Category: TCTD 2009 Awards

  • TCTD Awards 2009: Best Artist

    Our final award is somewhat nebulous and warrants a little explaining. It is someone who should be among the foremost names on your list when explaining chip music to outsiders, a person whose skills as a musician and composer are so inspiring that mere words cannot convey their importance to the scene.  The following nominations comprise artists from all the relevant categories. I am happy to present the (last!) award of 2009, Artist of the Year:

    minusbaby – With a stripped down live approach,  quality EPs for 8bitpeoples and rocking pixel work, Minusbaby made numerous TCTD award shortlists. His music becomes more nuanced and engrossing with each release.

    Bud Melvin – An amazing performer with an awesome release confirms my gut feeling that any year Bud is active, he is a nominee for this category.

    4mat – One of the demoscene greats returns to the fold.  Even his WIPs and fragments outstrip many official releases.

    Goto80 – Do you like breakfast?

    Little-Scale – This insanely prolific inventor and composer was the overwhelming choice of the public in this year’s nominations. He is an innovative songwriter, a great live performer and he knows a thing or two about interfacing with his hardware.

  • TCTD Awards 2009: Best Track

    In a year where all the gimmicks seemed to be tired (forced limitations, cover comps, time based show-offs) these nominees showed that at its heart, chip music ain’t a thing without good old-fashioned songwriting. There is no way to do justice to the dozens of deserving artists who have created great music this year, so when weighing nominations I tried to consider the artists’ use of chips and the quality of the production, but in the end it was simply a matter of “do you like the song?” These tracks are all superior accomplishments and I am proud to announce 2009’s Best Track Nominees:

    The J. Arthur Keens Band – Catfish Lagoon

    Youthful wunderkin releases dozens of songs and this is the one that catches fire. Catchy and sing-a-longability along with great sound design make a song that is not only one you can rock in your bedroom, but share with your parents, friends and the fairer sex.

    Bit Shifter – Easy Prey

    From the amazing 8bp100 Blip Fest CD package, the mix and the crowd only accentuate an amazing performance by one the masters of the US chip scene, Josh Davis.

    Mr. Spastic – FXLP

    The soundtrack to running through a brick wall, hyper energy and a solo that takes you over the cliff.  Not to be played before bedtime, church, major surgery…

    Dr. Von Pnok – Brain Swap

    Processed chips with insanely large presence and mental beats. Harsh, club-worthy and ultimately danceable.

    Chibi-Tech – A–nie Rabu Damon. (It’s A–nie Love.)

    Perverse and accomplished, what more can you hope for from ths winner of this years Famicompo Originals. Fans of VRC6 and Jodeci, this is your jam.

  • TCTD Awards 2009: Best Release

    “Release” is sort of an abused term in the chip community. TCTD regards the term “release” as:

    • Contains a number of quality tracks from an artist or groups of artists
    • Album artwork and hosting so you can easily direct friends who might want to learn more about the artist or label
    • Quality tracks

    The nominees this year include a variety of formats, from ROM carts to vinyl to digital to CD. Their common thread is that they are all collections of great tracks by some of the best artists in the game.

    Here are your 2009 Best Release nominees:

    Bud Melvin –  Popular Music / Self Released

    Bud is one of the most interesting voices in the chip music scene, his songs eschew chip music cliches and use a wide spanning soundscape to paint expressive backgrounds for his madcap narratives.

    Bondage Fairies – Cheap Italian Wine / LoboTom

    Sweden’s favorite 8bit, punk rock, robot duo’s sophomore release did not disappoint, with more Pixes flavored Devo-inspired scatologia  that rocks from the first synth warble to the last downbeat.

    Alex Mauer – Vegavox2 / Pause

    The master of the NES ROM album world (and thanks to NO CARRIER, it is actually becoming a world), this ROM showcases Alex’s acknowledged mastery of the 2a03 and gives you a glimpse of his lesser known pixel chops.

    V/A – Blip Festival 2008: 32 Live Recordings / 8bitpeoples and 2playerproductions

    Perhaps the definitive live chip music document, this release showed that the energy of Blip Festival and its performers can indeed be captured and will remain a keepsake of all involved for years to come.

    c-jeff – electric / Pause

    c-jeff’s concept EP shows off his considerable musical chops (with some help from his friends) and is one of the more touching and cerebral releases of 2009.

  • TCTD Awards 2009: Best Live Visualist

    This is arguably the toughest category to decide upon, for a number of factors, the main one being lack of interest in people to do visuals specifically with low-fi hardware and/or for chipmusic shows. This reduces the options you can choose from and, since I want to keep it fresh every year, my chances to not repeat stuff are slim. Here’s hoping 2010 brings new talents to this activity in relation to chipmusic, and also new bars are set for quality by those who already are in the game.

