In 1998, Andrew Tokuda, a.k.a. Digital Droo, put down his electric guitar and decided to go solo. Little did he know that he would roll over from heavy metal into electronic-based "techno" music—a genre he wasn't quite fond of at the time. "It was the soundtrack from the movie Mortal Kombat 2 which made me switch," he reminisces. "I've never heard electronic music that mixed elements of hard rock, punk, heavy metal, and industrial. It eased me into electronica."
Droo has since recorded a party-bowl full of electronic music, using racks full of synthesizers, samples, and outboard effects. Many of these songs were distributed on the Internet in the form of the now ubiquitous MP3, a format which he feels helped him gain a decent following. The MacAddict CD has also been a vehicle for his "virtual" popularity. He put together a compilation of his earlier songs on a CD titled, The MacAddict Years, which is available at MP3.com (www.mp3.com/digitaldroo).
Droo's music has also caught the ears of several Macintosh game developers. Freeverse Software asked Droo to write music for their games, "Wingnuts" and "Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab." You can also hear his music on Aspyr Media's "Spy Hunter" game trailer (and during the company's logo sequence in the game).
His latest and greatest project is scoring the game soundtrack for "Active Lancer," published by Freeverse Software. The game features five pieces of music for five game levels, as well as music for the high score screen and theme. A soundtrack CD has been produced, and marks Digital Droo's first "official" album release. It features over 60 minutes of audio, including audio samples for one of the songs for remixers and DJs.
"I feel I've come a long way with this electronic music stuff, but I still feel like there's a long way to go," says Droo. "I've upgraded my setup from a rack full of hardware to an entirely software-based production environment. Aside from a few vocal effects, all the sounds on the Active Lancer CD originated from my Macintosh Dual 500 G4 running Emagic Logic Audio Platinum. This stuff truly rocks, and I've only touched the surface of the technology."
This song is a bite-sized remix of one of the songs from the Active Lancer soundtrack. For more information about Digital Droo or to purchase the Active Lancer soundtrack, visit Digital Droo's Web site at www.digitaldroo.com.
