War Games: The Sounds I Made For The Film
In this video I breakdown the FM Synclavier sounds/sequences I made for the 1983 movie War Games
Anthony's musical touch as both composer and performer is connected with some of the most influential creative minds over the last 40 years. He’s composed and conducted original orchestral scores for over 80 feature films including Young Guns, Internal Affairs, The Man From Elysian Fields, 15 Minutes and Planes, Trains & Automobiles, been commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic for his symphonic work "In the Family Way", written over one thousand TV commercials in a myriad of musical styles, co-founded Levels Audio Post (LA's premiere post production facility) and performed and arranged on big-box-office films and influential hit records such as Michael Jackson's Thriller.
His extensive work as a young arranger, orchestrator and performer for Quincy Jones, Jack Nitzsche, Lamont Dozier, Arthur Rubenstein and Giorgio Moroder was vital in launching his own career. His early years pioneering modular analog synthesizers along with his wide-ranging music scholarship positioned Anthony at the center of the music technology revolution. He attended the University of Southern California School of Music as a piano and composition major.
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Dang this guy IS the 80’s! I can’t believe all the iconic sounds he’s responsible for 🤯
@therealc0rax
Жыл бұрын
He literally made everything that's good in our lives lol
@WoodyBReal
Жыл бұрын
@@therealc0rax for real, i feel guilty for calling him “this guy” like he’s just another random dude 🤦🏼♂️. These sounds filled my childhood and teen years. Amazing
@jennoscura2381
Жыл бұрын
Espen Kraft has the tag line "I am the 80s". But this guy might just have him beat on that.
@nickolasyounker
Жыл бұрын
Yea, its a W.O.P.R ! 🍔
@annother3350
Жыл бұрын
@@jennoscura2381 x1000%
That film is a masterpiece on every level, including the music. Perfect balance of nuclear anxiety and teen adventure. That's a tough tonal mix, but the music really hits the mark.
@amoricanseth8320
Жыл бұрын
well said 👏👏
As a big fan of Wargames and all things 80s, this is awesome
History Lesson is one of my favorites. I have it as my ringtone on my phone for years.
As a teenager in the 80's and growing up immersed in the advent of consoles, gaming and movies like Wargames, Tron etc. this just triggered a flood of memories, thank you so much for documenting the tools and stories from when you were in the thick of making these impactful soundtracks etc
The fact that you remember all that you did, when I can't remember what I programmed yesterday its mind blowing and inspiring!
@GlacierSound
Жыл бұрын
He must have photos or something right???
@VarionJimmy
Жыл бұрын
Totally agree! 😁
@JH-lo9ut
Жыл бұрын
@@GlacierSoundyou do realize how photos were made in the 80’s right?
@unduloid
Жыл бұрын
@@JH-lo9ut I think they used these things called "cameras."
@bentinho
Жыл бұрын
@@unduloid i mean, he would've had to take the pics. drop them at the lab and wait 2 weeks hoping they turned out 😂
It was such a relief to hear you have backups of the floppies...there's so much of the soundscape of the 80's in there. About the sound, the combination of FM and the military spec DAC's of Synclavier is still sounding so very good!
@Flackon
Жыл бұрын
Did they really build them with military spec hardware?
@dfglojkg
4 ай бұрын
Remember in the '90s when Apple introduced the G3? The military actually did shut down the project for a short interval. It's documented in 'zines like MacUser and MacWorld. Talk about the alchemy of lemonade from lemons! Apple - when finally given the commercial go-ahead actually used the anecdote about the Gov "shutting them down" to plug the G3 line.
@sounddroid
Ай бұрын
Yep, even the red control panel buttons came from military avionics, used on the B-52 bomber etc. That’s why they still work today! I have a 40+ year old Synclavier VPK controller that has never been serviced and still works perfectly. AMS Neve also used a lot of avionics parts on their DFC film consoles, and those buttons have been in daily use since the mid 90’s with very few (if any) failures. Also they have an unbeatable feel to them, just like the Synclav buttons.
These videos are priceless and a piece of history, Anthony. We thank you!
The music and soundtrack were and are awesome BUT the sound effects----man, iconic and so memorable to this day.
When he put the floppy disk in, I was expecting the computer to read back "Would you like to play a game?"
I knew the Synclavier was very powerful, for its time, in terms of its synthesis and sound design capabilities, but I had no idea of it's multi-timbrality and ability to play multiple sequences at once without using actual tape recordings. You must have blown people's minds with that thing. Thanks for the history lesson.
