======================================== The Trackers Handbook v0.10a ---------------------------------------- By Cools/Hertz ======================================== Introduction ------------ The Trackers Handbook has been written, not as a guide to one specific computer or tracker, but to cover every single aspect of tracking, every single tracker, and every single machine available ever. It is intended to be, when completed, the most comprehensive guide to tracking ever made, and a one-stop source of help for every level of tracker out there, from total beginners through to seasoned masters. It is not intended, however, to replace all the other great tracker tutorials and FAQs such as the alt.binaries.sounds.mods FAQ (even though the version I have is pretty old, I couldn't get hold of a copy newer than 1995). Just a short word to those in the scene that know about such things. I know there are hundreds of players and trackers around, but I can't go and get a copy of every single one and write an in-depth description all by myself. Main reason; I only own a PC :v( Second reason; I have other things to do as well as write this, such as tracking :v) Module players have been included here, for the simple reason that if you are writing a mod, you want to be aware of any possible conflicts and bugs that may occur when your music is played back on a different system from yours. This will enable you to maximise your audience. Hopefully I can steer this guide away from any sort of bias, but if any occurs, it is only due to my own and any contributors experience and preferences. Music style bias is quite likely, but that can only be expected, after all, it's human nature to like and hate certain styles. However, I will not allow any machine, tracker, sampler or player bias here, due to the fact that each has it's good and bad points. This is a very early alpha version, with vast areas and subjects incomplete, if you have any comments or contributions, or have spotted a mistake don't hesitate to contact me at :- E-Mail - c_o_o_l_s@hotmail.com Post - Matthew Coulson 16 The Pines Cilfrew Neath SA10 8AL Wales UK Please don't e-mail or post me requests for trackers, modules or samples. If I satisfy every request this will never get finished, so you'll just be wasting your time. Anyway, there's a list of Internet resources at the end, so use that... If you want to be on the mailing list to recieve the latest version when it's released (remember that it'll slowly grow in size), then just ask! Oh yeah, this is FREEWARE. Feel free to distribute, but not modify it. Cools Contributions ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ If e-mailing me about any these, please could you use the following as the subject of the message: - A contribution - Use "Contribution" - A mistake found - Use "Mistake" - A general comment - Use "Comment" Contributions are badly needed, and any contributors will have their names included in the contributors list at the end of the file, unless you specify otherwise (Even if your contribution doesn't get used your name will still appear here, unless you specify otherwise). If you want to contribute something, but don't know what, simply search for "(Information needed)" for some ideas. Anyone can contribute, no matter how experienced they are. So if you've just started and have found out something interesting, then send it in, you may be the only person that knows about it. You'll gain much respect for it. Rather than sending in general hints and tips, which are easy for me to find (even though they are much appreciated), I would rather have information on the trackers and players themselves. This is the hardest to find out, especially for trackers/players that are old and/or not well known and/or on a platform other than the PC. If I've included some tips or whatever, of yours without your permission (which will happen every time I find a new Bit of text myself, I'd rather have you tell me you don't want it, it saves time and means this gets added to quicker), and you don't want it to be included, just contact me so we can sort something out. One last point, don't send me anything if you want it to remain exactly how you wrote it. I WILL edit virtually everything, in order to keep the same sort of style right the way through. It makes it easier to read. ============================================================================= Contents -------- 1. Beginners - Erm, just what is a tracker? - Choosing a tracker - Amiga - DOS - Windows 3.1/95/NT - Mac - Unix/Linux/Sun/NeXT - Atari - Choosing hardware - Getting started - Ordering your resources - Let's go - The Effects column(s) - Sampling - Overusing voice samples - Ripping - Techniques 2. Intermediate - Effects - Sampling 3. Advanced - Effects - Going commercial 4. General Techniques - Spicing up your percussion - Zen of Tracking Advanced Tips and Tricks 5. Players - Amiga - DOS - Windows 3.1/95/NT - Mac - Unix/Linux/Sun/NeXT - Atari 6. MIDI (H e l p !) 7. Internet resources - General - Trackers - Samplers - Players - Samples - Modules 8. Glossary 9. Closing words - Thanks to... - Contributors - Future? ============================================================================= 1. Beginners Help! I don't know where to start! ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Being at the beginner stage is possibly the most difficult part of tracking, and it's where most people give up. The key is perseverance and practice. Listen to what others have to say about your initial attempts, but only listen if you know you'll get an honest opinion from them. Take on board any criticism, and use it to your advantage. Practice makes perfect, the more modules you write and sampling you do, the better you'll get, simple... - Erm, just what is a tracker? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A tracker is a piece of software that allows music to be made using only a computer and some sound samples. These sound samples are then played back at varying pitches and with various effects so as to produce music. The musical data used to describe how to play each note is arranged in a list like form, as shown below. Note Instrument Volume Effect command Effect parameters C#5 1 40 1 01 C#5 1 04 101 F-6 2 38 330 G-3 3 20 F05 --- -- 000 --- -- 102 --- -- 300 D-2 3 24 A0F C-4 4 -- 472 C#5 5 -- E93 --- -- 300 --- 3 P0 A0F --- -- 400 This data scrolls up the screen, and when it passes the cursor it gets processed and played. Not all trackers have this same layout, I've used FT2 for the example. Trackers produce files called modules, which is usually abbreviated to MOD. The term MOD originally meant a SoundTracker module, but over the years it has become a generic term for any type of module. MODs are a sort of hybrid MIDI/sample file. They contain sequencing information as well as the instruments (samples) that are used. It's actually quite hard to give trackers and MODs a 'definition' that can be understood by everyone. If you have Internet access then do a search for 'MOD trackers' and quite a number of definitions should pop up. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Choosing a tracker ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ May as well start at the beginning I suppose... Choosing a tracker to learn in is possibly the most important choice you can make. Some trackers have extremely difficult interfaces to learn, which, if you are only just starting out and have never used a tracker before, pose an additional aspect of learning that will need to be undertaken. There are six systems with trackers that I know of, classified as - - Amiga - DOS - Windows 95/NT - Mac - Unix/Linux/Sun/NeXT - Atari ST Obviously the system you own dictates what you can use, but the Amiga based trackers are split up into a few different areas, depending on your hardware. - Amiga (Information needed) ~~~~~~~~~ Ahhh, the good old days, where it all started... Amiga trackers are ten a penny, with traditional 4 channel trackers still prominent. Though many multichannel trackers are available, the majority of Amiga owners I know don't have a powerful enough system to use them effectively. Lets begin with what I personally reckon is the best Amiga tracker to learn on i.e. it's what I used, OctaMED. Currently in version Soundstudio 2, OctaMED has a Workbench style interface, and possibly the most comprehensive help system I have ever seen included with a tracker. OctaMED is a commercial package, though in the past complete versions have been included on magazines (how I got hold of it). OctaMED was the first tracker on any system to break the limits of 4 channels. By mixing two channels together and passing the result to the audio chip as they were being played, OctaMED could, as it's name suggests, play 8 channels at a time, albeit at a lower quality and slower speed than usual. OctaMED SoundStudio allows this barrier to be further broken, by allowing the use of up to 64 channels at 44.1 kHz in Stereo, even on an A500 (it won't work in real time on an A500, obviously). It also supports the use of certain Amiga 16-Bit Sound Cards, such as the Toccata, Delfina and Maestro. If you have one of these cards and, say, a 68030 or 040, then SoundStudio would be a sensible path to go down. The tracker that originally set the standard format for modules was ProTracker (experienced trackers will argue with me over this, but all will be revealled in a moment). Although SoundTracker was the first, it only had a few effects (arpeggio, set volume, set speed, pitch slide up, pitch slide down), and could only use 15 samples. ProTracker however, had lots of effects and could use 31 samples, a vast improvement over SoundTracker. ProTracker, like OctaMED, has a nice interface (though it's not Workbench like), and is easy to learn. Unlike OctaMED, ProTracker cannot handle more than 4 channels of sound, which may prove limiting to some people. - DOS ~~~~~~~~ There are a number of DOS based trackers around, generally each with their own MOD and instrument format, although most will allow loading of other formats as well. Scream Tracker 3 is a text-mode tracker, with a fairly basic interface. While powerful at its original release, it has now been superseded by other more powerful trackers. Fasttracker II is, according to United Trackers, the most used tracker at the moment. This could be down to the interface, which many trackers like due to its ease of use, being almost completely mouse driven. Fasttracker II has also been available for a long time now, which would also explain it's popularity. It uses it's own formats for modules and instruments. It's instrument format is more popular than IT's, possibly because it's been out for longer, and also because it's better supported in other trackers. Velvet Studio is another DOS tracker with a nice interface. Maybe not as easy to to use as FT2's, but nice all the same. It is very customisable and powerful. However, even the latest version is still quite buggy (while testing it it either crashed or hung