My Favorite SID Tunes by Link

Klaus Grøngaard, known as Link in the European C64 demo scene, was the first person to use my music editor on the Commodore 64. He was active from 1989 to 1991 and created more than 150 tunes.

Question: SID tunes? What's that?

SID tunes are chiptunes created on the Commodore 64, or an emulation of the C64 or its SID chip.

The SID chip in the Commodore 64 was quite advanced in 1982. It had three channels across eight octaves, ADSR, four different waveforms, pulsating on the square waveform, three ring modulators, and multi mode filtering. The music players written for it were usually called 50 times a second, quickly changing waveforms and frequencies to simulate vibrato, drums and arpeggio chords.

I’ve been listening through all of Link’s tunes in the latest High Voltage SID Collection which was at #65 at the time of publishing this blog post. I noted down the 32 tunes I liked and created stereo MP3 files for easy listening here. You could call it sort of “Link’s Greatest Hits” as compiled by JCH.

Most of the tunes also have mono MP3 alternatives from SOASC created using a real C64.

Abnormal
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Action Guy
1990 Vibrants SOASC

American
1991 Vibrants SOASC
The bassline and synth riff in the first 15 seconds was taken from “You’re the One For Me” by D. Train.

Audio Guy
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Ball Jump
1990 Vibrants SOASC

Be There
1991 Vibrants SOASC

Remix: Click

Breakdown
1989 Vibrants
This is the only tune that doesn’t have an SOASC version.

The Champ
1989-90 Vibrants SOASC

Chase HQ II (Tune #1)
1990 Ocean SOASC
This arcade racing game conversion was also known as Special Criminal Investigation.

Chase HQ II (Tune #2)
1990 Ocean SOASC

Cheyens House
1989-91 Vibrants SOASC
Unfinished work tune.

Choice
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Comic Frame
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Dwarf Fly
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Got It 3
1989-91 Vibrants SOASC
Unfinished work tune.

Greeky Tune
1990 Vibrants SOASC
I believe Drax and I watched him play this on a keyboard at a C64 demo party.

Remix: Click

Jazz Max
1989 Vibrants SOASC
Another one I’m sure Drax and I watched him play on a keyboard at a C64 demo party.

Jazz Time
1989 Vibrants SOASC
I really like the moody leader in the first part. Makes it sound like a northern folk song somehow.

Loader / Hi
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Piano Wamp
1989 Vibrants SOASC
And again another one I believe Drax and I watched him play on a keyboard at a C64 demo party.

Rock Line
1990 Vibrants SOASC

Soundwork
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Space M+
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Spiky Zak
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Stormlord II
1990 Vibrants SOASC
This wasn’t used in the game. Matt Gray made the music for it instead.

Sweet Anne
1989-91 Vibrants SOASC
Unfinished work tune.

Title 5
1989-91 Vibrants SOASC
Unfinished work tune.

Triad
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Tuck Says
1989 Vibrants SOASC

Tune Nr. 4
1989 Cheyens SOASC
The only Future Composer tune here. I know it’s crude, but there’s just something about it.

Victory
1989-91 Vibrants SOASC

Visage
1989 Vibrants SOASC

This was just a small collection of Link’s tunes – my personal favorites. If you would you like to hear more, please download the High Voltage SID Collection as well as a SID emulator for your system.

All of the SID tunes have been saved as MP3 using SID plugin revision 33.293 for XMPlay 3.8.2 with the LAME encoder installed. I turned on stereo emulation and also adjusted the filter setting for various tunes.

Download all MP3 files: SID_Stereo_MP3_Link.zip (116 MB)

Updates

November 26, 2017: Added nine remixes.

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