My uncle took a weekend job as a projectionist when our local cinema reopened in 1982. Whenever a new film came in, I got to help out when he was splicing the 35mm spools together. My reward was a bottle of Coke and popcorn and getting to watch the first screening in the best seats in the empty theatre. War Games holds quite a fond place in my heart as it was one of the first films I saw in a double bill along with Clash of the Titans. I think it was around the same time that I began noticing and loving the punchy, staccato, futuristic sounds of instruments like the Synclavier II, DX7, Oberheim DMX, and TR-808 that were starting to appear in movie soundtracks.
@russ254
Жыл бұрын
protectionists are always overshadowed by the more glamorous projectionists - you guys are great!
This channel must be one of the most precious resources on the internet
synclavier is actually insane. I definitely need to get onto Arturia one
@KRAFTWERK2K6
Жыл бұрын
They are also producing a new hardware model, all handmade by the original creator.
@benanderson89
Жыл бұрын
@@KRAFTWERK2K6woah, what!? Any news about that you can link to?
@KRAFTWERK2K6
Жыл бұрын
@@benanderson89 it's called the Synclavier Regen. Some synthesizer testing folks here on youtube have been testing it a few months ago and i think the creator of it has a KZread channel too :=)
I got my first computer after watching that film .... also fancied Ally Sheedy😀
For us audio nerds, it would be fun to hear your experience working with Bruce Swedien. Maybe, share with us some of his techniques that you might have observed? A video where you talk about the studios of the '80s and the '90s would be fun. Thanks again for sharing!
As soon as I heard that opening riff from War Games my mind went back in time to my early childhood in the 80's watching it on VHS. Great memories.
You are very kind sharing this fantastic Synclavier and your music, it looks brand new!
Amazing. I watched WarGames so many times on VHS in the 80s, and those sounds were a huge part of making the movie feel right.
@lundsweden
Жыл бұрын
VHS: Very Horrible System!
@russ254
Жыл бұрын
@@lundsweden VHS was great when the alternative was nothing at all (yes, I know about betamax). It made possible the pron industry, and you could record the Dukes of Hazzard and rewatch it as many times as you like.
@lundsweden
Жыл бұрын
@@russ254 True, I remember when VHS became popular in the 80s, I thought it was so cool, and a lot of my pocket money went to buying blank tapes. VHS was still viable until the early 2000s, but then DVD, TVRs and Web based video kinda took over. I got rid of my tapes around 2006, gave them all to a neighbour!
His studio reminds me of a mix between Fueris Bueller and Wargames bedrooms. The bedroom of my dreams in the 80's.
@EmilyKresl
2 ай бұрын
Ferris having a sweet computer setup was definitely John Hughes giving a nod to wargames!!! "I asked for a car, I got a computer. How's that for being born under a bad sign?"
This was incredible. A great soundtrack that can’t be forgotten.
I can’t believe you’re behind this iconic song from this iconic 80s movie 🎉 omg so amazing ! Thank you very much for sharing this! ❤
“Be the artist” - best advice of all time 😎
Aside from everything else, what a lesson on maintaining your instruments, data, and backups.
When the Synclavier came out, I was 18 or 19. I called them to ask about availability and price. Imagine my shock when the guy told me it was about $62,000.00. It was juuuuust a bit out of my price range.
@jimbotron70
Жыл бұрын
Lol, imagine that guy answering multiple times the same answer over and over again to random people shocked and hanging up the call.
@ericMT
Жыл бұрын
It was crazy how much the new gear was. I had the same experience but with the Fairlight CMI. It just wasn’t accessible to “normal” people like it is today.
My heart jumped when Anthony grabbed the floppy out of the drive.
Wargames and Blue Thunder are my favorite scores of Arthur Rubinstein! You and Brian Banks were masters performing the Synclavier II!!
War Games and Wendy Carlos' iconic score for Tron were what got me into electronic music. To think I am watching the actual dude who did this in 2023 is pretty rad! Thank you, sir!
What an amazing / beautiful machine. It must have been such a charge working with the Synclavier when it was the apex of synth tech. I feel that the 80's were the golden age of synthesizers, in terms of innovation (and lust). Thanks for sharing your stories and knowledge!
You look fantastic for a 60 something man. I could not believed a 45 year old worked on a 40 year old movie so I had to look up your birthdate! Rock on sir!
@anthonymarinellimusic
Жыл бұрын
Haha thanks 🙏
Wow! Phenomenal insights. Had no idea you contributed to this awesome film. It was very influential in our lifelong computing journey. You had a hand in so many important productions! Thanks for the show.
