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Static Line 29
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_\\__T_A_T_I_C___L_I_N_E______________________________________ January, 2000
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\\//__ Monthly Scene E-Zine ________________________________ 175 Subscribers
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Table Of Contents
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Opening:
Message From the Editor
Letters From Our Readers
Features:
Tryhuk's Top Ten Trax of 2000
Coplan's Top Nine Trax of 2000
Intros in 2000
Tracking Tool Index -- The Trackers
Columns:
Music:
The Listener -- Music from Hunz, Warder and Distance
Demo:
Screen Lit Vertigo -- In Cyber, Love creation MAX & Slavery
General:
Editorial -- What are we in for?
Scene Sense -- Perhaps it is Time for a Change
Link List -- Get Somewhere in the Scene (updated)
Closing:
Credits
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Message From the Editor
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As we do every January, we're doing a year-end review of the previous
year. This year, it's bigger and better than ever before. We got lots
of features this month, a "best of" accounts for the year 2000, and the
beginning of my quest for the best tracking tools. As a result of all
the work we put into this issue, we are running very lean on the regular
columns this month. I don't think you'll be at a loss, however, because
you'll have twice as many tunes and demos to catch up on. That's a lot
of stuff to download and check out.
Next month, all our regular columns will return. This month, you got
our second largest issue of all time...all 1475 lines of it.
Enjoy!
--Coplan
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Letters From Our Readers
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-=- Letter from Mister X -=-
Hello Coplan,
Great work as always with the latest version of Static Line. I am
writing to let you know that I have been archiving all of the Static
Line issues, and they are available in the Resource area of MODPlug
Central. They are all searchable and indexed (along with the other
resources such as Trax Weekly, Demonews, and various articles) so that
your readers can find an issue easily if they know what they are looking
for.
I would also like to request, if possible, a link from the Static
Line Link List. Whichever section you feel is most appropriate would be
fine, but I think that MODPlug Central fits best into the "portal"
section, since the site offers so much information and other services to
its visitors.
Thanks for your consideration, and keep up the great work with Static
Line!
--Mister X
MODPlug Central
http://www.modplug.com/modplug
MPC Resources
http://www.castlex.com/mods
-=> Reply from Coplan:
As always, it's good to hear from our readers. It's very nice indeed
that we have fans archiving our magazine. I have been to MPC Resources,
and if you do a search for Static Line -- sure enough, you find all our
issues. I have also taken the liberty to add the MPC Resources link
under the Portals section of our link list, as requested.
--Coplan
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Coplan's Top Nine Trax of 2000
By: Coplan
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It's inevitable, a year ends, and you gotta review the entire year.
I've done it every year since I've been writing for a scene magazine,
and this isn't an exception. It's been a bad year for me, review wise.
I have had a lot happen to me this year, and I missed a lot of months.
On top of that, I lost most of my mods a few weeks ago due to a major
crash. So, the songs in this column are a result of what I remembered.
Rather, what I could remember to download. Unfortunately, I was only
able to come up with the top nine tunes of 2000. That's fine, 'cause
between myself and Tryhuk, you still got 18 songs to look up.
Call me a cheater, because I have some songs from the Audiophonik CD.
But I feel that there are a few songs worth mentioning from there. If you don't have the CD, I highly recommend
grabbing it from http://www.imphobia.org. With exception of the
Audiophonik tracks, all other songs will be available at the following
address:
ftp.scenespot.org/static_line/suppliment/2k_countdown/
Well, here goes, in no particular order:
"The Approach" by Nightbeat (TheApproach.zip)
A traditional celtic/scottish style song, one that is remarkably well
done. This song became my introduction to Nightbeat, a very good
tracker. I have since downloaded many of his tunes, but this is my
favorite so far. If you have any interest in this type of music, you'll
definately want to grab it. For everyone else, it's worth a download
regardless. It's got a very funky feel to it, but it's still true to
form.
"Hymn" by Wayfinder and Phace (az-01.zip)
Back when I reviewed this song in issue #21, I made the mistake of
excluding Phace's name from the credits. I feel extremely bad for that
mistake, as this is one of my favorite trance tunes of all time, let
alone the year 2000. This is one song I have a lot of admiration for,
because Wayfinder and Phace composed the main riffs outside of Impulse
Tracker, and then inserted them into Impulse Tracker as samples of their
own. The song has a very smooth and complete feel for that reason. If
you're into trance, there is a lot to be found on the Azure website:
http://www.azure-music.com
"Emery" by El Blanco (emery.zip)
Once again, El Blanco has to be one of my favorite trackers. He does
a wide range of styles, so there's something out there for everyone.
He's on my list again this year (he had three songs last year). Emery
is what one would consider "oldskool style". I admire this song for
it's complex riffs and base and leads. Okay, so the song is very
complex. To kick it off, it's got some lyrics from Speak and Spell
(remember that orange little toy from E.T.?). You gotta grab this song
and crank it up load. This is a loud listening song.
"Spectral Vision" by Rez (Audiophonik CD -- no download)
I would say that this song is somewhat of a cross between a chip tune
and trance. I wish I had the sample data from this song, because the
samples sound pretty damn amazing. Yes, I said chips, but they don't
sound quite like traditional chips. They sound deeper than that -- much
more dynamic. The tune is also very dynamic, ever changing, every
pulling you into the song. You get immersed in the song, and you don't
want to leave. I love this tune.
"Autoguest" by Simak Wordmacro (si_auto.zip)
Robert Miles (Commercial artist, most know for his song "Children")
fans will like this tune. In fact, I think I heard Simak say one day
that Mr. Miles was his inspiration. Those who aren't familiar with
Robert Miles, let me tell you what you're in for: A house tune with
lots of percussion and piano. The piano is a nice touch to this song.
It might seem repetative at times, but it carries a melody that gets
carried through the synth-strings and so on. Definately a song you want
to dance to.
"Third Millenium" by Lluvia (Audiophonik CD -- no download)
I'll be honest, I have never heard anything else by Lluvia -- she's
pretty oldskool -- and I'm sorry that I have yet to download any of her
music. I don't know what style you would call this song, but it's got a
jungle or DnB feel to it. The way she layers each sample over top of
each other is quite amazing. I'm very impressed with the fact that it
doesn't sound like a pile of riffs. It is a complete song, and another
reason to grab the Audiophonik CD.
"Fantasy" by Tawan (az-03.zip)
Another good trance tune from the arms of Azure. Tawan isn't an
official member of Azure, but it seems as though he should be: This
song is incredible. The percussion in this song is nothing to write
home about, but the melodic backup and leads are all you need to enjoy
this song. Definately worth a download.
"Song & Dance" by El Blanco (sngdnc.zip)
The second El Blanco tune this year. This song also has somewhat of
an oldskool feel, but it is much more contemporary than emery. My
favorite part of this song has got to be the percussion -- especially
the kettle drum. Of course, I have a slight biased to kettle drums
anyhow. This is one of those songs that just sort of builds. Every
other pattern, or so, a new instrument is introduced, and the song gets
more and more complex as you go on. There are some rather interesting
transitions too, like when the piano enters the song. The only fault I
find with the song is that it ends just when it's getting good, a few
patterns after the piano enters. But, it is a very good ending, one
that would Make David Bowie proud (he likes to end songs this way as
well).
"Purple Coulded Planetoid" by PsiTron (npk-pclp.zip)
Orchestral techno, that's the best way I can describe this tune.
It's a nice little mix between the two styles, and I really like the way
it came out. PsiTron really does like his chips though, and you get a
lot of chips in this song. This is not a chip tune though. It is a
somewhat fast paced song with lots of things happening, at least in the
first part. The second part has a bit of a jazz influence, and adds a
nice little edge to the song.
