I'm Zee! Or my official artist name, ZeroJanitor.

I make music; mostly chiptune, mostly covers. My speciality is the NES/Famicom sound chips via the program Dn-FamiTracker, though I also regularly do SNES, Genesis, Game Boy, and even non-chiptune stuff.

I also dabble in pixel art.

All of my songs are like my children, in a way. Naturally, this means that of course I have favorites.

In terms of covers, I think Sheep Man, Futurama theme, and DK64 Crystal Caves are some of the cleanest-sounding, I'm really happy with how they turned out. Rogueport Sewers and Comp-U-Nerd were also really fun to make, with all the interesting sounds to work with.

My favorite original composition is probably Gloomy Gusts. Those types of moody, atmospheric songs really benefit from my getting better and better at working with more complex sound design.

So, the first interesting fact I have to say about Gloomy Gusts: the voice instrument that I'm using as a lead? That's actually Sheik's "tu" voice clip from Super Smash Bros. Melee that I trimmed and looped. I used that same sample in the song Aspartame in 2023.

Initially, it started off as a straight-up DKC2-styled SNES track. After writing a couple measures though, I decided to change gears and got rid of the DKC2 samples, making it more of a rock track instead. However, I never liked any of the guitar samples I could use, so instead I swapped it out for a clavichord and I actually really liked how that sounded. So it took a few tries to get a sound I really liked.

This was also my first experience using a VST called TAL-Filter-2 to create the sort of flanger bass you hear throughout the song. It's basically just doing a lowpass sequence on a sawtooth sample, I think it really helps sell that cool synthy sound.

Probably the Rosenkreuzstilette boss theme.

It's a fast song with many chords and modal changes throughout, and being fairly obscure meant that there really weren't any sort of references online like sheet music or chords. I just had to figure the whole thing out by ear, which took quite a while.

It's also the first public commission I'd taken on. So on top of being a difficult song, you also have someone else's expectations to live up to, making sure I could deliver what they paid for.

Ultimately, though, it came out great, and both the commissioner and myself were very happy with it.

Oh, tons. I keep a list of songs I wanna cover; whenever I think of something new, I put it on the list. Oftentimes, it's when I'm listening to a song and I think "I bet this would sound good in so-and-so style"

For specific songs: I've been wanting to do a cover of Jago's theme from Killer Instinct for a while. It's a simple, catchy song that I think would be fun, but I haven't quite thought about how I'd want to approach it yet. As a result, it keeps ending up on the back burner. Maybe 2025 will be the year, who knows?

It varies. Sometimes I'm motivated by a specific idea, like "oh this song would sound REALLY good in this style for X, Y, and Z reasons".

But more often, it's because there's a certain song I want to cover, and then I decide what kind of chipset it would be best suited for. If it's a song that doesn't need many channels, that's a good candidate for 2A03. If it needs more instruments that play at one time to sound "correct", then I would probably give that expansion audio. If it needs a rock edge, that might end up being a Mega Man X styled track. Sometimes I start working in one format, then realize it would sound better in another, so I switch over.

I also factor in what I've made recently. For example, if I see I haven't done a SNES-styled song in a while, I might prioritize doing one of those.

2A03 just refers to the default NES audio chip, the Ricoh 2A03. This is the same five-channel setup that every NES game in the western world uses, and what most people know NES music to sound like.

Other terms like MMC5, VRC6, etc. refer to expansion audio. The Famicom (the Japanese equivalent to the NES) allowed for games to come included with their own soundchips in the cartridges. These could add additional channels to the 2A03, often with their own unique abilities. FamiTracker lets you write with these chips as well, and even lets you combine multiple.

In general, I think the VRC6 is one of the most versatile expansions while also being easy to use. It's a pretty popular one to use.

I don't combine the expansions a whole lot, but I think the N163 is a good choice to mix with others because you can choose how many channels you want to add, anywhere from 1 to 8. It's also a free-wave instrument, meaning you can use any custom tone you want with it. I often use it to add chords to songs, or use different types of bass.

I used the VRC7 for my Crystal Caves cover, which I thought was a really good fit. The VRC7 is unique for using 2op FM synthesis, similar to what early 90s PC soundcards used. The way it's set up means you are largely limited to using the preset instruments, but those can still absolutely sound great in the right contexts.

That's a tough one. Right now, I'd say the answer is Clock Town from Majora's Mask in the style of Jib Jig from Donkey Kong Country 2.

Hmmm... I still have a soft spot for Aspartame. Or maybe In Your Dreams.

I think most of my old Paper Mario covers still hold up. They're on the simpler side, but they sound more like an authentic Mario game that way. If I had to name one, maybe Goomba Road.

Fortunately, I have a page on my website just for that: https://zerojanitor.neocities.org/art

This page hosts the pixel art that I'm most proud of. In particular, I've taken a liking to doing 32x32 icons lately, so the portraits of myself, Diego Rivera (Because I'm Depressed), Amadeus (Amadeus: A Riddle for Thee), and Elsie (The Dead Milkmen's logo) are probably the ones I'm most proud of.

As far as album art goes, I'm still really happy with how 2020 and 2022's album covers came out. Maybe I'm a sucker for that deep sea aesthetic, who knows.

Well, I've recently started using Furnace Tracker more regularly, and I'm looking forward to exploring more of its supported soundchips. If there's one thing kids these days are clamoring for, it's more Atari Lynx music.

Besides that? More of the same. Still plan to release new music, probably more pixel art as well.

I just wanna give a shoutout to the chiptune/tracker communities in general. There's so many musicians out there making the coolest shit you've never heard, and I wouldn't be where I was today if it wasn't for learning from what other people were doing.

I encourage anyone reading this to go on YouTube and search "famitracker music" and check out what's out there. Search by upload date, find something that could use more attention. If you really like it, leave a nice comment, or see if the artists have a Bandcamp or something where you can buy their music.

hell yeah thanks for having me (virtual handshake)