_//\\________________________________________________________________________ _\\__T_A_T_I_C___L_I_N_E______________________________________ January, 2000 __\\_________________________________________________________________________ \\//__ Monthly Scene E-Zine ________________________________ 175 Subscribers _____________________________________________________________________________ --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Table Of Contents ----=--=------=--=------=--=-- 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 --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Message From the Editor ----=--=------=--=------=--=-- 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 --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Letters From Our Readers ----=--=------=--=------=--=-- -=- 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 --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Coplan's Top Nine Trax of 2000 By: Coplan ----=--=------=--=------=--=-- 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 --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Tryhuk's Top Ten Trax of 2000 By: Tryhuk ----=--=------=--=------=--=-- 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. --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Intros in 2000 By: Gekko ----=--=------=--=------=--=-- 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... 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 --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Tracking Tool Index The Trackers By: Coplan ----=--=------=--=------=--=-- -=- 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 H”jlund 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 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 --=--=-- ----=--=------=--=------=--=------=--=------=--=------=--=------=--=------ 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 Static Line Subscription Management: 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 space at the end of each line. Please avoid foul language and high ascii characters. Contributions should be mailed to Coplan (coplan@scenespot.org). See you next month! -eof---=------=--=------=--=--