Chiptune is a style of electronic music made using the programmable sound generator (PSG) sound chips or synthesizers in vintage arcade machines, computers and video game consoles. The term is commonly used to refer to tracker format music using extremely basic and small samples that an old computer or console could produce, as well as music that combines PSG sounds with modern musical styles. It has been described as "an interpretation of many genres" since any existing song can be arranged in a chiptune style defined more by choice of instrument and timbre than specific style elements.
Autechre are an English electronic music duo consisting of Rob Brown and Sean Booth, both from Rochdale, Greater Manchester. Formed in 1987, they are among the best known acts signed to UK electronic label Warp Records, through which all of Autechre's full-length albums have been released beginning with their 1993 debut Incunabula. They gained initial recognition when they were featured on Warp's 1992 compilation Artificial Intelligence.
Video game music (VGM) is the soundtrack that accompanies video games. Early video game music was once limited to sounds of early sound chips, such as programmable sound generators (PSG) or FM synthesis chips. These limitations have led to the style of music known as chiptune, which became the sound of the first video games.
Monaural sound or monophonic sound is sound intended to be heard as if it were emanating from one position. This contrasts with stereophonic sound or stereo, which uses two separate audio channels to reproduce sound from two microphones on the right and left side, which is reproduced with two separate loudspeakers to give a sense of the direction of sound sources. In mono, only one loudspeaker is necessary, but, when played through multiple loudspeakers or headphones, identical signals are fed to each speaker, resulting in the perception of one-channel sound "imaging" in one sonic space between the speakers. Monaural recordings, like stereo ones, typically use multiple microphones fed into multiple channels on a recording console, but each channel is "panned" to the center. In the final stage, the various center-panned signal paths are usually mixed down to two identical tracks, which, because they are identical, are perceived upon playback as representing a single unified signal at a single place in the soundstage. In some cases, multitrack sources are mixed to a one-track tape, thus becoming one signal. In the mastering stage, particularly in the days of mono records, the one- or two-track mono master tape was then transferred to a one-track lathe used to produce a master disc intended to be used in the pressing of a monophonic record. Today, however, monaural recordings are usually mastered to be played on stereo and multi-track formats, yet retain their center-panned mono soundstage characteristics.
Music Has the Right to Children is the debut studio album by Scottish electronic music duo Boards of Canada, released on 20 April 1998 in the United Kingdom by Warp and Skam Records and in the United States by Matador. The album was produced at Hexagon Sun, the duo's personal recording studio in Pentland Hills, and continued their distinctive style of electronica, featuring vintage synthesisers, degraded analogue production, found sounds and samples, and hip hop-inspired rhythms that had been featured on their first two EPs Twoism (1995) and Hi Scores (1996).
Timothy John Follin is an English video game music composer, cinematographer, visual effects artist and game developer, who has written tracks for a variety of titles and home gaming systems, including the ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Amiga, Atari ST, Nintendo Entertainment System, Mega Drive, Super NES, Game Boy, Dreamcast, and PlayStation.
Múm is an Icelandic indietronica band whose music is characterized by soft vocals, electronic glitch beats and effects, and a variety of traditional and unconventional instruments.
Twoism is the debut EP by Scottish electronic duo Boards of Canada, self-financed and released through their own Music70 record label in August 1995. Initially limited to 100 copies and released privately, the EP was reissued by Warp Records on November 25, 2002.
Skam Records is an independent electronic music record label based in Manchester, England, founded by Andy Maddocks around 1990. Skam also runs a smaller sub-label called 33.
The Electric Soft Parade are an English psychedelic pop band from Brighton, comprising brothers Alex and Thomas White, the creative core of the band, as well as a number of other musicians with whom they record and perform live, most recently including Andrew Mitchell and Damo Waters, as well as long-standing bass/keyboard player, Matthew Twaites.
Sound Team was an American band based in Austin, Texas, that formed in 2000 around principal songwriters Bill Baird and Matt Oliver. For most of their recording career, Sound Team consisted of Bill Baird, Matt Oliver, Jordan Johns, Sam Sanford (guitar), Michael Baird and Gabe Pearlman (organ). Sanford and Michael Baird left the group in 2006. The band continued to record and tour briefly with a new line-up, but finally disbanded in late 2007.
Spirit They're Gone, Spirit They've Vanished is the first collaborative studio album by Avey Tare and Panda Bear, released in August 2000. It was later retroactively classified as the debut album by Portner and Lennox's group Animal Collective. The album was first released as a CD on the band's own Animal label with only 2000 copies produced.
8 Bit Weapon is an American chiptune music band formed in Ventura County, California, by Seth and Michelle Sternberger. It was originally created by Seth Sternberger around 1998. Its instruments consists primarily of old 8-bit and 16-bit computers such as the VIC-20, Commodore 64, Commodore 128, Amiga 500, and the Apple II, as well as game consoles such as the Nintendo Entertainment System, Game Boy, Atari 2600, and an Intellivision synthesizer.
Fat Day was a Boston-based noisecore band. Formed in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1992, they released a handful of LPs and several EPs on their own 100% Breakfast! label as well as many others.
Wevie Stonder are a British group formed in Brighton in 1993. They have released 6 studio albums on Skam, Sonig and Cack Records.
Noisia were a Dutch electronic music trio consisting of members Nik Roos, Martijn van Sonderen and Thijs de Vlieger from Groningen, Netherlands. They produced a wide variety of music including drum and bass, dubstep, breakbeat and house, releasing music under labels including Skrillex's Owsla, deadmau5's mau5trap and Jay-Z's Roc Nation. Noisia previously combined with the group Foreign Beggars to form the supergroup side project I Am Legion. They released their collaborative self-titled album on 2 September 2013. Noisia also have production credits under the pseudonym Nightwatch, such as for their work with Alexis Jordan, Hadouken!, Wiley and Wretch 32. They produced Hadouken!'s album For the Masses that charted at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart.
The Most is a Beat band from Umeå, Sweden. Original members are Frans Perris, Magnus Kollberg, Mats Westin (drums) and Marcus Holmberg. Vinyl EPs and albums being released on their own label TMR and on the label Ny Våg Records and later on CopaseDisques. Drawing inspiration from old Blues, Jazz, Bluegrass, 1950s-1960s Soul, 1950s-1960s R&B but also from bands like The Zombies, The Kinks, and The Who, their music has been described as re-inventing 1960s music.
Adem K is an Australian independent rock musician and songwriter. As a founding member of the group Turnstyle, Kerimofski is credited with introducing Casio and toy keyboard integration to the Australian contemporary rock music landscape in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
BluRum13, born James Sobers, is an American underground rapper, emcee, actor and producer who also uses the pseudonym Killa Platypus. Originally from New York City, he spent most of his formative years in Washington, D.C., and is the great nephew of knighted cricketer Sir Garfield Sobers.
The music of the 2004 anime series Samurai Champloo, created by the studio Manglobe, was produced by a team of four composers drawn from the hip hop musical scene. They were Shinji "Tsutchie" Tsuchida of Shakkazombie, Fat Jon, Nujabes and Force of Nature. The musical direction was chosen by series creator and director Shinichirō Watanabe as part of his planned blending of hip hop culture with the anime's setting in the Edo period, additionally incorporating contributions from guest artists. The opening theme "Battlecry" was performed and co-written by Shing02, while the various ending themes were performed by Minmi, Kazami, and Azuma Riki. The final episode's ending theme was "San Francisco", licensed from the rapper band Midicronica.
