So your dreams of being a music-video choreographer or hot DJ/producer have been crushed by the reality of pushing papers around inside a tiny cubicle. Well, weekend warrior, that’s what these new videogames are for. Like Dance Dance Revolution, Dance Factory (Codemasters; PS2/$39.99) is a mat-based game where you high-step and booty bounce in time to the console’s predetermined dance steps. Built-in calorie counter aside, the real twist to Dance Factory is that it makes up a choreographed routine to any music you feed it-gabber obviously generates the crazed footwork of a squirrel on crack, while Sonic Youth is good for stoking an interpretive dance session. A party game if we’ve ever seen one.

Rather less exciting is Beatmania (Konami; PS2/$64.99), which bills itself as the “first DJ simulation” for the Playstation 2. Bundled with a purpose-made controller-a box with a miniature turntable and seven white keys-the object is to push the buttons and scratch on time with flashing lights on screen. You’re not allowed to make your own compositions-and the faux turntable only mimics one kind of scratch-but if your idea of fun is honing your hand-eye coordination to anonymously-produced epic trance songs, then who are we to stop you?

Freegums. The name brings to mind the gummy smile of a senior citizen with his dentures out, or a dish of brightly colored Chiclets. It’s actually the alias of 25-year-old Peruvian Alvaro Ilizarbe, who’s been causing havoc in the streets of Miami, Florida since he was exported from Lima at the age of nine. Flexing a loose, colorful style that incorporates claws, laughing hyenas, palm trees, and clever sayings, Ilizarbe’s graphic design work is a smart, tongue-in-cheek reflection of South Florida and its environs.

Ilizarbe works in the art department of ad agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky by day, but as night falls, this Aquarian dabbles in a multitude of projects. His most visible endeavor is a line of reversible t-shirts, a smart idea that might actually justify you rocking the same garment for two weeks straight. His most recent coup–during December 2005’s art expo Art Basel–found him and TypeStereo’s Mike Del Marmol operating as Fufi Fufi; the pair tooled around the city in an ice cream van stocked full of limited-edition wares from Hunter Gatherer, Grotesk, and Ben Loiz, among others. We interrupted Ilizarbe drawing “snakes with weird skin patterns” and asked him what’s good.

XLR8R: Where does the name Freegums come from?

Alvaro Ilizarbe: When I was in college, I needed to make money and so I started doing these big house parties. I needed a name to tie them all in, like Mr. Freegums Toilet Swamps and Mr. and Mrs. Freegums Dance-a-lot. That’s how I gave birth to the name.

What are your three favorite t-shirts in your closet?

The first is a Stop Police Brutality shirt I made years ago; it fits so good. It’s black with a crazy list of names on the inside, which makes people wanna read it. Then there’s a mint t-shirt sample from some blank-maker in Fresno. It fits nice, feels good, and is faded just right. The last is an Eagle Claw “Razor Sharp” promo shirt. I hate it when I remember a good shirt but don’t know where it is… It’s like my washing machine ate it.

What music do you listen to when you work?

Cash, Madlib, Fleetwood Mac, Daft Punk, Nas, The Wu Tanga Manga Clan, Prince (this guy is at the top of my list), Bloc Party. My favorite song these past few days is “X’s And O’s (Kisses And Hugs)” by David Allan Coe.

If you could collaborate with one other designer who would it be?

Herb Lubalin. That guy is amazing: his composition, great type treatment, great publications. Look him up–you’ll see why. I hope to leave a lot of great work like he did.

Tell us about the ice cream truck you did for Art Basel.

That was one of the best projects I’ve done. It was a lot of work and it was a lot of fun. I got no sleep for about two weeks and was in a pissy mood but in the end everything fell right into place. It started with a bigger group of people but we all couldn’t agree on a theme and it fell apart last minute. So Mike [Del Marmol of Typestereo] and I embarked on a mission. We went around to ice cream wholesalers and saw postings on the wall about trucks for sale. One came through and we gutted it out, cleaned it up, fine tuned the ’57 Chevy engine, put a couch in it with a touch of Astroturf, reached out to a lot of artists and made it happen. We met a lot of crazy out-of-towners and saw a lot of interesting people. Mike’s wife Cindy got Universal Studios to buy the truck from us to use for an upcoming movie version of Reno 911!: Miami. They blew up (the truck) over the Port of Miami. Fufi Fufi blowing up, kid!

