organic art

See also kaleidoscoop parts. But it should have its own post.

Philips Music Module programs: Drum System

I told you in earlier post, I got this program from a MSX-er from Arkel who worked at the local TV-station of my town Gorinchem with a MSX NMS8280. He got it with some other German MSX software. Yes German, Philops Drum System wss never sold in the Netherlands, which was a real shame. A lot of Music Module owners would buy it without hestite.

Mmmm more the same post, different little story.

Sim Tunes

Videos were made but lot of stuff already on yt, so only own creations should be uploaded to yt.

TnC Internet Adventures: Red Zora (Magix & Ultra Red)

For some posts about Kaleidoscope software programs I had bought in the past, I was browsing in my special CD case full of Multi-media CD-/DVD-Roms.

Before I even found those Kaleidoscope CD-Roms, I re-discovered an enhanced Audio-CD
labeled Ultra Red Red Zora published by Magix. That was very interesting, because it was not only a maxi CD-single (4 tracks), but had also a multimedia part by Magix with demo's and the PlayR remix-program to create your own version of Red Zora.

I never liked the song Red Zora, but the Berlin Jones Remix (track 3) was not too bad. 
The single version reminds me a little too much of the remixes of disco-classics Daddy Cool and Ma Baker of Boney M.

Anyway, I tried to get the PlayR to work on my Windows 10 PC, but Windows 10 didn't let me install it. Too old. When I tried again with a VMware version of Windows XP Professional it installed, but cause my soundcard doesnt support the DirectSound of DirectX6 (yes that is old) the program crashed and never started up again after that incident.

What I saw was to turntables where you could add en remove samples of Red Zora in realtime, so while the music played you can play with the samples. Nice Idea, I saw it earlier in DJ Station, maybe from the same programmer.

There was also a possibility to create your own video-clip, with some visuals and short vids of a moving creapy version of a Lara Croft (Tomb Raider) clone.
I wondered if Magix wanted to create a "Red Zora" horror-movie, glad I could not find it at YT. And I am not planning to create a video myself with these vids, too scary.

I was wondering if I should find all tracks on YT and to my suprise "Red Zora" was not an original song, made with Magix Music Maker ( or any other Magix clone), but a remix of the theme from the TV-series "Die rote Zora und ihre Bande ". The TV-serie was made for children in 1979, but the story was much older, made in 1941 by Kurt Held. After the TV-serie they made a movie called "Die rote Zora" and they used the remix of Ultra Red as the new theme for the movie.Sorry, most info is in Germany language.

From the original music from the TV-serie I found an instrumental version (basic stuff for the remix of Ultra Red), a French version "Zora la rousse" and a German version "Die rote Zota". I liked the French version, cause I dont like any kids choirs...

I tried to find better remixes than in this maxi CD-single, but if you dont like the original,
you will find noty much, so I like only this remix of Tom Borijn, cause he used almost nothing of the original Zora song...

PSG Tracker videos

I was searching for Eschers on in my collection MSX disks and MCCM CD-Roms, 

when I found a disk called PSGTRCKR. As a regular user of FAC Soundtracker, Moonblaster and PRO Tracker I was of course very curious what a PSG Tracker would look like and what the possibilies were. I have not many music-editors for PSG that are more than a 3-tones organ.

PSG Tracker started with a nice logo in SCREEN 5, but after loading, the editor showed only 40 columns!!! Why create a MSX -2 logo and use only 40 columns of a MSX-1? 

But more trouble to come. There was only an incomplete manual inside the editor, 

no separate manual as txtfile and only 1 demo song . A converted Impact song. 

Well, the layout look a bit like Moonblaster and just like Moonblaster is PSG Tracker capable to convert a FAC Soundtracker music-files. Not the drumtrack (OH NO !!) and only 3 channels of the regular 6. I didnt test the conversion with every FAC Soundtracker version, but the editor had some nice features ( remember last input, easy delete), worked very fast and then I discovered the SELECT button I could change some more settings. 

I did expertments with PSG drums, which was not so easy to create. If you have only 3 channels sound, the PSG drums will collide with one of them.  

After I puzzled how the editor worked I converted my first song of Ernst Schuller ofUnicorn Corporation, "Shizo-Frequency". Its more a loop than a song, but I liked it so much 

I converted the original FM-Basic listing into a FAC Soundtracker musicfile and now into PSG Tracker. Choosing the right 3 channels was not so difficult, the PSG drums took a lot of time, cause I did not know how to copy part of tracks and I tried to make the song less boring by experimenting with different drum-riffs. 

When I finishing it I liked the result so much I recorded it and send it to YouTube. 

After convertIng my first FAC Soundtracker song I wanted to do more, 1 song of all the great MSX groups that used FAC Soundtracker, 1x Impact, 1x Unicorn Corporation, 1x FAC. 

