Pondering Something about SID Music.

[Analog-X64]

I was just thinking, how for some people SID music is Ear Shattering and yet for us it sounds beautiful.

I wonder if we are wired differently than other people. We get enjoyment out of listening to a SID Tune, where as others think its just a bunch of bleep, blop and chirp sounds??

What do you guys think?

[omoroca]

Listening to SID sounds is ear-shattering for me, too. But that's the wonderful thing about it. Other weirdos cut themselves with knives and stuff, we hurt ourselves with bleeps, blops and chirps.

And the pain feels soooooooo gooooooooooooooooooood!

Although I must say I listen to C64 remixes 95% of the time and only 5% original SID tunes.

[Analog-X64]

Well I think we all have one thing in common, is that we can see beyond the simplistic bleeps and blops and chrips and hear the sonic beauty. Hence all the Remixes.

So I think we have an ear for it that others dont... I think were wired differently.

[Vosla]

Really depends IMHO on the score on hand... There are SIDs that show the best of what the c64 was able to do with its sound hardware and there are those SIDs that remind of a mistuned cellphone ringtone.
BUT... for those who were 'active' around that time in the 80's, this sound was outstanding for home computers, hence the sweet memories.

[Razmo]

I think also, that it has something to do with the era in which we were introduced to it... most of us were computer-kid nerds back when the SID was introduced to us, and the whole C64 thing just blew us all away... I also believe that many of us wanted to make music or at least fiddle with the SID sound on the C64 (I Did), at that time, there were really nothing else available of this calibre to normal consumers... and it was a different sound than what we were used to in the mainstream music... the beginning of the electronic music era.

today I only listen to original SID tunes out of nostalgica... I prefer the remixed versions, but back then I actually liked to listen to the SID... that must be a sign that it has something to do with the time it was made... nothing you could find in mainstream back then exept Jarre and vangelis was electronically inspired... it was just ROCK & POP or be a musical nerd! I believe that many from the SID era are responsible for the electronic genres of today... I believe SID was an asset in promoting electronic music altogether...
The difference from us to those who like electronic music today (but do not like SID) is that we remember the thrill of it back then. Because HELL NO! a screeching Warhawk intro, or Thrust lead-in is NOT for my ears today!!!

Maybe also SOME people just have a tendency to like these highpitched sounds... I know for one, that I often hear my own mother tell me; "What's that irritating high sound in there!?" ... she does not like it, even if it's non-SID sounds... a trait I believe to have inherrited from the C64 era. I'm often "accused" of making music suitable for computer games by people (though they have no clue, that all game-music has gone for symphonic shit!.. shurely in 10-20 years, a culture like SID will never happen from the music we have in games today... I have to see this to believe it!)

[Tonka]

I think a lot of the original C64 composers used ultra high pitched sounds because:

a) Most of them were composing through a mono TV output - all low frequencies would have been pretty much annihilated.

or

b) They knew that most people would be listening through a mono TV output and all low frequencies would have been pretty much annihilated!

The high pitched sounds would have really cut through a mix coming out of a shitty speaker on a portable TV, so it probably sounded great to them (and us at the time). Some stuff can be ear-bleedingly painful now - Warhawk intro being a good example.

There's a lot of SID stuff that is still fairly painless to listen to though. The Ghouls and Ghosts suite is pretty painless. Oh, and this one quite relaxing and smooth on the ears, too...

Relaxing, non-irriatating SID music that you'll surely want to buy when it becomes available for general release

*cough*

[pepak]

It's about learning, preferably at an early age. Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen claim (in Science of Discworld II) that there are more nerve connections going from the brain to the ears than from the ears to the brain and that we tell our ears what to hear - which is incidentally a reason why people have serious problem understanding languages completely different from their own (remember the inability of Japanese to distinguish between a 'R' and 'L').

We have been exposed to 8bit music (SID in your case, Spectrum's one-bit beeper in mine) and learned to find something in it. Other's didn't. The same is true for other music, too - after all these years of listening only to soundtracks (movie or game, it doesn't matter) I find myself unable to listen to songs. Even if I find one which I like (extremely rare) I am absolutely unable to follow its words - even if I focus my attention exclusively to understanding the lyrics, it takes no more that two or three words before I lose track again - and in any language, including my native.

[agent4125]

I could listen to the Ultima IV tunes all day, even the battle sequence which is only like 8 measures looped. =) It's a bit like listening to the soundtrack of a favorite movie*. But I also occasionally listen to SIDs I never heard before, and I appreciate them because I know there usually just one person behind it trying to do something special with such a limited palette.

I also think the appeal is similar to pixellated graphics. It's just a unique aesthetic and will probably never go away entirely.

* update: I guess pepak and I have similar brains =)

[Lagerfeldt]

According to the Fletcher-Munson curve our ears are quite sensitive around the 3-4 kHz area which is exactly where the lead synths are in many C64 tracks.

[Razmo]

According to the Fletcher-Munson curve our ears are quite sensitive around the 3-4 kHz area which is exactly where the lead synths are in many C64 tracks.

But how does that describe why some people LIKE C64 sounds, and others don't? ... I gues that too much energy in this area alone is cause for discomfort then ... I wonder if womens voices tend to be in this region too when being "tempered" ?

