Band releases album on "obsolete" 3.5" floppy disc

A UK band called Batch Totem has released a 74-minute album compressed down to fit on a 1.4MB, 3.5" floppy disk. Who need vinyl nostalgia?

"Trunkeret & Ikonisk" by Batch Totem (an alias for musician, Jonas Olesen) consists of 19 tracks, which are heavily compressed in the GSM 6.10 WAV format, at various bitrates. The album is on the Ristretto label, and can be bought online with PayPal.

"The idea is essentially to release an album on an almost obsolete medium that fits very well with the music on an aesthetical level," says Olesen. "Secondly, the scope of the project is to use heavy compression as a feature that shapes the music, instead of a limitation that reduces sound quality."

Link (Thanks, Matt!)

[#1 posted by OM , October 9, 2007 6:29 PM]

...You know, I got a kick out of this one, but to be totally honest if you *really* want to impress me, release two more versions: one on a Hollerith deck, the other on Punch Tape :)

[#2 posted by dculberson , October 9, 2007 6:33 PM]

They should really mess with people and release it in binary on audio tape.

TI 99/4a baby!! (or vic20 or ...)

[#3 posted by Alys , October 9, 2007 6:59 PM]

Would be interesting if I actually had a floppy drive...

[#4 posted by ssaargent , October 9, 2007 7:28 PM]

how about a Scotch DC 300XL. I still have a few for novelty.

[#5 posted by Dave X , October 9, 2007 7:38 PM]

Uhhh... there's a whole netlabel that does this-- Floppy Swop: http://www.floppyswop.co.uk/

Get with it, Boing Boing!

[#6 posted by Flying Squid , October 9, 2007 8:27 PM]

The band's website has this awesome ly hilarious mp3 on it. I remember this speech used by Negativland in their song Michael Jackson. Man is it wild. Google the Church Universal Triumphant to find out who these loons are.




...and the movie Ghostbusters.

[#7 posted by LOLcat Stevens , October 9, 2007 8:39 PM]

Well they don't get my respect until they release their entire catalog on a 5.25" disk full of chiptunes

And don't go telling me that it would be too lo-fi. If it's good enough for Timbaland to rip off, it's good enough for primetime, i say...

[#8 posted by Krisjohn , October 9, 2007 10:40 PM]

If they use the LS-240 FD32MB Superdrive's 32MB format for 1.44MB floppies then they wouldn't even have to do anything special with the music.

http://www.chguy.net/news/feb01/fd32mb.html

[#9 posted by felsby , October 10, 2007 3:05 AM]

"trunkeret & ikonisk" is pure, unadulterated danish for "truncated & iconic". They may be from the UK, but Jonas is from Denmark! http://musicthing.blogspot.com/2007/09/dude-releases-74-minute-album-on-single.html

[#10 posted by Phos.... , October 10, 2007 3:10 AM]

Meh, PCPro.co.uk was only a month or so late with this story.

I guess their still keeping a ye olde magazine printer's schedule?

[#11 posted by flexatone , October 10, 2007 3:20 AM]

Forget 1.4 MB -- Tristan Perich is a 1-bit minimalist.

[#12 posted by jan , October 10, 2007 3:21 AM]

darn i wanted to do this once... maybe they could use a (dead cheap) 3.5 floppy drive as a case?

[#13 posted by Honeyschool Die , October 10, 2007 6:15 AM]

There's a Toronto band called Garbage! Violence! Enthusiasm that released three songs on three 3.5" floppies. The pack was called "Picard in Peril" and each song was about an episode of Star Trek where... well, you can guess the rest.

I can't find any info about it online, but you can get it at Soundscapes.

[#14 posted by nex , October 10, 2007 10:19 AM]

Cory doesn't read bb gadgets? o_O