Tim Follin - Chronos

[vimster]

Simply amazing. Just imagine this coming out of your rubber-key 48k Speccy. The man really is a legend, but he's very modest about his achievements.

[Lishy1]

Apparently he left the video game music industry because he wasn't making enough money?

You're shitting me?! This dude should have been paid just as much as Nobuo Uematsu! Tim Follin's music is legendary!

[officialmashitup]

@Lishy1 Well partially that, Tim is quoted as saying he always wanted to work in the Film industry rather than the Video Game industry, he was only initially helping his brothers out. It's a great shame, because he is one of the most awesome composers of the 8-bit era

[jewtab]

This man didn't knew what "limitation" means.

[y2k4ever1]

Damn thats smooth BD

[ZDST]

Dude... I could totally imagine an old 70s synthesizer playing this...

....and pink floyd singing over it...

[jbarrera0228]

better than most composers today

[mingepotato]

For anyone interested, Sascha Zeidler&Niklas Sjösvärd have made a C64 SID cover version of this song. You can find it on the HVSids collection.

[fuzzface100]

Gotta love Tim Follin. He could make amazing music with a toaster given half the chance. This incredible considering the hardware limitations.

[SpiralPegasus]

@fuzzface100

Pffffttttttt ahahahhahaha

Good one! You know? If Tim made music for toasters my room would be full of toasted bread!

However, knowing Tim, I'd say he would make better music with an espresso machine! :D

[80sremixcentral2]

How many of you have actually played this game, care about anything but the soundtrack or know that the Follin brothers didn't make this game single-handedly?

[beefMERCIFUL]

@80sremixcentral2 don't be a snob bro

[SpiralPegasus]

@80sremixcentral2 I have.

Shmups are my favorite sort of videogames and boy, Chronos would be NOTHING without it's theme song.

It's not badly done but it's very boring and gets old quickly.

The song, however...

[2Trololo]

One of my favorite 1-bit music. Also Agent-X and Raw Recruit is wonderfull... =)

[mirabilis]

@2Trololo 1-bit? ZX Spectrum is an 8-bit computer.

[porcorosso81]

@mirabilis

Yeah, but the sound output is only 1 bit. It's the most primitive way of generating sound, and i'm very impressed what Tim is capable of squeezing out of this little emiserable beeper.

[mirabilis]

@porcorosso81 Put it that way and C64 is 12 bits ;)

[porcorosso81]

@mirabilis

That's actually hard to determine, because, although the waveform DACs of the SID are 12 bit, the envelope generator and filter modify and mix the waveforms using analogue signal processing. Which means, the SID sound is a mixture between analogue and digital techniques.

On the spectrum however, it's only speaker on/off/on/off... ;) What you hear here is essentially the Z80 making the music, which is quite impressive. Not to mention it's also a cool tune trying to get out.

[2Trololo]

@mirabilis and Amiga is 14-bit this way. =)

[2Trololo]

@mirabilis Z-80 is, but PCM device is not. PCM is 1-bit in ZX.

[2Trololo]

@mirabilis Out port is 1-bit in Speccy.

[flowtekk77]

not the sound.. sound was produced by Z80 sending one bit information to the speaker - only 1 or 0

[flowtekk77]

not the sound.. sound was produced by Z80 sending one bit information to the speaker - only 1 or 0

[mirabilis]

@flowtekk77 Yeah. I get that now. CD's is 16-bit music. ;) Using a faster CPU and adding a low pass filter you could play hifi music with just one bit toggling. But this is true 1-bit, no filtering. I like it! ;)

[stelian222]

I play this game right now! I remember when i play this game first time in 1994, O yeaaa!!!! and now i play again.

[ViperKirby]

I knew Solstice had good music and did a lot with the NES sound, but holy crap this throws extremely high hardware limitations out of the window

[ShokaLion]

Once you get the ear for Tim's style, you can spot his touch. Awesome effort for a machine with such dismal sound capabilities. You'd never guess it with Tim at the keyboard.

[TheDarkTrancer]

My all time fave multichannel speccy music.

