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Jesus Fuck. One month left. Slowing down? NOPE. This week we've got a track from one of THE most underrated chipsters in the scene, so get the fuck ready!! Grab the track here!
WT:
How did you first come in to contact with
the chipscene?
HunterQuinn: Well this is
going to sound pretty cliché, but the first introduction I had to the
‘chipscene’ was sabrepulse when I was a wee high school lad. Later the same
fine gentleman who showed me said ‘first chip experience’ showed me “Reformat
the Planet”. This fine gentleman was my long-time friend Andrew (who ended up
becoming AndaruGO). He and I had spent a long time trying to find out how to
make music that sounded reminiscent of old school systems like the Gameboy. He
showed me this fine film and blew my mind. I’ve been changed ever since. Later
I ended up finding out about Pxl-bot who released one of my first collections
of chipmusic.
WT:
Which artists influence you musically?
HQ: Well to be honest, most of my musical
influences aren’t chip related. I mean; I still do have chip artists that I
straight can’t go without. Bit Shifter, Nullsleep, Covox, Random, Condom,
NNNNNNNNNN, BSK, Animal Style, Knife City, Kris Keyser, Glomag, Cheap Dinosaurs
are the ones straight off the top of my head.
But
in a world where most of my musical influences lie elsewhere in the musical
spectrum, there are a plethora of artists outside of chipmusic that have left
long lasting impressions on me. In highschool I was really into post hardcore
and “screamo”, but not what Victory records did to screamo. I’m talking Circle
Takes the Square, As the Sun Sets, Cursive and whatnot. Also The Minor Times
and The Number Twelve Looks Like You. I was really into Dillinger Escape Plan’s
‘Calculating Infinity’ and ‘Irony is Dead Scene’. But at the same time I am
also into (and have been almost forever) Skinny Puppy.
With
that said, I’m still a sucker for things like Radiohead and Daft Punk. Also I’m
really into old Michael Jackson right now-- the bass lines are unstoppable. Overall though I think that one of my biggest
influences are the people that listen to my music. I learn from every skip I
receive on bandcamp and nothing speaks like comments I get on soundcloud.
Making music that I like is important, but if people don't give a shit about it
then why the fuck am I making it?
WT:
Could you tell us a bit about your recent
release, ‘VanitySelector’ please?
Vanity
Selector is a fevered attempt to create a release that transcends everything I
have done up to this point-- incorporating everything I have learned and
foreshadowing everything I hope to achieve in the future. I tried to take write
something that wasn’t so reliant on the fact that my instrument was a Game boy
and what came out was Vanity Selector.
WT:
There was a year between
‘VanitySelector’, and your last release ‘Cyberphantom’. What goes in to such an
extensive album-writing process?
HQ: A lot that went into the writing of this
release was sitting in my wav channel. Living in it even-- for days at a
time. In reality this is me chain smoking/ pacing around my back yard/
consuming an adequate amount of booze in 5 hour sessions; all in the hope of
editing a song down to what I feel is acceptable.
It’s
honestly not such a bad time.
But
in all honesty it was just rewriting everything I had over and over again to
sound as full as I could make it and also making the song only playable in live
mode.
WT:
What inspired Cyberphantom’s creation?
HQ: Cyberphantom was part of a duel release that
came out on bandcamp and noisechannel (cyberchamp was the noisechannel
release). It was probably 17 songs all together, mostly unorganized ideas and
things that I was more trying to do, not so much succeeding at. Then I started
to write a release that a lot of people don't really know that much about
called Bday Brodown. It came out on bandcamp the November after I released
Cyberphantom. It was more of a short “Hey I’m still here” release showing what
I had been up to musically.
But
after the skip factory that happened on bandcamp I started to rethink what I
wanted to write.
I
Listened to a TON of Covox and Bitshifter and nnnnnnnnnn and started to think
that I needed to sack up and write some serious music. The way that the aforementioned
musicians manipulated their devices really spoke to me and really pushed me to
try to make my music have a purpose I guess? I don't know, it’s whatever
really.
WT:
How do you feel about playing live, and
what set ups do you use?
HQ: I feel like playing live is the most
important thing ANY musician can do to promote themselves and their scene. So
performing as a chip musician is possibly even more important. Supporting the
chip scene is super baller so whilst doing said supporting, one can actually
give back to their scene. Shit’s crazy right?
I
know.
But
in all seriousness, playing live is what breathes fresh air into every
community. Why not spread the love?
Moving
on….. My set up is pretty simple. I run two DMG play it louds, one green and
one clear, sprayed black. I run one with RCA out and the other with 3.5 out.
Then I just run it through this super funny mid 90’s radio shack mixer I got
from this basement I painted. (random I know). Then I just run one song
at a time and switch off Gameboys.
WT: What’s the backstory of the cartRAGE
events?
HQ: AndaruGO was the dreamweaver who created
cartRAGE. The whole idea is to bring interesting chip music to Cincinnati. A
kind of showcase of what we think is progressive in the chip scene to turn the
common music enthusiast’s head. We have had a lot of success and we have a new
venue and artists booked for the end of December. Stayed tuned, it’s going to
be one hell of a show.
WT:
Could you tell us more about your
WeeklyTreat?
HQ: Final Selector was originally supposed to be
on Vanity Selector -- BUT in the recording process there were some technical
difficulties. So the song didn’t make the cut and the album was released.
So
here lies the story of this song though. I was listening to AndaruGO’s music
one day and I was like “Man…. I really need to work on some lead lines…. I’m
super slacking”. So I started this song and really tried to make a lead heavy
fun experience to play live. It has a lot of on-the-spot soloing and muting and
multiple track activations. It’s actually kind of made it hard to play at times
but I actually enjoy playing it more because of that.
WT:
What lies in the future for you?
HQ: Now that I have some free time I’m really
going to focus on cartRAGE and also some projects I’ve been really neglecting.
I’m going to be working on a cybergrind release and also maybe some other game
boy/ guitar/ “brutal”/ post hardcore screamo thing.
Also
expect some serious booty jams soon.
Signing
out.
~~~~~~~~~nextweek|announcement~~~~~~~~~