The Beepers! Wow it's great to see this video, I loved the movie Wargames, it was the very first film I ever owned as a child on VHS back then (the second one being the Disney movie, 'Flight Of The Navigator', another film with incredible synth work!), I now own the film on VHS, DVD and Laser Disc, the soundtrack for it was so impactful on me as a child, and the songs by The Beepers had a huge influence on me on my early life obsession with music and specifically, synthesizers, when the synclavier hit the scene back then, I feel like it totally changed scoring and pop music (the EMU-Systems Emulator / Emulator II also!), it was such a powerful platform and literally tons of people were trying to get their hands on them (honorary shoutout to the Fairlight CMI also!), I'd read soo much about the production of this film over the years since the advent of the Internet, and so many things have fascinated the hell out of me about it, like Joshuas voice was actually recorded backwards and then cut up and sequenced to give it that really quirky monophonic quality to the sound of it, it is so cool now with the Internet that we can go back and reexamine films and music now with much more access to information now in 2023, it was much harder to obtain back then before the Net and it has changed so much about every aspect of life, I would have loved to have been able to read more about this film when I was a kid, turns out I only had to wait over three decades to get more insight on it, better late than never, haha! Thank you much for this video, it's awesome to see the sequences on the synclavier (I have become a total synth nerd / musician myself along the way), and hear the sounds on the actual hardware once again, I searched high and low for the Wargames OST and finally recentlly, acquired a copy of it, and it's been an absolute pleasure to go down that wormhole again, big respect to you Anthony, and thank you very much for the tunes!
I was working as a broadcast radio tech, the radio station always had movie premiere tickets available, I saw War Games and its always been a favorite movie of mine. I got into electronics because of synths in music and movies and now I 40 years later I can appreciate where the sounds of the sound track came from. I appreciate all Anthony's you tube informative videos! excellent!
It's true, I used to program a whole nights performance (40 songs) for my cover band in the early 90s and it felt so much more direct and connected than what I do now with my DAW.
Thanks Anthony! I grew up listening to this music, and now at 60yrs old, Im thrilled to be learning how to play and recreate this music! Vintage synths are so cool!
That vibrato synth sound is amazing!
Brother, History Lesson and Video Fever are the soundtrack to my younger self when I was getting into programming. I looked for the "proper" soundtrack record for Wargames everywhere back then but none of them contained your tracks. Thank you for inspiring me into becoming what I am today, a professional game developer. You rock.
So it was you, do you realize you defined my love for electronic music for a life time with your sound track ? THANK YOU !!!
Not only is the guy responsible for War Games but so much responsible for the great sounds and programs of Michael’s synth sounds! Amazing dude!
Just your appearance brings us back to 1983🤣
I've never been so happy to see a floppy disc so hard before! I could watch another hour of you simply breaking down the history lesson song and maybe give us a little taste of the lyrics that were originally for the tune but were taken out. I had no idea you were the beepers! I love you guys!!! I've been that one person listening to the wargames soundtrack for the last decade on KZread.
Man I’m so glad I discovered this channel and it’s good to hear anybody talk about the score for Wargames 👏🏾👏🏾
I love how the floppy disk has tape over the write tab so you won't accidentally erase it. Classic!
Definitely agree that playing and printing while you're recording gives you an immediacy and also makes you commit and get it one shot rather than endlessly fiddling later and finding you're only going sideways.
The sounds and music is wonderful.
War Games is a brilliant film and the music is perfect. I had the LP record soundtrack when I was a teenager and I loved the combination of music, songs and clips from the film. It’s brilliant to hear the story behind it and hear these lovely sounds coming together.
Love it 🤩 Have seen this movie so many times. I included my take on two of your WarGames sounds in my factory bank for the Regen, as a tribute to your Synclavier work (Principal’s Office Echo and New Grade Lead) 🙏
@paulschilling2996
Жыл бұрын
kzread.info/dash/bejne/q3aEpcFtnMrUlM4.html
@Bent6
Жыл бұрын
Paul - I'm really digging your patches in the Regen (really enjoyed your patches in the Sync V too!). They're serving as a great tutorial for me to build my chops up! Thanks!
@paulschilling2996
Жыл бұрын
Here is my “New Grade” lead for the Regen kzread.info/dash/bejne/q3aEpcFtnMrUlM4.htmlm43s
Absolutely love the soundtrack for Wargames. What a treasure! Thank you for sharing!
Love old school technology.
@oholm09
2 ай бұрын
Me too
Anthony, couldn’t agree more on how this can add to our modern music palate. Love your site!
Still the best and most accurate hacker movie ever! What a great soundtrack.