So, what are you waiting for? Go download some tunes that you missed in
the year 2000. You got 12 months before I hit you with another list.
--Coplan
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Tryhuk's Top Ten Trax of 2000
By: Tryhuk
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There's no real order of the top ten, because it's too hard to choose
the best ten tracks and it's impossible to sort them and tell which one
is better. I rather tried to make a wide selection of styles and I tried
to choose tracks I really believe that are worth downloading, even on
slow modems that some of us still use. So here it goes:
Title: Ubik
Author: Alpha conspiracy
Comment: Interesting electronic track influenced by garage group sound.
I like how the track sounds, it's quite unique in the scene.
Detailed review in Static line #21.
Title: Last train
Author: Smash
Comment: Mix of jazz an triphop with extremely good work with mood.
Detailed review in Demojournal #82. Released as tdr#150.
Title: Come visit my life
Author: Stereoman
Comment: lovely ambient structures, repetitive melodies with lovely
trumpets, great drumlines and awesome atmosphere. With
this track esem turned back to his older music. Tokyo164
release.
Title: No love out there
Author: Prymer
Comment: Lovely atmospheric triphop with nice guitars. Detailed review in
Demojournal #74. TDR#147 release.
Title: Bulentoi
Author: Lime
Comment: Hypnotic mixture of minimalistic electronic and jazz/funk.
Chords that stuck in your head. Reviewed in Static Line 24.
Released as Milk #84.
Title: Room for one
Author: twilton
Comment: Again a well made electronic track, full of little small details
that make it sound complete. I also like tat it sounds like
having ideas from more people. Noise release.
Title: Autumn in the budapest (giants steps musicdisk)
Author: carlos
Comment: Without question is carlos one of the best scene musicians
and his newest musicdisk was a prove. Autumn in the budapest
is a remix of streets of budapest, his older track. It's amazing
how has the track changed. Reviewed in SL21, j'ecoute release #6.
Title: Lifetime
Author: El mobo & plug-in
Comment: Great guitars in lovely song. You can hear there that they know
what they're doing - it's not like many other track that contain
minutes of repeated or boring music to get a bigger length.
Reviewed in sl26. LTP mp3 music competition entry.
Title: no fucking fishing for compliments (fishbone mix)
Author: falcon
Comment: minimalistic and gentle like a first love. Great track.
tokyo dawn records release #100 (repertoire2)
Title: Sarah's song
Author: Hunz
Comment: progressive electronica meets ambient music and pop,
underdrawn by great vocals. I always liked his music.
Guest release for hellven.
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Intros in 2000
By: Gekko
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When the new year comes it is typical to think things over, so why
not be typical. In this intro review column I do not only plan to write
about the latest and best releases. I would also like to review
'oldies', great works from years ago which might not be known today, and
works of beginners, too. I think that these are relevant to the intro
column because intros used to be more important on the scene than they
are today and "newborn sceners" tend to start their career with intros
instead of demos. Comments and ideas about this column are welcome.
Email me also if you have tips for reviews.
As the new year is here it is also time to have a quick look at what
has been there in the previous one. There were generally less intros
than in the years before. The quality was average but there were a small
number of outstanding ones.
Some general trends are visible about intros in 2000. In the question
of platform, DOS eventually disappeared, almost every piece is made for
Windows, and even a few ones for Linux. Usage of 3d acceleration
appeared and rapidly became common; this went on about a year or two
after the same happened with demos but here the process was much faster.
The trend to use complex operating systems such as Windows brings that
size optimizing (to make the program smaller) became less important in
programming. By now, Assembly language is very rarely used, demo coders
move on to C, C++ or Java. Basically no more size optimizing
competitions (eg. 256-byte intro coding) were held in 2000. Very few
parties had 4k intro competitions, this genre is very close to
disappear. This process also means that making intros, that is,
squeezing a demo into a given size limitation, is becoming more and more
pointless.
Despite all these factors, there were some very good intros in 2000.
This was the year that demoscene programmers discovered the
possibilities of using a complex OS such as Windows. This means easy
access to sound and video hardware, including 3d acceleration, usage
built-in fonts to display texts, and so on. These do lead to smaller
programs, that is, more can be put into an intro. Apart from this it is
always true that computers become faster and faster. One can create more
impressing effects on PCs nowadays than what was possible on those
computers that were common a few years before.
Only the technical aspects were covered so far, but it is more
important what we can see and hear. The major trend was minimalism: only
a few colors are used, if 3d objects are shown, they are drawn with flat
shading (they appear flat and unrounded). The point in minimalism is
that a few colors can fit each other better than many, so that the
result might be more pleasing to the eye. Besides, minimalism is healthy
for intros: minimalist graphics and effects are simpler, so they take up
fewer bytes... In this style tunes of IDM genre (Intelligent Dance
Music) were the most common. IDM in music means something like
minimalism in graphics - they fit each other. Unfortunately minimalist
intros were often just a bunch of boring effects thrown together, eg.
spheres and cubes flying; without any meaning or originality. Even
though there were a few very good minimalist intros, too. The groups
creating intros in this style are Threestate, Fuzzion, Replay, Unik,
Fresh and Array. Realtime raytracing intros (3d scenes with true shadows
and reflections) also became widespread. Unfortunately it often means
just spheres jumping up and down. By now some intros and demos showed
that realtime raytracing can even look good. It was back in 1997 that
TBL created their intros 'Jizz' and 'Stash'; colorful intros with
psychedelic trance music. These were very influential on the scene. Many
people started to copy their style instead of going on their own way.
These Stash clones were just faint shadows of the originals, both
technically and in style. This trend did exist even in 2000.
I made a top 5 of 64k intros released in 2000. I tried not to be
partial, but this is just a subjective list of mine. If you have not
seen intros of 2000, watching this five can give you an overview of what
was there. These are not the typical but the best ones, so for example
there is no Stash-wannabe among them. These intros can be downloaded
from scene.org, just find the directory of the party and the
competition. To make your life easier:
ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/parties/2000/
Heaven Seven by Exceed; #1 at Mekka 2000
Original and spectacular one with great design and graphics. The
code is also impressive, it has an accurate and fast raytracer. The tune
is fine, but the bass is quite shocking on huge speakers... Wonderful
scenes: female figure running in light, a small temple, flight above a
sea, fractal object made up of little spheres, and so on. You can
discover new details every time you watch it.
Lost Vegas by Threestate; #3 at Ambience 2000
A great intro, if you can take their egoism as a joke. The music is a
slow and noisy tune of IDM style. The intro is made up of many parts
which are loosely connected by the fine minimalist design. Each has a
title, eg. "mass media" or "effect of the year". Small human figures are
crowded up in infinite rows, and they are jumping up and down. A 3d
statistics chart proves that 3state is the best demogroup. A tree made
up of TV screens grows in the middle of a valley.
FR08 by Farbrausch; #1 at The Party 2000
Farbrausch is another name of Elitegroup, the group which made
Kasparov, the winner of the demo competition at The Party 1999. This
intro is something like the 64 kilobytes version of Kasparov. It is a
very impressive 3d scene player - and that is it. It requires DirectX 8
and the party version is not really stable.
Different Noise by Aardbei; #1 at Dreamhack 2000
Short but interesting intro with a noisy grey design. There are
flying meduzas, a starfield, tunnel made up of curly wires, an abstract
terrain with a lake and hills and several other effects which words fail
to describe... <grin> The music is a noisy track which fits the effects
perfectly.
