Show Notes
Today we're joined by industry legend Neil Biggin in an absolutely massive show! Neil regales us with hilarious stories as we cover a wide range of his electronic music during his time at Gremlin Graphics from about 1992-1996. He walks us through some memories of landmark events during the 16 and 32-bit eras: the launch of the CD32, the first days of the Playstation, and being at a company with one of the world's first motion capture studios.
Neil Biggin began his career with Zool 2 on Amiga, and continued with games like the CD32 versions of Zool 1 and 2 and Top Gear 2, Top Gear 3000, the Actua (or VR) sports games, Loaded, Re-Loaded, a number of FIFA games from 1997-2000, and music porting duties for the Desert/Jungle Strike games. His earliest works are teeming with the lovely sounds of Rave and House music, but as his sound progresses he gets deeper into other genres like Metal, Jungle, Drum and Bass and much more. Whether you're new to his work or an old fan, Neil's music continues to sound great to this day.
Neil is also in the process of re-releasing much of his music. Check out his Spotify as more gradually starts appearing over the coming months. He's also working on the latest iteration of the Amiga Immortal album series where Amiga legends like himself, Barry Leitch and many others come together to remaster their own works for modern audiences.
Neil's Links:
Spotify | SoundCloud | Twitter
The kooky song that Neil was thinking of was indeed Martian Hop by the Ran-Dells, a kitsch classic that's still pretty entertaining today.
Track List:
All tracks composed by Neil Biggin unless otherwise stated. Tracks marked with a * indicate previews, newly released tracks or exclusive unreleased material shared from Neil.
0:00:00 Zool 2 - Mount Ices (Amiga) 0:08:09 (Bedding) Zool 2 - Bulberry Hill (Amiga) 0:12:38 Zool - Track 6 (CD32) 0:25:51 Top Gear 2 - Track 1 (CD32) 0:33:18 Top Gear 3000 - Track 2 (SNES) 0:40:15 (Bedding) Top Gear 3000 - Track 3 (SNES) 0:44:32 (Excerpt) Zool 2 - Bulberry Hill (Remaster)* 0:44:54 (Bedding) Desert Strike - Title (DOS - Adlib) 0:47:57 (Bedding) Jungle Strike - TItle (SNES) 0:50:07 Bedding) Jungle Strike - The Madman's Son (SNES) 0:51:00 (SFX) Jungle Strike (SNES) 0:51:43 Premier Manager 3 - Title (Amiga) 0:59:48 Loaded - Track 6 (PS1) 1:14:24 Zool 2 - Tooting Common (CD32), demo also used in Loaded as a hidden track 1:19:48 Actua Golf - Main Menu (SAT) 1:26:19 Actua Golf - Options (SAT)* 1:38:59 Re-Loaded - Purpid (PS1) 1:59:40 Shoot For Loot - Title Theme (Arcade)* 2:01:22 Shoot For Loot - Track 5 (Arcade)* 2:15:54 Hardcore 4x4 Flea's Dreams (PS1 - Unreleased OST)*
More from Pixelated Audio
Pixelated Audio is back from another VGMCon in Minnesota, this time about space! Joining Gene once again from last year are Pernell from Rhythm and Pixels and Carlos from Heroes Three!
Our show takes us back in time to the pleasant summer vibes of Malibu Bikini Volleyball, a no-frill sports game released in 1993 for the underdog Atari Lynx handheld, developed by Hand Made Software and composed by Paul Tonge.
Today, we're looking back at Astyanax, an action platformer released for arcade and NES in 1989 and a game we both grew up playing. Sometimes referred to as "The Lord of King" or "The Astyanax", the original arcade game was developed by Aicom and published by Jaleco, with the NES version developed and published by Jaleco. Both versions share some similarities, like fighting hordes of mythological creatures, but the key difference for our show is they feature completely different soundtracks. We'll be focusing on the NES soundtrack written by Toshiko Tasaki with an occasional detour to the arcade original composed by Kiyoshi Yokoyama.
In this installment of Pixelated Audio, we're taking a stroll through the soundtrack of Blades of Steel. Originally, Konami released this fact-action hockey game in the arcades in 1987 but it really gained popularity a year later when it was converted to the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1988. However, most of us (at least your hosts) tend to forget that two sequels were released: NHL Blades of Steel '99 and NHL Blades of Steel 2000 which we’ve got some tunes from as well.
With the holiday season upon us, Gene and several other friends visited Sacramento Gamers Expo where we met some awesome game developer legends like David Crane, Garry Kitchen and Ed Annunziata. Joining Gene is Michelle (the 'voice' of Sue Kasper), AJ of VGMPorium (also on our Persona show) and last but not least Brian Stewart, one of the biggest VGM fans you'll ever find. Join us as we look back at our experience at SGE playing games, attending panels and looking back at our gaming in 2024 more generally.