and retro   
   computer cultures ther website can be found here.  www.goto80.com   
      
   4-mat (programming/design, UK) makes tiny audiovisual art for various 8-bit   
   computer systems, and works with game audio.  He was also one of the first   
   in the world to make chipmusic on the Amiga in 1990.  4mat.bandcamp.com   
      
   iLKke (graphics/design, Australia) is a notorious pixel artist and   
   composer, who started in the Amiga demoscene in Serbia.  ilkke.net   
      
   Ray Manta (concept/design, Australia) is the alias of veteran electronica   
   producer   
      
   Tim Koch, who initiated and organized the project runs   
   datadoor.bandcamp.com/ where you can download music by some of the artists   
   named above, and from himself, it depends what you want out of your music   
   but I would advise you to check out some of the unique pieces on offer.   
      
   WEBSITES   
      
   Videos   
   www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPXGA7R6gb0   
      
   Device   
   datadoor.net/dubcrt/   
   datadoor.bandcamp.com/album/dubcrt/   
      
      
      
   *************************************   
          INTERVIEW WITH TIM KOCH   
            Creator of DUBCART   
   *************************************   
      
   datadoor.bandcamp.com/track/antispeed-tim-koch-cartridge-remix   
   datadoor.bandcamp.com/album/dubcrt   
      
   COMMODORE FREE:  Please, can you introduce yourself to our Commodore Free   
   readers?   
      
   Tim Koch:  Hi my name is Tim Koch, I have been using Commodore machines   
   since about 1985 - I grew up with a C64 and then in the late eighties   
   jumped over to Amiga for music production - then strangely enough became   
   heavily involved again with the Commodore 64 via a love of the SID chip in   
   around 2008.  Since then I have gradually started using trackers and other   
   music tools (Prophet64/Mssiah) for live performance using the SID chip, and   
   also toying with PETSCII in perhaps a more progressive way (I'd like to   
   think anyway).  I also run DataDoor which is the music label /   
   software+hardware oddity label.  Outside of Commodore / retro scene I have   
   been writing, releasing, and performing electronic music for the past   
   twenty years or so (under my real name as well as "10:32").   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  So what was your first introduction to Computers, and especially the   
   Commodore range of machines?   
      
   TK:  in the mid 1980s as a kid many friends had Spectrums here in   
   Australia, but somewhere along the line we scammed our parents into   
   purchasing a C64 for 'educational' purposes which of course meant games.   
   First and foremost I think I was blown away by this discovery of dynamic   
   sound and music since I had just heard the more rudimentary blips on   
   Spectrum / Amstrad / Texas Instruments of friends.  After realizing just   
   how different the SID sounded to fresh ears I think I did literally enjoy   
   games more for their soundtracks than anything else, and of course Galway's   
   Parallax title music and Hubbard's Delta in-game music exposed me to more   
   interesting composition than standard melodic game-theme dynamics.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  So it's mainly the music /graphics that are a big part of your   
   Commodore love then?   
      
   TK:  Oh yes definitely, the odd qualities and restrictions of the 6581 and   
   8580 has always fascinated me, as has the PETSCII character set (or   
   CBMSCII) for CBM machines.  As has been stated quite a lot, the   
   restrictions of a tool set or technology are often the factors that result   
   in unexpected creativity or surprises, and I think the limitation of three   
   oscillators with the SID and also the rudimentary nature of PETSCII have   
   always fascinated me to the point of wanting to toy with both and learn a   
   little more about what can be done.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  DUBCRT is listed as a music album with interactive light synthesizer   
   and remix gadget released as a Commodore 64 cartridge.  Was it important to   
   fit everything on one cartridge?  Were you ever tempted to maybe consider a   
   memory bank switching cartridge with a number of CRT files held on   
   different chips that could be switched on or off for different music?   
      
   TK:  We did have a lot of discussion about potentially using bank-switching   
   and some other tricks, but eventually thought it would be better to stick   
   to a focused group of just eight songs that effectively mimicked somewhat a   
   conventional music album in length.  Eventually we thought it better to   
   cram as much as possible into the 64k of the EPROM rather than expand the   
   architecture of the cart to allow for too much content which would perhaps   
   result in the loss of focus of the crux of what we initially envisioned for   
   the DUBCRT.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  For anyone not exactly clear, what does the cartridge actually do?   
   So, once installed and powered on, what happens?   
      
   TK:  Without giving too much away, after a very short intro the cart loads   
   a menu that is essentially a blank puzzle template.  At this point the user   
   can jump into one of eight songs and their associated visualisers.  Within   
   each song and visualiser it is possible to alter the parameters of what is   
   happening on screen (colour, type of PETSCII characters being used, rate of   
   activity, and some other glitchy variables).   
      
   In it's boot-state - each of the eight songs are hard locked to their   
   associated visualisers, but once the secret sections are reached, the user   
   can alter the sequence of song and visualiser which displays how each   
   visualiser reacts distinctly different depending on the type of SID   
   activity.   
      
   Without giving too much away, listening to the songs in a certain order   
   will gift the user with more puzzle pieces that appear on the main menu   
   once you exit from a song/visualiser.  One visualiser is an abstract   
   PETSCII platform-game controlled via joystick in port2 - and the more   
   tokens that are collected in this game also gift the user more puzzle   
   pieces in the main menu.   
      