What is your favorite spot in Miami?

Miami is such a beautiful place. It is home to the World’s Steepest Parking Lot Ramp. I like taking people there and just putting the car in neutral and riding down it. You should see their faces–it’s like they are on a rollercoaster for 1.5 seconds. Amazing. Going airboat riding is great too. There used to be a three-story treehouse right by the water and it was like a two-mile hike to get to it but after all the hurricanes it’s barely survived.

What qualities do you most value in other people?

When people look at you in the eye when talking, and shaking hands. Also, when people can be themselves and not worry about how they are being perceived.

What projects have you got coming up?

I’m working on patterned textiles and garments for 2007; in the planning stages of making an album with Sam Borkensen from Friends With You, and I have something going on for the Select Media festival in Chicago that Ed from Lumpen puts together with a lovely group of people.

Is the whole hand-drawn thing getting out of control?

Not really. Nothing will ever be as bad as how graffiti got, like the really bad “graffiti” fonts people use.

Can you talk about the inspirations behind some of your Freegums shirts?

My past line was centered around wildlife. I went to every public library in South Florida looking through hundreds of books and found a lot of good stuff. At times I find myself using Spanish words and working them into my designs, like Muelas Gratis. It stands for “free molars.” I was trying to say “free gums”–that would be “encillas gratis”–but after I had drawn it and everything, I was like, whatever, shit looks good. The infamous Freegums Claw shirt came from an early Saturday adventure a bunch of friends and I took to the Everglades. We went airboat riding like crazy rednecks and then walked around looking at alligators. I was mesmerized by their stubby feet; we named one of them “Club Foot.” When I got home, I was drawing one of them and I was like “Ohh shit! This would look great on a shirt coming out of your neck like ‘Arghhhhhhhh, I want you!”

8-bit music is something of a moving target, more of a movement than a genre. Even a name can’t be agreed upon–the closest to universally accepted terms are “chiptune,” “micromusic,” and “8-bit,” but new variants are being churned out every day, with varying degrees of cleverness (“bitpop,” “blip-hop,” etc.).

The most identifiable common element of the 8-bit scene is an aesthetic association with the sound and style of early console and home-computer videogames, but this form can take on different guises. Some producers fixate on the unembellished output of a single four-channel, 8-bit sound chip; others meticulously reconstruct 8-bit sounds using modern equipment. Some songs overly nod to game soundtracks; others are distant descendants, exploring game music’s textures but not its conventions.

Although the idiom’s practitioners approach this style from every direction imaginable, low-bit music is nothing new–its lineage parallels that of home computing, stretching back more than 20 years. The current micromusic mini-movement is actually a derivation of computer-game hacking; it claims roots in mid-’80s “crack intros,” where videogames were “modified” and animations, music, and codenames added to the intro screens–a nerd-world equivalent of graffiti. These embellishments became increasingly elaborate until the intros eclipsed the game as the object of interest, turning into standalone showcases of programming prowess called “demos.”

This impulse to push limits continues in today’s low-bit music. It has spurred the creation of homebrew programs, hardware, and techniques, making it possible to construct live, beat-driven tracks on an Atari 2600, control a Nintendo Entertainment System via MIDI, and turn a Game Boy into a portable, pocket-sized music workstation. And for all of the scene’s stylistic chaos, this moment is a rare snapshot of the healthiest time in a movement’s development–a free-for-all of diverse experimentation that can probably only happen in the absence of a definition. Joshua “Bit Shifter” Davis

Artificial Intelligence
It’s game on for Brazilian 8-Bit head Artificial.

You probably remember the days when your parents desperately asked you to turn down the volume of the TV while you were playing Nintendo. Judging from the kind of sound Kassin extracts from a simple Game Boy with his Artificial project, you can only imagine his mother suffered a lot more than the rest.