TAC 2 by Tazadum; #1 at Trax 2000
This intro can not be put into any cathegory such as minimalism. The
design is fine-tuned and consistent from the beginning till the end. It
contains extreme amount of effects: tunnel made up of little spots,
fractal trees, raytracer, 3d morph, flat shaded objects, and so on. The
visuals are synchronised well to the music, which is a calm tune. Not a
really original intro but fun to watch.
--Gekko
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Tracking Tool Index
The Trackers
By: Coplan
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-=- Introduction -=-
This project started more like an experiment. Being a long time
member of the scene, I have seen many changes. I have nothing against
change. But, I don't always have the need to change myself. That need,
however, came out the other day. I realized that I didn't quite have
all the tools that I needed in order to succesfully make the type of
music I wanted to make. So, I decided to hop on over the Maz Sound Tools
(http://www.maz_sound.com) and grab some software and utilities. I
grabbed a lot, and evaluated a lot. To save you from repeating this
task, I decided to share my findings with all of you. Every once in a
while over the next few months (barring some real life situation that
prevents me from doing so), I plan to review a different set of tools
that might be beneficial to tracking. This month, I think I'll start
easy: The Trackers
-=- Tracking Classic Style -=-
No doubt about it, there are still two tracking programs that hold
the standard in the scene: Impulse Tracker and Fast Tracker II. They
are the trend setters, and (as far as I'm concerned) the point where
extended features stopped becoming a necessity and started becomming
ear-candy. IT's implementation New Note Actions (NNA) was a big one.
Being able to continue a note while starting a new one in the same
channel was quite impressive, and made tracking lives much easier. Look
at the old skool trackers -- some still take up 6 channels for their
harps and trumpets, even though they don't have to with NNAs. Fast
Tracker II brought the new interface to us -- which was the answer to
some prayers, but the "back-off" sign for others. Sure, being able to
play "nibbles" while playing your tunes is neat, but some people just
prefer the Scream Tracker interface. So, the break down:
Impulse Tracker
Creator: Jeffrey Lim (AKA: Pulse)
Interface: DOS (Can shell from Win9x)
Sound Cards: Most major brands, or anything SB16 compatible. You'd be
surprised how many still work in IT. It even works on PC speaker,
but don't expect good results.
Mind you, I might have a slight biased, but IT is still a classic.
The key commands might take some getting used to, but there is always
help right there with the tap of the F1 key. The help is also context
sensative, which means that it'll change depending on what part of the
program you are useing. You'll also never find a more complete user
manual, as Jeffrey (and his helpers) have done a wonderful job
documenting every tiny little feature of the program. I admire the time
that was put into the documentation of this program.
The most notable feature of Impulse Tracker is it's abilities with
instruments. The innovative technology was the New Note Actions (NNAs).
NNAs allowed you to carry an instrument through the beginning of
another. The theory is that the program will allow the instrument's
sound to be carried to another channel. This is very handy for many
instruments, as you can create a better transition between notes. The
problem is that you need to know how to use the NNAs well, or you can
seriously bog down your computer (imagine 256 virtual channels - the
program maximum - playing at once, then trying to add a few more.
Another nice feature about IT is that it supports a lot of formats.
At the time of its surface, Scream Tracker 3 was still running rampant.
Since IT was based on ST3, it was only natural that you could save into
the S3M format. That did, however, pose the same limitations that the
S3M format had -- so IT became a standard. Impulse Tracker, can load
several formats, including the MOD, 669, MTM, S3M, XM and of course IT.
IT also supports many sample formats; most notable are PAT (Patch
samples for the Gravis Ultrasound line of cards) and KRZ (Kurzweil
synthesizer patches), among many others.
I have heard some people complain about the 64 channel (256 virtual)
limit. It shouldn't bother most people, but it might possibly affect
some of the fast paced electronic styles out there, useing all 64
channels and NNAs flying all over the place. It could get hairy. Then,
of course, there is the natural limitation of being a DOS program. Even
I will admit that the days of DOS are numbered, and it isn't getting any
easier to configure DOS programs through windows. The interface, as
told by some, might be a bit archaic too. I disagree here, as I believe
in simplicity -- but I can see the point. After all, I refuse to use a
mouse if I don't have to.
Fast Tracker II
Creator: Triton Productions (Vouge & Mr. H)
Interface: DOS
Sound Cards: In theory, any SB16 compatible sound card, plus some
other standards, work fine in it. However, I have had some
problems.
Fast Tracker II (FT2) is an innovator of the interface. No other
tracking program that I know of allows you to play nibbles while you
listen to tunes. Seriously though, it has full mouse support, and lots
of things to click on. It has a nice online help menu as well, which is
a good thing as no other documentation comes with the tracker. The
manual is, unfortunately, not written well enough for someone who's
never used the program, or any tracker for that matter. The benefit of
Fast Tracker is truly the interface. It has a lot of bells and wistles
that might not be necessary, but all-in-all, it is much more user
friendly for the windows generation.
The major drawback about FT2 is that it seems to have a glitch with
my sound card. I use an Sound Blaster Live, and it seems to crash if I
try to play sound through it. In theory, this shouldn't be a problem,
as I have the environment variable set properly and my card emulates the
SB16 standard (Well, I might add). Hell, even Scream Tracker still runs
on this sound card. If you can get it to work, though, it is a fairly
decent tracking program, and one worth checking into.
-=- New Trax, Same Culture -=-
There is a whole array of new tracking programs out there. For the
most part, they all try to be just like the other guy -- nothing majorly
innovative and interface changes. It is my hope that one day, someone
will offer something new. But, they are definately worth a look at as
alternatives to the DOS based ancestors. As I am not very familiar with
most of these programs, I admit I might be missing a lot of details.
But I did spend at least a week with each program.
Modplug Tracker
Creator: Olivier Lapicque
Interface: Windows (DirectX support)
Sound cards: Any Windows 9x compatible.
You gotta give the man a lot of credit for versatility. Of all the
trackers I played with, this is one of the most customizable. If you're
an oldskool tracker, you might be able to get used to this program
pretty easily, as it supports keyboard settings from the two most
popular: Fast Tracker and Impulse Tracker. That made my
experimentation very easy.
The interface is pretty typical of a windows interface: menus and/or
buttons. One oversight, however, is that you can't view multiple panels
at once. I, for one, would love to be able to view the instrument panel
and the track panel at the same time. I can't do this in IT either, but
at least you can see that a given instrument is playing. In a windows
environment, this type of thing should be relatively easy, but I'm not a
programmer (keep that in mind). That brings me to another peeve -- no
mass list of samples/instruments. I like to see my entire list of
samples at once -- I have yet to figure out a way to do that.
There are some very nice features in Modplug Tracker. The one that I
love the most is the "cleanup" tool. This set of tools will remove
unused patterns, clean out unused sample data (even crop out unused
portions of sample) and re-order your patterns so that the list reads in
a linear manner. Aside from the obvious use for song cleanup before
release, these tools might make cooperative songs fairly easy --
especially the pattern organization tool. The chord function is pretty
tight as well. Granted, one could track in chords with Impulse Tracker,
but it was pretty difficult to get used to. MPT takes advantage of a
windows interface, and actually gives you a tiny piano section to tool
with. This should make it easier for most people. Finally, another one
of my favorite features is having more than one song open at a time.
This has allowed me to take ideas from one song and stick them in
another. A much neaded feature. For those new to tracking, this is my
recommended tracker for you.
MadTracker
Creator: Yannick Delwiche
Interface: Windows
Sound Cards: Windows Compatible
I've never heard of this one, 'til I came to Maz. It has a lot of
potential as a tracker, as it's got quite a nice interface, and some
interesting features. It is based on the Fast Tracker II interface, it
seems, which might be a comfort to some. But there is enough different
to piss you off (no nibbles). In fact, I would've rated this as one of
the best, if it weren't for some very important issues.