Ps. Anyone ever heard this being used on any other 8 bit,say c64?

[TheDarkTrancer]

My all time fave multichannel speccy music

[Mazinga]

A Masterpiece!

[KreatorOfDeath1985]

wow 1 bit music has alot of feeling

[rolloLG]

Best Spectrum music ever...

I wish there was a modern mix too.

[markwrightrf]

@rolloLG I remember the Crash review for this that stated the music was "a sort of noise rather than actual music"... maybe it's because I've heard it hundreds of times that I recognise the genius!

[bluntendo]

Tim i need some music for my calculator please!

[Clione79]

Мдя....помню старый добрый ZX Spectrum 48K

[MasterJace]

lol swiped some of the bass and chords for a bit of a hip hop instrumental at 0:15

[Archimedes75009]

Tim is a living legend !

Thanks guy ! You helped the Spectrum be respected.

[TheGarbagePickup]

wow

[mingepotato]

I used to stop breathing while listening to these amazing feats/tunes. So did the Spectrum :)

2:05 fade-in-lead. Classic!

[GrandDizzy]

We love you Tim!

[matmusada]

Man....this composition leaves me breathless.....I mean HOW do you produce something so tight from something so limited....It's inspiring.

[AndrewTSq]

haha amazing. There was a game on Your Sinclair / Sinclair User (Dont remember) covertape with a bear, that had something like this music on 48k. I was amazed then how they could do this with a 1bit speaker.. i mean.. its just on, or off..

[20eric07]

@AndrewTSq Pulse Width Modulation. It's like holding down a button on an auto-fire joystick, data goes in so fast they modulate the waves into music.

[ncaso]

We check Raw Recruit game music...

[Arkhigoul]

A

MAZE

ING

[Asterra2]

Someday, somebody ought to disassemble the code to this music playroutine and figure out how to get the individual voices combined without the resulting acid noise. There are several tunes by Follin like this, only available via the Spectrum's speaker, or emulated equivalent.

I once tried to see if I couldn't clean up the acid effect in an audio editor. Didn't get very good results.

[SpiralPegasus]

@Asterra2 I know I'm replying to a year old comment but I'm highly interested in a clean version of this song.

If it is of any help I learnt today that emulators (or at least the one I use, ZXSpin) add a "dirty" sound not to just the emulated game, but to ANY speaker output.

I mean, I had Chronos open in ZXSpin and meanwhile I was browsing some HQ songs here on youtube and they had a clipping sound that disappeared when I closed ZXS.

Maybe there's a way to prevent that from happening?

[georgemargaris]

@SpiralPegasus Its funny that you say that... I just wanted to comment on a cover version.

I remember 10 years ago I (re)discovered tim follins stuff through the internet. I found a lot of cover versions of his classics.... It was formidable synthesizer music. I am trying to find it again.

[radishfest]

@SpiralPegasus you'd just have to use a piezo speaker (costs less than $2) and feed it the frequencies. i could do a nerdy-ass tutorial or post a re-recording, cool project ◑ ᴥ ◑

[SpiralPegasus]

@radishfest If I need the original console, I'm screwed, since I haven't seen one in like 20 years.

If I don't, then sure!

If you could post a rerecording that would be even better, since you know what you're meant to do and I don't haha.

Thanks for the reply :)

[fearandloathing19]

Dang, it's not on vgmusic...huuuuu

[McKottfars]

Also, isn't this music just 1-bit?

[LBcoyote]

Yes, it is.

[Meteotrance]

how man this guy is completly nuts he do impossible tune with 8 bit computer, the legato is just awesome !!!

[mingepotato]

This game and music is from a Sinclair Spectrum 48k computer.

[torwaron]

You are right its from good old Spectrum! It takes 10 minutes to load but a realy nice game! My first paralax shooter!

[lordcolor]

This tune is absolutely stunning. One of the most original 64 tunes I've heard. Tim Follin be the master.

[torwaron]

I loved this game and the music!

[thesearethedays]

I think this was another one from Tim Follin?