The idea behind Artificial is simple: to make music using Game Boy’s blips and beeps. Doing it is a little more complicated. Instead of turntables and a laptop, Kassin’s live PA consists of two Game Boys, a MicroKorg keyboard, and two delay pedals, all plugged to a four-channel board. This lo-fi approach comes as quite a switch for Kassin, a well-known Brazilian producer who has worked with Tropic·lia’s Caetano Veloso, Bebel Gilberto, and even Japanese pop stars.

All of Kassin’s gigs as Artificial are improvised, mixing pre-recorded beats with live effects to create a rough-sounding collision of electro, Miami bass, and breakbeat. Relying on heavy electronic drum sounds, some songs gravitate loosely towards house, while others could be a bed for hip-hop lyrics or point to new possibilities for baile funk.

In order to access the videogame soundbank, Kassin utilizes two specially made cartridges, which transform the toy into a synthesizer and a sequencer of 8-bit beats and noise. “I read about this LSDJ program that allowed you to program a Game Boy and I bought it online,” says Kassin. “When I talked about it to my partner, Berna Ceppas, I found out that he had just bought a similar one called Nanoloop.”

The technical limitations of such rudimentary tools are not a problem; rather, they fit perfectly with the music’s aesthetic. “Every time I feel limited by the programs, I just use something else,” says Kassin. “When I’m missing some chords, I use the keyboard. It’s the drums and the bass I like the most. I also use a laptop with some beats programmed in it, just in case–basically because the Game Boy has let me down a couple of times.”

The laptop came in handy during 2005’s Sónar festival, when his Game Boy failed. “It was great nonetheless,” recalls Kassin. “I programmed the show on the plane on the way to Spain. I had a great time at these concerts. The reactions were funny, because people didn’t expect me to sing in falsetto, for instance. And a lot of people danced.”

Released through his own label, Ping Pong Discos, Free U.S.A. captures some of this live action. An American citizen (his father is American), the idea for the record came during a trip to the United States. “I was on a US tour with my band, +2,” explains Kassin. “It was just before the war [in Iraq] had begun. In Minneapolis there were flags with “Free Iraq” written on them in front of every house. I thought this was such ignorance–comparable to the Nazis–that I recorded an album called Free U.S.A.”

Smack My Bit Up
Sacramento Band 8-bit Conquers the World with NES Beats and Ninja Stars.

Jay-Z’s “99 Problems” galloped to the tune of the Legend of Zelda theme before 8-bit took the floor. We were at Sacramento’s Old Ironsides club. The rappers of the group 8-bit were cloaked in fashionable radioactive suits and they were swigging beer. They had an iPod running their backing tracks. And they had charm.

One felt it in their choppy rhymes, which recalled Run-DMC. It was written across rapper Le-frost’s bespectacled face, which poked out of the cubbyhole of her helmet to lead a chuorus of “I’m grabbing my nuts.” It was distilled in catchy, fuzzy melodies and thunking beats, the kind that would be at home on any Nintendo game. Even after robots intoned “Suck my dick, bitch!” in the hook of one of their songs, the charm remained.

After the show, bandmate Robo-T asked Le-frost, “What is it that we make fun of about rap? “We make fun of ourselves,” she replied. “That’s basically it.”

Parked outside the club was the group’s cramped tour van. They bought it with Beck’s money–well, with the money they got from last year’s Ghettochip Malfunction remix of Beck’s “Hell Yes.” Beck’s brother happened to be an 8-bit fan, and the star’s manager gave them a call. The crew then laced the hip-hop original with a melody choked out of a dusty Game Boy cartridge, and found themselves in the company of Ad-Rock, Boards of Canada, and El-P on the Guerolito compilation.

8-bit was one of the more curious groups to emerge from the LA underground in the early ’00s. They began as a joke. Robo-T and his brother, Anti-Log, are Indiana transplants who moved to Highland Park, where they met Le-frost at a bowling alley. 8-bit first got the hang of sampling by yanking tunes and noises from NES classics like Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out, Rygar, the Zelda games, and Wizards and Warriors 2. “We just grew up with Nintendo and liked the way it sounded,” explains Robo-T. “We started out sampling it and putting beats on it to make our own music.”