MT2, the native format of Mad Tracker, is not exactly universal.
This wouldn't be a problem if you could export to a different format,
like IT or XM. While the program can read these formats, it cannot save
into these formats. Don't assume, however, that it can play a format
well if it can be read. Playback for the IT, S3M and XM formats were
less than satisfactory. Effects were poorly timed and samples weren't
playing at proper volumes. In some situations (especially with XMs),
samples weren't even played properly at all. You also don't want to
alt-tab away from this program, as it will start to skip and crackle
like an MP3 played on a 286 Mhz machine (well, not that severe, but it
does lose some of it's timing). These two problems are very big in my
opinion. Aside from that, I was able to carry out my evaluation.
Mad Tracker has two features that caught my eye. The first was
concatenation. Concatenation is a method of combining two sets of data
based on one common element. This is most often used in spread sheets
or databases, but it's nice to see it used in a program like this.
Ideally, you can take the information from one channel and join it with
that of another. Very useful for mimimizing channels (and Mad Tracker
supports NNAs, so this is a logical tool). The other cool feature that
caught my eye was the pattern effects. In each pattern, you can define
a bunch of basic effects like stereo delays, distortion, flange and so
on. It's a nice little add-on as it makes life a bit easier for the
casual tracker. My only recommendation for Mad Tracker users, however,
is to record to wav, and convert to MP3. Otherwise, the format isn't
exactly portable.
-=- Everything You Knew Doesn't Count -=-
There are a few new trackers on the scene these days. These aren't
traditional trackers. They are the new wave of modern computer based
music. They threw out all the old rules (with some exceptions), and
brought in some new. The best way to explain this series of trackers is
to consider a blend between traditional trackers, and digital synthesis
(be it software based, or hardware based). It is a definate alternative
to those who are interested in doing some good high quality electronic
styles.
Before you read on, however, please realize that a 4th generation
tracking program like this dictates a few differences. The most
notable difference is that you can't export into normal modules. The
inner workings of such programs are much more complex than that of a
traditional tracker. Exporting to a true module track is next to
impossible. Playing a song isn't like playing a standard module either.
You need to have access to the "machines" (the sound generator and
filter add-on/plugins) in order to modulate the song. Thus, playing the
tune through an external program isn't so logical either. This in mind,
realize that it is recommended that you export your song to a WAV
(usually built into the program), and convert to an MP3. That is the
best way to get your tunage out there. Many thanks to Oskari Tammelin,
creator of Buzz, for his help in understanding these concepts.
Buzz
Creator: Oskari Temmelin and Hans Andersson
Interface: Windows
Sound Cards: Windows Compatible (DirectX Support)
Buzz was the first of the 4th generation programs that I picked up.
Having very little prior experience with synthesis, I was quite
confused. For one, I had trouble figuring out how to get sound working.
Fortunately, I discovered a tutorial song that teaches you basically how
to write a song in it's song message. Once I read the tutorial, I knew
enough to at least experiment with the software. It's been about three
weeks now, and I'm finally starting to write music in it. Once you get
used to manipulating the "machines", things start to go a bit more
smoothly.
For those of you used to the oldskool tracking programs, Buzz has two
distinct differences. The first is that you generate your samples
through "machines" that you manipulate and filter with other machines in
order to achieve the sounds you want. While it might seem like a lot of
work to get a good instrument, it is also quite dynamic. Especially for
those of you into the electronic styles. With many of the machines, you
can change the sound output on the fly by special commands put into a
pattern.
The second key difference is the way you "build" your song. Each
machine has it's own channel and pattern information. If you create a
machine, you then create a pattern that you can enter your notes and
data in. Now, the big difference -- each machine also has it's own
channel in the sequencer. You may or may not actually have some
patterns playing for a machine all the time -- in fact, it's not
likely. You can define several riffs, for example, and sequence them
in a given order. You can also sequence other machine's riffs relative
to that. What you have is a very dynamic sequencing system where you
don't have much redundant data -- as you don't literally track notes
for different machiens side-by-side.
Though dynamic, this system does have one key design flaw. There is
no way to see the actual notes as they are played relative to each
other. When you look at pattern data, you can only view one machine at
a time. When you view sequence data -- you only see a list of patterns
in each channel, no note data. As I've played around with things, I've
found it pretty easy to fall out of key, or out of rhythm, as patterns
don't have to be equal length, and that alone causes problems.
Overall, however, I see Buzz having a lot of potential. The
developers have discussed a possible new version, but it isn't exactly
a priority. They have other projects on their minds. The scalability
of Buzz isn't a concern however. People can develop machines at their
leisure, and upload them to buzzmachines.com -- a depository for over
200 buzz machines (generators and filters). Just be aware that if you
plan to use Buzz, you'll most likely have to record the song into a WAV
and distribute your music in MP3 format. If you use machines that
others might not have, that poses portability problems. In the free
music scene, we don't want that.
Psycle
Creator: Juan Antonio Arguelles Rius and Mats Hjlund
Interface: Windows (Linux with Wine -- read on)
Sound Cards: Windows Compatible (DirectX Support)
Of the 4th generation trackers, I would have to say that Psycle is my
favorite. It has all the nice little tricks that Buzz has, plus some
features that allow me to better use the program. While Buzz might have
the dynamic sequencer, Psycle takes more of a traditional tracking
approach to sequencing. You have a pattern editor and an order list,
much like traditional trackers. The obvious advantage to this is that
you can see notes side-by-side just like you always have been. Though,
you run into the same problem that you always did with older tracker --
redundant note data. If you have a baseline that is going to be the
same for several patterns, you'll have to copy-and-paste it into all
the new patterns. In my opinion, it's worth it, so I can see exactly
what I'm doing.
Much like Buzz, you also have several machines to work with plus
Virtual Studio Technology (VST) support. You can choose from any of
the native machines, or you can use any number of the VST machines out
there (pretty common). While I don't see nearly as many native machines
out there, I think Psycle has the most potential.
Now, the best part for all you linux geeks out there. Ranger Rick
and I were messing with this program the other day, and he discovered
that you can actually run this under Wine in Linux without any problems
-- so long as you have working sound drivers and a current version of
Wine. This isn't a linux magazine, so I won't bother getting into
details, but it is possible. Both Ranger Rick and I were able to
successfully listen to music via Wine, and I even did some tracking in
it. Not bad.
As with every programs, there are some things I wish I had in Psycle
as well. For one, I wish I had a nice play interface that Impulse
Tracker has. There is a checkbox in the Pattern Sequencer that allows
you to follow pattern numbers in a song, and if you click on the
pattern currently playing, you can figure out what you need. But, I
like to see everything automatically scroll as it is played. I'll
admit, I even like the channel specific VU meters, which Psycle does
not have. The other disadvantage is that the quality documentation for
Psycle must be found online at http://www.pastnotecut.org/psycle/ --
the Official Psycledelic's website. The help file that comes with
Psycle is rather poor, and incomplete. If you intend to use Psycle,
you best visit that site.
All in all, I would recommend Psycle to anyone willing to spend some
time learning a new interface. It has such a great deal of potential
as a tracking program. If you like your old samples, don't worry, you
can use them with the Sampler machine. But to fully use the program to
its potential, you should learn how to use the sound generation and
filter machines as much as you can.
-=- Wrap-up -=-
Well, I think I did a big dent in all the popular trackers out there.
As a result of my experimentation, I decided that I am going to start
useing Psycle more now. For some projects, I will continue to use
Impulse Tracker. I still have the need to release things in modular
format, like for some of the orchestral game music I do. But for my
electronic styles, I will be useing Psycle and releasing in MP3 format.