One of my favorite movies and soundtracks! Thank you for making the soundtrack as well as this video! ☺️🙏🎹🎵🎶
Thanks for sharing these videos with us Anthony! Hearing this song from War Games affected me more than hearing the Thriller stuff. I never knew your name before doing these videos, but now I realize you pretty much defined my learning years with your sounds. 🎉
This is great. Always loved that song & never would have guessed its a synclavier. Amazing what these then-state of the art machines costing more than an ultra-luxury car could do, still can do, & not really be replaced without precise MIDI cloning today
I really enjoy this channel! 😍. I read that the Score for John Carpenter's Starman was almost entirely made on the Syncavier, sounds programmed by you and Banks. That angel choiry theme made my hair raise, and still do. I would love to hear that made and performed here.
My youth put in sounds 🤩☺️
This is fantastic! Thank you for sharing the breakdown of these iconic sequences.
Iconic film and soundtrack!
Beautiful work. Amazing that your files, disks, archive and hardware are all in perfect condition decades later. Thank you so much for sharing this insider look.
This is pure gold. Thank you Anthony
I thoroughly love your channel. So much of your work is a big part of the soundtrack of my life. Thank you for your generosity, not just in allowing us to relive these good memories by hearing these sounds again, but also sharing their rich histories and backstories. You’re adding a whole new dimension to these works and giving the world a new appreciation for them. War Games is especially close to my heart and this track in particular is etched strongly in my soul. I’m thrilled to learn you were behind its creation. Is there any way I can buy the full track? Does that exist in any form of recording I could obtain just for private use as a listener? In any case, thank you so much for your talent and your art; then, now, and into the future. Cheers.
@anthonymarinellimusic
Жыл бұрын
Hi Robert, thank you for your kind words. I appreciate your support and contribution to the channel. It means a lot to me. I don’t know at the moment about getting individual tracks from films but my team has been looking into it. If We do find a way you’ll find out on the channel. I would like to have them too. Nice to meet you and best luck in your endeavors! Stay in touch.
@robertholtz
Жыл бұрын
@@anthonymarinellimusic Nice to meet you too, Anthony. My genuine pleasure. Thank you for the thoughtful response. Be assured, I’m subscribed and will be tuned in to your future developments for sure, especially for any merch or special media. If I can ever be of any aid to you or your team specifically (not sure if you know my background) please do not hesitate to reach out any time. Nothing would make me happier than to help you achieve your next steps in any way I can.
I am very thankful for stumbling across this video on Friday December 1st 2023! Is War Games really 40+ years old? It's one of my favourite 80s films! Thank you, Anthony, for this great deep dive in to this iconic soundtrack!
Boy these sounds really are so early 80s huh. Come so far in the last 40 years. Crazy to think we could do a hundred times this on our phone now.
@pierrenic.7682
Ай бұрын
But you miss the point..l you can play and edit stuff in your phones … but tried to mix an album with your phones…
@personalwatching9312
Ай бұрын
@pierrenic.7682 nah I'm making the point of how far tech has come. A little Luke talking about the computer power they used to send people to the moon. :)
Oh man! You made so many influential things!!!!!!!!
8:23 I was about to leave comment asking about the studio/mixing process once the track is sequenced. You answered my question before I had a chance to comment. Thank you!!
Dude! I remember seeing you in Keyboard Mag. I was stunned when I saw the Synclavier. A producer I knew had one in his tiny apartment. Thanks for showing how durable floppies are!
Fantastic. Have a lot of love for this movie, and great to hear this story. Also, love all that equipment!
I really enjoyed the detail you share with us tone dorks. You’re a gem. Today I’m just learning about you by pure chance whilst looking up iconic bass lines. You’ve heard it thousands of times but this is what the tube is all about in the best sense.
The synclavier is a dream machine to me. Even today I would take it over anything. So warm and wonderful. And capable. Thanks for this Anthony.
You put just me back in the theatre in 83. Amazing!
I had the great pleasure of using a Synclavier at the BBC Studios in Edinburgh back in the 90s. They had a gigantic array of hard disks in a thing the size of a fridge. Each hard disk was 12". At the time I was using an Ensoniq ESQ1 to do the same job, and it was pretty clear that the whole space was moving to computers. But the old hardware was great for the time.
Such an underrated soundtrack to. :D Love this!
Amazing! One of my favorite movies, thank you for sharing this with us!
This is something amazing you are working on showing to the Next Generation.. 🖖 Thank you!
I just watched the movie for the first time. The background sounds are awesome. I noticed all of them. It’s crazy that I’m watching a video explaining them. Great job!
What a legend! Thank you for the great content.
