Among the few concepts I've dabbled with in the long lead-up to my next album, one in particular piqued my interest: I happened upon the means of a process by which one might compose for VGM (i.e., within the constraints of a track being playable on Mega Drive via the .vgm format), but subsequently export that composition to multitrack PCM (a WAV file for each of the six YM2612 and four SN76489 tracks involved in the Mega Drive's native VGM) for processing beyond the capabilities of the original hardware. This means that because the chip's channels are emulated separately, processing of those channels may be accomplished at a deeper level than the mere cosmetic embellishment of their combined stereo mix (or mono in the case of some chips). This involves some general mixing/mastering techniques, of course, and notable among those I would tend to apply is my signature method of shaping stereo fields.
The thinking here is that, while one can use all manner of mixing tricks and techniques to push the aural envelope beyond what conventional use a given piece of a hardware would normally yield, when dealing with a piece composed in a way so as to be reproducible on a common piece of hardware under ordinary circumstances (a game console in whatever level of home theater configuration), much of the aural character must arguably be insinuated in its composition or at least inferred by the listener or, at the very least, simply quite flat and restrained (if composed without an appreciation for the medium, say). Enthusiasts of such music bring to bear a sonic sensibility undoubtedly altered by some level of psychological proclivity which assigns this music a depth and breadth simply not present by any objective metric. It could be said that this insinuated character is present, yet simply subdued within the bounds of the hardware's constraints.
Nevertheless do such constraints lend to a creative process both unique and creatively conducive in a way distinctive from their more dynamic cousins among more formally musical or more advanced and contemporary production mediums. To this end, one might well compose a piece for such limited hardware simply unlikely to have been created on anything else, no matter how capable something like, say, a DAW or sampler may be in convincingly reproducing certain sounds or even the limitations of that hardware (admittedly, Plogue's Chipsynth MD, exemplary in that last regard, may well be an exception). To my thinking, composing in such a manner is more likely to yield compositions which might just as easily or more appropriately have taken a more high-resolution and dynamic audio thoroughfare and ill-require such a downgrade which arguably short-changes the spirit of the limitations merely suggested by such pantomime.
Essentially, I aim here for the composition of a track driven by the constraints of the original game hardware and be able to distribute this composition in a way playable on that hardware while additionally being able to employ emulation trickery in expanding and deepening and generally rendering a more intriguing form of its aural character. While this might seem a bit irreverent, my own sense is that I'm doing the PCM capture greater justice by treating it as raw material for recreating my own impression of the original VGM as its producer and composer.
In the context of Ghastly Shears, its original VGM audio and a demonstration of the manner of composition is available for listening/viewing here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCRwdGT2DXQ
The outcome, I think, has proved rather staggering, even by mine own amateur abilities as the engineer of this, I suppose, somewhat of a technical remix.
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