the machine several times :v( ), so think carefully before setting out to learn how to use it. It's very good, just not very stable. Real Tracker 2 is again, another tracker with a good interface. It uses a Windows like modular environment, so you only have to have what you want on screen. It also, in the registered version, supports VESA screens, so you could, if you wanted, run it in 1280x1024 mode. On my machine, however, every time I quit the program it resets the machine, and there are a few other noticable bugs as well. Again, like Velvet Studio, think before learning it. However, if you don't care about a graphical, mouse driven interface, and want the most powerful DOS tracker currently available, then there is only one choice, Impulse Tracker. Ever since it's release it has been slowly gathering converts simply due to it's vast range of features. However, like I said above, it doesn't have a graphical interface. In fact, it's interface is almost exactly the same as ST3. If you've tried ST3 before, and liked it, then go with IT. - Windows 3.1/95/NT ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As far as I know, EasyMod for Windows is the only Windows 3.1 tracker available, but I don't know anything about it. (Information needed) There are two trackers available for Windows 95/NT, ModPlug Tracker and SoundStudio. Neither are completely finished yet, ModPlug being an alpha and SoundStudio being a beta. ModPlug Tracker is one of the few trackers that doesn't use it's own special module format, preferring instead to allow you to create Impulse Tracker, Fasttracker II, and ProTracker modules. Soundstudio looks like being a VERY good port from the Amiga, if they keep all the features from the original (synthetic sounds, hybrid samples/synths. How did the hybrids work anyway? I could never get anything to happen!) then it will probably be the best tracker yet. Since they use Windows 95/NT's sound drivers, you don't have to worry about using SB compatibilty or using a tracker which supports your specific sound card. As long as you have the latest 32-Bit drivers you will get the best quality sound possible from your sound card. - Mac ~~~~~~~ Player Pro 4.4.1: Can access the sound chip directly, so it takes less processor time than SoundTrecker. It'll still work when new Macs with new sound chips come out, because it can also use the regular Sound Manager 3.0 if necessary, like when the PowerMacs came out and Player Pro didn't support their sound chip. Only edits its own format, MADF, but it can import and export MOD, S3M, MIDI, and some other formats I can't remember right now. PlayerPro has a very mixed track record for some of its more obscure import and tracking options, but reportedly plays many of the basic mod formats better than the other Mac heavyweight, Sound-Trecker 2.2. PlayerPro is shareware and until you pay the $20 registration fee, most tracking/editing features are turned off (including import and save) and it will automatically quit after having been open for 20 minutes. A CD-ROM version is also available for $40, which comes with a library of mods and instrument samples. Upgrades are free, except for the upgrade from the disk to the CD-ROM version, which will cost $20 for an upgrade. Unlike Sound-Trecker, it is fully PowerMac-native, which means it FLIES by on a PowerMac. Sound-Trecker: $40 shareware. Partially, but not fully, PMac native, but it can do simulated surround sound for headphones or (I think...) Dolby Surround decoders. However, with the Surround option, the fact that it's not fully native really shows, as you hear clicks when you try to do other stuff. However, the slowdown isn't that severe on normal Macs. The two other advantages are that it can play (Octa)MEDs, which Player Pro can't handle, and some MODs play better with it than Player Pro. Keepin mind that with the extra features and bug fixes with Player Pro 4.2, most MODs play -much- better with Player Pro, though, and PP is cheaper. Rich "Akira" Pizor adds: Sound-Tracker is a shell program which plays formats based on plug-ins, providing for maximum flexibility, since plug-ins can easily be written whenever a new format is introduced. Currently, most of the standard 4- and 8-track MOD formats are supported. Also available is a plug- in that makes it PowerPC native. It is also known for having one of the better interfaces of Mac MOD players. The resources for creating/editing MODs are present, yet the appropriate menu items are greyed out. I've not met anyone who could explain this anomaly to me. The two theories I've heard are that you get editing capabilities if you register the program (German ReadMe not too well understood) or that the resources are simply sitting there while the author learns how to integrate the corresponding features into a later release of the program. MacMod Pro is currently on release 3.22. It is a complete player and tracker for the Mac, capable of creating mods from 4-32 channels. (The jury is still out on the file type, but it seems to save currently in standard ProTracker (M.K.) format.) It features all of the player options of Sound-Trecker 2.2, and the version currently on the info-mac archives also includes a sample MOD that's quite good, along with 5 instrument samples so you can get going right away. Since version 3.0.1, the help system has been improved tremendously. The staff editor and S3M compaitibility options haven't yet been implemented, but these are promised for the next release. The interface has also markedly improved. Looks like the author got some help from a more experienced programmer. MacMod Pro is shareware. A $25 registration fee is required to unlock the Save option, but all other functions work off the shelf, so you can get a good feel for how the program works and for what it takes to make a mod. Meditor 0.55 Delta: The first freeware tracker for the mac has arrived! Unlike PlayerPro or MacMod Pro, Meditor gives you full access to all its features right from download, so there's nothing to stop you from editing to your heart's content. It supports all the sound formats supported by Sound-Trecker as well as a new one called MMF; a Sound-Trecker plug for MMF format is included, but to my (editor's note: i.e. Akira's) knowledge there is no IBM-compatible program that supports this format. Meditor uses a variation of the "classical" editor, with no option for staff editing or digital editing. Supports all the standard effects and octave ranges, and allows up to 32 channels (more in MMF format, but why would you need more than 32?). Only one file can be open at a time and it's a little buggy, but hey - it's free. - Unix/Linux/Sun/NeXT (Information Needed) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I know there are trackers available for Unix, but do I know what they're called or what they're like? No - Atari ~~~~~~~~~ Atari ST: There is a port of ProTracker from the Amiga. This will allow you to create 4-track MODs. Atari STE/TT/Mega STE: To create mods on these machines, you basically have a choice of two programs - ProtrackerSTE or Octalyser ProtrackerSTE is an upgraded port of ProTracker from the Amiga. It handles only 4 tracks, but has the full PT command set and gives good quality playback. (Note there are also a bundle of PT clones for these machines, such as Esion) Octalyser is an 8-track tracker. You need a fast STE or a TT to playback all 8 tracks though. Octalyser will let you create or play back 4, 6 or 8 track mods. It will load many different mod formats, but not S3M or MTM. Sound quality is quite good. Atari Falcon030: For creating mods on this machine, there are basically three main choices: Octalyser (mentioned above) has drivers for the enhanced sound system, thus giving good quality playback, but only 4, 6 and 8 track MOD formats, not S3M or MTM. MegaTracker - 32 track tracker. All tracker commands and practically all mod formats are supported including S3M and MTM. Unbelievable speed and quality are produced by the DSP mixing. Unfortunately, the instructions have not yet been translated from French, but it is only a matter of time. Digital Tracker - 32 track tracker. Supports almost all tracker commands and formats, although it hangs on some S3Ms. this is commercial software and only a demo is available, which has certain restrictions. Conclusion ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Whatever tracker you decide on using, before you even start tracking with it, be sure to read the manual. Load a few already made modules in so you can play around with the various features and find out how they work. Spend a day figuring out every feature of the tracker. The only way to find out what tracker is best for you is to try out a few and then decide. I would recommend that you choose a tracker that produces a standard module format for the hardware you are producing on e.g. if you own an Amiga a MOD based tracker would be a good choice, on a PC an IT or XM tracker would be a good choice etc. DON'T do what I do and use multiple trackers to produce one tune, doing that is not advised (if you're interested I use FT2 and IT, FT2 to do the bulk of the work, and IT to tidy up and add panning. I just find FT2 more intuitive). It makes work much harder, especially if you get something sounding perfect in one (in my case gating in FT2), only to find it sounds horrible in the other. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Choosing Hardware ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The basic hardware requirements to track are:- A computer - You probably already have one of these. If you don't, then how on earth are you reading this! Your computer MUST have some sort of digital audio capabilities. If you have an Amiga, Atari or Mac then you should be okay for now. If you have a PC (and by that I don't necessarily mean an IBM compatible) without a digital sound card of some description, then you're finished before you've even started. Go out and get one now! Monitoring Equipment - A pair of speakers and/or a pair of headphones. Since we're talking about basic requirements here, practically anything will do to get you started. