xwd is here at college

ilovecopyleft:

DL 5th channel by Yerzmyey

Chipmusic is fun. Not only is there the ability to force new sounds out of hardware by using it in ways it was never intended (hello SID ADSR bug) but there’s also using the new sounds in a way that doesn’t sound like noise. Today’s track by Yerzmyey shows a fun feature of the ZX Spectrum’s AY-3-8910 series sound chip. (I think he found out it’s really a YM, but it’s the same thing, really.) Each channel on the AY has both a square wave generator and a noise generator, and desynchronizing the two (and then tuning them, very carefully) allows you to play two different sounds at the same time with one channel of the chip. The part at the beginning? With the bass and lead playing? That’s one channel.

Aside from the mind-bogglingly awesomeness of that (and it’s tuned to sound nice and catchy, too!), this track is a lot of fun. Yerzmyey’s songs have a tendency to be very powerful, lots of loud bass, harsh sounds, and crunchy drums. While a lot of that comes from the AY itself, mostly it’s Yerz being awesome. There’s no option in any tracker for “catchy melody” (I’ve checked), that’s all him. The AY is particularly suited for fun melodies, the Teleidofusion track from a few weeks ago uses the same chip. It might be that everyone involved here is a member of the premier AY chiptune band, the AY Riders. They rock the AY like no others.

If you need more ZX Spectrum in your life, the AY Riders are a good place to start. They have a couple of albums, each one with tracks from several riders. Yerzmyey also has an 8bitpeoples release, FREAKuencies, and this particular track comes from his release on DWD Records last year, Interphase. Both of them are nice and booming. There’s also plenty of goodies on his 8bitcollective page, too, with some two sounds on one channel action occurring in a few tracks. If you want to get in his head a little he was recently interviewed by TCTD, where you can find out how little he actually likes his own music.

Just a warning, high-pitched square waves played loudly probably aren’t so good for your eardrums. Wear headphones or resist the urge to crank the volume all the way up to avoid permanent damage. Yeah, I know you’re smart enough not to do that, but I want you to be able to hear the next post. :)

I think I’m allowed to call him Yerz, right? I saw people doing that on the TCTD blog, so I figured that’s a fun nickname for him. Plus I’m not entirely sure how to pronounce it anyway, what with me being American and all.