It is my hope that this new trend of trackers continues on. I do not
believe that trackers have reached their maximum potential --
especially after seeing such fine examples this month. More
developments are being made all the time, and I believe that there is
still a long way to go before it stops.
--Coplan
--=--=--
--=--=------=--=------=--=----
The Listener
Music from Hunz, Warder and Distance
By: Tryhuk
----=--=------=--=------=--=--
The event of the month is without doubt a big comeback of Hunz. He
released many new songs and they're all damned good. He surprised me
again with a slight style shift to crossover of classical pop,
progressive electronica in alphaconspiracy style and impressive music of
bjork. I would recommend you all his new tracks, but because I
understand that not all people can make such a big downloads, my
personal pick would be probably "sarah's song" which is doing pretty
good in mp3.com charts.
-=- 15th of November -=-
-=- -- Warder -=-
I bet my socks that you'll be very surprised by the newest release of
Warder. During last few months he (finally) became known for his amazing
tracks in celtic style, but now he searches again for a new style to
study. And that's the reason why we can now listen to "15th of
november", a blues track with jazz elements with in scene unique sound,
comparable only with no one less than necros. It has very calm and
enjoyable sound, perfectly tuned up instruments and a structure without
a single crack. Give it a try.
Song Information:
Title: 15th of November
Author: Warder
Release date: december 2000
Length: ??
Filename (zipped/unzipped): w-15on.zip
File Size (zipped/unzipped): 1676757b
Source: http://third-eye.planet-d.net/warder/w-15on.zip
-=- technature 14.10.2000 -=-
-=- -- lackluster -=-
I guess I belong to a small comunity of people that don't think about
his every track that it is a superb piece of alternative music. But his
newest release - a 60mb record of his performance in helsinki was a
really nice present to all scene people. Entire session is very solid,
tracks are very well sequenced to slowly build a lissome atmosphere,
gently changing tempo and a way that tracks handle the melody. IMHO it's
his best release after bothersome (mother mix). I don't know what else
to say - as I said, I really enjoy the atmosphere of this performance
and it also contains most of my favourite tracks. If you have a chance,
it's definitely worth the download (although even I had to ask a friend
to make the download for me).
Track listing:
01. space
02. 11/11/99
03. 31/10/99
04. starcell u.k.
05. 20333
06. dooba
07. shk2x
08. teramut
09. rumk8
10. 07/10/99
11. haloaw
Song Information:
Title: technature 14.10.2000 / domma-2 / helsinki, finland
Author: lackluster
Release date: november 2000
Length: 58 minutes
Filename: lackluster_-_live@technature-141000.mp3
File Size: 60mb
Source: http://lackluster.stc.cx/mp3
--=--=--
--=--=------=--=------=--=----
Screen Lit Vertigo
In Cyber, Love creation MAX & Slavery
By: Seven
----=--=------=--=------=--=--
-=- In Cyber by Satori + Aural Planet (final version) -=-
Found at www.scene.org
Released at Digital Zooo (I didn't find any other demo from Digital Zooo,
nor a result file. Maybe it was the only one?)
System requirements: Nothing mentioned. Win9x, 18 MB HD, no 3D
card required.
Test Machine: PIII 900 196MB, SB-live, GeForce 2MX 32MB, Win ME
(Yes, I prepared myself for the next millennium)
The credits:
Code: Zden/Satori
Music: Raiden/Aural Planet
The Demo:
If you've seen Metamorf, Different Engine or other demos of Zden, you
know he makes "different" demos. They're not aiming to please the eyes,
but to bring you a message, or at least submerge you in their specific,
coherent atmosphere. In Cyber is no exception. The main ingredients of
the 512*384 demo are wireframe triangles without anti-aliasing, very
contrasting primary colors and morphing/growing 3D forms with gliding
textures. As you can guess from the title, the theme is cyberspace. Not
the commercial Internet with it's banners, flash anims and pretty
pictures, but a complex geometrical universe with its waves of data, a
nirvana of ones and zeros. Several objects have a distorted look, but
not as much as in Metamorf. The spiral and the weird object at the end
are fascinating. Due to the way the polys are clipped, they seem to be
constructed and deconstructed at the same time. Weird.
There's only one normal picture, a photo of a Buddha statue. Raiden
composed the soundtrack again, but it's quite different from Metamorfs:
less industrial, more idm. It starts with a kind of almost echoing sound
that stays in the background during the whole demo. It's the foundation
for a whole range of synthesized instruments, which I really can't
describe more specifically (My music vocabulary sucks, yes). But I
think it fits the theme of the demo perfectly.
Overall:
If you're not scared by this kind of experimental demos, In Cyber is
a really nice demo. Maybe some parts could have been a bit shorter, but
it's never boring. Content-wise, everything fits together nicely. My
only criticism isn't about the contents, but about the form: 18 MB is
just too much for this kind of demo. There's a 12 MB big datafile of
uncompressed textures and height maps which pkzip can reduce to 2 MB. I
know Zden's motto is "Fuck demos, let's art", but I don't think using
(for example) the free Zlib library is that much of an effort.
-=- by INF (party-version) -=-
Found at www.scene.org
1st place at The Party 10
System requirements:
win98/win2k, fast Pentium 2 (p3 or athlon recommended), 128mb ram
(256mb recommended), fast opengl accelerated 3d card (GeForce
recommended), windows compatible soundcard, and 12 MB HD
Test Machine: PIII 900 192MB, SB-live, GeForce 2MX 32MB, WinME
The credits:
code: krav, doc mental
graphics: tmk
music: quiet mode
3d: orome, voja & duncan
The Demo:
INF's newest demo follows the style of their previous demo, Yume 2000,
with a lot of pictures of pretty Japanese girls, and a new virtual idol.
She runs through a subway station and a hi-tech/low-fi city, hurrying
cause she's got to be somewhere on time. She even looks at her watch,
although she doesn't wear any :) The use of accelerated 3D improves the
realism compared to Yume 2000. Especially the fact that the whole model
is now build from a single skin helps a lot, no more limbs that have
strange intersections at the joints. Still the movements are a bit
artificial, and the face shows hardly any emotion, except maybe a frozen
expression of quiet amazement. Regarding effects, there are dynamic
shadows, a radial-blurred morphing object, and the typical accelerated
effects like the transparent whirling textures that look kind of
motion-blurred. The pictures are made by TMK, who sticks to his favorite
subject: Japanese girls with a dreamy look staring into the void. There
are a lot of hires hicolor oriental eyes, lips and faces, some
full-screen combined with dot-filters, some part of a scrolling
sequence. There's one bondage-type picture that doesn't fit with the
rest, but as mentioned in the info file the demo was made during a whole
year, and TMKs style changed a bit during that period. The music is
again an MP3 by Quiet Mode, which probably is a Japanese commercial band
because "this demo will be included as a data track on the next quiet
mode single to be released in japan". Such a cooperation between
demogroups and music groups is IMHO the only acceptable way to use
commercial music in demos. The tune is quite dnb-ish, with very little
variation and almost no melody. At the start and halfway through it, you
can hear several people talking at the same time, but I don't know
Japanese so beat me what it is about. I can't say I like this style,
it's too monotonous for my taste.
Overall:
Love Creation Max has very good pictures and 3D scenes, OK code and,
well, not-my-style-of music :) The overall atmosphere is strange though:
the fuzzy pictures of the pretty girls contrast with the sharp numbers,
lines and barcodes that are overlaid on the 3D scenes, some parts have
gray snow or a horizontal blur over them which gives an even more low-fi
feeling to the demo. INF had a lot of problems creating this demo, and
it's not what they wanted it to be (read the full story in the
love.txt), but it's sure worth checking out.
