TW #3 — Music: Beginning the Tracking Experience (Psibelius)

author Psibelius (Gene Wie)
date 1995-03-30
article 1. Music: Beginning the Tracking Experience
created 2026-08-30 · updated 2026-08-30

psibelius on how he started tracking and what a newcomer should avoid.

Key claims#

  • He began in March 1994 with Renaissance's MultiTracker 1.01b; with nobody to teach him he opened someone else's song, deleted all the patterns and wrote something new with their instruments — a weird "Ode to Joy" within hours.
  • Advice: ignore people telling you that you suck, "evaluate the good, and improve how you want when you want"; don't call your own mods "totally awesome" and "PLEASE don't WRiTe LiKe THiS"; credit the person whose instruments you use; avoid "trial member" groups; take a break when blocked — "not everyone can compose 999999999 songs a day".
  • He founded Epinicion Productions on the idea that newcomers should not go through the abuse he did.

Relevance#

Scene history and beginner workflow; the "learn from someone else's module" method is still the fastest way into a tracker.

Pages touched#

psibelius, traxweekly, tracker.

source file wiki/summaries/s-tw003-beginning-the-tracking-experience.md · graph