Very inspirational! Now I'm trying to remember when in the movie this tune played. But you're totally right about "Be the artist". Too much music today is produced almost only from a technical viewpoint and it lacks the artistry.
Too cool. Big fan of that movie. You had a synclavier back then! Amazing life you led.
Fascinating overview, thanks Anthony !
What a fantastic video. This was the soundtrack to my childhood. I sort of followed this in a very low cost way. In the 80s I got a Yamaha PSS480 home keyboard. It's a very distant relation to the Synclavier in that it is a multitimbral FM synth. I didn't have a multitrack audio recorder, but the 480 had 5 monophonic live Sequencer slots where you could record and overdub multitimbtally. It also had midi, but I didn't have any other midi equipment until several years later. So I made music using just this keyboard and a tape recorder. Many years later I'm still looking for a recording setup that is as simple and creative.
LOVED WAR GAMES! It was the future as far as I was concerned.
Amazing instrument and your compilation. Nice to see and hear the floppy loading. The seek head sound takes me back to the bbc computers we had here in the UK. Thanks for another great video.
I always wondered who The Beepers were, and why I couldn't find any other songs by them. I loved all of the music from War Games, both The Beepers songs and the rest of the score.
Masterpiece of a track, loved the movie too!
I love this movie. It's the movie that got me started as a Software Engineer. I love the music as well. I own the soundtrack. I would love to see more videos like this on the music and sounds from the movie.
The thumbnail for this video! Pretty funny! Anthony illustrates that the truly great artists continue to evolve! Well done!
You seriousness and dedication is a lesson in itself.
I love the quality of the image of this video. There's something that looks from the 80's in it... I don't know if its the light, or the camera itself but it suits the purpose very well.
I'm actually blown away by how advanced the Synclavier was, and not in a 'for its time' way, just in relation to modern gear. I feel like the unlimited power on tap these days usually comes with tradeoffs on the hardware or UI side of things, or horse power will come with compromises in build quality and having to menu dive, but something like that was built to last.
Video Fever...the best sound!!!
wanna point something out here too: Anthony is showing two distinctly different disks, from two different synclavier eras. Synclavier II over their lifetime used two different disk formats: The first, was the single sided, double density format at 48 tracks per inch (40 tracks on a side) that stored 180K per disk used in the Synclavier II. This was actually a step up from the disk format used in the original Synclavier (1978), which was single density, 90K. The sequence/instrument disk he inserts is a double density disk. With the later systems, NED adopted a disk format first widely used in the IBM PC/AT called High Density. NED called it the SuperFloppy. This format stored data at 96 tracks per inch, 80 tracks per side, and had a much higher sector count (which ironically matched the 8 inch floppy in both speed and sector density). This gives a nominal capacity of 1.2 megabytes per disk. The boot disk used is a high density superfloppy. You could replace the disk controller in any synclavier system to add SuperFloppy capability (which is what was done here), and the upgrade was $1500 from NED (!) The original Double Density floppies were full height Tandon TM-100-1 drives. The SuperFloppy drives were half-height Panasonic drives (I forget the model). You may notice the two disks have different oxide colors. The high density floppies used cobalt oxide (instead of ferric oxide), which has a much higher coercivity, meaning it can withstand recording a much tighter magnetic field in a smaller space, needed for squeezing more data in the same physical space. See the little red button on the top of the drive? That's the boot button. Pressing this button at any point, will trigger the IPL (initial program load) of an operating system into the Synclavier. Normally this was the Synclavier Monitor. You could press this at any point, and you often did, because yes, the Synclavier can crash. :)
That's so funny. I just saw Wargames back in July and have been fixated ever since. Turns out you uploaded this video right when I saw it. Been looking up BTS footage and interviews. Thanks for making this and talking about one of the best 80s movies providing one of the best scores of the era.
This is amazing. Keep up the videos and track breakdowns. Totally remember this movie. Thank you!
I’ve been an electronic music producer for 20 something years, but this is like nirvana watching all your videos! Can’t wait to see the Thriller video! Would love to hear your take on the LinnDrum and any stories you might have surrounding it. Prince and his rhythms have always fascinated me as well. Thank you for your great videos and sharing!
This is so cool - love the synthy score in this movie and Blue Thunder!
OMG how am I just now finding this?!
Nice to have found your channel. Speaking of of gear from the past, after sitting for 20 years I just reinstalled that Trident console you sold me in the 90's.
Fascinating! I love that movie. I had no idea the synclavier had those sequencer/DAW functions. Thanks for sharing!
Very cool! One of my favorite movies, great to see this is all archived still.
Nice demonstration. It's great to learn about more production uses of Synclavier FM!