-=- Slavery by Fairlight (final version) -=-
Found at www.scene.org
1st place at Dreamhack 2K accelerated democompo
System requirements:
Windows 9X,NT2k, ME Pentium 233, 64 MB, Direct-X 7.0, 6 MB HD
(I think a group is really oldskool when they actually include a
decent info file with their production. Thank you Fairlight)
Test Machine: PIII 900 192MB, SB-live, GeForce 2MX 32MB, WinME
The credits:
Code & 3D: Pantaloon
Music: Andromeda
Graphics: Graffik
The Demo:
The first thing I noticed when watching Slavery was the contrast
between the sharp 3D and the really blocky images and 2D effects. The
images are 256*256 textures stretched full-screen, and some transparent
textures that glide over the screen had like 16*16 pixels. Is this
supposed to be a new kind of design or what? Today I watched it again,
after having installed DirectX 8 (because Fr-08, the best intro of The
Party 10 requires it). And guess what, everything was much smoother.
Apparently Fairlight uses some kind of hardware interpolation that's not
supported by DX7, so if you've the same problem, download the newest DX
at http://www.microsoft.com/directX/homeuser/downloads/default.asp .
The demo starts in an basement filled with water and pipes, the credits
are shown on wooden boards on the floor. The relaxing tune (a 4,5 MB
MP3) with ethnic instruments make you feel at ease, until it changes
with one dissonant shriek to a trash-metal song with some screamed
vocals. An picture of a head wrapped up with barbed wire is shown now
plus a fast morphing blobby object surrounded by flares. The rest of the
demo follows this pain+flashes style: a room with lightning, slogans a
la "Dig deeper in your grave", a skeleton hand and ribcage in the
background, an endless 3D raster of metal pipes... The info file states
that Slavery is a try-out of Fairlights new 3D system, and that it
consequently contains no real effects. Still, you can do lots of things
with moving 3D objects and transparent textures. The typical rotating
ball with "hairs" of lights, for example, or the Wonder/Sunflower effect
that looks like satellites casting light from their edges. There are
quite some pictures in the demo, a handdrawn Slavery logo, several body
parts with barbed wire, a naked girl,... Too bad the trick to stretch
textures to fullscreen results in visible jaggies, even with
interpolation, and the JPG artifacts don't help either. Still the
images manage to convey most of the feeling, just like the soundtrack.
Overall:
Slavery is not a top-notch production, but as said before it's just a
try-out. The fast-changing mix of effects/objects is quite enjoyable,
but the design is a bit too flashy, and IMHO those horizontal lines
that move over every screen don't add anything to the demo. I'm looking
forward to see Fairlight's first full demo with this system, to see what
they can do when they push it to its limits.
--Seven
--=--=--
--=--=------=--=------=--=----
Editorial
What are we in for?
By: Coplan
----=--=------=--=------=--=--
Finally, the true millenium is here. What can we expect as
demosceners in the upcoming year? What about the upcoming decade?
Well, I'm not Nostrodamus, but I can attempt to make predictions.
-=- DOS is out, Linux is IN -=-
When the demoscene came to PC, DOS was the basis for everything. DOS
based trackers, demos, etc. But, DOS is slowly becoming obsolete.
Microsoft doesn't support it anymore, and I don't expect that the
demoscene will either. Linux, however, has a lot of potential for
maintaining the demoscene. For one, it's open source. Open source
allows coders to fully understand the inner workings of the operating
system and its libraries. What that means is that it might be a lot
easier for coders to develop high quality demos. As for the music
scene, more and more sound cards are getting full support for Linux, and
that's a very good thing. Pretty soon, you'll start to see some very
good Linux based tracking tools -- though I have yet to see any good
ones. I don't think it will be too long, though. After all, Sound
Blaster (the industry standard) is offering linux drivers for their
popular Live series. It's just a matter of time.
-=- MP3 Mania -=-
MP3s are taking over the scene. Like it or not, it's a reality. But
that is a good thing, if you look at it the right way. It's still
music that you'll love. MP3s allow for one major advantage, one that is
very worthwhile: Scalability. If you have a 6 minute song in IT
format, it can be any size depending on the sample data. High quality
samples are a very popular thing these days, with good reason -- you get
incredible sounding samples, you get a pretty good song. It is not
unlikely for a 6 minute IT file to be more than a couple of MB in size.
The same song in MP3 format will be consistantly about 6 minutes (128
bit sample). I expect that we'll see new versions of tracking programs
that offer direct support for MP3 conversions. There might even be a
way for some music editing programs of the future to take advantage of
the faster processors out on the market, and allow you to mix MP3s like
they were records (two turn tables, and a microphone). Hell, MP3 might
end up becoming the format of yesterday, replaced by some new format.
-=- Net Radio, Net TV and the Demoscene -=-
Some people are already starting up some net radios for trackers.
It's a good idea, and a good way for tracking to become popular again
at least in a prestigious way. But the same could hold true for
videos as well. As bandwidth grows wider and wider, I imagine that one
day, we'll have a method for piping high quality videos through the
net. It's already possible, just not widely accepted -- as the
majority of the computer users still use 56k modems. Fear not, it's
coming. And it will do wonders for the scene. After all, aren't demos
quite nearly music videos anyhow?
Lord knows what we can expect in the upcoming year, and in the
uncoming decade. I think about it every day, and I wonder and I dream.
I just hope it all happens soon, I'd love to see what's coming at us.
--Coplan
--=--=--
--=--=------=--=------=--=----
Scene Sense
Perhaps it is Time for a Change
By: Psitron
----=--=------=--=------=--=--
Many of you probably are already aware of the small amount of days
left for DOS in the mainstream world. If anyone out there has Windows ME
then you already know that Microsoft was, in fact, telling the truth
about removing DOS from future Windows releases after all. Windows ME
has no true DOS support that I am aware of, anyway (as one is now unable
to make a pure-DOS bootdisk). Impulse Tracker, however, still seems to
run in a shell, but those days are soon to be short lived - at least for
the fanatics that want the newest versions of Windows.
In my opinion that, in a nifty four-letter word, sucks! But that does
not mean that trackers are S.O.L., more or less. There is, after all,
your old dusty copies of DOS sitting around or even FreeDOS if you used
your DOS disks to stabilize your wobbly table one too many times. But
this is simply a work-around to keep using an out of date tracker that
is no longer being updated and maintained anyway. Impulse Tracker is
still a very powerful and useful tracker, but how useful can it be when
one has to constantly boot from DOS to Windows all the time? Once more,
IT does not support (at least not directly) newer soundcards on the
market that many musicians are deciding to buy, either for power,
price, or both.
Of course, there is always the new line of Windows trackers in
existence. Yet my personal experience with them has been that their
interface is lacking (as I do not like using mice to track) or, in the
case of MadTracker, they are buggy beyond all comprehension, and lack
thought-out approaches to new tracker designs.
I believe this seems to be an indicator of a larger problem, one that
will progressively become more clear as the scene migrates to (cringe)
Windows. It seems that the scene needs a new direction entirely, in my
opinion. Windows has, and will continue to suck - and do not even try
to debate that one. Not even the apparent stability of ME can change my
mind. I believe that the scene has the opportunity and responsibility
of packing up and moving elsewhere. Yet as much as I hate to admit it,
Windows will likely continue to be used by many musicians, graphicians,
and coders alike but now because of power - because of ease of use
(lazy bums). But there is a whole world of possibilities sitting out in
the world and FREE, too! Linux, BeOS, FreeDOS (cuz' you can't beat good
ole' DOS), and now even Solaris are all free for the taking and very
powerful:
Linux, a free truly multi-tasking, multi-processing operating system
with many of the libraries necessary for good demos and multimedia
applications already in place for sceners to thrive in. Granted, in my
opinion, the tracker department has a long way to go. For example, I am
waiting to see a tracker that utilizes plug-in GUIs for the Textmode
tracker like myself to the mouse-based FastTracker style that many
current Linux trackers emulate. I am also very eager to see a tracker
with a new concept out there. Sorry Linux tracker developers, but a
Fast Tracker II clone does not cut it in my book, for while FT2 is
powerful and preferred by many, it lacks support for things like
resonance, more than 32 channels, sample compression, etc.