He says that his group now produces the majority of their vintage sounds from scratch. True to the NES sound, the melodies and rhythms are usually repetitive, but attention grabbing. So, too, is 8-bit’s packaging. Their self-released CDs on their Ninja Star imprint are sometimes wrapped in handmade origami throwing stars.

As for their new record, The Chrome Album, a few 8-bit members describe it as “proggy” or hip-hop-meets-noise-rawkers Hella. “We’re trying to be the Rush of rap,” clarified Robo-T. Le-frost is counting on this approach being so successful that she’ll be able to buy a Bentley soon; the others are more pessimistic. “Whatever we do, we’ll have to do it quick because we’re going to die quickly,” Spacey-K said. Robo-T chimed in, “Yeah, I plan to be hanging from a rope in the next six months.” Cameron MacDonald

Heavy Artillery
8 Bit Weapon Decodes His Music-Making Set-Up.

LA’s Seth D. Sternberger bristles with more artillery than the dudes from Contra, his every piece of gear on par with the Spread or Laser Guns and not a lame Fire Ball in sight. Known in the burgeoning micromusic scene as 8-Bit Weapon, he’s been performing live and turning out material (both original tunes and Commodore 64 covers) since 2001. Intellivision Music launched their label with his EP and a remixed re-release of the limited-edition “Vaporware Soundtracks” is available for order from his website. The ever-excitable Sternberger is busy working on a score for the Disney short Catch 1up and a top-secret multi-platform game for Nokia, but took time to spec out his sound for us. Matt Earp

XLR8R: What’s your setup for playing live?

Seth Sternberger: I have a series of backing tracks running off a laptop as well as some MIDI sequences. Then I perform on a sandwich of a MicroKorg vocoder, a C64 computer running Music Machine, and a C128 computer running SID [Sound Interface Device] cart 1.0.

How do you process all that at once?

Primarily, I use a MIDI sequencer to control my 8-bit weapons, such as the MIDINES and the SIDstation. I sequence the Game Boys with LSDJ, a cart synth/sequencer combo for all Game Boys and I have an Atari 2600 that you can manually sync up to a handful of MIDI clock tempos. But it’s a lot more fun to lay down a rocking drum track off the Atari synth cart and get a fat lo-fi bassline, then record it into Acid. I also now have three new weapons that use Apple computers: the Apple IIe drum machine, using a “Drum Key” Card; the Apple II (or IIc/IIe) synth sampler; and the famous “Crap-O-Phone”–it’s a 2×4-looking orange controller that allows me to play an Apple II like a guitar!

Do you end up using certain 8-bit systems for certain parts of the music, like basslines?

The SID chip is the most dynamic audio chip ever to rock the microcomputer scene! Its digital/analog features allow it to be an incredibly versatile synthesizer. SID has great bass potential as well as amazing lead sounds and wild sound effects. It’s also great for chord arpeggios, especially with a nice low-pass filter sweep! The Game Boy has great bass too, the old grey one. It also has very distinct waves. The magical thing about the NES is the triangular wave bass! The most awesome micro-bass ever!

Are any of the instruments too delicate to leave the studio?

Yes, the SIDstation. It’s been through hell and back and I can’t bring myself to put a good friend like that in danger ever again.

Is there any piece of equipment universal to most performers in the scene?

The Little Sound DJ and Nanoloop carts for Game Boy, the Synthcart for the Atari 2600, and recently the MIDINES cart.

You seem able to make all your sounds with existing software and hardware. Is anyone doing hardcore computer hacking or modding?

gwEm made his own tracker for his Atari and my evil twin brother, FirestARTer of Germany, made his own SIDstation-like synth, a MIDI Game Boy interface device; he even made a C64 into a TB-303! My other buddy, Paul Slocum, makes his own software and hardware mods. Paul made the Synthcart for the Atari 2600 and the SID cart for the C64. He has also made a dot matrix printer synth! He is crazy!