Was David Whittaker the laziest musician on Amiga? - Page 3

dirk_the_daring · 16 November 2009, 21:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stefan Lindberg

I wonder what speed the WOTD music should be playing at... the Amiga version plays the music slower than the Atari ST version (wich i am used to) judging from the youtube longplay videos?

Here are two recordings from the Atari version:
wotd-the_dark_tower.ogg (used at level 1 in Amiga version)
wotd-title.ogg

Try playing WOTD in 60Hz mode and music will play at that speed...

desiv · 17 November 2009, 18:28

When you consider the quantity of his music, and the fact that most likely (and definitely in some cases) he was asked to do similar music to other music (which is pretty standard, not just for games, but for any music), it sounds to me like he did a really good job adding variety and his own feel/sound to the games he worked on.
He made the people who paid him happy (judging by the quantity of his work) and the end users (for the most part) happy.

Sounds like a pretty good career to me...

Just my opinion..

desiv

Stefan Lindberg · 19 November 2009, 20:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by dirk_the_daring

Try playing WOTD in 60Hz mode and music will play at that speed...

I have never played the Amiga version... just seen the longplay video and i also checked out the music in windows Deliplayer, i guess the Amiga version got a bad "NTSC" to "PAL" conversion like many console games of that time.

alexh · 19 November 2009, 23:45

If you'd never heard the NTSC ones you'd never know. I prefer the slower versions.

alexh · 19 November 2009, 23:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Photon

Trying to find the song that Whittaker sampled heavily for SOTB... I noticed it just the other week... was it Vangelis??

Pretty much Whittaker never sampled any songs for SOTB. I'm pretty sure all samples come direct from the Korg M1 synthesiser. It was a big deal at the time and the Korg M1 had articles in all Amiga magazines around the time of SoTB.

If there is a song which sounds familiar it is surely because it is performed using a Korg M1?

Galahad/FLT · 19 November 2009, 23:56

Lady Gaga used the same samples as Whittaker in Poker Face.

desiv · 20 November 2009, 06:04

From a youtube posting:

Quote:

When I was creating the music for Shadow of the Beast I sampled the Korg M1 quite a lot, also some Korg DS8 and Kawai K1. Some of my Amiga tracks also contain samples from Korg 01/RW and the good old ST-01, ST-02 sample discs. I did also sample some tapes/records too... and a covermount tape from a magazine called Sound On Sound from years back.

desiv

Oopps.. That's Tim Wright, not Whitaker.. :-)

alexh · 20 November 2009, 10:35

Erm Tim Wright never wrote anything for SOTB 1

desiv · 20 November 2009, 18:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by alexh

Erm Tim Wright never wrote anything for SOTB 1

See, that's how I read it and why I thought it was Whitaker.

Then I re-read it and manually inserted a comma that wasn't there, and it makes a huge difference..
From:

Quote:

When I was creating the music for Shadow of the Beast I sampled the Korg M1 quite a lot

to

Quote:

When I was creating the music for Shadow of the Beast, I sampled the Korg M1 quite a lot

desiv

alexh · 20 November 2009, 19:33

D'oh!

onkelarie · 24 November 2009, 11:47

Quite frankly, some of the most memorable tunes (for me that is) are actually from mr. Whittaker... Games like Red Max, Obliterator and Speedball 1 have great tunes.

s2325 · 27 December 2009, 20:18

[ Show youtube player ]

Grazey · 25 January 2014, 19:57

It wasn't just samples that Whittaker reused.
On the ST he reused complete tunes!
For example Cloud Kingdoms sub tune 7 is identical to the title tune of Warlock the Avenger.

I'm not sure if this is the same on the Amiga.

There was also another two Whittaker games which had identical music. Think it was a rugby game and a football games.

Grazey

Mark Wright · 26 January 2014, 07:17

Can't believe I missed this thread first time round! Can't believe there is so much praise for David "Jas C Brooke" Whittaker either!

By his own admission, David Whittaker was a hack of the lowest order. He's on record as saying (you'll have to find the source yourself) that his gameplan was to set himself up as a quick-turnaround production line, able to supply any old plink-plonk rubbish knocked up in an afternoon, but crucially always to deadline, and for virtually any format.

He built his reputation on being available, reliable and cheap. Need it this afternoon? Dave's your go-to man! But we need it across C64/Spectrum 48/128/Atari 8-bit - no problem, your guys can just slot it in. What - it's done already? Wow! And look - your invoice is already here too! Whatta guy!

