1 Reply by bitpusher2600

(21 replies, posted in General Discussion)

e.s.c. wrote:

def not 8bc. we allow nonsense/off-topic threads here and there. 8bc eventually became a situation where things were rarely on-topic

I accept blame for that one for sure.
I just wish to say one thing before I go: chip music is a part of the electronic music world, and electronic music often goes hand in hand with the car audio and basshead world. I drew a line between the (now previous) site tag and that train of thought, so I presumed
1: there were possibly some fellow bass junkies right here at cmo
2: it would become an interesting topic of conversation that could go who knows where. I am equally as guilty as many others for going off topic at 8bc. I never had such a negative view as many do here, but to each their own.

Still, truth be I'm an honest to goodness reject with forum talk and so on. 35 years old, been arounund the internet since it's home adoption, and still lack the skills to conversate or make sense online. Maybe I misunderstand topics too easily, and I have no clue how to be liked or respected, so I conclude I cannot. Between that and the fact nobody here likes my brand of music much anyway, I overall feel like I just waste people's time and space here. I appreciate the admins and people who built and maintain sites like this one because chip music to me will always be something audacious and special. As for me though, I will discontinue posting here and just be an occasional lurker. Sorry of course to those who otherwise think I'm a goof. It wasn't intent to annoy, ever.

Take care all.

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2 Reply by bitpusher2600

(21 replies, posted in General Discussion)

Haha, no you misunderstand smile
I thought you controlled the site tag, which are usually always a good laugh.
Just chiming in on the subject matter. Perhaps I should've put a smiley on the end of the topic title. Nothing specific directed at you, it was supposed to be a enthusiastic acknowledgment to the controller of the site tag.

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3 Topic by bitpusher2600

(21 replies, posted in General Discussion)

Sorry, but as a lifelong basshead (and bit a nerd about it to boot), I couldn't resist chiming in; I've been a Rockford Fosgate man ever since my first car.

It's fair to note that when it comes to a booming system there are (in my opinion) two types of people:
1. The person who just wants 'loud'. This person will stick any number of speakers and amps in a vehicle with no serious concern over brands, properly matching components in terms of wattage and resistance, etc. "Yo dog, my sh** is loud!"

2. The proper bass nerd. People who care greatly about their sound set up, who care about brand and care about making sure all of their components are matched correctly (again, rms wattage, resistance, resonant frequency response, sound stage, correct air space, understands the assorted technical differences between sealed and ported enclosures, etc).

There really was some beautiful and amazing music that came from the bass scene that I would bet alot of people who otherwise thought "big speakers" in a vehicle were a dumb, combined along with the people I mentioned in number 1 above would definitely have missed including people who otherwise loved electronic music. I would reference the most talented musicians such as Bass 305, Techmaster PEB, and all kinds of music from Neil Case (known to the world as either Beat Dominator or Bass Mekanik) as examples.

I'll stop talking now. This whole subject is just a big passion of mine. I wasn't even 10 years old and already had tons of these instrumental electronic tapes in my bedroom, just great music. Cheers.

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4 Topic by bitpusher2600

(5 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

https://www.engadget.com/2017/01/06/ret … retro-boy/

Why do I have the feelings that
1: someone will prosound mod this thing
2: that it will sound more like an emulator than real Gameboy hardware.

Guess it would make backlighting alot easier though.

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5 Reply by bitpusher2600

(17 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

If I may;
You are in for a learning curve, and in some respects Nanoloop is probably alot easier to learn and start making sounds with right out of the gate than LSDJ. While I much prefer LSDJ you can't sell Nanoloop short by any means and there are so many awesome chippers who use it for their tunes. If you are serious enough about making Gameboy based tunes there's no reason why you couldn't eventually acquire both (and I'm sure you've noticed there are people who have said they use both.)

I only know two things that are absolute fact:
1. If making Gameboy music is only a passing fad or interest, you likely won't get far. Trying it out may be necessary before deciding you want to really invest yourself into it but that degree of effort is needed to get real comfortable with either software and make some full on tunes.

2. The money needed to get both LSDJ and Nanoloop (for the sake of trying out or working with either) really isn't that bad considering what it would cost to buy an actual synth, drum machine, sampler or etc and not to mention a fun approach using such vintage hardware for all those purposes rather than being another bloke performing everything on a laptop.

With regards to LSDJ, these tutorial vids were extremely important for me (and I have posted them in order.