BeOS, an astounding a very new piece of art that needs just a little
TLC. While I have not had the opportunity to experience BeOS for
myself, screenshots make it look impressively like Linux, BeOS is a (now
free) true multi-tasking OS that has even more enhancements for
symmetric multi-processing. It even has a tracker! Though it is not free
unfortunately. Also BeOS seems to lack hardware-support - something that
really hurt Be, and the rest of man-kind quite extensively. If the
right circumstances exist, BeOS could easily replace Microsoft as a
gaming (and demo-developing) OS - something I have been waiting to see
since DOS-based games.
Yes, even FreeDOS, which, despite a few bumps, is still a very
powerful OS for the simple reason that it is so damn, well, simple. With
only a little overhead it is true that DOS will crash and die very well.
But because of this lack of overhead, DOS has the ability to 'get the
hell out of a program's way by allowing direct access to hardware.
Sure, there are few libraries for DOS, which means that someone is going
to have to write some either for his or her own personal use, or for the
betterment of the scene.
Some of you are probably still hearing talk of DemOS. Well, to my
knowledge, DemOS has been dead for quite some time. But is the concept
too hard to understand? Imagine having an OS with the idea in mind to
provide groups with a method of utilizing the computer to it's absolute
potential without having to worry about all the crap that Windows,
among other Oses, throw into the mix to slow things down. I would
personally like to see this idea revived, as it follows to the letter
the original ideas of the scene. I keep reiterating because I am still
unconvinced that many of today's demos are holding true to this idea.
In a nutshell, I believe an integral part to making the scene shine
like it used to 'back in the day' is for the scene to simply find a
better alternative to the crap that we all have to put up with. And
that is being slave to the commercialized world of Microsoft and others
alike. To ever go a step further, I think the gaming industry would have
very much to gain by packing up shop and moving to an OS like BeOS or
Linux (which is already being attempted). Hell, even OS/2 - anything
that shows Microsoft that we are not a bunch of lazy idiot minions that
Bill Gates will use to control the world.
Someone once said to me that it was 'progress, not perfection.' On
that note, I, as a tracker, group-member, and scener am not in search
for change overnight. I am, however, in search of something that could
be categorized as change in the right direction. I believe the scene is
stagnant with the stench of out of date trackers and bad libraries that
cause many demos to be mere 'bleh's on the Wow-O-Meter. Potential, after
all does not amount to much of anything without actions to turn that
potential into something that hopefully makes me immediately thing of
sex.
I hope your Holidays were very wonderful, and I hope you had a
wonderful New Years as well. I do hope, however, that you stayed the
hell away from the colored beer. ;) On a final note, for places to go
to find more information in some of the Oses presented here, you can
look into these fine websites - on a web browser near you:
http://www.linux.org (though there are MANY sites related to Linux)
http://www.be.com/products/freebeos/
http://www.freedos.org (though there is also another Free-based DOS
clone - I forgot the name of it, alas)
--PsiTron
--=--=--
--=--=------=--=------=--=----
Link List
----=--=------=--=------=--=--
Portals:
Orange Juice.............................http://www.ojuice.net
Scene.org.................................http://www.scene.org
SceneSpot.............................http://www.scenespot.org
Pouet.net.................................http://www.pouet.net
Demoscene.org.........................http://www.demoscene.org
Scenet....................................http://www.scenet.de
Demo.org...................................http://www.demo.org
Czech Scene................................http://www.scene.cz
Hungarian Scene........................http://www.scene-hu.com
Italian Scene...........................http://run.to/la_scena
<N> ModPlug Central Resources..........http://www.castlex.com/mods
Norvegian Scene............http://www.neutralzone.org/scene.no
Polish Scene...........................http://www.demoscena.pl
Russian Scene..........................http://www.demoscene.ru
Spanish Scene............................http://www.escena.org
Swiss Scene..............................http://www.chscene.ch
Archives:
Acid2.....................................ftp://acid2.stack.nl
Amber.......................................ftp://amber.bti.pl
Cyberbox.....................................ftp://cyberbox.de
Hornet (1992-1996)........................ftp://ftp.hornet.org
Scene.org..................................ftp://ftp.scene.org
Scene.org Austra........................ftp://ftp.nl.scene.org
Scene.org Netherlands...................ftp://ftp.au.scene.org
Swiss Scene FTP...........................ftp://ftp.chscene.ch
Demo Groups:
3g Design..............................
http://3gdesign.cjb.net
3State...................................http://threestate.com
7 Gods.........................................http://7gods.sk
Aardbei.....................................http://aardbei.com
Acid Rain..............................http://surf.to/acidrain
Addict..................................http://addict.scene.pl
Agravedict........................http://www.agravedict.art.pl
Alien Prophets...................http://alienprophets.ninja.dk
Anakata..............................http://www.anakata.art.pl
Astral..............................http://astral.scene-hu.com
Astroidea........................http://astroidea.scene-hu.com
BlaBla..............................http://blabla.planet-d.net
Blasphemy..............................http://www.blasphemy.dk
Bomb..................................http://bomb.planet-d.net
Broncs..................................http://broncs.scene.cz
Byterapers.....................http://www.byterapers.scene.org
Calodox.................................http://www.calodox.org
Cocoon..............................http://cocoon.planet-d.net
Confine.................................http://www.confine.org
Damage...................................http://come.to/damage
Eclipse............................http://www.eclipse-game.com
Elitegroup..........................http://elitegroup.demo.org
Exceed...........................http://www.inf.bme.hu/~exceed
Fairlight.............................http://www.fairlight.com
Fobia Design...........................http://www.fd.scene.org
Freestylers..........................http://www.freestylas.org
Fresh! Mindworks...................http://kac.poliod.hu/~fresh
Future Crew..........................http://www.futurecrew.org
Fuzzion.................................http://www.fuzzion.org
GODS...................................http://www.idf.net/gods
Halcyon...........................http://www.halcyon.scene.org
Haujobb......................................http://haujobb.de
Hellcore............................http://www.hellcore.art.pl
Infuse...................................http://www.infuse.org
Kilobite...............................http://kilobite.cjb.net
Kolor................................http://www.kaoz.org/kolor
Komplex.................................http://www.komplex.org
Kooma.....................................http://www.kooma.com
Mandula.........................http://www.inf.bme.hu/~mandula
Maturefurk...........................http://www.maturefurk.com
Monar................ftp://amber.bti.pl/pub/scene/distro/monar
MOVSD....................................http://movsd.scene.cz
Nextempire...........................http://www.nextempire.com
Noice.....................................http://www.noice.org
Orange.................................http://orange.scene.org
Orion................................http://orion.planet-d.net
Popsy Team............................http://popsyteam.rtel.fr
Prone................................http://www.prone.ninja.dk
Purple....................................http://www.purple.dk
Rage........................................http://www.rage.nu
Replay.......................http://www.shine.scene.org/replay
Retro A.C...........................http://www.retroac.cjb.net
Sista Vip..........................http://www.sistavip.exit.de
Skytech team............................http://www.skytech.org
Sunflower.......................http://sunflower.opengl.org.pl
Talent.............................http://talent.eurochart.org
The Black Lotus.............................http://www.tbl.org
