| Paza - Ninjani Diskus |
| Label: Independent |
By: monkey3
Aug 04 08 |
|
|
|
 |
Paza was my first foray into the Wonderful World of Chiptune Music. And I discovered him in rather roundabout way. Rather than looking for videogame music, like I had done with The Minibosses, this all began with an article in a free copy of Nintendo Power magazine... I wont bore with the details of how I acquired it, but there was this article on the artist Beck (Loser, anyone?) which intrigued me. Beck in a gaming magazine? The article was about his dabbling with chiptune music for an EP remix of four songs from the album “Guero”. The album was titled “Gamboy Variations”, and it was mentioned that Beck had worked with two chiptune artists to remix the songs, one of whom was Paza.
What I discovered was very pleasing to my nerdy bone (nerdgasm I dare say?).
|
|
I was very interested in this chiptune business and immediately googled Paza. What I discovered was very pleasing to my nerdy bone (nerdgasm I dare say?). The album I downloaded was called Ninjani Diskus and its songs quickly made their way into iTunes top 25 most played list. It had taken something I had a deep affection for and produced something entirely original with it. For a gamer nerd like me it was Manna from the internets.
Ninjani Diskus is an energetic, hectic, break-beat style of music that is culled entirely from sounds ripped from NSFs (Nintendo Sound Files) and the Commodore 64. Heavy percussive elements abound throughout most of the songs. Many of the songs are paced a breakneck speed and carry you along for a wonderful ride while visions of 8-bit sprite dance in your head. My favorite tracks from the album include:
Hijihijihiji – not sure what the hell the title means, but this song is peppy that makes you think of magical castles and skipping down brightly colored brick roads. This song makes me think abut what kind of music could have been on the early consoles. Fortunately now I have Paza to listen to.
Iudd – another mind boggling title but another great song. This song should make you want to bang you head along unless you have become one o the undead or you just really hate videogames. There is a little bit of heavily synthed vocals that I am not sure actually mean anything, but it doesn’t matter the song makes you feel like rocking out to 8-bit goodness.
Tiutiu – bloody hell, I am not sure about these names but this song is alternately slow and fast and sort of melancholy in a bright blippy sort of way.
|
|
Tiutiu – bloody hell, I am not sure about these names but this song is alternately slow and fast and sort of melancholy in a bright blippy sort of way. It reminds me in some way of scifi classic games like Contra or maybe Bionic Commando, the music isn’t similar, but it invokes that sort of cyberpunk like genre. Oh and there is random 8-bit frog and what I think is a puppy, sounds thrown in.
Dark – (see, they don’t all have incomprehensible names). This one is, like the name implies, a bit dark in pacing but somehow still as fast and energetic as the rest. This one has a really good beat, hard and heavy with some severely distorted vocals that I cannot identify. The Duck Hunt duck also lends its vocal talents.
Paza hails from Stockholm, which it seems is a large player in the chiptune world, and currently lives in the internets at a site called X-dump (or just go to pazarahm.com). His latest music under the name Paza Rahm and His Gummiband is a lot less chiptune than it is typical electronica (if there is such a thing) but it is still catchy and peppy and he has a number of songs for download, with their new album for sale on iTunes and Amazon. But if you want to download the wonderful Ninjani Diskus album you will need to venture to a site called 8 Bit Peoples. This is a beautiful site dedicated to chiptune (aka Bitpop) music from various artists and all for free. Do yourself a big favor and go there now!
|
|
|
|
|
| Latest Features |
|
| Latest CD Reviews |
|
|
|