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Getting Started ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ok, so you've gotten hold of a tracker that you like the look and feel of, the next thing to do is to get hold of some samples and/or modules. These should preferably be in a style that you like and be of a reasonable quality. Just go to the Internet resources section for a list of places to look. If you don't have Internet access, then any local shareware libraries or BBS systems should be able to sort you out with some. Samples are preferable to modules, but it's easy enough to rip the samples out of modules. Alternatively, you could sample your own sounds, but this can be quite difficult to do if you don't know what you generally use or need. As you don't yet know how to track properly yet, I would recommend you choose which to learn first, tracking or sampling. This will ease the learning curve. If you want to learn the key points to good sampling, skip to the sampling section and when you've finished there, come back here. - Ordering your resources ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ First of all you'll need to set up a few directories in which to store your music stuff. There are many different ways to do this, but I'll describe mine for you to have a base to build on. Obviously you don't have to follow this, it's just to give you an idea of a structure. In the root of my HD I have a directory called Music. Within this directory are three others: Mods, Samples, and Other. Mods and Samples are self explanatory, and Others is used to store texts and such like. I keep all my trackers in their own directories in the root. Any tools that are for use exclusively with a tracker are kept with them in the same directory. Inside Mods are another two directories: My_Mods and Unfinish, which should be self explanatory. Mods itself contains MODs written by other people. Inside Samples are another set of directories. Bass, Breaks, Drumkit, Strings, Piano, Stabs, FX, Vocals, Chip, Temp. I also use directories for individual instruments (being a dance musician I download as many samples of 'classic' dance synths as possible). So the structure of my music directories is as follows:- ROOT-+-CD2WAV +-FT2------+-SHRINKXM | +-WAV2XI | +-XMC +-IT-------+-ITPR | +-ITF | +-ITTXT +-MUSIC----+-OTHER +-MODS-----+-MY_MODS | +-UNFINISH +-SAMPLES--+-BASS-----+-JV1080 | +-NOVBASS | +-TB-303 +-BREAKS +-CHIP +-DRUMKIT--+-BASS | +-CLAP | +-CRASH | +-HAND | +-HI-HAT | +-SNARE | +-TR-808 | +-TR-909 +-FX +-PIANO +-STABS +-STRINGS +-TEMP +-VOCALS As you can see I try not to categorise samples too much. For example the strings directory is used to hold pads, violins etc. Basically anything that sounds 'stringy' 8v). This allows me quick access to the samples I want (I can remember what most of them are called and sound like). I also regularly clean out my sample collection by getting rid of any that are bad quality - clipped, noisy etc. Any that I'm unlikely to ever use or I have already used and don't want to use again are also gotten rid of. I would recommend you start off by creating some sort of structure, it'll stop your disk getting cluttered and enable you to work more efficiently. - Let's go ~~~~~~~~~~~~ By now you should have a tracker you're happy with, some samples and/or some modules. Start up the tracker, and load a sample or two in and "jam" with them. Play around and get used to what keys notes correspond to. When you have a riff that you're happy with, try inputting it into a channel. This can be done in two ways, either in step-time or in real-time. The majority of modules are produced in step-time, maybe with a small amount of real-time just to see roughly where the notes need to be placed. If you have a MIDI keyboard connected to your sound card (Information needed), then you could use that to input the notes. Generally though, due to the harsh amount of quantitization that occurs with a tracker you are better off doing it in step-time. Once you've managed to get this riff into a channel or two, and it plays back sounding all right, you're ready to carry on with the rest of the pattern. Start with the bassline. I would recommend that you try producing a few 4 channel modules first, use one channel for drums, one for bass, one for lead, and one for chords. This should help as you'll always be able to see what's going on, on the screen. If you find you do want to use more channels to begin with, then by all means go ahead, but bear in mind that most of the great tracker musicians today started on 4 channel modules... Start by writing music that you really like listening to - don't try and write an orchestral piece if you don't listen to it - it'll show. The best way to learn how to do something is to watch someone else do it. This applies to tracking as well. You can learn a lot just from listening to the great ones in the scene. If you come up with a tune idea and you know what you want it to sound like, it helps a lot to look for a tune from one of the masters that sounds similar to what you want to write, and listen to their tune over and over again. Look for the things they do with their tune that sets that tracker apart from the others in the scene, and if you can adapt their techniques into your song in an original way, do it. Never release your first tune. There are very few people who are gifted enough to really make a quality tune the first time - it's all practice and experience! Once you have finished a tune, listen to it a couple of days after... see whether you can view it from another point of view. Get a couple of friends to listen to it and ask for some constructive criticism, you know, what's good as well as what's bad. If you want to make a tune realistic, try to imagine how the instrument would be played. Pretend you are a musician when you write a part.. Also, if you use an instrument such as a piano, try to use more than a single piano note - a real piano will have more than one note playing at a time - use some chords, etc. Originally, people used to sample whole chords to save sample space. Now we've got these wonderful trackers with gazillions of channels. Constructing chords from notes because you have the space to do so gives a better and more a professional sound. However, be very careful! If you decide to construct a chord rather than use a single sample, some musicianship is required. Simple major chords are easy, but inversions really add to a piece. If you are able to do it this way, you'll get a professional, crafted sound. But it does take a long time before you'll get a smooth flowing part. For a nice fill to the sound, try to balance the usage of low and high frequencies. Tunes with too much bass and too little treble sound rough, tunes with too much treble and too little bass sound insubstantial. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Effects column(s) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ By now you should be wanting to experiment with some effects, to make your music more interesting and more professional. Before we start, lets just get something straight. Effects should only be used when they are needed. Using effects just because you can doesn't automatically improve the quality of your music. This section will only cover effects with letters/numbers that can be used in ProTracker MODs. This is to keep some sort of standard. Many trackers use different letters/numbers to represent the same effect, so check before trying anything. If you try an effect listed here and it produces a result completely different to how it is described here, then consult your trackers manual. Effects are typed into the rightmost column of each channel in every tracker. They consist of an effect command and a value. Different trackers have different letters and numbers for the same effect command. But pretty much all of them work with hexadecimal for the value. If you don't know what hex is, then the following extract, taken from the Impulse Tracker manual, should help. Instead of using a decimal system (ie. base 10), it is more natural for the computer to work with hexadecimal (often abbreviated to simply 'Hex') - numbers which operate in base 16. The first 9 numbers in hex are denoted by '1' to '9' and the next 6 are denoted by 'A' to 'F'. So if you count in hex, it will be as follows: (0), 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, C, D, E, F, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 1A, 1B, 1C, 1D, 1E, 1F, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 2A etc. To convert a hex number to decimal, multiply the 'tens' column by 16 and add the value of the second column. ie. 32 Hex = 3*16+2 = 50 decimal. 2A hex = 2*16+10 = 42. (because A = 10) The maximum number that you can represent with two Hex digits is FF = 255 decimal. Let's start with the most basic effect, the set volume command: C. Input a note, then move the cursor to the effects command column and type a C. Play the pattern, and you shouldn't be able to hear the note you placed the C by. This is because the effect parameters are 00. Change the two zeros to a 40 (hex)/64 (dec), depending on what your tracker uses. Play back the pattern again, and the note should come in at full volume. The position jump command next. This is just a B followed by the position in the playing list that you want to jump to. One thing to remember is that the playing list always starts at 0, not 1. This command is usually in hex. Onto the volume slide command: A. This is slightly more complex (much more if you're using FT2 or IT, if you want to achieve the results here, then set slides to Amiga, not linear), due to the fact it depends on the secondary tempo. For now, set the secondary tempo to 06 (you can play around later :v), load a long or looped sample and input a note or two. A few rows after a note type in the effect command A. For the parameters use 0F. Play back the pattern, and you should notice that when the effect kicks in, the sample drops to a very low volume very quickly. Change the effect parameters to F0, and use a low volume command on the note. Play back the pattern, and when the slide kicks in the volume of the note should increase very quickly. This because each part of the effect parameters for the A command does a different thing. The first number slides the volume up, and the second slides it down. It's not recommended that you use both a volume up and volume down at the same time, due to the fact the tracker only looks for the first number that isn't set to 0. If you specify parameters of 8F, the tracker will see the 8, ignore the F, and slide the volume up. Using a slide up and down at same time just makes you look stupid :v) Don't do it... The Set Tempo command: F, is pretty easy to understand. You simply specify the BPM (in Hex) that you want to change to. One important thing to note is that a value of lower than 20 (hex) sets the secondary tempo rather than the primary. Another useful command is the Pattern Break: D. This will stop the playing of the current pattern and skip to the next one in the playing list. By using parameters of more than 00 you can also specify which line to begin playing from. The next command we'll look at is the portamento up/down: 1 and 2. Command 1 slides the pitch up at a specified speed, and 2 slides it down. This command works in a similar way to the volume slide, in that it is dependant on the secondary tempo. Another portamento command is 3: Portamento to Note. This slides the currently playing note to another note, at a specified speed. Unlike the 1 & 2 commands however, this one stops when it reaches the desired note. The best way to describe this is to give an example. C-2 1 000 - Starts the note playing --- 000 C-3 330 - Starts the slide to C-6 at a speed of 30. --- 300 - Continues the slide --- 300 - Continues the slide One thing you can note about this and many other commands is that is it has a memory. Once the paramenters have been set, the command can be input again without any parameters, and it'll still perform the same function unless you change the parameters. This memory function allows certain certain commands to function correctly, such as command 5, which is the Portamento to Note and Volume Slide command. Once command 3 has been set up command 5 will simply take the parameters from that and perform a Portamento to Note. Any parameters set up for command 5 itself simply perform a Volume Slide identical to command A at the same time as the Portamento to Note. There are various other commands which perform two functions at once, but these will be listed later. