TW #5 — Interview with TheHacker (Popcorn)

Popcorn's first appearance in traxweekly ("I've been with TraxWeekly since the first issue, but this will be the first … something involving me appears"): thehacker of kosmic asked to be interviewed by IRC message, and Popcorn only placed the name after seeing "11 new releases from Kosmic".

Key claims#

• Krisjanis Gale ("it's Latvian, so don't ask"), 18, student; KFMF and fy00zhen, "my own group that hasn't done anything really big yet". Handle from friends teasing "you hacker" — "I don't hack systems … just muzik and code".
• Started in August 1993 without knowing a scene existed: bought a gravis-ultrasound, ripped Amiga samples and sequenced them in MODEDIT v2.0. Found KLF music on The Sound Barrier BBS (NY), e-mailed maelcum, sent UUENCODEd songs, "and next thing I knew I was in KLF". Popcorn: the Ultrasound is "the soundcard to have if you are involved in the PC demo / music scene. At least for the moment."
• Training: a year each of saxophone and clarinet, two years of "cheesy tunes with keyboards" with his friend Jai; plays bass in a real band, Psyko-Reactiv.
• System: "a cruddy 386-25 clone running MultiTracker". Workflow: find "sum k-rad samples", open them in MMEDIT "and see where the first sample set takes me, changing the samples as needed to fit where the song seems to be going. It's a really spontaneous thing."
• Listens from Megadeth to Tchaikovsky; lately ambient — Aphex Twin, Orbital, Maelcum, basehead, AndrewM of KFMF; likes non-cheesy rave, industrial (Skinny Puppy to Front 242) and alternative.
• Had heard little outside KFMF releases; expects the five-musicians to be "really diverse" judging from Basehead and necros.
• Own songs (Kosmic filenames): 1 Mig Down (1MIG_KLF, the fans' favourite), the MindCore (MIND)KLF, 1994), Alarm (ALRM_KLF, "chip tune", 1994), the HalfBaked musicpack, P0lar B0nd (K-POLAR, ambient, 1995), a To The City remix (CITY#KLF, 1994). "My favorite is always the tune I'm working on at the moment."
• Plans: Stevens Tech (Hoboken, NJ), a web page, a software company, "muzik".

Practical takeaways#

• Let the samples lead: pick a set, start, and swap samples as the song reveals its direction (tracking-workflow).
• A 386-25 and MultiTracker were enough for eleven Kosmic releases in 1995.
• The 1993 entry route: GUS + ripped Amiga samples + MODEDIT, then a BBS with a group's music on it (tracker-scene-history, sample-ripping).

Notable quotes#

• "I bought my GUS, and started ripping Amiga samples and sequencing them in MODEDIT v.2.0." — TheHacker
• "It's really kewl how the Internet is being used recently for such kewl ventures." — TheHacker

Relevance#

A Kosmic member's spontaneous, sample-led workflow, a 1993 start on MODEDIT and MultiTracker, and one of the wiki's few named 1994 chiptunes from the Kosmic catalogue (Alarm).

Pages touched#

thehacker, kosmic, maelcum, gravis-ultrasound, tracking-workflow, tracker-scene-history, five-musicians, chiptune, traxweekly.