Of course.. who* cares unless they find out?
* interscope records.
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Virgins-ia
Thanks for the new words of support, everyone.
What NIN stuff are you working on, xero?
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Brooklyn, NY
0.02:
Brendan, I agree with pixls' initial comment that in terms of sound design, there are definitely better choices you could have made when approaching a project of this nature.
A really huge thing that distinguishes NIN's sound is those grungy, abrasive/droney textures derived from guitar distortion. The NES is a really versatile platform, but I honestly think that eschewing the DPCM, this would have sounded so much better on a C64 or gameboy or something else that lets you draw crunchy, deep waveforms.
Without that consideration the presentation sounds really skeletal and sort of akin to those "8bit" covers that pop up on BoingBoing for a day and then fade away forever.
Full disclosure: I'm really not a fan of the whole "8bit _____, because I can" thing. I think that if anyone is looking to tribute/cover existing music, it should be built from the ground up with _every_ part of the original work firmly in mind. Transposing everything by ear into a tracker is still impressive in terms of the artist's devotion, but I think it's important to not be satisfied with replicating only the notation or only instrumentation -- it's got to be the whole shebang in order to maintain interest beyond viral internet novelty.
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Virgins-ia
Thanks for your feedback, Josh. I appreciate it and the explanation of how you feel about covers helps me understand your point of view. However, you tell me not to use the NES.... and this is Gameboy, actually. DPCM is not being used at all. I'm using the gameboy waveform from Tetris for the bass. I can see the mixup (even though gameboy is in the title), I guess I use it mostly like an NES because I don't often write on the Gameboy. I haven't implemented any panning yet.
While the TL;DR factor might be in play, I do explain in the project FAQ that I'm actually using eight different chips to do this album. The video also displays all of them. This will be the only Gameboy track. SID/C64 and POKEY/Atari800 will get slightly preferential treatment with two tracks each, and then there will be MSX+SCC, OPLL, SN76489, NES, and VRC6.
I have to say, though, I don't really consider The Only Time to be a very grungy, abrasive, or gritty track. Though with some of the others, I wholly agree. What about the original track gives you an abrasive impression?
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Brooklyn, NY
InversePhase wrote:
.... and this is Gameboy, actually.
Oh damn, my apologies. I actually listened to this a couple days ago and forgot how the text of your OP read, and I confess I hadn't noticed the part about SID, MSX, etc in your project description. My bad.
InversePhase wrote:
I guess I use it mostly like an NES because I don't often write on the Gameboy. I haven't implemented any panning yet.
Yeah, that's probably my main contention. The game boy (most notably the wav channel) can pump out a lot of really loud and dynamic textures. I feel a lot of the voices would sound a lot better once you play around with effects and panning on the sub-notation level. Definitely, definitely make use of tables to shape the timbre of those plain-jane pulse waves.
InversePhase wrote:
I have to say, though, I don't really consider The Only Time to be a very grungy, abrasive, or gritty track.
I meant in terms of the overall unifying style of the album, the sound of Trent's vocals, and what I mentioned above.
I try to avoid using straight waves whenever possible and I think that's an especially important tactic when doing covers. There's not many "real" instruments that sound like game boy's 50% duty cycle square wave, after all 
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▐▐▌▌▐▌▌█▐ ▐▐▌▌▐▌▌█▐ ▐▐▌▌▐▌▌█▐
InversePhase wrote:
Thanks for the new words of support, everyone.
What NIN stuff are you working on, xero?
it's all over the place.
mostly pretty hate + downward
but there's some broken in there too.
and as much as i dont want too, i promised
her we'd do @least 1 song from the fragile too.
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Connecticut USA
This is rad.
Sometimes I ponder starting a kick starter just to fund my cigarette habit. Kick Starter - give misfit cancer by 40.
But seriously dude, good luck with the NIN album. Sounds awesome.
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infradead wrote:
I would just like to add that IAYD is no trent reznor
laffo
herr_prof wrote:
Not true. You cant release covers of songs for free or otherwise without permission.
What if the song in question was under something like a Creative Commons Non-commercial?
Also, semi-related rights question: I have a song that I made an arrangement of that I really would like to open my album with, but I'm crediting the original composer. It's much like how glomag did "Red Pixel Dust (Morricone)." Hopefully it won't be some kind of problem, but I'm not looking to make any cash off it and it's a new arrangement so we'll see how that goes.
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Virgins-ia
Hey xero, if you don't want to do Fragile, that's inevitably on my list, just not for this album. I like Fragile.
an0va wrote:
herr_prof wrote:Not true. You cant release covers of songs for free or otherwise without permission.
What if the song in question was under something like a Creative Commons Non-commercial?
That depends on whether the [CC] license they chose allows derivative works or not. And if you intend to make any money, you'd have to work something out with the original artist where they offer the work to you under a different license.
an0va wrote:
Also, semi-related rights question: I have a song that I made an arrangement of that I really would like to open my album with, but I'm crediting the original composer. It's much like how glomag did "Red Pixel Dust (Morricone)." Hopefully it won't be some kind of problem, but I'm not looking to make any cash off it and it's a new arrangement so we'll see how that goes.
I think you left out the question....
PS for Josh. You make great music, but get to know your duty cycles. That's 25%. =]
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InversePhase wrote:
That depends on whether the [CC] license they chose allows derivative works or not. And if you intend to make any money, you'd have to work something out with the original artist where they offer the work to you under a different license.
http://musiciancoaching.com/music-busin … e-it-away/
There is a license fee (royalty) associated with licensing and using the composition. This is called a statutory mechanical royalty rate. This Federal rate is currently set at $.091 for songs 5 minutes or less in timing, and payable per song for each unit distributed. For recordings given away as promotional products, it is not uncommon to try and negotiate a reduced rate (e.g., 75% of the Statutory rate), or even gratis (free), however the copyright owner is not required to grant it.
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InversePhase wrote:
I think you left out the question....
Gah. "Do you think this would be a problem?"
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Virgins-ia
an0va wrote:
Gah. "Do you think this would be a problem?"
Now read the post above yours.
My advice, from some of the good experiences I've had with contacting musicians, is this:
Why don't you just email/tweet/contact the artist somehow and ask?
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InversePhase wrote:
an0va wrote:Gah. "Do you think this would be a problem?"
Now read the post above yours.
Already did, and it helped, but you still seemed to need a question. 
Thanks!
Last edited by an0va (Jun 9, 2011 12:46 am)