One thing I DO remember though is, that I did not hear C64 tunes for MANY MANY years after going to the AMIGA computer... actually I heard the voice of SID again when I first discovered SIDPlay on the PC many years later... and when I first heard all those old tunes again that I knew I had loved back then I got shocked how awful they really sounded! ... could not believe my ears after all these years! ... I'm not sure what happened to me or my ears... have to admit that I've become used to SID music again, but one thing that really struck me when discovering the SID sound again was that they used so much vibrato on their sounds!? ... it sound directly awful, and is grossly overdimentioned much of the time... why I did not hear this back then still puzzles me.

[Instant Remedy]

I absolutely love one thing about the SID and its music and that is the arpeggio chords. Common people probably find this kind of sound geeky and computer-gamish but I just like the lush/sparkly sound.
The original SID-sounds and arp-chords are a dilemma for me when creating remixes. What to keep and what to replace to make it more available to common people is a difficult question for me.
Since my main idea of making remixes in the first place is to bring the great tunes to people not necessarily familiar with the SID or C64. Too much SID gives a "true-to-original" sound but may also sound too oldskool and geeky. The opposite may stray away too much from the original feel and sound.

How does you guys feel about arp-chords? Hopefully a fistful of Timbaland&co introduces the "wierd and cool soundz" from the 8-bit era to the grey masses and makes it more acceptable.

Of course it depends on the sound and intensity of the sounds and often small amounts of effects like chorus/delay/reverb smooths the sounds to a acceptable level.

I agree with Razmo also, those brutal vibratos sounds a little awkward today. Rather replace sounds in this case. Also, drums and wierd ringmodulation SFX are a little too much for me today, even if the character of the song heavy depends on this.

[Sidman 64]

My thoughts on this is,
People who love the C64 sound grew up with it....
I remember getting a Spectrum on Xmas day in 1985, and all of 1986 I loved playing the games like JET SET - M-MINER -
S-WULF etc etc for the game play.
But on Xmas day 1986 I got me a C64 and remember loading in Rambo and was blown away.
Firstly I could not believe that music was playing while the game was loading, and that it sounded far better than my speccy, even my mum who loved playing on the Speccy loved Martin Galways Ocean loader track.
So I think people fell in love with the C64 because the sound on the games was catchy - had 70's synth like sounds, and sounded soooooo much better than the Amstrad and Speccy.
Plus there was some amazing musicians in 1985-86-87 in Rob - Martin - Ben - Whittaker +
others who spawned what we do and love now.
We even got sampled drums - bass - guitars - speech, so I think people of today who doesn't like the sound of our 64 never
went through that experience of Speccy to C64 and the fantastic tracks that came with so many games.
But on saying this if you take say 100 people who doesn't know what a C64 is, or may of heard of it but don't know any of the tracks and sat them in a C64 concert to experience SID80's, PPOT, C64 ORCHESTRA, or even Reyn the one man band, I would guess that at least half would possibly enjoy the concert and tracks.
Play the same track from the C64 and they will cringe

All the matters is we have a concert every year, or every two years and keep the C64 music going......

[Razmo]

For me, what is so unique about the SID are of course also the arpeggio or "Broken Chord" as it's also called, plus the extremely wild and crazy FX you get from ringmod and sync sounds (yes... those you don't like so much IR! )

For me to keep using the real thing, the SID, it has to give me something really unique... afterall I'm building a SID synth with the intent of actually USING the SID in my current productions.... and the SID ... IS unique!

Many SID tunes use the efffect of ringmod'inf and syncing two differently playing melody/rhythm lines together which create very unique FX sequences (Sanxion definitely comes to my mind here!)... no other synth today can do this...

The same goes with the arpeggio lines... the only other machines capable of doing them properly are the MIDI Box FM synth... the problem with the geeky sound is that it's very abrupt changes... if you make VERY FAST glides between the transitions in the arpeggio, it will give you a much softer and pleasing character.

And then we have that lovely filter... analog and multimode... a rare thing seen on a sound chip of it's time!... and then it's buggyness (6581)... that sweet rumbling distorted resonance is unlike any other analog filter

These are MY reasons for using SID sounds today... and they surely can sound as lush as even a mighty Virus synth...

My reasons for loving it back then was the introduction into something new... the electronica world of sound synthesis (not many other tracks made with synths back then sounded better)... and as with everything else in this world; when something become a part of your culture, you tend to like it better, and SID was part of the computer-culture of the 80's.

[Tonka]

How does you guys feel about arp-chords?

(In a manor of speaking)...

Also, drums and wierd ringmodulation SFX are a little too much for me today, even if the character of the song heavy depends on this.

I still love C64 drums to death! Best drums on any 8 bit, ever...

Ring mod & sync are still firm favourites, too. On a C64, they can be used to make truly unique sounds which are almost impossible to create on any other synth. Trying to replicate Ben's Last Ninja Level 2 intro style (which uses a synced and ring modded triangle and saw wave combination with an upwards pitch bend on just one of the oscillators) with anything other than a C64, is practically impossible!

[Tonka]

Many SID tunes use the efffect of ringmod'inf and syncing two differently playing melody/rhythm lines together which create very unique FX sequences (Sanxion definitely comes to my mind here!)... no other synth today can do this...

Agreed.

The real bonus of working with a C64 for me is that just swapping one channel with another and applying a ring-mod/sync effect can change the character of a song entirely. You just have NO idea how the channels are going to sound or interact until you actually DO it! It's just so random - I love it!