MegaDriver
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
MegaDriver | |
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Origin | São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil |
Genre(s) | Heavy metal Instrumental rock Video game music |
Years active | 2003–present |
Website | www.megadriver.com.br |
Members | |
Nino MegaDriver Ricardo Daniel Jeff |
|
Former members | |
Nettão "The Butcher" id9 KillerKeys |
|
Notable instrument(s) | |
Nino's Mega Drive Guitar and his Sonic the Hedgehog guitar |
MegaDriver is a Brazilian heavy metal and video game music cover band formed in 2003 (see 2003 in music).
Contents |
[edit] History
MegaDriver is a Brazilian heavy metal cover band. Their covers consist almost entirely of video game music, especially from the Genesis system (Mega Drive was the Genesis' name outside of North America). Because of this focus, the band's style has been termed "game metal". In fact, MegaDriver's founder, Nino Megadriver, claims that MegaDriver is the first "video game metal" band and that others started copying the style soon as it got attention by the media and on the emulation and gaming scene.
The band considers itself to be a "non-profit independent project" and does not charge for its music. Their stated goal is to "pay homage to classic video games." To this end, they have made their entire repertoire available for free download at their website.
They have released four CDs titled Action Metal, Push Start Button (Round One) (a demo CD) and, more recently, Top Gear and Swords, Shurikins & Fists, as well as several singles. In addition, the band has released four full soundtracks for the Metal MAME project, which reprograms MAME images using heavy metal remixes of the games' original music. They have even gone as far as to making their own music videos with their songs in the background, i.e., the video for "Raging Storm" is a tribute to Geese Howard, using various footage from Fatal Fury games, artwork of Geese, and also footage from the Fatal Fury anime.
[edit] Appearances in the media
MegaDriver has made several appearances in the media, in both news articles and on music and tech channels (including G4 and MTV). MegaDriver also appeared at the Arena Gamer Experience 2006, performing some of their remixes of well-known game tracks.
In late 2007, controversy arose in the last Video Games Live Brazil, where many fans expected to meet the band, but as far that is known, there hasn't any contact from the VGL staff and the band members. Surprisingly, the unknown band "8 bit instrumental" (8bitvgm for short - link), from the Minas Gerais state, got invited to perform at the Brasília VGL presentation and gathered many fans. There still ongoing debate on why the band was not invited.
[edit] Line-up history
The band is made up of four members: guitarist, founder and frontman Nino MegaDriver (born Antonio Francisco Tornisiello); Ricardo, the second guitar; Daniel, the bassist of the band; and finally, Jeff, the drummer. There are were also a small number of other members, such as Nettão (also known as "The Butcher") who was once drummer, replaced by Jeff. This also applies to id9, who has left and been replaced by Daniel.
[edit] Customization of guitars
One point of interest is two of the lead guitarist Nino's instruments: a guitar made from an original Mega Drive, and a guitar made in the shape and image of Sonic the Hedgehog's face. These console mods are unique and gave inspiration to several other console mods that are usually shown at Youtube as "new stuff" (a Sega Master System Guitar by instance).
[edit] Members
[edit] Current members
- Nino MegaDriver – lead guitar
- Ricardo – rhythm guitar
- Daniel – bass
- Jeff – drums
[edit] Former members
- Nettão "The Butcher" – drums
- id9 – bass
- KillerKeys – keyboard
[edit] Discography
[edit] Studio albums
- Push Start Button (Round One) (2003)
- Action Metal (2005)
- Sword, Shurikins & Fists (A Tribute to Yuzo Koshiro) (2007)
- Top Gear (2007)
[edit] Singles
- "Metal Contra" (2004)
- "Metal Axe - The Golden Axe Remix Project" (2004)
- "Metal Beast - Rise From Your Grave!!!" (2004)
- "Raging Metal" (2004)
[edit] See also
- The Minibosses, one of the very first game-music cover bands, focusing mainly on NES tunes.
- The Black Mages, a metal band founded by Nobuo Uematsu to play Final Fantasy arrangements.
- The Advantage, another band which plays covers of Nintendo theme music.
- The OneUps, another band which plays covers of video game music (although with a more jazz-inspired sound).
- The NESkimos, another band which plays covers of Nintendo music, but adds a very heavy style to it.
- PRESS PLAY ON TAPE, another band which plays covers of video game music (Commodore 64 tunes as rock).
- The Megas, a band which covers Mega Man songs, adding lyrics to expand on the game's story.
[edit] References
- Judao (Portuguese)
- Game Master Magazine (Portuguese)
- RetroGamer magazine (English)
- Game One magazine (Portuguese)
- EGM Brasil magazine (Portuguese)
- Yahoo News (Portuguese)
- Nintendo World (Portuguese)