Pterodactyl Squad

The Dark Side of the Moon - The 8-bit Album, by Pterodactyl Squad 9 track album

Looking back now, I do feel it's a great release, and I believe we achieved that flow with the way it all sequenced up and matched the original.

ptesquad.bandcamp.com/album/the-da... #chiptune

He graciously said yes, so that's why you see his name on the last track, but in the end I was just happy to see the back of the project.
It was weird being the second chip TDSOTM, and I definitely felt ours could have been a bigger deal had it been first.

I thought we'd engaged and bounced off the original well.
But then something even more ironic happened - one of the tracks that got submitted utilised audio from Brad Smith's release so I had to go to Brad and get clearance to use this.

For example, we had tracks like Money by sergeeo with the sound font from Sonic the Hedgehog's Casino Night Zone (very clever), alongside Game Boys, the Speak and Spell etc.
Steve Jenkins from Telefuture did the art, which I, again, think is really clever.

Had I known someone else was working on it, I wouldn't have bothered with ours. It almost seemed pointless to carry on, but in the end I felt ours did offer something that the original didn't, i.e. variety in the styles and sounds.

And it seemed to get picked up everywhere - I guess similar to what had happened with our Weezer release. The idea of chiptune tributes was still novel around 2010/11 and they seemed to really hit the zeitgeist.
I was pretty dejected about it to be honest.

People were working on their tracks, but I remember it taking longer than I'd anticipated. Then the funniest thing happened - someone else released their own chip version of TDSOTM and beat us to the punch! That person was Brad Smith with his MOON8 release.

That's kind of complicated when you're planning to use different artists, but I thought that would be a selling point of the release too. So it was a little tricky getting the right artists on board and having them commit. Inevitably some people dropped out and needed to be replaced.

I even wondered why it had never been done before.
This one would be different to the Weezer tribute though, and it required more planning. I knew it needed to basically track to the original, in the same way that each song flowed into the next in one giant sequence.

After the success of the Weezer tribute, we wondered what else we could do in the same vein and I was going through a big Pink Floyd phase at the time. Because of the nature of TDSOTM and all of its experimentation and textures, I knew it would make for a great chiptune tribute.

The Dark Side of the Moon - The 8-bit Album cover

As I continue my look back through all of our releases (with huge gaps between each post), let me tell you a funny story. It's about The Dark Side of the Moon - The 8-bit Album.

That's kind of complicated when you're planning to use different artists, but I thought that would be a selling point of the release too. So it was a little tricky getting the right artists on board and having them commit. Inevitably some people dropped out and needed to be replaced.

I even wondered why it had never been done before.
This one would be different to the Weezer tribute though, and it required more planning. I knew it needed to basically track to the original, in the same way that each song flowed into the next in one giant sequence.

After the success of the Weezer tribute, we wondered what else we could do in the same vein and I was going through a big Pink Floyd phase at the time. Because of the nature of TDSOTM and all of its experimentation and textures, I knew it would make for a great chiptune tribute.

We were so honoured to have Kageyama-san contribute a track to our Train Radio compilation in 2021. I believe it was the first music he'd released in a while. RIP to a chip hero.

We got the sad news that Kageyama Masashi passed away. The composer of one of the most beautiful retro soundtracks of all time, Gimmick! I've listened to it so many times, and I have it on again right now.

Here is a post that has all the tour dates that we are playing on it so you know when we are playing shows in the next few months. They start next week. It is great when people are at the shows so please come to them thank you.

Guchi fans-we need your help
See you on tour next week
anamanaguchi.com 🫶

What Cannot Be Told (Deluxe Edition), by Noisewaves 16 track album

I have been listening to Noisewaves all morning because of @ptesquad.bsky.social. First time I’ve listened to this in ages, and it holds up extremely well.
noisewaves.bandcamp.com/album/what-c...

Anyone know what Shawn and Ryan have been up to lately? @nickmaynard.bsky.social?

Noisewaves, by Noisewaves 5 track album

ptesquad.bandcamp.com/album/noisew... #chiptune

It was never mainstream but it did fit in with a lot of what was happening in the big indie and electronic scenes.
I seem to remember Noisewaves doing some live shows around this time (with live drums?). I haven't spoken to Shawn in a very long time, I wonder what he's up to now.

Post rock/indie mixed with electronic stuff, those verbose song titles (e.g. Do I Look Like I Want To Play Volleyball?), one word but plural band names, and album art with lots of geometric shapes. I miss that era a lot. I feel like chiptune really had a moment then.

In this case it was 2A03 chip stuff with guitars as the special ingredient. I'd say there are plenty of similarities to The Depreciation Guild here. Yeah, looking back from 2025, this EP really embodies a lot of what was happening and popular at the time.

It was great to put out Noisewaves' self-titled debut in 2010. As I've said before, there were plenty of other labels doing straight up chip releases really well around this time, so I aimed to put out chiptune + something else, whenever the opportunity arose. #chiptune

재미 있어요 😎

Pocari Sweat and soy milk

Btw I'm in Seoul right now surviving the summer. Drinks are key to this.

If you're looking for a really cool and tenured #chiptune label, check out PTE Squad! They're taking in submissions as well!

Short Attention Fan, by Weave of K. 5 track album

Link to release: ptesquad.bandcamp.com/album/short-... #chiptune

As always, if you have something you're working on, get in touch.

And if you're wondering what the future holds for the label, I do know of a small handful of releases in the pipeline. I just checked and it's been a year since the last thing we put out (from Corset Lore), so I'm hoping we can get something new out sooner rather than later.