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sampling ~~~~~~~~~~ Let's talk about all the business that goes on before a sound ever gets to your computer's memory. Sound in the air is continuously changing, and when it gets converted to an electrical signal the changes are still continuous. Your computer, however, can only store numbers using a limited number of digits or precision. Continuously varying sound is called an analogue signal. Once the computer grabs the sound, it doesn't have enough precision to store all the information about the sound in order to perfectly reproduce it. What the computer has stored is called a digital signal representation. Your sound card captures information about an analogue sound signal by measuring its intensity at a given instant. This corresponds to one single point on the waveforms we've been looking at. In order to capture an entire waveform, the measurement process must be repeated at a high rate, usually thousands of times a second. Since the hardware has limited speed and memory capacity, there are only so many points it can capture. Any information between those points is lost forever. This process of capturing the sound in small intervals is called sampling. To play back a sound, we just reverse the process and convert the digital samples back to an analog signal. Of course, the new signal will probably retain some of the staircase effect, so the reproduction won't be perfect. There are four main things to consider when sampling. The sample resolution and frequency, amplitude, and copyright (very important). The sample resolution is another term for the number of bits a sound is sampled at. All trackers can handle 8-Bit samples, and most modern ones are able to use 16-Bit samples as well. Sampling in 16-Bit will render better quality sound all the time, while 8-Bit can sound the same, most people would advise 16-Bit samples all the time. The main problem with a lower resolution is that you are likely to get some or a lot of noise, depending on the quality of your source. The only trouble with 16-Bit samples is that they are twice as large as 8-Bit ones. A good trick to use is to sample in 16-Bit, do all your editing in 16-Bit, compose with 16-Bit samples, then for the release convert the all the samples to 8-Bit. You'll find you can halve the size of your MOD this way (But make sure you keep a copy of the 16-Bit version). The listener may lose some quality, but this is usually masked by the mixing routine of the player. More important than the resolution of the sample when determining quality is the sample freqency. The sample frequency refers to the number of "snapshots" of the incoming sound taken per second. The higher the sampling frequency, the better the reproduction of the sound is. So just how many snapshots do we need? If you look at audio specs much, you've seen CD sampling rates of 44.1 kHz, or 44,100 samples per second. That's a lot of snapshots! A well-known signal processing theorem (Nyquist Theorem) says that to accurately reproduce a signal, you have to sample at a rate at least twice the highest frequency component in the signal. So the CD sampling rate of 44.1 kHz will capture frequencies up to 22 kHz. You might be wondering what happens if you don't sample at a high enough frequency. Well, what you get is something called aliasing. This sinister sounding term just means that since the sample points aren't close enough together, it looks as though you sampled a lower frequency that really wasn't part of the original signal. Alias frequencies are like ghosts - poltergeists really - you can't see them but they make a lot of noise. So by sampling at too low a rate, not only do you miss some of the high frequencies, some of them get thrown back into the mix as unwanted guests at lower frequencies. They are audible as background noise and distortion. Monitoring the volume of the incoming sound is vital to produce a good quality sample. If your sampler uses oscilloscopes to "view" the sound then make sure the waveform gets as close to the top and bottom of the window, without flattening out (clipping). If your sampler uses volume meters instead you want to get the sample as near to 0 dB as possible, without going above. Now, onto copyrights. If you're not planning on ever releasing a tune commercially then use samples from wherever you like. It's extremely unlikely anybody will bother chasing you when they know you won't be making any money from it. If however, you eventually want to be able to release your music, then pay close attention. If you sample individual sounds, you should be able to get away with it (especially if you hear the sound in three or more commercial tunes). If you sample large and/or easily recognisable parts of any tunes, then get them checked out before you even think about releasing your tune. After all, I don't expect you fancy paying out large sums of money just because of one simple little sample. Take the time to tune all your samples as accurately as possible. To do this, play a long, clear, looped sample, then move to another channel and tune ALL your other samples to this one sample (so they all have the same reference). Many potentially excellent modules have been spoilt because they were poorly tuned. Of course, this doesn't count the cases where samples are intentionally slightly sharp or flat for effect (which should be the rarity instead of a rule). - Overusing Voice Samples An extremely common mistake made by even some experienced trackers is finding a voice clip that they think sounds absolutely great or hilarious, and sticking it into their latest song approximately 87 times. People often do this with dance tracks. This very frequently kills what would otherwise be some truly great songs. No matter how funny or cool something sounds the first time you hear it, there are only so many times you can hear it and still like it. Also, music is about hearing a melody or grooving to a cool dance beat, not hearing somebody say the same thing over and over again, so your song shouldn't rely on voice clips to sound good. If you delete the voice clips from one of your songs and find that it sounds terrible without them, that means that you relied too much on the voice clip and don't have enough MUSIC. Using a truly funny or interesting voice clip once or twice can make a good song great, but it can't make a bad song good. - Ripping There are a number of very important points that should be kept in mind when ripping samples. Look for samples that sound clear and don't have any clicking sounds at the point where it loops. If you're looking for a sample of a real instrument, make sure it really sounds like the instrument or else it will sound stupid. Also, the newer the sample, the better. And finally, if you rip samples, it helps a lot if you e-mail the person who made them to get permission to use them, but if you don't get permission, AT LEAST thank the person in the Sample Text. That's just basic politeness. Okay, you're probably fed up of reading about sampling and actually want to do some for yourself. First of all you need some sampling hardware, on a PC virtually every sound card in existance can do some sort of sampling. On an Amiga or Atari you're going to need some extra hardware on top of the built in Start by centralising, and then normalising the sample. Then, starting at the end of sample (always work from the end first, any computer will find it easier to fill an area of memory with 0s than shifting a large chunk of memory around) zoom in and look for a point on the centre where you think your sample ends. Zoom back out to the whole view, does it look like you've marked the right place, if it does then mark from that part to the end of the sample and delete it. This is where ============================================================================= 2. Intermediate Ok, I know my way around, I can sample and use effects, and I've released a few mods, but just how are certain things done? ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Effects ~~~~~~~~~ Do you use echoes on various parts of your MODs? If not, why not? They are an easy way of filling out the sound. Really easy to do as well. Simply copy a channel into another empty channel, change the volume of the channel down to under half of it's current volume, and insert a row in only that channel. Play back the pattern, if it sounds nice, then you've succeeded. Inserting only one row will only work well at slow BPMs, however, so keep on inserting and playing back until it sounds nice. One point to remember, and this is something I've seen in many MODs, even ones produced by masters (I won't give any names :v]), is that if the echo is fairly long a few notes will be chopped off the end of the echoed channel when you insert rows. But these notes still exist in the original channel. When the tune is played back the echo will appear to stop at the beginning of each pattern, and then start again. This reduces the 'live' feel of the entire tune. Just remember to copy the chopped notes onto the beginning of the next pattern in the playing list, and everything will sound fine. Another cool effect (IMHO) is gating. This is usually done with the A command. Load a long/looped sample and set it to maximum volume. Now input the channel below (The notes can be anything, but keep the effects the same) (No Volume Column) C-5 1 A0F - Starts note, slides volume --- 1 A0F - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A0F - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A0F - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A0F - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A0F - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A0C - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A08 - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume E-5 1 A0A - Starts note, slides volume --- 1 A0A - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A08 - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A06 - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume D-5 1 A08 - Starts note, slides volume --- 1 A08 - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A06 - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume --- 1 A04 - Sets volume to sample default volume, then slides volume