Sega Genesis

Featured, Game Music

Know Your MAG: MegaDriver

December 28, 2013 | Brenna Wilkes | Comments Off on Know Your MAG: MegaDriver Share this Know Your MAG: MegaDriver

More “Know Your MAG” for MAGFest 12, and it’s time to touch upon some of the new Main Stage bands! This time around we have the almost exclusively Sega-oriented metal band, MegaDrivermaking their MAGFest debut.

Believe it or not, Megadriver has been around for a decade. Based out of Brazil, the band was created by Antonio “Nino Megadriver” Francisco Tornisiello and focuses on two things: Sega Genesis (aka: Megadrive) game music, and performing as metal as possible. In fact, Nino Megadriver boasts that the band was the progenitor of the “game metal” mold that many bands have since adopted as their style of choice. Whether this rings true or not, most would agree that having more Sega Genesis/Megadrive music is never a bad thing.

MegaDriver and it’s five-man crew of metalheads have released nine albums to date, with several recent updates to older tunes. Though almost solely Genesis/Megadrive based, they have been known to throw in some renditions of songs from other consoles, such as tracks from Batman for the NES and Starcraft II. However, expect a heavy dose of Golden Axe and Sonic the Hedgehog music that hopefully isn’t just “Green Hill Zone”. (Surprisingly, despite how prolific “Ice Cap Zone” is in the video game arrangement scene, to the point of being obscene, not one MAGFest band has performed it live. Could MegaDriver be the first?)

MegaDriver hits the Main Stage on Friday night at 10:30pm.
Featured, Game Music, Reviews

Definitive Rage: Bare Knuckle OST (Review)

August 27, 2012 | Patrick Gann | 3 Comments Share this

Update: I just noticed that an old friend of mine, Ben Schweitzer, translated the liner notes for this album over at SEMO. If you want some great insight from Koshiro himself, this is a great resource. Koshiro’s self-aware choice of using “club music” is very interesting, and that’s only the first paragraph!

Yuzo Koshiro’s older soundtracks are very hard to come by. All those G.M.O. / Alfa Records releases (catalog prefix ALCA-) would cost you hundreds of dollars to collect.

Fortunately, the three separate soundtracks for Bare Knuckle I, II, and III (known as Streets of Rage in North America) have been compiled into one handy-dandy set thanks to publisher Wave Master (catalog number WM-0691~4). It’s four discs: the three OSTs (with a whole bunch of previously unreleased tracks) take up the first three discs. In fact, the second half of each of the first two discs have the Game Gear versions of their soundtracks (II first, then I).

And then, on disc four, a recording of a live set of music DJ’d by Koshiro back in 2002 that runs over 40 minutes in length. WOW! Talk about rare. Wave Master went well out of their way to give us the definitive Bare Knuckle / Streets of Rage album.

After the jump, I’ll be giving you my take on the album. I’m new to the franchise (GASP!) but I’m a long-time Koshiro fan. Let’s see how it turns out… (more…)
Chip Music

Animal Style Goes Deep Sea Diving In a Sega Genesis

April 19, 2010 | Joshua Kopstein | 1 Comment Share this

No matter what instruments or chipsets he uses, Philadelphia’s Joey Mariano (aka Animal Style) always manages to craft catchy, funk-flavored tunes in a style that’s uniquely his own. Earlier this year, he released Teletime, an album composed entirely using NES sound font and sold briefly in the form of actual functioning NES cartridges. Now, Mariano expands his repertoire once more with Trenchvent, a brand-new EP that explores the murky depths of the Sega Genesis’ YM2612 sound chip.

The album contains 5 tracks of crunchy FM synth goodness and is available free via New York netlabel 8bitpeoples. Check the video below to see Joey explain how he went about producing the album using the Genesis hardware.

Download: Animal Style – Trenchvent (8BP)