Chiptune is a strange subgenre for most people to listen to. The basis of Chiptune is to play music through an old Gameboy or Super Nintendo output filter (or anything similar from an older video gaming era, for the matter) and have a different impact altogether musically. Bit Shifter is the leading artist and one of the early innovators for Chiptune, and this is one of the early releases by them. Is it any good? Let’s find out.

The Connector Conspiracy begins with some awesome kick beats and repeating textures that sound truly awesome. Instantly, you can hear how wonderful and excellent this tune is. It’s fantastic, and for anyone who loves Electronic music of any sort, this will be ideal for you. An excellent piece of music with layers of sounds, this is a great introductory piece for this album. It goes into a minimal midsection breakdown, which is twisted and interesting. A great piece of Chiptune, this sounds really great and exploration. It wraps up with 4/4 beats and concludes just under three minutes in length. Great start.

March Of The Nucleotides is a glorious and beautifully melodic piece of music. It quickly enters into a rapid fire beat based tune that sounds really wonderful. This is a beautiful and wonderful sonic piece of music that still sounds great. An excellent listen with pretty melodies and rhythmic excellence, this is music for Game Boy and Nintendo fans who cannot listen to ordinary music. A great listen throughout, this sounds very, very good. It ends with a nod to The Chemical Brothers sort of sound, great effort.

The No Enemy Code has a super cheesy intro, before launching into a great piece of music. This album and these songs are hugely underrated. There is a great mixture of sounds, beats and textures throughout with a cheerful and optimistic sound to the 8 Bit goodness. A wonderful, powerful and lively listen, this is very out there, but still great listening. An excellent piece of music, through and through. This is one for those who grew up with Atari, Nintendo and Sega. Brilliant.

Cursor War is 16 seconds long, and is a short, sharp sonic assault. Not too much is to be said here, but it’s okay for what it is.

Magmadiver begins with some interesting introductory sounds that sound really truly awesome. The intricate melodies will no doubt blow many minds out there, this is impressive and amazing. Soon enough, beats then enter and we are underway. A great and awesome tune to hear, Bit Shifter creates music unlike anyone else. There are some distorted 8 Bit style hi-hats and drumming in the second half. Even for largely experimental music, this is fantastic. Great to hear. It segues straight into the next track.

Inversion begins with a quirky melody and a pretty sound structure. Soon enough, 4/4 beats enter this track and we launch into a great pounding piece of Electronic music. A very good piece of music, this is somewhat akin to Hardcore EDM, it sounds super fast and intense. Really excellent listening, this sounds really awesome and catchy. A great sounding piece of music, there are some interesting melodies towards the end that should be heard by all EDM fans. Great tune.

The Utopia Proclamation begins with a strange melody, followed by some House Music style 4/4 beats and other intricate melodies. Nonetheless, the music here is very, very good. It sounds really fine, fantastic and incredible. Obviously Bit Shifter is a real musical genius. The piece of music here is awesome and excellent structured, and is a quirky piece of music that is good to listen to through headphones or to add to spice up a playlist. Great piece of music, the ending is excellent, as per usual. A fine listen.

Permutation Cipher begins with some really weird sonic sounds. Soon enough, this tune quickly has some irregular beats emerge and we are underway. This is another major key, upbeat and euphoric listen to enjoy to the full. This one sounds much more quirky than usual, but still does the job nicely. With a catchy, cut up kick drum beat and cleverly placed melodies on top, this is really excellent. It ends much more minimally, an out there and great listening experience.

Charm, Beauty, Truth, And Strangeness begins with a great cut up melody for this style of music. Soon enough, this track gets going with a pounding 4/4 beat and some other percussion based sounds. Again, this is a really excellent listen. It sounds like MS-DOS territory on this tune, and is a really great and dramatic piece of music that must be heard by more people out there. Nonetheless, another great effort by Bit Shifter, and worth hearing time and time again. Good work.

Renegade Subroutine is a short intermission style piece at only over a minute long. It’s surprisingly weird, and super catchy. This is the sort of thing that would be popular in a Timezone from Japan. A really good piece of music, however.

The Uncertainty Principle begins with some heavy electronic textures, all in 8 Bit mode, however. This is certainly an interesting and different listening experience. It quickly launches into a great and rather minor key piece that certainly is different. This is excellently created and structured, it sounds totally unusual than anything else you’d expect. One of the best pieces from this album, this is certainly excellent. The second half sounds more subtle towards the end in terms of structure, but still retains the energy and volume of this piece. Great music.

Parallax Barrier has a very Atari 2600 style video game mock intro, before some other freaked out sounds enter. Still, this is an excellent tune to listen to, it just sounds supercharged and interesting, like the best can of energy drink you can have. A super cool piece of music, this is extremely underrated and decent listening. A really cool tune from this album, and a Chiptune classic. Nice work.

Inversion Redux is a short piece that sounds like rapid fire Chiptune. Again, this is fairly bizarre music, but it is irresistably excellent to hear. There is a breakdown in the middle with some repetitive sonic sounds that sound really awesome. A cool tune, it ends with a few seconds of silence, before having an unusual ending. Good stuff.

Double Density is a super short piece at one minute long. Having said that, it is a really excellent listen and is one of the most popular tunes from Bit Shifter. A good demonstration of Chiptune styled music for those who know nothing about it.

The Dark Matter Mystery may refer to the unsolved scientific mysteries of the universe. This one is much more catchy than what came before it, and it does sound really pumped up and awesome. A pounding and interesting tune to listen to, there are quirky melodies in this tune throughout. Very unique, interesting and catchy, this is a brilliantly upbeat and well structured tune. Nice effort throughout, this paints a pixellated picture of outer space. Great work. It concludes nicely.

Maple Leaf Rag is a very, very weird sounding Chiptune piece of music. It is pretty, yet very unusual sounding. A good effort as we approach the end of this early Chiptune release, it does sound really cool. Proof that adding a more unusual piece of music into an album can make things a bit better. Good to hear all the same, this sounds wonderful. Good tune throughout, there is a dramatic tempo shift at the end of this piece. Nice.

March Of The Nucleotides – mRNA Mix is the last track on this album. It has various beeps and bleeps to open with, launching into a decent remix of the earlier track on this album. A wonderful, intricate and joyful listen, Bit Shifter and co. do extremely well on this album, and this track as well. This is an colourful, energetic and interesting piece of music that stands out more than most. A very decent and excellent piece of music, this sounds really electrifying. Wonderful and tuneful, this sure shows some amazing promise as a futuristic genre of music. Definitely worth your time. Great conclusion to an underrated album, and an equally underrated form of music. Nice to listen to. A supercharged and fine tune to hear, the album ends with a computerised bleep.

This album is an underrated, golden classic of Chiptune. It sounds very amazing to this day, and has aged better than your average EDM compilation of note. If you love nostalgic 8 Bit sounds from the Nintendo Entertainment System and the Game Boy, seek this out to play now and again. It works incredibly well, and is a good listen.

Totally enjoyable.

9/10