Now play, and you should find that you get this choppy sound that gets less choppy with the slower slides. That choppiness is gating. Gating works best when used on strings and vocals, but just play around and see what you come up with. Sampling ~~~~~~~~~~ Do you have a CD-ROM drive? If so, do you use a CD-Ripper? You should do. (If you already do then you can skip this section) A CD-Ripper will allow you to get -perfect- copies of audio on CDs. Which means no noise to spoil your lovely sample. As far as I know, FT2 is the only tracker to have a ripper built in, but it isn't very compatible. If you use DOS for tracking then a CD-ripper called CD2Wav seems to work very well, it'll also take advantage of any 32-Bit CD-ROM drivers installed if you run it under Windows 95/NT. However it can't rip specific sections of a CD. If you want a small 2 second bite of sound from the end of the track, you have to rip everything before the part you want, which is very inconvenient. If you want to rip CD-DA on Windows 3.1, then the only package I know of is Digital Domain. This is quite basic, but it does the job quickly and effectively. On Windows 95/NT, CD-Worx would be a good choice. CD-Worx comes in separate versions for 95 and NT, due to the fact that NT uses a different way of handling things. CD-Worx is a nice program, with features for ripping from a variety of CD formats. One problem you more than likely find if you use Windows 95 OSR2 is that CD-Rippers don't seem to work with it. To get around this you'll have to bypass Windows 95's 32-Bit disk drivers by going to Control Panel/System/ Performance/File-System/Troubleshooting/Disable All 32-Bit Protect-Mode Disk Drivers. Note that you must have DOS CD-ROM drivers installed for this to work properly. ============================================================================= 3. Advanced I know everything :v) - what next? ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- The key thing you want to remember when you're at this stage is that everything must be professionally done, whether it's sampling, tracking, use of effects, absolutely everything must be at top quality. Vocals ~~~~~~~~ Chances are that some time or other you are going to want to incorporate some sort of vocals into your music. This can be very hard, and there are two important things to remember: the vocalist, and the words. Both should be of equal importance in your mind. A good vocalist singing crap words sounds unprofessional, the same goes for a crap vocalist singing great words. Few people can sing well, and even fewer can write respectable songs. Your best chance of getting good vocals is to find someone who is willing to write some lyrics for you (who is able to write lyrics), and then hire a studio and a vocalist for a couple of hours. The main reason for hiring a studio is that it'll probably have VERY expensive and VERY nice microphones. They'll know all about using them and they'll also have the best environment to record in. Remember that you'll probably want to take a recording of your tune with you so the vocalist will have something to sing to! You can then sample the vocals and incorporate them into your tune. Obviously you'll have to check that the studio has a sampler that can save onto disks that you can use, the actual file format isn't too important as there are plenty of converters around. An alternative method would be to find out if the studio has a CD- Recorder, you could then record the vocals direct to CD and rip them off at your leisure. The same goes if you have a DAT machine, you could record to DAT in the studio and then sample the vocals when you want. Effects ~~~~~~~~~ Going commercial ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Releasing commercially when you use a tracker is nigh on impossible, due to the lack of respect trackers have from 'proper' musicians. Although there are a lucky few who have done it. Names that spring to mind are Bjorn Lynne (Dr. Awesome), Dex + Jonesey, Eric Giesen (Sidewinder), Vivid (Does anyone know of anyone else? No 'apparently' please!). The main problem with getting your music released is the output format. Here's a short table to determine whether or not you'll have this problem. Soundcard quality DAT machine CD-Writer Problem? ----------------- ----------- --------- -------- Good, with digital Yes Yes No output Good, with digital Yes No No output Good, with digital No Yes No output Good, with digital No No Yes output Bad, no digital Yes Yes No output Bad, no digital Yes No Yes output Bad, no digital No Yes No output Bad, no digital No No Yes output Basically, as long as you have a CD-Writer or a good quality digital output and DAT machine, you won't have a problem getting a good quality recording. Which means you'll be able to produce good quality demos without the need to hire a professional studio (!) or mastering company. Something else to consider when you're going professional is the quality of your samples. The number of times I've heard a tune good enough to be released that has been spoiled by bad samples is ridiculous. Drums are generally the culprits, especially those with high frequencies in them. Don't settle for anything less than CD-Quality, unless you want that 'in vogue' lo-fi sound. ============================================================================= 4. Techniques ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Spicing up your percussion (Taken from CU Amiga May 1994 - Slightly edited to be more generic) Fat Beats ~~~~~~~~~~~ There are a number of things you can do to add a Bit of life to your percussion. One of the best ways to beef up a drum sample is to mix it with another sample. You've probably already experimented with this, mixing kick, snare and hi-hat samples, in order to fit your entire rhythm into one track. However, to get a really kickin' sound, try mixing your percussion samples with samples of tuned instruments. For instance, mixing a really deep analogue-type bass sound with a kick drum produces a really heavy, squelchy, dance floor sound. Similarly, try mixing snare and guitar sounds, for an unusual and funky effect. try adding Laser-type pulse sounds to 808 style snares for an authentic Sheffield clunk and bleep sound. Echomania ~~~~~~~~~~~ Another way to add a Bit of life to a rhythm track made up of individual samples, is to echo the entire track. This is a quick way of funking up your percussion, and you'll find you can create a great track with only kick, snare, and open hi-hat when you use echo in this way. Bring Out Your Dead ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You've probably got quite a collection of hackneyed breakbeats, which are instantly recognisable, and therefore pretty much unusable. One way round this is to sample some more, but it theory at least, you always have to be careful of the copyright laws when sampling other peoples material You could always buy a sample-compilation CD, but most of these are a tad expensive for the casual user. On the other hand, it's quite possible to breathe new life into a dead breakbeat. One method, is to apply some sort of sound effect to the sample, preferably in stereo. Most sampling software nowadays has a range of effects built in with which you can process you sample, but most of these produce fairly unsubtle results when applied to percussion samples. So what's the alternative, if you can spare the memory and two tracks (a stereo pair is what we're looking for here), is to use the tracker itself to produce a real-time phasing effect. To do this, load the same breakbeat sample into two different sample locations. For best results, pick a breakbeat that stretches over two bars (32 lines of a standard 64 line pattern). Play the first instance of the sample (at a reasonable rate!) on line 0 and line 32 of a 64 line pattern, on one track. Do the same thing on track 2, but this time with the second version of the sample. Now for the clever Bit. Fine tune the second version of the sample up or down one or two points. Now when you play the pattern, you'll get a phasing effect, with the rhythms moving in and out of the stereo field - great for trance techno type extravaganzas. If you're feeling particularly adventurous, try playing one of the samples an octave down from the other. If you can't spare the memory or two tracks for the rhythm, you can get a similar effect in mono as follows. Load up the first and second breakbeat as before, and resample or pitch shift the second by a few points, then mix them together. The effect is a lot less subtle than the stereo version, but can be just as effective in the right circumstances. On A Ragga Tip ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Another way to squeeze the last Bit of life out of a dying rhythm is to change the playing length and sample trigger positions from the normal start of the bar. This is a technique much favoured by breakbeat and jungle techno groups like SL2 and The Prodigy, and works best at fairly fast BPMs. Play your breakbeat on lines 0 and 32, and adjust the tempo so that the rhythms trigger in time, with no glitches. Now trigger the sample on the following lines: 0,6,16,26,32,42,48 and 54. When you play this back, you'll have a rhythm track that sort of rolls around the beat - perfect for just adding a bassline and calling it your finished song! For a brutal stereo version of this, try playing the same sample on a different track (on the opposite stereo channel) on the following lines: 0, 10,16,22,32,38,48 and 58. You might even go the whole hog and combine this with the stereo phasing effect. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- - The Zen of Tracking Advanced Tips and Tricks (Slightly edited for formatting) o Indian food for thought (Greets to Graham the Happy Scum for this idea in TW#86 "Wrecking Samples with Impulse Tracker"... despite a few technical glitches.) You can get a very Indian-sounding "24-tone" scale in Impulse Tracker by using this technique: (FT2 users will have to accomplish the same thing via the "tone" setting) Load your sample twice. Look at the second one, and write down the samplerate. Multiply that number by 1.0304 (NOT 1.0293, as in TW86) and put the result in the "playback rate" field of the first sample. Now you have a consonant tone in the second sample and a semitone above that in the first. By playing the second at C-5 then the first at C-5 then the second at C#5 then the first at C#5... (and so on), you get a semi-tone chromatic, which is pretty weird. : ) If you're really bold, you might get some cool Indian sounding stuff going out of it. Good luck tracking it, though. It's a whole new set of musical theory. : P o The Amigascene and you If you either release or listen to .MODs (not .XMs, .ITs or .S3Ms, etc), then you're probably aware of the Amiga scene, which still uses the .MOD format today. If so, keep this in mind: the Amiga plays music 1bpm faster than PCs. For example, at speed '6' in a .MOD, a PC is playing it at 120 bpm (I would assume, anyway), and an Amiga is playing it at 121 bpm. What this means to you, the listener, is that certain drum loops and riff samples will sound off-kilter, rhythmically. So be a little more forgiving in such circumstances. If you want to hear it as it was originally written on the Amiga, put it in FastTracker (or whatever your favorite tracker is), save it as an .XM (likewise with the favorites), and change all the tempos in the song to their appropriate Fine-tempos (bpm), plus one. There are also some other effects that don't convert well from Amiga to PC, which are apparent in chip tunes. For the best reproduction (though still not perfect), look for a player called "Midas Player", since it handles things a little better than most with .MODs. Radix has a few things to add: well.. In protracker the EFx command is used alot... it actually changes the waveform in the sample (only in the beginning), so in chiptunes, chipsounds can get somekind of wavesequence sound, "weeeeeeeeoooong" ... that does not work on any prog on pc I have seen anyway... and arpeggio on pc is not that fun either :/ don't know really, but chip sounds sound better on Amiga... another thing is that pc with a GUS can sound really awful while playing a high and a low tone of the same sample at once... this is really lame.. like a C-3 and a C-7 (same sample) sound really untuned o Very Cool Reverb Sure, you have an echoed lead. But do you have a reverberated lead? This sounds very cool indeed: Load the lead in your favorite sample editor (mine's CoolEdit), reverb it however you like (I use a straight reverb, on the "last row seats" setting), so that it's REAL deep. Now load the tracker. Create the echo track as usual (copy the lead, offset it by a few rows, and change the volume to less than 50% of the lead) .. Much nicer, eh? If you want a reverb that's not-as-deep to use somewhere else, you can widen it for the echo track, creating this weird echoed attack kind of thing, like this(FT2 Format, 1 is the lead, 2 is the reverb): 01 C-5 01 40 000 C-5 02 08 840 02 --- -- -- 000 C-5 02 10 8A0 03 --- -- -- 000 C-5 02 20 880 04 --- -- -- 000 --- -- -- 000 05 F-5 01 34 000 F-5 02 08 8C0 06 --- -- -- 000 F-5 02 10 860 07 --- -- -- 000 F-5 02 20 880 08 D#5 01 3C 000 D#5 02 08 840 09 --- -- -- 000 D#5 02 10 8A0 0A D-5 01 30 000 D-5 02 08 8C0 .. ... .. .. ... ... .. .. ... Of course, you don't need to keep retriggering the note. I just thought it sounded cool with bouncing pan. In any case, I think a reverb-ed lead sounds even better than an echoed version... Try it and see for yourself. o 'Phased' Leads A very cool effect for writing leads, which is commonly used by advanced trackers is a phased synth string. (In fact, it's almost hard to call this an 'advanced' trick.) You can find samples that work for this is a lot of different places (any good 'sweep' string sample will do), but the way that they're used is the important aspect... It's quite simple, really. You just create an instrument with a volume envelope typical of a lead... Something with a sharp attack, a moderate length sustain, and an expontentially quieter decay (my ANSI art is miserable, but I'll try): . <-- Full volume here |\______ / \ |<-- 60% \_ volume \__ here \____ \________ \ <-- 10% volume here (or less), and a moderate (300ish) fadeout. The total length of the envelope should be about twice as long as the average length of the note (ie: an average length of a quarter-note should have an envelope that lasts about as long as a half-note). Now, as you write your lead, keep the notes in the same channel, and slide to them at a very fast rate ('F', generally), like this: 01 C-5 01 40 000 <-- This starts off the sweep 02 --- -- -- 000 03 --- -- -- 000 04 --- -- -- 000 05 F-5 01 34 3F0 <-- You slide to the note here 06 --- -- -- 000 07 --- -- -- 000 08 D#5 01 3C 3F0 <-- And here... See the effect? 09 --- -- -- 000 0A D-5 01 30 3F0 <-- Etc. Retrigger the note .. ... .. .. ... to 'start over' the phase. It's important, however, that you echo this lead in another channel, since it will sound fairly flat otherwise. ============================================================================= 5. Players ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- - Amiga - DOS - Windows 3.1/95/NT - Mac - Unix/Linux/Sun/NeXT - Atari ============================================================================= 6. MIDI ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- (H e l p !) ============================================================================= 7. Internet Resources ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Links marked with a * haven't been tested by me. Only Web sites have been included as they are usually quicker to search through and access than FTP (or so I've found). If you want FTP sites to be listed then send me home directories for the particular software. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- General ~~~~~~~~~ Hertz - http://www2.prestel.co.uk/hertz United Trackers - http://united-trackers.org MAZ Sound Page - http://www.maz-sound.com Hornet - http://www.hornet.org Mod Resource Web - *http://www.armory.com/~greebo/mod.html League of Kaos - http://www.loknet.demon.co.uk Kims Mod Page - http://www.castlex.com/mods Novus's Wide - http://surf.to/novus World of MODs Temple of MOD - http://egnatia.ee.auth.gr/~nalevrid ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Trackers ~~~~~~~~~~ Amiga ~~~~~~~ OctaMED - http://www.octamed.co.uk Windows 3.1/95/NT ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ModPlug Tracker - http://www.castlex.com/modplug SoundStudio - http://www.octamed.co.uk DOS ~~~~~ Impulse Tracker - American Homepage - *http://www.citenet.net/noise/it - European Homepage - *http://huizen.dds.nl/~im-pulse - UK Homepage - *http://www.cin-net.demon.co.uk Fasttracker II - http://www.starbreeze.com Real Tracker 2 - http://www.utbm.fr/les.personnes/arnaud.hasenfratz/rt/ Velvet Studio - http://velvet.home.ml.org Mac ~~~~~ PlayerPro - *http://www.quadmation.com/pphome.htm Unix/Linux ~~~~~~~~~~~~ ?????? - *http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~conradp/maube ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Samplers ~~~~~~~~~~ Cool Edit - http://www.syntrillium.com GoldWave - http://www.goldwave.com CD2Wav - *http://sunny.aha.ru/~gw/ ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Players ~~~~~~~~~ Amiga ~~~~~~~ Windows 3.1/95/NT ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ModPlug Player - http://www.castlex.com/modplug (95/NT) Mod4Win - http://www.mod4win.com (3.1/95/NT) OctaMEDPlayer - http://www.octamed.co.uk (95/NT) DOS ~~~~~ Cubic Player - http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Vista/4107/ e_index.html Mac ~~~~~ MacMikMod - *http://www.stack.nl/~mikmak/mikmod.htm Unix/Linux ~~~~~~~~~~~~ MikMod - *http://www.stack.nl/~mikmak/mikmod.htm ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Samples ~~~~~~~~~ Synths - http://www.volftp.vol.it/soundwave/samples.html (Only go to this site if you are prepared for some LARGE d/ls. Contains COMPLETE sound sets from many synths) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Modules ~~~~~~~~~ The ModArchive - http://www.modarchive.com ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- If any of the above links are missing or down then contact me so I can remove them. If you have any to add, then send me the category and the URL... ============================================================================= 8. Glossary A ~~~ Analogue - Voltage controlled as opposed to pulse controlled. Analogue sound can more easily be used to accurately represent the original sound that it recorded than digital can. The disadvantage is that analogue has more imperfections in the sound. Arpeggio - A method used by synthesizers that did not have enough voices to constantly have chords (like the SID which only had three voices). Instead, it would rapidly play the notes in sequence by taking the instrument and sliding it past the three notes rapidly. This effect is still used to reproduce that sound. Art Of Noise - (Information needed) B ~~~ BPM - Beats Per Minute Buffer - A buffer is used in many players to store extra music data in case something slows down the computer. It can still read from the buffer and play the music. C ~~~ CD-DA - Compact Disc Digital Audio CD-Quality - 44.1 kHz, 16-Bit, Stereo sound. Centralize - To center a wave on the 0 mark. Channel - What notes are put on in a tracker. In earlier trackers, one channel could only have one note at a time (one note would cut the other off). By using NNAs, one note on a channel can ring out past another note on the same channel. Chiptune - A module that is made to sound like an early computer music synthesizer, usually sounding like the Commodore 64 (SID), Nintendo, Game Gear, Lynx or Game Boy sound chips. However, this has come to mean any module that is small in size, usually anywhere from 5 to 20kbytes. Clipping - When a sample is amplified up so that the peaks of the waveform go past the maximum level allowed and get flattened out. Column - A section of a channel. The first column is the notes column which keeps track of the note (A-G) and the octave (0-9). Between the note and the octave, there is either a dash (-) or a number sign (#). The number sign says that the note is sharp. The second column is the sample/instrument column. This column says what sample or instrument number is used to play the note. The third column is the volume column. This is the volume (in the 0-64 range) that the note is played at. In recent trackers, this can also be used for limited effects. The fourth column is the effects column. This starts with the letter (or in some cases, the number) of the effect (for example, 3 is slide-to-note) and ends with a number which is exactly how the effect will operate. 