this. The more i keep trying to stop writing chip and write more "real" music, the more cool shit i find in lsdj, especially the wav channel.

Nanoloop (e.s.c. Nordloef).

Not to derail off the topic again, but what I about Nanoloop is it acts purely built on the fact that you are making music on such a limited interface. And Nanoloop has the same idea as other 16 step sequencers which shouldn't make it that hard to make something interesting. I call it music but maybe I'm a bit weird.

What I've been doing to learn LSDJ is to just read the manual, repeatly. I'm stumbling but was how I got the sounds on Nanoloop.

it all came to me in a dream.

and then i realized i fuckin sucked and starting reading the manual. READ THE MANUAL. also, protip: in lsdj, if you are hovering over a command, hit the A button again to get a scrolling message on the top of the screen that tells you what the fuck the command does.

from what I understand a softsynth on the nes would probably sound 8 million times better. Jsr??

yes, it's our secret shame.

Like you keep telling yourselves "its not what I have its what I do with it!" over and over like some kind of insane mantra?

imagine how us sample tracker guys feel.

Oh Heos, we know you famitrackers only look down on us LSDJ users because you are jealous of our meaty WAV channel.

This

I started two months ago, tried the demo on an emulator and mucked around trying to figure out just how to save. Got a usb cart and I carry it every where. Always finding new things to do, I love it. Found the manual and I've been plugged in non stop. In the car, in lobbies, walking in traffic, and had more than one fight with my significant other about how much time I spend playing game boy. Happy to join the fray.

^True indeed!

Theres also a difference between learned and mastered

I figured this is what you meant, and it got some good responses so I'm glad...so let me answer your original question now!

It kinda just clicked for me when I started really focusing on creating instruments in the program instead of throwing notes together. IAYD was a huge help in that regard: he really supported me and taught me a few things about the program as far as instruments go. From there, everything just kept moving forward and I tried more and more new things! And I continue to do so.

Oh don't you worry.  You're definitely not.

I first started this past September with Famitracker.  I had no experience with trackers other than some random custom guitar hero song software.  I did Famitracker for about a day until a friend told me about LSDJ.  I was like "Fuck it...I'll just invest completely in LSDJ since I think its super rad." So I donated some cash to get LSDJ and spent a day making a shitty cover of the Transylvania level music from Duck Tales.  Every note in the melody/bass was stopped with a "k" and the thing as a whole basically had no dynamics to speak of.  After that I started writing my own stuff.  Since I have a long history with my guitar and writing music the only problem was figuring out commands and getting certain sounds.  I basically used a new command heavily in each song I made to get strong grip on each one.  I then bought a DMG off of ebay, made it look pretty (I know it has nothing to do with learning LSDJ, but it was a fun project and got me more pumped), realized it was tough to do some things I wanted to do since it has a tough time going above 160bpm and all that, so I grabbed my girlfriends gameboy color (cant find my old one D:) and that works swimmingly.  I now have most of the program down really well with the exception of grooves.

I also agree completely with DaPantz (and I'm sure I'm not nearly the only one).  Many times I'll make a wicked combination of sounds almost completely by accident...and because of the way probability/luck works in general, there's no way one would run out of these wonderful "accidents".

My next step is getting my hands on another cart and GBC to sync it with my current setup.  I really enjoy mixing channels together to get crazy unique sounds that surprise me sometimes when they sound like something the gameboy couldn't even do.

Plus having access to two WAV channels would be godly.

That's a very good point! I agree. I think what I meant when I started the thread was 'how did you get your head around the software in the beginning'. When I first started using LSDJ, having no experience whatsoever with trackers or any software based music for that matter, I was confused as all hell. Just interested to hear how others conquered the initial WTF phase. Unless I was the only one who experienced this?