While video game music now covers a wide range of genres and instrumentation, I'll always have a love for good ol' square waves and FM synthesis. Chiptunes have been around since the birth of video games, cracktros and the demoscene. Some of today's best chiptune musicians now have a direct hand in scoring some of the medium's best soundtracks, from Disasterpeace's FEZ soundtrack, to Virt's Shovel Knight.
Let's give some love to chiptune artists and chiptune music! Share your favorite artists and tunes in here! I'll start with some of my favorites: (Unfortunately only two media are allowed in OPs so the rest will be bandcamp links)
DEPTH OF PERCEPTION by RUSHJET1 (Forgotten Music)
Rushjet is one of my favorite pure chiptune composers. His VRC7 music is just sonically amazing, painting wonderful audio landscapes with the same techniques as Konami's composers.
STOP AND SMELL THE FLESH by JOEY GRADY (Death Road to Canada OST)
As someone who composes chiptune music with additional instrumentation themselves, I'm a big fan of combining video game hardware synths with real world players. What makes Death Road to Canada's OST so cool is its country and funk inspirations, creating mellow but infectious grooves that stick with you for a long time.
BATTLE AGAINST A HANDSOME FOE by NELWARD (Mother 4 fangame OST)
Nelward may be the closest thing chiptunes have to this generation's Hip Tanaka. Smashing together absolutely wild samples from all sorts of sources as well as using natively sampled SNES samples, there's really nothing like Nelward's music right now. He has a new album out, you should give a listen! (The above track was submitted for a Mother fangame, the majority of his music is... wilder).
BATTLE THEME A by JAKE KAUFMAN aka VIRT (Boot Hill Heroes OST)
Of course it would be easy to list just about any Shovel Knight song from Virt's amazing catalog of tracks. I thought I'd go outside the box with this pick, a tune from the very underrated Boot Hill Heroes soundtrack. Here, Jake brings the spaghetti western to the Super NES sound chip, producing a rollicking battle tune that is at times evocative of Final Fantasy and at times evocative of a bar fight in a saloon or a wagon chase.
TRAILS by J. ARTHUR KEENES BAND (Mighty Social Lion)
Dan McLay started out as a humble chiptune musician, and through the J. Arthur Keenes Band, grew into something completely new. Mighty Social Lion reminds me a lot of the darker music of the Beach Boys. Combining square and triangle waves with piano, guitar, drums and hand claps, you WILL NOT forget this album, whether you like or dislike it. There is probably no album in all of chiptune like this album.
OTHER GREAT CHIPTUNE ALBUMS:
Chibi-Tech - Psycho Somatic Generation
Petrifom - Don't Worry You're Great!
Disasterpeace - Ram Son
Phlogiston - Downwell OST
THE PART WHERE I JUST NAMEDROP EVERY CHIPTUNE ARTIST I CAN REMEMBER:
uhh alright let's see, Norrin Radd, Shnabubula, Kplecraft, Knasibas, Coda, Anamanaguchi, YMCK, Random, Auxcide, 8bitweapon, Chipzel, Sabrepulse, Toby Fox, ChronoWolf
Let's give some love to chiptune artists and chiptune music! Share your favorite artists and tunes in here! I'll start with some of my favorites: (Unfortunately only two media are allowed in OPs so the rest will be bandcamp links)
DEPTH OF PERCEPTION by RUSHJET1 (Forgotten Music)
Rushjet is one of my favorite pure chiptune composers. His VRC7 music is just sonically amazing, painting wonderful audio landscapes with the same techniques as Konami's composers.
STOP AND SMELL THE FLESH by JOEY GRADY (Death Road to Canada OST)
As someone who composes chiptune music with additional instrumentation themselves, I'm a big fan of combining video game hardware synths with real world players. What makes Death Road to Canada's OST so cool is its country and funk inspirations, creating mellow but infectious grooves that stick with you for a long time.
BATTLE AGAINST A HANDSOME FOE by NELWARD (Mother 4 fangame OST)
Nelward may be the closest thing chiptunes have to this generation's Hip Tanaka. Smashing together absolutely wild samples from all sorts of sources as well as using natively sampled SNES samples, there's really nothing like Nelward's music right now. He has a new album out, you should give a listen! (The above track was submitted for a Mother fangame, the majority of his music is... wilder).
BATTLE THEME A by JAKE KAUFMAN aka VIRT (Boot Hill Heroes OST)
Of course it would be easy to list just about any Shovel Knight song from Virt's amazing catalog of tracks. I thought I'd go outside the box with this pick, a tune from the very underrated Boot Hill Heroes soundtrack. Here, Jake brings the spaghetti western to the Super NES sound chip, producing a rollicking battle tune that is at times evocative of Final Fantasy and at times evocative of a bar fight in a saloon or a wagon chase.
TRAILS by J. ARTHUR KEENES BAND (Mighty Social Lion)
Dan McLay started out as a humble chiptune musician, and through the J. Arthur Keenes Band, grew into something completely new. Mighty Social Lion reminds me a lot of the darker music of the Beach Boys. Combining square and triangle waves with piano, guitar, drums and hand claps, you WILL NOT forget this album, whether you like or dislike it. There is probably no album in all of chiptune like this album.
OTHER GREAT CHIPTUNE ALBUMS:
Chibi-Tech - Psycho Somatic Generation
Petrifom - Don't Worry You're Great!
Disasterpeace - Ram Son
Phlogiston - Downwell OST
THE PART WHERE I JUST NAMEDROP EVERY CHIPTUNE ARTIST I CAN REMEMBER:
uhh alright let's see, Norrin Radd, Shnabubula, Kplecraft, Knasibas, Coda, Anamanaguchi, YMCK, Random, Auxcide, 8bitweapon, Chipzel, Sabrepulse, Toby Fox, ChronoWolf
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