End of Feb already.. had a huge month with Blip Festival Australia happening so apologies if I missed some things this month.. (pic from Graff artist Gameboyone.)

Cheapshot

The one and only ChipBass powerhouse that is James York aka Cheapshot is about to drop a new release called Streets of Bass and its going to be huge.. a follow up to the amazing zOMG! release last year you can hear for yourself with this exclusive preview of the track Minger.. Stay tuned to Cheapshots Facey for download details
KeFF

Awesome Chipbass / Skweee / Game Boy wonk from this Finnish bro. Really love hearing his particular sound develop hopefully see a new release soon

O Samuli A

Some more stuff from Finland, wonky Chipstep available on Vinyl!! Really keen on the groove that is in some of these tracks

Kodek & Not Fear

Straight up Ice Funk Skweee, great to hear Kodek exploring some new sounds and working with other artists this is really quality .. cool fun video and name your price download.. no excuses grab it.

DA CHIP – DAFT PUNK REMIXES

So the first one of these came out a few years back this one is even better. Including some of the biggest names in Chipmusic and some of the hardest bassheads as well (Cheapshot, cTrix, Knife City, Sabrepulse to name a few). really liking the sound of a lot of these tracks and its all free grab both this one and the old one from the site HERE

Abortifacient

Australian Voodoo Bass scientist delivers this new freebie. It was the last track he played as the Opening act of Blip Fest Australia and it really left an impression on me.. Huge Abstract Massive rhythms and great sound design.. grab it!

DKSTR

Finland is killing it this month.. This release is one of the first that I know of that is an artist who is active within the chipmusic scene being released on a well known Skweee label. A great release and very true to the skweee stylings whilst keeping a very authentic chip flavour as well. Highly Highly recommended. Also a reminder that this guy is part of weekly beats and has been uploading some great jams HERE

Read full review of Tijuana Bible – DKSTR on Boomkat.com ©

Weekly Beats Roundup
Fossa – Proto Dynastic Felines Some electro skweee funk badness .. NICE!
Minikomi – Nauticus Omnivore Again killer track from Minikomi even if it was mucking about with software he doesn’t like
bleo – standard deduction wonky funky and all sorts of weirdness, somehow holds together into an awesome track
Lazerbeat – 06 Monsters This track totally nails an emulation of the chipbass sound and then some.. like cheapshot with added grit or something
Dos.Putin – 4′rizza Huge Bassy Chipstep funk from the renamed 486kid..

So I attended Blip Festival in New York City and it was absolutely incredible I am going to attempt to recap some of the Chip Bass-centric highlights and a few extra bits too!

BLIP FEST CHIP BASS RECAP

I don’t think I can begin to describe the all encompassing shared lucid dreaming that is Blip Festival. Massive visual walls blasting lo-fi destruction and the worlds best and most creative practitioners in the art of squeezing sounds out of archaic machines combine to provide an unforgettable 3 nights of shows. This year it was very clear that chipmusic is broad and diverse and shows no sign of slowing down, there was punk (10kfreemen), noisy amiga core (stagediver), alt-folk-electro-awesome (talk to animals), post-rock space anthems (starscream) and heaps more. All the acts were really amazing but for this post I will just be sticking to the Chip Bass focused acts.

 
Ralp

This guy from Spain delivered a non-stop assault of heavy kick drums and rolling bass. While I may not be able to name a single Ralp song and his set (as well as his albums) seem to be a single epic progressive electro jam that is actually an incredibly refreshing thing in a live show and it kept the energy high through out the set. You can download a bunch of his music from here.

Beastmode

BBEEEAAASSSTTMMOOODDEEE! So incredibly heavy, this Canadian is all about heavy distorted bass, stripped back beats and horror visuals. This set went down as most likely to give you nightmares with glitched crazed clown visuals and the performer wearing a scarecrow Halloween mask. After this set I am even more eagerly anticipating a proper Beastmode release. You can check out some tracks on his soundcloud.

cTrix

Australia! FUCK YEAH! Everyone in the chip scene knows cTrix is king of the dancefloor. His set at Blip further solidified this title and blew everyone’s high expectation out of the water. He swapped and changed between cheesy demoscene synthpop, the best produced amiga dance remixes ever (see above video) and also unleashed a new self made tool the gAtari (an Atari 2600 with original tunes through effects pedals). Your best bet to get a hold of cTrix’s music is to bug him to release more of his limited edition USB keys (I got one at blip).. You can get some music and contact details here.

Wet Mango

Harsh heavy hip-hop beats and an aggressive stage persona made this a really standout act. The tempo switched and changed throughout always keeping a kind of industrial edge with very heavy bass. Having not heard much of her music before this show I was very pleasantly suprised and will definitely be keeping an eye out for future releases. You can too here.