    Being a VJ for 8 years and having done anything from ultra underground events to 100.000+ people megaevents, allowed me to see almost ANYTHING there is to see about live visuals in the context of a music show and I can, with confidence, agree with what most renowned VJs have adopted as a motto: CONTENT IS KING. And when content is the context, I have to say that I haven’t seen much development on this side of things regarding low fi visualists. As discussed last year, a VJ has to have a plethora of skills, all necessary to stand out from the rest, so here’s my advice to you all, neophyte or experienced:  try to nurture them all in harmony to reach the next level!

    On the other hand what was really great about 2009 is that it has become the VJ+Musician collab explosion. Many artists have teamed up to deliver a solid show once onstage, musically and visually. This is the way to go, fellas, so keep it up.

    Enough babbling, let’s get to the nominees. Hate mail goes in the comments section, non-anonymous, please ;):

    Dan Winckler:

    Dan is a bit underrated among the chip scene. He does some interesting work mixing up old technology with new by means of OPENEMU, a tool he helped develop, where he can open an old platform to the ways of modern technology like Quartz Composer.

    ENTTER:

    Raúl’s work with Meneo has gone from strength to strength. Personally I can’t enjoy a Meneo show as much when Raul is not present, showing how much he is determinant to the power of the project him and Rigo Pex have created. He also is a king of the performatic presence of the VJ on stage, since he’s not just another nerd hidden behind a pile of hardware. Big ups for that.

    Paris Treantafeles:

    Paris doesn’t seem to want to stand still. He has entered into many collaborations this year, among which we can remark the one with OUTPT (specifically doing visuals for Nullsleep, a mighty trio) and the one with NO CARRIER (where he jumps on the mic!). Like NO CARRIER, he also is fundamental to low-fi VJ software development.


    Raquel Meyers:

    Once part of ENTTER, Raquel has finally shown her “true form” since working alone and we love it. Her works are full of attitude and tell a good story. One of the pioneers along with Entter in collaborating with chipmusic artists, her work with Goto80, Bubblyfish, Glomag or Jellica is some of the most referential in the scene, and it perfectly illustrates the chipmusic attitude empowered by collaboration.

    The C-Men:

    Last year’s winner is stalwart of the scene. Celebrating his 10th anniversary of VJing, Julian took it upon himself to re-invent his work: taking 10 years worth of material and repurposing it in a new form while VJing alongside his old team mate and organizing/promoting a party all around this celebration, The C-Men team shows that they didn’t get stuck in time and still can maintain the people (and colleagues) at the edge of their proverbial seats.

  • TCTD Awards 2009: Best Oldschool Demo Production

    This has been a great  year for oldschool demo production. The quantity of productions has increased, however this brought with it an increased number of QUALITY productions among them. It was hard to select the nominees! Among all these, I warmly welcome back the Amiga producers.  We had a ton of new Amiga demos this year and this only makes me happy. Also, we had very solid output in most of the dedicated and open demoparties like Breakpoint, Assembly and tUM. The increased interest in oldschool computers as demomaking platforms has led as well to more machines being pushed towards their limits like they never did before.

    With this trend, we also see an increase in “crossover-ing” between chipmusic and demoscene. A lot of chipmusic artists have ventured into the demoscene, and a bunch of demoscene artists have gathered more exposure in the eyes and ears of chipmusic aficionados. However, judging from the votesheets submitted for the 2009 TCTD awards by our readers, there’s a widespread, appalling knowledge of the demoscene. Not only most sheets were empty in this category, a bunch posted stuff that wasn’t even related. Come on kids, we post a lot of demoscene material for you, pay some attention! There’s a ton of awesome stuff to discover within. I promise more stuff in 2010 so you can fill up that slot in next year’s Awards (and not suggest that we nominate a record pressing company for “demo production” :O)

    Not wanting to steal any more of your time, I hereby present you with the Demo nominees:

    Andropolis by Booze Design & Instinct (Commodore 64):

    Booze Design does it again. Teamed up with Instinct, they deliver a punching production for your Commodore 64.

    Cernit Trandafir by Dead Hackers Society (Atari STe):

    It may not be superflash, but what it does it does with good quality. I love the resolution and soundtrack on this one. It was a tough call between this and Suretrip II

    Syntax Infinity by Tulou & Traktor (MSX2):

    Not a very popular platform, the MSX2 receives an amazing demo at Breakpoint 2009. It should have won the compo.

    Future 1999 by PwP (Commodore VIC-20):

    Even though PwP prods are pretty similar, this time around they have managed to use samples for some SPOOKY voices saying freaky shit.  I love it.

    VIA by Neurotypical (Acorn BBC Micro):

    OK, it might not be very inspired, but this  shit is hardcore. It’s video + digital audio streamed off a fricking BBC Micro. Many points for hardcoreness and rare platform usage.