The Digital Artists Wired Nation.http://digitalartists.cjb.net
The Lost Souls...............................http://www.tls.no
TPOLM.....................................http://www.tpolm.com
Trauma.................................http://sauna.net/trauma
T-Rex.....................................http://www.t-rex.org
Unik.....................................http://www.unik.ca.tc
Universe..........................http://universe.planet-d.net
Vantage..................................http://www.vantage.ch
Wipe....................................http://www.wipe-fr.org
Music Labels, Music Sites:
Aisth.....................................http://www.aisth.com
Aural Planet........................http://www.auralplanet.com
Azure...................................http://azure-music.com
Blacktron Music Production...........http://www.d-zign.com/bmp
BrothomStates.............http://www.katastro.fi/brothomstates
Chill..........................http://www.bentdesign.com/chill
Chippendales......................http://www.sunpoint.net/~cnd
Chiptune...............................http://www.chiptune.com
Da Jormas................................http://www.jormas.com
Fabtrax......http://www.cyberverse.com/~boris/fabtrax/home.htm
Five Musicians.........................http://www.fm.scene.org
Fridge...........................http://www.ssmedion.de/fridge
Fusion Music Crew.................http://members.home.nl/cyrex
Goodstuff..........................http://artloop.de/goodstuff
Ignorance.............................http://www.ignorance.org
Immortal Coil.............................http://www.ic.l7.net
Intense...........................http://intense.ignorance.org
Jecoute.................................http://jecoute.cjb.net
Kosmic Free Music Foundation.............http://www.kosmic.org
Lackluster.....................http://www.m3rck.net/lackluster
Level-D.................................http://www.level-d.com
Miasmah.............................http://www.miasmah.cjb.net
Milk.......................................http://milk.sgic.fi
Mah Music.............................http://come.to/mah.music
Maniacs of noise...............http://home.worldonline.nl/~mon
MAZ's sound homepage..................http://www.maz-sound.com
Med.......................................http://www.med.fr.fm
Mo'playaz..........................http://ssmedion.de/moplayaz
Mono211.................................http://www.mono211.com
Morbid Minds..............http://www.raveordie.com/morbidminds
Noise................................http://www.noisemusic.org
Noerror.......................http://www.error-404.com/noerror
One Touch Records......................http://otr.planet-d.net
Park..................................http://park.planet-d.net
Radical Rhythms.....http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/merrelli/rr
RBi Music.............................http://www.rbi-music.com
Ruff Engine................http://members.xoom.com/ruff_engine
SHR8M......................................http://1st.to/shr8m
Sound Devotion................http://sugarbomb.x2o.net/soundev
Soundstate.........................http://listen.to/soundstate
Sunlikamelo-D...........http://www.error-404.com/sunlikamelo-d
Suspect Records........................http://www.tande.com/sr
Tequila........................http://www.defacto2.net/tequila
Tempo................................http://tempomusic.cjb.net
Tetris....................................http://msg.sk/tetris
Theralite...........................http://theralite.avalon.hr
Tokyo Dawn Records........................http://tdr.scene.org
Triad's C64 music archive.............http://www.triad.c64.org
UltraBeat.........................http://www.innerverse.com/ub
Vibrants................................http://www.vibrants.dk
Wiremaniacs.........................http://www.wiremaniacs.com
Zen of Tracking.........................http://surf.to/the-imm
Programming:
Programming portal......................http://www.gamedev.net
Programming portal.....................http://www.flipcode.com
Game programming portal...............http://www.gamasutra.com
3D programming portal.................http://www.3dgamedev.com
Programming portal......................http://www.exaflop.org
Programming portal............http://www.programmersheaven.com
Programming portal.....................http://www.freecode.com
NASM (free Assembly compiler)......http://www.cryogen.com/nasm
LCC (free C compiler).........http://www.remcomp.com/lcc-win32
PTC video engine.........................http://www.gaffer.org
3D engines..........http://cg.cs.tu-berlin.de/~ki/engines.html
Documents...............http://www.neutralzone.org/home/faqsys
File format collection...................http://www.wotsit.org
Magazines:
Amber...............................http://amber.bti.pl/di_mag
Amnesia...............http://amnesia-dist.future.easyspace.com
Demojournal....................http://demojournal.planet-d.net
Eurochart.............................http://www.eurochart.org
Heroin...................................http://www.heroin.net
Hugi........................................http://www.hugi.de
Music Massage......................http://www.scene.cz/massage
Planet Chartmag............http://www.agravedict.art.pl/planet
Pain..................................http://pain.planet-d.net
Scenial...........................http://www.scenial.scene.org
Shine...............................http://www.shine.scene.org
Static Line................http://www.scenespot.org/staticline
Sunray..............................http://sunray.planet-d.net
Total Disaster...................http://www.totaldisaster.w.pl
TUHB.......................................http://www.tuhb.org
WildMag...........................http://www.wildmag.notrix.de
Parties:
Assembly (Finland).....................http://www.assembly.org
Ambience (The Netherlands)..............http://www.ambience.nl
Dreamhack (Sweden)....................http://www.dreamhack.org
Buenzli (Switzerland)......................http://www.buenz.li
Gravity (Poland)............http://www.demoscena.cp.pl/gravity
Mekka-Symposium (Germany)...................http://ms.demo.org
Takeover (The Netherlands).............,http://www.takeover.nl
The Party (Denmark).....................http://www.theparty.dk
Others:
Demo secret parts....http://www.inf.bme.hu/~mandula/secret.txt
Textmode Demo Archive.................http://tmda.planet-d.net
Arf!Studios..........................http://www.arfstudios.org
#coders..................................http://coderz.cjb.net
Demonews Express.........http://www.teeselink.demon.nl/express
Demo fanclub........................http://jerware.org/fanclub
Digital Undergrounds.....................http://dug.iscool.net
Doose charts...............................http://www.doose.dk
Freax................................http://freax.scene-hu.com
GfxZone............................http://gfxzone.planet-d.net
PC-demos explained.....http://www.oldskool.org/demos/explained
Pixel...................................http://pixel.scene.org
IRC Channels:
Scene.........................................ircnet #thescene
Programming.....................................ircnet #coders
Programming....................................efnet #flipcode
Graphics.........................................ircnet #pixel
Music.............................................ircnet #trax
Scene (French)..................................ircnet #demofr
Programming (French)............................ircnet #codefr
Graphics (French)..............................ircnet #pixelfr
Scene (Hungarian)............................ircnet #demoscene
Programming (Hungarian)......................ircnet #coders.hu
Programming (German)........................ircnet #coders.ger
--=--=--
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Editor: Coplan / D. Travis North / coplan@scenespot.org
Columnists: Coplan / D. Travis North / coplan@scenespot.org
Dilvish / Eric Hamilton / dilvie@yahoo.com
Gekko / Gergely Kutenich / mont@tar.hu
Psitron / Tim Soderstrom / tigerhawk@stic.net
Setec / Jesper Pederson / jesped@post.tele.dk
Seven / Stefaan VanNieuwenhuyze/ seven7@writeme.com
SiN / Ian Haskin / sin@netcom.ca
Subliminal / Matt Friedly / sub@plazma.net
Tryhuk / Tryhuk Vojtech / xtryhu00@stud.fee.vutbr.cz
Technical Consult: Ranger Rick / Ben Reed / ranger@scenespot.org
Static Line on the Web: http://www.scenespot.org/staticline
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http://www.scenespot.org/mailman/listinfo/static_line
If you would like to contribute an article to Static Line, be aware
that we will format your article with two spaces at the beginning and one
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See you next month!
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