March Wed 9 p.m. $10

Jim Cuomo started using computers when the operators had white coats and the
computer took up several floors. After composing a variety of different music - jazz, classical, musical, military ... he was asked to write music for video games in the 1980's . The result was a long list of popular games :

Defender of the Crown, Sim City, SlamDunk, Ole, Jigsaw, International Cage Match, S.W.A.T., Zombie, S.D.I., Serenade, Astarte, Expressing etc

Then he began getting messages in 2004 "Are you the Jim Cuomo who wrote ...?"
and "Are you still alive?" and then "Would you be interested in performing with your
classic game music?" Yes to all three.

He uses the Amiga (1985) the Oric (1983), the Canon X-07 (1982) and the IBM 7090 (1967!?!).
This concert at the 303 in Northcote is his first in Australia - after thousands elsewhere.
He will perform music from several of his ten albums-on sax, digihorn, zaphoon, and clarinet.
The music is from his games but also from groups he has created over the years -
Spoils of War , Mormos , Duoglide , Ejazz, and SignificantBits.

His saxophone has been featured with Marianne Faithfull, Yves Montand, (new Australian) Leo Sayerand many many more.

little-scale: always by your side (1)

2009-03-16T20:49:00.002+11:00

"A minimalist approach to Sega Master System music.

For Lauren." - little-scale

New Raptorface Release - Aeon!

2009-03-15T20:13:00.001+11:00

"This is just a short 5 track release that i've been working on recently - i hope you guys like it! let me know what you think." - Raptorface

Get it into you now!

SoundBytes Round 3! Melbourne 27th March

2009-03-15T15:47:00.007+11:00

Friday the 27th of March will see the return of the successful SoundBytes chip shows!

This is set to be something quite special as we have confirmed Jim Cuomo from U, S and A. Along
side Jim will be SoundBytes veteran 10k as well as Maddest Kings Alive, Derris-Kharlan, Astro
Zombies as well as the Slurry Beats Collective throwing down DJ sets between live acts.

There will also be an ABC film crew who will be reviewing artists and taking footage for a chiptune
segment on ABC2's popular all things gaming show "Good Game".

Peep the flyer below and see you all there!

10k playing Abercrombie Hotel - Sydney 12 March 09

2009-03-12T10:19:00.003+11:00

10k will be playing tonight at the Abercrombie Hotel!

In other news he'll also be playing SoundBytes Round 3 in Melbourne on the 27th of March...
We'll keep you posted with more details and a flyer once it's done.

In the mean time make sure you get down to the Abercrombie Hotel tonight to peep the man himself.

Beach Party 2009 - Demo Party in Melbourne

2009-03-10T16:26:00.006+11:00

A very cool party going on in Melbourne town BEACH PARTY 2009 even if you can't make it to the party everyone is invited to submit as per the Rules Page

Beachparty 2009 is a demoscene get together on the beach featuring demos and competitions for music, graphics and coding.

Everyone is invited to enter the competitions, however it should probably mentioned that the rules push the focus towards older/classic home computers and the sounds and sights that can be produced on them.

Anyone with an interest in computers/consoles new or old is welcome. We are not elite and this is open to all!

Beachparty 2009 will be held over 2 days this year.

* Sat 28th MAR, Day 1: A hang out day with bbq. Bring an entry and receive a sausage and a beer!
* Sun 29th MAR, Day 2: Competitions will be held, voting, winners and prizes.
Remote entries are allowed, send them to beachparty@disasterarea.net.

All remote entries MUST be received the day before beachparty 2009 (27/3/09). Otherwise, you'll have to be there in person on the first day - this is the best way because you'll get a snag and a beer!

Godinpants on 8bc Open Mic Podcast!

2009-03-09T22:20:00.002+11:00

Godinpants is featured in the latest 8BC Open Mic Podcat episode, put together by Silreq.

"This time "Godinpants" brings us an improvised nanoloop breakcoresque poodle swooning set, not to mention it was controlled and triggered using a bent toy guitar. We begin by debating the pluses and minuses of an ass-beard. Robot is a bit on the angry side because of a close encounter with a goat. . .err sheep actually, and we end the episode with some fake gabba, so have a listen and respect yer goat. . ."

Get it here: http://milkcrate.com.au/silreq/8bcopenmic/8bc_open_mic_Episode_2.mp3

More info: http://8bitcollective.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=10012

Australian Chip Compo released!

2009-03-05T19:45:00.005+11:00

Chipsters
The Australian Chipmusic compilation Vol II

The second volume of the Australian chip music compo has been released.

This time around there were a total of 16 tracks that made it onto the list.

It can be downloaded here

Big Thanks to Astro Zombies and little-scale who were both instrumental in the organisation and execution of this release.

So get on it and enjoy!

Original back cover image by the Flickr user tico24 available here:
http://www.ﬂickr.com/photos/tico24/16066110/in/photostream
Original back cover image available under a creative commons
attribution 2.0 generic license:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

The artists reserve all rights in regards to any audio content published in this release.

Dot.AY live on 4ZZZ radio

2009-03-04T13:21:00.002+11:00

This Sunday 8/03/09, I will be performing a live set as well as playing a bunch of my favourite Chip Music on Brisbane's finest independent Radio Station 4ZZZ, 102.1 FM.

It will be from 8-10pm (AEST) on the Forcefed Fistfuls show. Previous guests have included

Buraka Som Sistema (Enchufada)
The Bug, and Warrior Queen (Ninja Tune)
Joker (Hyperdub)
Peanut Butter Wolf (Stones Throw Records CEO)
and more....

so I am really pumped to play on a show mostly dedicated to Dubstep, Grime and BASS...but for this week the whole show is going Chip and Game inspired, I will take requests to play any of my songs or any Chip song you think should be played via the comments.

You will be able to Download the show after it has happened from the above link