Arguably this was acceptable in the 8-bit era, even if you accept that you're deliberately placing yourself way down the pecking order, happy to play Stock Aitken & Waterman to Rob Hubbard's Led Zeppelin and Martin Galway's Pink Floyd.

Actually, as an Atari 8-bit owner in the mid-80s starved of anything new or good, I was quite glad to hear his predictable warbles accompanying yet another crap budget game I'd bought just because it was there. Even if it said "Jas C Brooke" on the title screen.

To be generous, perhaps it was this prodigious workload rather than lack of musical ability that caused so many hearts to sink when confronted with yet another lackluster, Whittaker-by-numbers soundtrack. It got worse in the early days of the 16 bit era with Whittaker's 8-bit notation data now forced to play some guitar sample nicked from the Sonix disk, or trumpet. Notation data, by the way, that always conformed to the following rules:

4-bar introduction minus melody
4-bar main melody bit
4-bar simple variation
KEYCHANGE!
repeat above
START AGAIN
Song length: 0:49

20 years ago, I made some Whittaker "piss take" modules using his template, based on how I imagined he'd score some games that weren't converted to the Amiga (Ninja, Elektraglide). Blimey, they're here:

http://fonix.dyndns.org/soamc/index....&sl=&sis=N%2FA

Select the subtunes for DaveNinja and Elektraglide for my sarcastic interpretations - shame they don't loop endlessly as they were designed to do.

Musically and technically speaking, anyone who mentions David Whittaker in the same breath as the likes of Hubbard, Galway or Huelsbeck is doing so out of a sense of nostalgia. Or is tone deaf.

So there.

psygnosis · 26 January 2014, 14:26

Who cares!!

s2325 · 26 January 2014, 14:42

I like his 2 less famous tunes - dark castle.sid [ Show youtube player ] and armageddon man.sid [ Show youtube player ]

Galahad/FLT · 26 January 2014, 17:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by psygnosis

Who cares!!

Says the guy that took the time out of his day to comment in a thread who's subject he doesn't care about..... thats who

Grazey · 26 January 2014, 18:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mark Wright

Can't believe I missed this thread first time round! Can't believe there is so much praise for David "Jas C Brooke" Whittaker either!

At first I thought you were saying Jas C Brooke was an alias of Whittaker. I must admit I had my doubts Jas existed in the past. Especially when in an interview David he said he did the ST version of Outrun even though the the game credits JCB.

But I've found a C64 JCB interview which states he wrote the music drivers and Whittaker did most of the composing. From a music ripping point of view his songs were one of the easiest to rip and had the bonus of been PC-Relative which was quite rare in the early days.

Grz

psygnosis · 26 January 2014, 18:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

Says the guy that took the time out of his day to comment in a thread who's subject he doesn't care about..... thats who

Well we are all entitled to an opinion

Codetapper · 26 January 2014, 21:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mark Wright

By his own admission, David Whittaker was a hack of the lowest order. He's on record as saying (you'll have to find the source yourself) that his gameplan was to set himself up as a quick-turnaround production line, able to supply any old plink-plonk rubbish knocked up in an afternoon, but crucially always to deadline, and for virtually any format.

David Whitaker's tunes certainly all sound far too similar to me. Another artist that I don't rate (and certainly can't think of any top-100 C64 tune composed by him) is Martin Walker.

Consider Armalyte, Citadel, Hunter's Moon etc - almost the same boring intro "music" made up by playing almost random notes with some warbling effect an no melody to speak of. I really don't see why anyone rated him as a musician. I enjoy C64 cracktro tunes more than his stuff.

When you have a smash hit like Armalyte on your hands, why not get Rob Hubbard or Maniacs of Noise to pump out a decent tune for the game?

Anyone else agree with me on this one?

View Poll Results: Was David Whittaker the laziest musician on Amiga?
Yes	10	10.64%
No	48	51.06%
I still liked his tunes, but they were a bit samey	36	38.30%
Voters: 94. You may not vote on this poll

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17 November 2009, 18:28	#42
desiv Registered User Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Salem, OR Posts: 1,770	When you consider the quantity of his music, and the fact that most likely (and definitely in some cases) he was asked to do similar music to other music (which is pretty standard, not just for games, but for any music), it sounds to me like he did a really good job adding variety and his own feel/sound to the games he worked on. He made the people who paid him happy (judging by the quantity of his work) and the end users (for the most part) happy. Sounds like a pretty good career to me... Just my opinion.. desiv

19 November 2009, 23:45	#44
alexh Thalion Webshrine Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Oxford Posts: 14,400	If you'd never heard the NTSC ones you'd never know. I prefer the slower versions.