   So essentially once the user has filled the empty puzzle slots, they need   
   to arrange them in a configuration that then alerts the user they have   
   entered the next 'mode' (or secret section).  Each new mode then unlocks   
   more functionality, eventually resulting in a special section that then   
   allows the user to have A LOT of control over remixing all of the songs on   
   the cartridge.   
      
   There is a secret section that allows the user to remix all of the patterns   
   of the song they choose, alter waveforms of each oscillator etc.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  Has anything ever been created like this before?   
      
   TK:  Well there have certainly been games and demos that have incorporated   
   elements of DUBCRT, but as far as I can tell nothing has been released as a   
   cartridge in this fashion where the onus is on experimentation and   
   playfulness.  Games such as Master of the Lamps or Frankie Goes To   
   Hollywood certainly inspired the simple puzzle aspects of DUBCRT, and   
   abstract music disks such as Disco Calculi (Wrath Designs 2007) definitely   
   have some similarities.  Jeff Minter's Psychedelia is also of course a very   
   big inspiration.  I think also that Goto80's vision in terms of perhaps   
   pushing the SID into more progressive territory is quite distinctive   
   especially since he uses defMON which is a custom-tracker in a way that it   
   has been personalised to some degree to his own needs.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  So the Commodore 64 is best known for it SID chip and graphics, and I   
   think your intention was to use petscii graphics.  Was this purely down to   
   memory or because of this classic retro feel?   
      
   TK:  Definitely a homage to SID and PETSCII, with a shift towards the   
   restrictions that are offered by both.  I think PETSCII is only now being   
   fully explored in terms of the quirks and possibilities of using it   
   creatively.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  Petscii graphics certainly can be very leasing and unique.  Could you   
   explain to our readers who was involved in the project, and how were they   
   selected?   
      
   TK:  Goto80 did all of the music, 4mat did all of the code, iLKke did all   
   of the incidental PETSCII (logo, intro screens for each song/visualiser   
   section).  Personally I just came up with the idea and we all developed the   
   design and ideas, with 4mat's code obviously guiding the general design in   
   a very major way.  Goto80 has always done very interesting things with the   
   SID, so from the outset the project was he and I brainstorming how it was   
   going to work and who we could find to code it and also do general PETSCII   
   gfx such as logos and other components.  4mat had been doing great and   
   interesting things with his more adventurous and abstract demos with Atebit   
   and Orb (he and iLKke did a Commodore PET demo previously), and iLKke has   
   such a great visual flair (and is also a great chip musician and coder in   
   his own right) - so it all fell into place in terms of us all having a   
   pretty similar vision in regards to how we regarded retro tech and art   
   aesthetics.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  How was the production of the device achieved?  How did you move from   
   Art music and coding onto a physical cartridge format?   
      
   TK:  Once the music choices of Goto80s were totally locked in, 4mat got   
   busy finalising the code and the design grew from this.  Once a working   
   template was in place we got Goto80 to finesse the tracks we had chosen.   
   Consequently once we had a working CRT file, I started working finding a   
   suitable PCB design, and luckily DDI had a great PCB already in existence   
   which then Dale @ DDI and I configured to work with a transparent   
   plexi-case that complemented the LEDs on the PCB that threw light upwards,   
   bouncing back off the plexi back onto the DUBCRT logo that is etched on the   
   PCB :) Also the pulsing red LED on the reset switch is a great touch,   
   almost acting like the beating heart of the whole PCB haha.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  I see from the website the cartridge has sold out, and pretty quickly.   
   Are there plans to re-release the device?   
      
   TK:  It sold out in approximately two and a half hours, and was always   
   meant to be a passion project and done in a small run.  Luckily Tim at   
   Shareware Plus in the UK has licensed the DUBCRT to do another batch of   
   cartridges later in the year (Tim has re-released Paul Slocum's Cynthcart   
   recently with new packaging and extra features).   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  There is an audio-only version available of the music.  Was this   
   created, I presume from feeding a "real" machine and not using emulation?   
      
   TK:  The audio version is an oddity in that I audio dumped the songs from   
   the cartridge on a real C64 (6581SID) and a C64C (8580SID) - and then   
   edited them into a stereo file with each version of the SID in left and   
   right channel respectively.  The DUBCRT is ultimately suited to the new SID   
   chip (8580) but is still acceptable on a 6581 SID - just some odd quirks   
   with filters and the like.  The DUBCRT is however not suited to any NTSC   
   machines, with some undesirable problems with speed and visuals!   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  Will there be a follow on version?   
      
   TK:  At this stage there is definitely plans for a DUBCRT2 - and actually   
   the first batch of cartridges all have slotted EPROMS - so in theory there   
   may be a chance people can just swap over the EPROM if we do a new version,   
   but ultimately it would be nicer to do a whole new design, so that is the   
   plan!   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  How do you feel about emulation?  Do you think it has a valid place in   
   retro community?   
      
   TK:  I think there is definitely a valid place for emulation in that it   
   opens up accessibility for a project such as this - and we are planning to   
   release a digital only version with VICE bundled maybe for those who have   
   no experience with emulation.  Large parts of the cart were done without   
   even touching authentic hardware (I did a lot of the testing on my real   
   machines here), with the code done in a PRG studio type environment.   
      
            - - - - - - - - - -   
      
   CF:  What has the general feed-back been like?   
      
   TK:  There has been very good feedback so far - with people quite intrigued   
   with the format and also the unusual nature of the graphics in that they   
   really don't follow any conventions or standards, but they are more a   
   homage to 60's and 70   
      
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