Spinning 8-bit NES cover

[Travis]

Ever wonder what it would be like if A Sceptic's Universe wasn't a cd, but...an NES game?!

Sounds pretty crazy...but thanks to chiptune artist extraordinaire Matt "Norrin Radd" Creamer, we at least know what Spinning would sound like -

http://8bitcollective.com/music/Norrin_Radd/Spinning+(NES+Spiral+Architect+cover)/

 

[Asgeir Mickelson]

WOW! Awesome!

- Asgeir

 

[Norrin_Radd]

Thanks for posting this here Travis. I just realised I had an extremely old account on this forum from back in 2002!

Asgeir, this album has struck a decade long chord with me, and has completely altered my song writing forever since. It is an absolute honour to even have you hear this track, let alone approve of it.

It's hard to believe, but I have even more respect for the album after having worked on this. Even the bars that are suppose repeat and be the same are different! That is exactly what I can never get enough of. And that's pretty much what I try and do in all of the music I write. No two bars exatly the same.

 

[Asgeir Mickelson]

We love the cover song! Very well done! Must have been a real pain in the ass to program it...

I remember back when we wrote the album that we always did something different with riffs that was repeated. The nature of tech metal I guess...

 

[Norrin_Radd]

I wouldn't call it a pain, but it was definitely an, experience haha. I basically had to put a loop around each bar from the song, and press play infront of every note over and over until I could hum the note and find it on my guitar, then I would program it in. The bass was absolutely the hardest thing to transcribe though. That Lars is a MANIAC. Took about 20 hours all together over a period of a week.

Over the last 3 years I've been writting an entire album of technical NES music that is very inspired by Spiral Architect, bands such as Necrophagist and some of the more technical 70's prog bands. So it was almost familiar territory. Almost. But I think Spinning is pretty much the most consistantly technical song ever written. I can't believe it was 10 years ago too (that it was recorded anyway).

I would love for you guys to check out the album when I release it! It is very much a homage to ASU.

 

[thinkingplague]

I'd love to check that album myself, too

Great cover! I wasn't really alive in the 8-bit era but those sounds are cool. Again, I probably don't have the right to be nostalgic about it, but it's nice that those sounds are still alive. Some artists and bands even incorporate them into their songs (Genghis Tron, Squarepusher I think..).

So I really dig this cover. Great work, good luck with that CD, keep us posted please

(damn, with even noticing I began singing "inner sense lost in a stream.." this could work as a karaoke version as well!)

Oh, another thing. By "some of the more technical 70's prog bands", what do you mean? that sounds quite interesting.

 

[Norrin_Radd]

Hahaha, I have been hearing ghost vocals to this track in my head as well haha. We'll just have to bring this to karaoke bars and rock some faces

As for the album, I have about 5 tracks off it on my myspace page. Though it makes me feel dirty to post a link to a myspace, any myspace, you might get a kick out of hearing what this album will sound like.

http://www.myspace.com/norrinraddnesmetal

In particular, this song is TECHNICAL: http://8bitcollective.com/music/Norrin_Radd/Four+Lights+(Revised+2009)/

As for technical 70's prog bands, You can almost do no wrong. Almost every 70's prog album had at least a few 7/8 sections, without exception. But some of the more memorable and technical albums I can think of are:

Locanda Delle Fate - 1977 - Forse Le Lucciole Non Si Amano
Cortex - Troupeau Bleu (1975)
Cos - 1976 Viva Boma
Univers Zero - Ceux Du Dehors
Cherry Five - Cherry Five (Later known as the band Goblin)
Goblin - Roller
Arti E Mestieri - Tilt (1974)
UK - Danger Money
UK - UK
Area - Crac
Lotus - Lotus (1974)
Starcastle - (1976) - Starcastle
Starcastle - (1977) - Fountains Of Light
Necromandus - Orexis of Death (1972)
BANCO DEL MUTUO SOCCORSO

The list goes on and on. But definitely, if you enjoy technical music, 70's prog as a wide open source of virtually untapped inspiration. I mean, other than Spiral Architect, and a handful of other bands around, 70's prog is the next most technical music ever crafted.

 

[Asgeir Mickelson]

Checked your Myspace page. Great songs! It reminds me lot about Decode - the project I had with Erik Tiwaz (Tyr). He wrote 4-5 songs and I got them as midi files and my Mac used kind of the same sounds as in your music. You should hook up with him and make a new tech metal masterpiece!

 

[Norrin_Radd]

You should hook up with him and make a new tech metal masterpiece!

I'm sorry, but that's Spiral Architect's job I can't wait to hear the new stuff you guys have been working on.

I am now EXTREMELY curious to hear this Decode project. That sounds about as mind boggling as I can imagine. Was it ever released?!

Also, I can't believe asgeir checked out my myspace

 

[Travis]

You should hook up with him and make a new tech metal masterpiece!

Or hook up with me someday... Though, I know it's already been talked about, but I'm sure that custom 8-string of Tyr's probably sounds pretty good.

But as Norrin said, us tech-metal fans on this hemisphere are still pretty curious about what kind of new stuff SA has working. Cynic took about 15 years to write a new album, Atheist is doing the same right now...a few more years, you guys will have to follow suit, too!

 

[Jack Klompus]

What did you use to program these, if you don't mind me asking? I have a program that automatically converts a midi file into 8 bit sounds, but the sound samples aren't as good as the ones in this cover.

 

[Norrin_Radd]

I used a tracking program called ModPlug. It is not midi, it is essentially a sampler. Though it can export midi if needed.

Before bouncing it down to MP3, I made a wav of every one of the 5 channels from this song, then attempted to mix them properly, by notching some of the like frequencies to try and clear up the muddiness.

I am sure that some of the problem with the way the midi to 8bit conversion stuff suffers from is that there is a lot of subtle volume techniques you have to use to create an authentic NES sound. In order to create the sound of reverb, when you only have one channel to work with, is to keep a mental note of the notes you want to be accented, and add much lower volume version of the note in any of the empty spaces you can between notes. Unless the conversion program has an algorithm to do this, it will probably sound more like a steady stream of sound, with little in the way of dynamics.