Knife City

The drummer from pop-punk chip super stars Anamanaguchi is a standout artist in his own right delivering one of the most hard hitting dancefloor shaking sets of the festival. He also dropped in two or three of the most brutal chipstep tracks I have ever heard (one in the example video above) the production and sound design in this music for just a gameboy is absolutely incredible. He apparently has a release upcoming on 8bitpeoples WATCH THIS SPACE….. space

AFTERPARTIES AND THE LIKE

Ok so surrounding blip there were a bunch of other events… B.Leo at the Hexawe Allstars show was a standout for me…this guy delivered some great skweee style bleeps and beats from his handheld tracker. Other than that the official after party with Sabrepulse, Glomag, Trash80 and JDDJ3J may as well have been Blip day 4 with some of the best well produced dance friendly music of the week.

Also worth noting the True Chip till Death Awards happened during Blip week and awarded my favourite Label Metrodub, “Label of the year”. Metrodub have also released a new Cheapshot EP this month so support a great label and grab some great free music here.

Finally I will leave you with a lovely little chipbass/dub mixtape from Battery Powered Music.. Download here
 

Every month after I do these posts I wonder if there will be enough new material next month to fill out an entire post and every month I am overwhelmed and surprised with the quality and quantity of Bass influenced Chipmusic being put out in the world and the vast majority for free or cheap.. I <3 Chip Bass!!! (image by Jenn Yves Lemoigne)

MonoDeer

From the Netherlands this GameBoy artist (aka DEER or Mark van den Heuvel) has made some of my favourite chipstep stuff in the past but hasn’t been active for a little while, so it is with great pleasure I announce his return with this killer track that has a real unique swing and step to it and I am a big fan MORE PLEASE! Stream the Finished track below or download the Demo here

March of the Grizzly Bears by MONODEER

Sparkyboy

Now to the only active South African Chip artist that I know of  Sparkyboy. His most recent EP release is a great progression of his style and includes some Dubstep influences as well as a bit of Tropical/Reggaeton and electro and is really really great fun. My two favourite tracks on the release are Veldstep and Danger Danger (Stream Below). Really just download the whole thing for free from Calmdownkidder records its worth it.

Maddest Kings Alive

Australian Multi-Chip instrumentalist has come out with a new cracking classic dub track with nice chip melodies and earthquake inducing sub-bass. Towards the middle once the breaks kick in and it gets going this track really really shines, pick the track up for just $1!

little-scale

Another Australian and not the last in this post either (incredibly biased towards the aussie chip scene deal with it). little-scale from Adelaide is not only a very prolific and talented artist but also a keen inventor of new tools and hardware for the chip community and also recently graduated with a Doctorate which focused on Chipmusic. It was actually his study I believe that prevented him from releasing as much material in some time (for an artist that also completed a song everyday last year). So this short EP is a welcome return for the artist and it is great to hear him attacking a slightly wonky bass-driven sound on the title track, check it out and download the EP here.

Chalices of the Past

LETS GET TROPICAL!! This squad from Britain bring out the lo-fi distorted steel drum vibe so well I immediately grabbed this release when it came out. The previous release 2Rude is unlike anything else in the chip scene and so incredibly refreshing because of it, yet within the uniquness there is an element of unified sound that even crosses to this new release. Super distorted kick drums, tropical rhythms, steel drums, glitched bleepy melodies, it is a recipe that seems to be repeatable with constant success. Literally one of my favourite releases of the year incredibly original.

Bankai + Abortifacient

This is a release I have been awaiting and even though it isn’t out yet the first sounds of what to expect have appeared and it is a giant mash of chipstep, kuduro, moombahxcore and whatever else. Batshit crazy Australians making gritty lo-fi bangers is probably the best thing ever so have a listen, and keep an eye on ALLCAPS RECORDS for when this drops.

Four Litres of Hope (demo, feat. Abortifacient) by Bankai

cTrix

The unchallenged lord and master of dancefloor chipmusic in Australia cTrix in preparation for heading off to Blipfestival in New York next month (I will be going to and will give a special Blipfest ChipBass round-up and review next month), he has released another one of his epic jams. This is all live Gameboy Tech-House stuff running through a DJ Mixer and its unashamedly cheesy at times but so masterfully done it gets booties shaking on the first drop.. Download here.

Etch (Ant1 remix)

Vekta Records the sweet creative commons based future dub garage label that released the Chipstep banger by Kraettz are about to put out a Remix EP of their most recent release by Etch, RGB. I have been flung the Ant1 remix and it is a real nice mix of chip arps and heavy bass grooves. Expect this to be out in the next week or so, keep your eyes on the Vekta Records page.