Zef: LSDJ A-Z command walkthru
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HhgsET_EKlk

Zef: Advanced LSDJ command guide:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RyvPK8ZD50o

Zef: Glitch Walkthru
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OGwSr7KFcPM

*Edit*
You might also want the old Waveboy's patchbook for making some nifty tables in LSDJ. These parameters will show you how to make some of those classic chiptune instruments you often hear. Download it and keep it somewhere, because once you learn your way around LSDJ a bit, this info will make alot more sense.

https://1drv.ms/b/s!AicTJgAVzu9hgaV1w9UoKZhkpL0_Ew

Finally, the wav channel in LSDJ can work with external sound samples, did you know about that? You can incorporate say kick drum or snare samples from other machines or sound sample libraries into your tunes to expand the range of what you can produce from just a single Gameboy. I have uploaded a collection of my favorites from all around the web and uploaded this collection to my own website here:

http://bitpusher2600.net/files/KitLib.zip

Use the LSDJ rom patcher included on Johan's server where you downloaded LSDJ and you can install any of these kits in the wav channel sound banks.

--
If any of this sounds confusing, be patient. This will all be, I hope, useful to you at some point.

Cheers.

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6 Reply by bitpusher2600

(17 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

I would chime in that what can be made with those different softwares is indeed very different in sound. My main preference (despite the fact I suck at getting the best out of it) is LSDJ on the DMG. I have also produced an album a couple years ago using an iPhone and Nanoloop, it's really a good tool in that platform. I bought Nanoloop 1 & 2 at the same time a couple years ago but haven't done much with them because I don't like them on the Gameboy, and believe me they work and sound completely different when using it on Gameboys rather than a mobile device.

To start with, LSDJ is far more precise and perhaps "authentic" (a debatable point) than Nanoloop in terms of how you are working with the Gameboy's hardware. The power of sound design, the real depth of it all is top notch with LSDJ, especially thanks to its capability to apply tables. All in all though, strictly speaking on the original Gameboy, I don't know that I've ever heard anything that couldn't be equally produced from LSDJ vs Nanoloop, so in that particular case it may really come down to preference of working environment. I may in fact be wrong but I've only got my own exposure to go on. Perhaps some our Nanoloop loving peeps could expound on this.

Now, the GBA is a different beast if you look at Nanoloop 2. That hardware is capable of producing sounds that the original Gameboy cannot and Nanoloop 2 is designed to take advantage of all that. Check out music from a bloke named "Cheapshot", he has a fantastic range of GBA based stuff that can easily demonstrate the diffrence of the GBA from the DMG.

For the record, using LSDJ on a GBA makes no difference, it will only produce the sounds that it was designed for, which is the original Gameboy.

Nanoloop on iOS/Android has about zero to do with Gameboy chip music. It can easily use wav sample libraries and manipulate those samples in all kinds of ways. It's synthesis is not really related to the Gameboy sound design in any way. That said, it is capable of some chippy sounding stuff, or the opposite and it can do a far more conventional approach to electronic music of any style.

There is of course the new Nanoloop Mono for the DMG that I have not been exposed to save for a couple of Youtube vids, and that shiz seems to be an entirely new beast, makes some pretty gorgeous sounds.

So to answer your main question, they are indeed different tools but they don't all necessarily produce the same output, they've all got their advantages and disadvantages when compared to one another. In terms of style of musIc, that's all on you. It really comes down to understanding the actual sounds/instruments you can create in these different environments and choosing what you like best. I don't think it would be fair to say (just as an example) that LSDJ is supreme for creating one style of music over Nanoloop, or saying the GBA is supreme to the DMG because it can produce different sounds. So again, once you understand what different things you can get from these softwares, you can produce any style you want to.

Good luck mate.

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7 Reply by bitpusher2600

(2 replies, posted in Releases)

Awesome Yerz! It's great to see you rocking live.

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8 Reply by bitpusher2600

(37 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

Well, I could not be happier with this!
It worked flawlessly for me. Upon running the app I flashed my kitted out LSDJ to one bank, and Pokemon Gold onto the second. Roms and sav's zipped back and forth and just fine. Now I can remove Virtualbox and Windows from my system. Thank you so much rbino.

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9 Reply by bitpusher2600

(37 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

I appreciate guys like you very much.
I went thru alot of hassle setting up Virtualbox on my Mac with an unregistered version of Windows 10 solely for the sake of working with my EMS carts, and I can't even remember how much screwing around it took before I got things to work. As soon as opportune allows I will test this on Mac (mine is running El Capitan) and let you know how it goes.