19 November 2009, 23:56	#46
Galahad/FLT Going nowhere Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: United Kingdom Age: 50 Posts: 9,014	Lady Gaga used the same samples as Whittaker in Poker Face.

20 November 2009, 10:35	#48
alexh Thalion Webshrine Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Oxford Posts: 14,400	Erm Tim Wright never wrote anything for SOTB 1

20 November 2009, 19:33	#50
alexh Thalion Webshrine Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Oxford Posts: 14,400	D'oh!

24 November 2009, 11:47	#51
onkelarie Registered User Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Spijkenisse / the Netherlands Age: 54 Posts: 525	Quite frankly, some of the most memorable tunes (for me that is) are actually from mr. Whittaker... Games like Red Max, Obliterator and Speedball 1 have great tunes.

27 December 2009, 20:18	#52
s2325 Zone Friend Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Gargore Age: 43 Posts: 17,789	[ Show youtube player ]

25 January 2014, 19:57	#53
Grazey Registered User Join Date: May 2009 Location: Kingston Upon Hull - home of the Hubbard Posts: 25	It wasn't just samples that Whittaker reused. On the ST he reused complete tunes! For example Cloud Kingdoms sub tune 7 is identical to the title tune of Warlock the Avenger. I'm not sure if this is the same on the Amiga. There was also another two Whittaker games which had identical music. Think it was a rugby game and a football games. Grazey

26 January 2014, 07:17	#54
Mark Wright Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Hove, actually Posts: 218	Can't believe I missed this thread first time round! Can't believe there is so much praise for David "Jas C Brooke" Whittaker either! By his own admission, David Whittaker was a hack of the lowest order. He's on record as saying (you'll have to find the source yourself) that his gameplan was to set himself up as a quick-turnaround production line, able to supply any old plink-plonk rubbish knocked up in an afternoon, but crucially always to deadline, and for virtually any format. He built his reputation on being available, reliable and cheap. Need it this afternoon? Dave's your go-to man! But we need it across C64/Spectrum 48/128/Atari 8-bit - no problem, your guys can just slot it in. What - it's done already? Wow! And look - your invoice is already here too! Whatta guy! Arguably this was acceptable in the 8-bit era, even if you accept that you're deliberately placing yourself way down the pecking order, happy to play Stock Aitken & Waterman to Rob Hubbard's Led Zeppelin and Martin Galway's Pink Floyd. Actually, as an Atari 8-bit owner in the mid-80s starved of anything new or good, I was quite glad to hear his predictable warbles accompanying yet another crap budget game I'd bought just because it was there. Even if it said "Jas C Brooke" on the title screen. To be generous, perhaps it was this prodigious workload rather than lack of musical ability that caused so many hearts to sink when confronted with yet another lackluster, Whittaker-by-numbers soundtrack. It got worse in the early days of the 16 bit era with Whittaker's 8-bit notation data now forced to play some guitar sample nicked from the Sonix disk, or trumpet. Notation data, by the way, that always conformed to the following rules: 4-bar introduction minus melody 4-bar main melody bit 4-bar simple variation KEYCHANGE! repeat above START AGAIN Song length: 0:49 20 years ago, I made some Whittaker "piss take" modules using his template, based on how I imagined he'd score some games that weren't converted to the Amiga (Ninja, Elektraglide). Blimey, they're here: http://fonix.dyndns.org/soamc/index....&sl=&sis=N%2FA Select the subtunes for DaveNinja and Elektraglide for my sarcastic interpretations - shame they don't loop endlessly as they were designed to do. Musically and technically speaking, anyone who mentions David Whittaker in the same breath as the likes of Hubbard, Galway or Huelsbeck is doing so out of a sense of nostalgia. Or is tone deaf. So there.

26 January 2014, 14:26	#55
psygnosis Registered User Join Date: Mar 2013 Location: liverpool Posts: 163	Who cares!!

26 January 2014, 14:42	#56
s2325 Zone Friend Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Gargore Age: 43 Posts: 17,789	I like his 2 less famous tunes - dark castle.sid [ Show youtube player ] and armageddon man.sid [ Show youtube player ]

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