34A would mean that the sound would slide into this note with a speed of 4A. The number depends on the effect. Composer 669 - (Information needed) Crossfading - This technique is used to fade out one sound while another fades in (preferably at the same rate). The result is that one sound fades into the next smoothly. Cubic Player - MOD player for DOS. Cutoff - The point in which a filter starts to gradually cut frequencies out of the sound that are above the point in a low pass filter. D ~~~ D/L - Download. When you copy a file from a computer connected to yours. DeliTracker - Amiga based player Digital - A method in which messages are sent between electronic parts using pulses of electricity instead of a constant flow which varies in voltage (analogue). Digital sound is usually more pure than analog but does not reproduce the actual sound as accurately. Digital Tracker - (Information needed) DigiTracker - (Information needed) DMF - X-Tracker module. Can be 32 channels Duplicity Check - A method of controlling NNAs. If one note encounters another that matches the check criteria, it will take a different action than usual such as fading it instead of cutting it. E ~~~ EaglePlayer - Module player for the Amiga. Supports a huge range of formats and variations. Envelope - How a sound is controlled. Some envelopes are graphical and have various nodes, or joints, that have lines drawn between them to show how that aspect of the sound will behave. Some other envelopes are ADSR types. This stands for Attack (how quickly the sound approaches), Decay (how quickly the sound fades out), Sustain (how long the note is held before it falls) and Release (how quickly the sound is released when it stops). Equalizer, EQ - Alters the sound so that some frequencies may be boosted and others may be muffled, like more complex bass and treble settings. F ~~~ FAR - Farandole Composer module. Can be 16 channels with a max of 64 8-Bit/16-Bit Samples Farandole Composer 1.00 - programmed by Daniel Potter of Digital Infinity. Supports GUS only. Edits 16 tracks, 64 instruments, an own command set (does not claim to be PT-compliant), 8 and 16 Bit sample support, sample size up to 1 Meg, imports MOD, 669, GUS PAT and ST3/Digiplayer samples. Features separate volume column and track panning. Loads MOD, 669, ULT (buggy) mods. Uses SVGA to display all tracks on screen simultaneously in 132x50 mode. Has a built-in sample editor. FastTracker 1 - programmed by Mr H of Triton. Supports SB, SB Pro, Soundplayer, DAC, Internal Speaker. Edits 4, 6 or 8 tracks, 31 instruments, 8-Bit samples of 64KB maximum size, ProTracker command set, track panning supported by external players, 100 patterns. Relatively simple, easy to use tracker, which is good for starters, but it suffers from its output formats' deficiencies. Partly mouse driven. Freeware. Fasttracker II - The first PC tracker to introduce 32 channels and volume/ panning envelopes. It can load MOD,NST,XM,S3M,STM and can save MOD and XM modules. For technical reasons certain effects (mainly panning) from STM and S3M mods don't work at all. It can load WAV,IFF,SMP,SND,RAW,PAT and save IFF,SMP,WAV samples. It can load and save XI instruments. It also has a VERY useful feature of being able to save the current pattern or track. It also has it's own built in WAV writer, which is useful for producing audio CDs or for mixing samples for 4 channel MODs. Coded by Vogue and Mr.H. Current version is 2.08 Filter - Anything that throws out some and keeps some parts of a sound like a sieve. Flange - An effect that is created when the same sound is played over itself but one of the copies is offset very slightly. After the initial offset (which is not required but is nice so the note isn't twice as loud at the beginning), an extremely slight pitch bend will produce a "whoosh" sound. This effect used to be done with reel to reel tape recorders by slowing down one reel and then releasing it to let it catch up. FLTx - StarTrekker module. Frequency - The number of cycles a wave makes in a second. Also used to mean the pitch in samples per second. G ~~~ Gain - How much the amplitude is increased by an amplifier. Gated - If a sound is gated, then it alternates between a high and low volume very quickly. Global - A setting that effects everything. Grave Composer - (Information needed) GUS - Gravis Ultrasound. A hardware mixing sound card favoured by many in the demo scene. Unfortunately, very difficult to get hold of anymore. H ~~~ Hard Pan - When a sound is Hard Panned Left, it will only come out of the left speaker in a stereo system and vice versa for Hard Pan Right. Hard Panning can be very painful on headphones. Hardware mixing - When a MOD is mixed by a sound card. Allows even slow computers to play back high quality sound, due to the minimal CPU load. The sound chip in the Amiga does this. Head Tracker - (Information needed) Hex - A system of numbers that many trackers use so that higher numbers may be fit into less digits. This system counts from 0 to 9 like the normal system, but then counts from A to F before looping over to 10. High Pass - A filter used to cut out low frequencies and allow high frequencies to 'pass' through. I ~~~ Inertia Player - MOD Player for DOS. (Information needed) Instrument - An instrument is the data used to affect the playback of a sample without the need for an effect. In the original trackers, the instrument information was the sample volume, finetune, and loop, and it was held within a module. The sample could only be saved as a sample and it would lose volume and finetune information (I think samples with loop information would retain this when saved, am I right?). Now, with the more advanced trackers, an instrument consists of one or more samples with things like volume envelopes, panning and vibrato all included. These instruments can be saved and they retain all of their original information. Interpolation - A technique used to make sound smoother and take out the high pitched ringing sound that occurs when a sample is played below the sampling rate by drawing straight lines through the points instead of "stepping" through the sample. Some interpolation draws curves instead, giving clearer sound. IMHO - All Internet users should know this one, which originates from the dawn of modems. IMHO stands for In My Honest/Humble Opinion. Impulse Tracker - Currently the most powerful PC tracker available, IT can load IT,MTM,XM,S3M,669 and MOD modules, and save IT and S3M modules. IT can load S3I,IFF,WAV,Wxx,ITS,RAW,PAT,KRZ samples, and can also rip samples directly out of MOD,PTM,669,FAR,MTM,S3M,XM,IT modules. IT can load XI and ITI instruments, and rip instruments from XM and IT modules. Coded by Jeremy Lim a.k.a Pulse. Current verson is 2.14p3. Impulse Tracker is no longer being updated, due to the piracy that Pulse recieved when he brought out the stereo WAV writer for $30. Trackers didn't like having to pay for something :), so he decided to stop updating IT. Rumours are currently circulating that the source code to IT has been sold to Future Crew, which may or may not be true... IT - Impulse Tracker module ITI - Impulse Tracker instrument. (Actually these can have any extension or none at all, but the manual refers to them this way, I think it might be something to do with the header.... hang on a moment... nope! The header uses IMPI) ITS - Impulse Tracker Sample. See ITI, except the header uses IMPS :-) IFF - Interchange File Format. A very flexible format generally used on the Amiga. Sound is stored as a subset of IFF called 8SVX. J ~~~ K ~~~ L ~~~ LFO, Low Frequency Oscillator - An oscillator that puts out a frequency so low that it is inaudible. This is usually used like an envelope. A neat experiment if you have your computer hooked up to speakers is to take a sine bass, keep playing it lower and lower until you can't hear it, then turn up the volume and the bass (with a boost perhaps) on your stereo, take the cover off your speaker and watch it move. Be careful not to blow out your speaker! Linear Slides - A method of calculating pitch slides used in recent module formats that is more constant from one sample/speed/pitch to the next. Loopback Point - A point in the pattern that the player will go back to when a loopback command for that point is executed. Lossless Compression - A compression technique that makes the filesize smaller without sacrificing sound quality. Lossy Compression - A compression technique that sacrifices sound quality to make the file smaller. Low Pass - A filter that cuts out high frequencies and allows low frequencies to 'pass' through. M ~~~ M.K. - ProTracker module. Mac-Mik-Mod - (Information needed) Mac-Mod-Pro - (Information needed) MED - Music Editor or OctaMED module, can be 64 channel with full panning. Meditor EPSILON TR3 - (Information needed) MegaTracker - (Information needed) Midas Player - (Information needed) MikMod - (Information needed) MMD0 - OctaMED module MMD1 - OctaMED module MMD2 - OctaMED v5+ Module MMD3 - OctaMED Soundstudio Module MOD - Possibly the most diverse module format around. Just because a file has .MOD on the end doesn't automatically mean that it is a four channel 15/31 instruments module, oh no. There are many different forms of MOD around, Fasttracker MODs for example can have more than 4 channels. Mod4Win - A MOD player for Windows 3.1 upwards. Very popular due to it's compatibility and features. ModEdit (current version reported to be v3.01) - programmed by Norman Lin. Supports SB, DAC and the internal speaker using Mark J. Cox's playing routine (it runs even on 286 PC's). Edits only M.K. format. Mouse-driven menu interface. This editor's main quality is its sort-of-musical notation. Whereas almost all other trackers display the tracks vertically and notes are only discernible by their key character, ModEdit displays the current pattern horizontally and the notes on a vertical spread. This editor is old but could suit some people to get started on. It has a very good documentation, which can unfortunately be a Bit misleading at times, however. ModPlug - Module programs by Olivier Lapicque. ModPlugin is a plugin for browsers so you can listen to MODs embedded in a web page. ModPlug Player is the most feature packed MOD player for Windows 95/NT. ModPlug Tracker is a Windows 95/NT tracker. Modulation - Changing an aspect of one sound using the data of another one MTM - MultiTracker Module Multichannel Mode - A mode where when a note is entered in a channel that has multichannel mode on, it will enter it and then skip to the next channel with the mode on. MultiTracker Module Editor 1.01b - programmed by Daniel Goldstein aka Starscream of Renaissance. Supports GUS, SB and SB Pro. Edits up to 32 tracks, 31 instruments, features the PT command set (which is not completely compatible), 8 Bit samples (MTM format can store 16 bits). Features track panning. Imports raw samples and GUS patches (only registered). Loads MOD, 669, MTM and FAR mods, more formats planned. N ~~~ NNA, New Note Actions - These allow more than one note to be played in a channel at the same time. Noise Tracker - (Information needed) Normalize - To amplify the wave as far as it will go without clipping. NST - A MOD file produced by Noise Tracker. Can have 4 channels and 15 8-Bit instruments. O ~~~ OctaMED - The first Amiga tracker to break the four channel limit. By mixing channels together before playing them you could get 8 channels (albeit at reduced quality and control) on a bog standard A500. Coded by Teijo Kinnunen OKT - Oktalyzer Module. Can be up to 8 channels with 255 7(?)