16-bit Fortress

I might be listening to too much 8-bit Megaman music to be composing Mario-style tracks.

The build up will go like this (for this track anyway):

- 2-bit bass
- 4-bit adds hi-hat (open and closed)
- 8-bit introduces melody
- 16-bit fills out with a counter-melody

Oh and I tried my hand at MilkyTracker. After spending most of yesterday finding my bearings (talk about a cumbersome GUI) I input the 2-bit bass line and compared to the NSF version. The quality of the tracker version pales to the emulated NSF. The triangle wave had no tooth so I'm sticking with MML. I actually find its notation less of a chore than your standard tracker interface.

I'll keep MilkyTracker around though; it's not perfect but the output sounds better and offers more control than the YMCK plugin in Garageband. Plus it supports my MIDI keyboard so I can compose there, then arrange in Garageband and finally score in MML. From there I export as a .wav from Audio Overload then trim and compress in Garageband before converting to a .caf (iPhone OS's preferred audio format) on the command line.

You know, in case anyone was wondering :P