Regardless, thank you and thank you again for trying to do this.

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10 Reply by bitpusher2600

(11 replies, posted in General Discussion)

I would just throw my two cents on Deflemask. Computer based tracker that does a small multitude of different consoles/chipsets and does not need you to provide any sample libraries or not. I tinker with it from time to time but I fear I may be hypocritical in suggesting it as a supreme tracker since I myself do prefer the hardware side of chip music, as in using actual hardware, so my only use for my computer in that regard is recording the output from my mixing console. At any rate, good luck my man! smile

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11 Reply by bitpusher2600

(8 replies, posted in General Discussion)

Hello to you DayDreamer smile
Always nice to see a new face (so to speak.)

marcb0t probably has the best suggestion ever. You didn't specify if there was a specific console or system you want to produce music with, and unlike DAWs, trackers offer such specific and fine control over actual composition. As such, Deflemask will allow you to create music with the sounds of a small handful of different systems if you aren't totally sure exactly which you intend to work with. Different systems, very different sounds abilities of course so it definitely makes a good place to start.

I hope you stick with it. Between an individual's love for the stuff they grew up with, and the sheer audacity of using hardware for things it was really not designed for (like being a sort of music studio), chiptune is genuinely awesome.

If you run into the occasional chip snob or prick that feels the need to tell you what you are doing "wrong" with your music, don't fall into the trap of actually listening to their bs. You'd be somewhat hard pressed to find any two chiptuners who sound exactly alike smile

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12 Reply by bitpusher2600

(4 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

It has been quite a while ago but if I remember it was about three weeks or so. He had a heck of a load schedule on his hands and still took on my DMG. That was my first, it was one I had sent in myself for a backlight and RCA prosound mod. The second DMG I ordered sometime later, that took about a month and it was one that he was selling rather than me finding another and sending it in, and I had the same mods done.

If these sound like long times to wait, I would seriously suggest that if you are serious about your music making, excercise patience, because in return you will get quality work that will certainly last you for a good while.

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13 Reply by bitpusher2600

(43 replies, posted in General Discussion)

My own story is slightly lame but simple enough. I used to dabble a little with music I would post to the old mp3.com, and was a live turntable DJ at a couple of local clubs. I was not a turntablist or scratch DJ, but I had alot of money in vinyl and tended to blend drum n bass, hiphop and electro. I had given it up after a couple years but still tinkered. One day, I randomly found a video on YouTube of Bit Shifter performing some techno mix on a pair of Gameboys (I never found what he was performing, it wasn't a tune from one of his releases and it didn't have that video game-like sound.) Anyway, I was totally blown away if not confused at how this was happening. Once I found out the phrase "chiptune", that lead me to 8-bitcollective and 8bitPeoples. I found out there was a way to make music with the very first console I fell in love with as a kid, the Atari 2600 and started tinkering. The rest is history. I moved to the Gameboy and so far, that's where I remain. Good times smile Chiptune and the sheer audacity of it all is among the coolest things I've ever known. Taking something and using it for something it was never remotely intended for. Just awesome.

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14 Reply by bitpusher2600

(4 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

Thursdaycustoms.com

This fellow has RCA prosounded and installed backlights in 2 DMGs for me, can't say enough good things about his work.

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15 Reply by bitpusher2600

(8 replies, posted in Releases)

Something I really want to say to you:
I had picked up a copy of both Nanoloop 1 and 2 some time ago but barely touched them because LSDJ...I just feel alot more comfortable with and it makes sense to me. That said, I recently decided to start tinkering with the Gameboy Nanoloop, so I hit up YouTube and watched your tutorial vids. Basically, that Garage beat you did on this release, "Spank", my eyes got wide the moment you flipped to that on your video and I actually said to myself outloud "Holy cow this dude is dope as F***!" That seriously makes me want to try it all again. So thank you for that.

I'm sorry I didn't know about you sooner but your style of chiptune is awesome. I need to acquire this release on CD smile

So there it is. Thank you for the sick beats and the tutorial vids. I still honestly don't care for using Nanoloop but I just have to try again. The Advance SP is definitely a capable little machine smile See ya.

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16 Reply by bitpusher2600

(37 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

If the battery fails in an EMS your work is gone so backing up regularly is wise, but I trust the EMS because I've been working with them for a while, the flashing software is easy to use, and they have not once crashed or failed on me. I've never had my hands on a derp cart but if it's truly drag n drop for roms and saves, it is then spending more money for more convenience no? I'm happy with the EMS carts myself anyway smile

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