/8-Bit instruments. Oktalyzer - (Information needed) Oscillator - A device that produces a sound by vibration. Oscilloscope - A device that shows visually what waveforms look like. Order - The order that patterns of a module are played in. P ~~~ Panbrello - Pans the sound around like vibrato. Panning - Panning refers to the volume at which a sound is played out of two separate speakers. If the sound coming out of one speaker is louder than the other then the sound will seem to be closer to that speaker. Pan Swing - A setting that makes the sound pan around from note to note. Pattern - Every MOD is split up into a number of patterns. A standard ProTracker MOD can only have 64 rows per pattern. Paula - The sound chip that started it all off. Allows 4 mono or two stereo channels to be played back in 8-Bit at a maximum of 30kHz. Physical Channels - The number of channels used in a module without accounting for extra channels used for fades by NNAs. Pitch-Pan Seperation - This will change the panning position depending on the pitch. The Pitch-Pan center is the note where the instrument will be played in the middle. To either side, the notes will be panned by an amount depending on the pitch-pan seperation value. PlayerPro - (Information needed) Portamento - Pitch bending/sliding. Primary Tempo - In a MOD, the primary tempo is the one that can be set in BPM, usually between 31 and 255. ProTracker - The tracker that set the -original- standard for MOD files. (Information needed) Q ~~~ Quantize, quantization - Refers to the accuracy of the timing of notes when they are recorded in real time. In a MIDI sequencer notes can be quantized to a very accurate level, in a tracker, the faster the overall speed the more accurate real-time input will be. R ~~~ Real Tracker - A DOS based tracker which can use two effects columns (not just an effect column and a volume column). It can load RTM,MOD,NST,S3M,XM and save RTM,MOD,XM modules. It can load RTI,XI,S3I and save XI,RTI instruments. It can load RTS,RAW,WAV,IFF,S3I and save RTS,RAW samples. Graphical Windows like interface which can go up to 1280x1024. Current version is 2.23 Ripped, ripper, ripping - A ripped sample is one taken from a module, game, demo, or application, generally done without the authors permission. A ripper is a program that rips samples (and/or other data) out of module, game, demo, or application. Ripping refers to the process by which data is ripped, either by hand or by using a ripper. The ethics of ripping have been discussed over the years, and it is generally agreed that if you rip something out of someone elses work, you should also allow others to rip things from your work. You should also credit the person you ripped the data from by mentioning their name in your file. Usually ripping is only done on non-commercial files like modules and demos, due to the legalities involved if the data you rip is copyrighted. Row - A single line of a pattern RTI - Real Tracker instrument RTM - Real Tracker module RTS - Real Tracker sample S ~~~ Sample - A digital image of an analogue sound. Samples can be looped and played back at different pitches. A sample can also be one amplitude measurement in a digital recording. Sampling Rate - The interval that amplitude measurements (samples) of a source are taken at in a digital recording. A digital recording will not accurately measure frequencies above half of the sampling rate. The higher the rate, the more real the sound sounds. Saw Wave - A waveform that zig-zags, like a sine wave but with only straight lines. SB - SoundBlaster. Most PC trackers can use one of these. Secondary Tempo - This is pretty complex. The Secondary Tempo controls the number of ticks per row. The less ticks, the faster the BPM. But not in all trackers. If you use OctaMED and you set the Tempo to SPD not BPM, it seems to work the other way around! The more ticks the faster the BPM - why is this? Scream Tracker 3 - A hybrid tracker that can use both samples and FM synthesised sounds (it can only use a SB for FM). It can load MOD,STM,S3M, OKT, and can save S3M and MOD modules. Scream Tracker 3 was the first tracker (I think) to use 16 channels, and is still (again I think) the only tracker to use both FM and digital sounds together. Current version is 3.21. Sine Wave - A waveform that curves smoothly and evenly in an S-shape. Sinusoidal - Having to do with sine waves. Software mixing - When all the mixing of the MOD is done via software before being passed to the sound card for playing. Song - (No I'm not mad :v). A song in tracker terms refers to a module that doesn't contain any samples. Songs originated back when hard drives were small, and they allowed a composer to track and save modules which would automatically load the samples when needed. Sound Tracker - The first tracker (I'm pretty sure it was anyway). Only had 5 effect commands and came with two disks of samples! Sound Tracker Pro 2 - The second version of Sound Tracker, released in 1996. Has a similar interface, but can only save MODs in its new format, which is completely incompatible with the old one. SoundStudio - Basically a "professional" version of OctaMED, which allows upto 64 channels, panning, an effect command for playing a sample backwards, plus a WAV writer. Coded by Teijo Kinnunen. Originally released for the Amiga, currently being ported to the PC. One cool feature that SoundStudio allows over practically all other trackers is it's ability to use stereo samples. Square Wave - A waveform that jumps sharply but evenly from one extreme value to the next. StarTrekker - Amiga based tracker. Supports 8 channels STM - Scream Tracker module Stone Tracker - (Information needed) S3I - Scream Tracker 3 instrument S3M - Scream Tracker 3 module Symphonie - (Information needed) T ~~~ Tempo - The speed at which a tune is played, measured in BPM. Tremolo - Like vibrato, but for volume. U ~~~ U/L - Upload. When you copy a file to a computer connected to yours. ULT - UltraTracker module UltraTracker - programmed by MAS of Prophecy. Supports GUS. Edits up to 32 tracks, 8 and 16 Bit instruments, variable C2Spd with finetune, bidirectional looping, instrument panning, 255 patterns, subset of the PT commands, two effect slots per note. Built-in sample editor. Imports S3M, MOD, 669, FAR and MTM mods. Imports IFF, PAT, WAV, FSM, SND and raw sample types. Mouse driven. Shareware $20. The ULT format is not very well supported (outside this tracker). UNIS Composer - (Information needed) UT - United Trackers. An organisation formed to bring the tracking scene together. V ~~~ Vangelis Tracker - (Information needed) Velvet Studio - DOS based tracker with a lot of features. It can load AMS,MOD,S3M,STM,XM,MTM,ULT and save AMS,MOD,S3M,XM modules. It can load AIS,XI,PAT and save AIS instruments. It can load ASE,SMP,S3I,IFF,WAV and save ASE,SMP,WAV samples. It can load APS,ACS,XT and save APS,ACS pattern data. Graphical interface. Current version is 2.01 Vibrato - The modulation of the pitch of a sample with a certain depth and speed controlled by a certain waveform (LFO) that increases from 0 at a certain rate. Virtual Channels - Channels that are created but not shown on the editor to play more than one note simultaneously on the same physical channel. Volume Ramping - A technique used by some players to take out clicks by sliding the volume of a note down very quickly (at a high rate too so it doesn't cause further clicking) instead of just cutting them. W ~~~ WOW - Grave Composer module WSS - Windows Sound System. A sound card introduced by Microsoft. Allows 64kHz 16-Bit Stereo audio. A lot of cheaper sound cards will allow SB Pro and WSS compatibility. Unfortunately, the only DOS tracker that uses WSS is IT. So anyone with one of these cards who uses FT2 because they can't get used to IT, is stuck with 22.05 kHz Stereo, 44.1 kHz Mono sound. (Me included, I must get an SB16) X ~~~ X-Tracker - (Information needed) xCHN - Fasttracker 1 Module XI - Fasttracker II instrument XM - eXtended Module - Fasttracker II module XP - eXtended Pattern - Fasttracker II pattern XT - eXtended Track - Fasttracker II track Y ~~~ Z ~~~ 0 ~~~ 1 ~~~ 2 ~~~ 3 ~~~ 4 ~~~ 5 ~~~ 6 ~~~ 669 - Module format used by Composer 669, Unis Composer (which used it first?) 7 ~~~ 8 ~~~ 9 ~~~ ============================================================================= 9. Closing words ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Has anyone noticed that by tracking you end up hearing more? "Hearing more?" I hear you say. Yes, I mean that you end up consciously noticing effects like panning, and you break music down into it's component parts. A couple of my non-tracking musician friends tell me the same thing happens to them. Once you also know what synths produce what sounds, you keep on thinking, that's a JV800, that's a Prophecy etc. It's really annoying!!! Does anyone have a copy of a CD called Terror Temple? I got a copy of a tape of it a few years ago but I lost it (must have been an omen to tell me to stop copying tapes). I absolutely loved the first track. I don't know what it was called or who it was by, but I have this distinct memory of what it sounded like. It was basically a choiry type sounding bit and the most insane siren I've ever heard, surrounded by incredibly fast drums (it was gabba :v). If anyone knows what this track was called and/or where I could get a copy, then please contact me. That's all folks, the end of The Trackers Handbook. I hope you've enjoyed it and found it useful. All that remains is for to send out my thanks to the following people, for their help in producing this. Thanks to... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ (In no particular order) John Simmonds - For being the guy behind the writing of this, if it wasn't for his enthusiasm in wanting to quickly find out what to do this would never have been started. LeftField - For great music to listen to while writing this. Leftism is one of the greatest albums ever - if you don't have a copy then get one, I can guarantee you will like it... If you're wondering why I listened to CDs rather than mods when writing this, it's because this was written in DOS Edit! Tony Horgan - For getting me started in tracking and for all the tips and samples given in CU Amiga, they really were invaluable to a beginner. Kim - For including this file on her great (and visited a lot) page. This really got everything started. MAZ - For encouragement, contributions, samples, including this file on his page, and the great idea for the ZIP file name. Kosmos - For encouragement, suggestions, and getting this into the UT News letter. Contributors ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ (In no particular order) Darren Irvine, Jeremy S Rice, Radix, SquareMeister, Kupan, Pulse, Ilpo Karkkainen, ToalNkor, Stereoman, Dan Nicholson, Greebo, MAZ, Barry Nathan, Rich "Akira" Pizor, Novus, Louis "Farmer" Gorenfeld, Alevridis Nikos, Rubz Future? ~~~~~~~~~ I want to include some ASCII art dotted around the place, to disperse the text a little. Because this is a multi-platform document, I can't allow any ANSI/Hi-ASCII. If you've got something you'd like to include then send it to me, thanks. When this guide gets too big, don't worry. I WILL split it into various seperate files, which will make it harder to edit. But it'll be far easier to read. A few people have suggested a HTML version. I'm not convinced enough as not everyone has a browser, so I won't produce any HTML myself. If, however, somebody else wants to do it, then let me know. Remember, be yourself, track for yourself. Because if you don't enjoy your music then it's sure as hell nobody else will... END.