-Sorry if I missed other MSX groups -

So I was looking for a nice song of the FAC, some kind of ballad. I found "Basic Principles" but editing the drumtrack in almost 80 tracks was no fun. Also the song swapped channels, so after converting 3 channels some part had only a bassline in PSG Tracker. 

I edited the song, so every channel was in use during the whole song and I noticed that the editor had no feature to create different PSG voices, every voice sounded the same if the same octave was used. Pity, I was going to like the program. 

I finished the song put it to YouTube. 

Then what? I had put so many hours in Basic Principles I had no strength left to convert another one. Maybe a song of TwinSoft ? There was another important feature missing in PSG Tracker, a MSX Basic replayer. Now you cannot use PSG Tracker songs in your own Basic programs,  like other music editors can.
I put a question in the MSX.org forum, but if seemed the original maker lost all sources 

and documentation. I don't think I get a proper answer from anyone.

If you want to try it, here is the zip with 2 disks, 1 program disk and 1 music disk. 

You have to switch disks, cause PSG TRACKER only works with 1 drive.

MEDIAFIRE PCLOUD  ( beware dont save on your programdisk it's copyprotected).

Auf Wiedersehen Monty (TnC Gamemusic Collection)

In my opinion is the title music of the MSX-1 game "Auf Wiedersehen Monty ",
one of the best PSG songs I ever heard. Great bassline, steady ritmes and a melody with some of the highest notes I ever heard the in-game music.  Still the original music was made for Commodore 64 and the MSX version was not more than a remake of the ZX Spectrum conversion of the original C64 game.

While I was searching on YouTube I found the Auf Wiedersehen Monty game was released for at least 8 different microcomputers including, for example, Amiga 500 and Atari ST ! With great disappointment, I must say the best title music was made for the original game on C64. Still, the MSX/ZX Spectrum version is very enjoyable although it is just the standard 3 PSG voices, melody, bass and drums.
The composers of the C64 are Ron Hubbard and Ben Anglish, however, the MSX version gave al the music credits to Ben. Both are famous in the C64 scene as SID music format composers,  the non-official standard music-format tor chiptunes.

Okay now back to the MSX part of this post. Auf Wiedersehen Monty was just 1 of the few European game-music titles that were remade on an MSX-computer itself (of course also some Konami, XAK, Aleste and other Japenese stuff). I found 2 different MSX remakes, 1 from FAC and 1 from Airborne, lucky for me FRANK DEMOS FOR YOU AND ME had already put the whole musicdisks (Synth Power 2 and Fading Away ) on YouTube. So I extracted the remakes from these videos. Then I discovered both MSX composers were lazy and didn't remake the whole song.The FAC compo stops (out of tracks) and the Airborne starts the loop after the 2nd bridge. Also, both have no intro. Despite these facts, I uploaded both versions to show the C64 world that MSX-2 can be much more than just another ZX Spectrum with a better video chip.

I search for the best remixes and this my editor picks:

- Dimitris Kouts 
(interesting choice of instruments, more spooky than the original)

- On Guitar
(it's Solknight remix with Ruvino playing live electric guitar, just the melodies)
- Die Gronkh Version, La La
(this is how the Amiga version should sound, no SID emulation needed)
- Metalmix
 ( by RBT, who that might be, but it's sometime metal, sometimes more rock)

- Oxygener(Ron Hubbard)  

 (early dnb from the master himself, great for halloween)

- makke root down
( rapping, movie samples, hiphop-beats, really an outstanding version)
- Rene-Berti's 
( first it started scary, then it goes to swinging big band music, amazing )
- MIDIbox SID
(it sounds like the C64 SID version, but with lots of effects it sounds fresh again)

Jeroen Tel suprised me with a live mix at Assembly 2012 including only remixes of famous computergames, like...Auf Wiedersehen Monty, featuring Ben Anglish on freestyle flute!

And I made me think back to a message I send to some MSX-BBS for help organizing The MSX GOES HOUSE project for some MSX House parties (like this at Assembly 2012).
I will tell you more about this in another post soon.

DnBuser & TnC: Strong & Delayed (the real story)

I thought it was time to reveal the real story about DnBuser & TnC: "Strong & Delayed" tracks. If you read my post about DJ Station and see the video on YouTube you already know the real story.

So I am sorry making up a story about a DJ Collective called "DJ Station" and a real DJ DnBuser, who was only a virtual DJ created by TnC.

Now I can only tell you how I created these "Strong and Delayed" track, I just let the DJ (DnBuser) start the mix and when I liked the intro, I started to drag new samples to the numbers in the circle.

I never used the Vocal samples, cause I just hated the femal voice they used. Fun to know while creating a track, is when you drag (for example) BD to number 1 it sounds different when you drag it to number 8...

I wanted to create more tracks in different music styles, but after the "Strong & Delayed" series, all my attempts were never good enough to publish in any way...
Maybe some day...