RetroTech: Atari Video Music - The Migraine Machine
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- Опубликовано: 25 апр 2017
- A demonstration of the Atari Video Music from 1977.
Anders Enger Jensen's music can be found here: www.eox.no
The track used most in the video was this one: / aurora_borealis
Here's a full length version of the track being played through the Atari
• Atari Video Music Mach...
Ben Heck's Atari Video Music Teardown is here: • Ben Heck's Atari Video...
The RF to Composite box I used can be found on ebay
They sell NTSC or PAL versions (click your country).
UK ebay.to/2oxw1k7
US ebay.to/2pRxFRz
CA ebay.to/2p7AJby
DE ebay.to/2pRulFV
AU ebay.to/2pRrvAW
NL ebay.to/2oA5EJz
Old RadioShack Catalogues can be viewed at www.radioshackcatalogs.com
The Atari Inc Book can be found on Amazon
UK: amzn.to/2pSOFa4
US: amzn.to/2oyj4qo
To save anyone the trouble of re-posting the following trivia from Wikipedia in the comments..I've done it here.
'Devo used a Video Music screen as a background in the video for "The Day My Baby Gave Me A Surprise". It appears again, connected to a vocoder, in the music video for "Beautiful World". Daft Punk also used a screen in their video "Robot Rock". The diamond pattern visuals from Video Music can also be seen in several scenes from the 1979 movie Over the Edge where the mute character Johnny watches the visuals in his bedroom. The same pattern also appeared in an episode of The X-Files (Season 1 Episode 7, "Ghost in the Machine") as part of a video surveillance system.'
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------THANKS TO ------
Jerobeam Fenderson for the intro animation: oscilloscopemusic.com/
---------Outro Music----------
Over Time - Vibe Tracks • Over Time - Vibe Track...
---Outro Videos----
If you want to find one the videos shown in the outro - type the code shown at the bottom left of the clip into the youtube search box. UPDATE: This isn't working properly on all the videos...sorry. 
Наука
Devo used this as a background element in their "The Day My Baby Gave Me A Surprize" video, and the band explained this thing as "a weird thing made by Atari that just rendered Navajo blanket patterns on your TV"
CKT1138 i was scouring the comments just to see if anyone else knew this obscure piece of knowledge. Kudos. yeah we must have watched the same complete history of deevelution commentery. Good to see a fellow Devo fan. So cool to see the actual device he was talking about after all these years.
Danny Stine Devo fans are always happy to find other fans, and I am no exception, duty now for the future!
CKT1138 And now we are bothTecmoan fans as well! Coincidence?
I was seeing if anyone had mentioned this haha
I had one of these until a snowball ran down a hill and smashed it.
OMG I miss this thing!!! We had this in the living room as a kid and I loved playing with it!
The Milkdrop plugin for Winamp is still my favorite music visualizer ever. It remains incredibly powerful even today.
Same here, best effect on old television's
I can imagine this might appeal to people who had a lot of house parties in the 70s but with TV screens being so small back then, the effect wouldn't have been as cool as one of those flashing Radio Shack type disco light toys. No, the real application would have been in public venues - discos, night clubs, bars, and mobile DJs etc. Imagine how awesome this would look on a video wall of the time, flashing away to Earth, Wind and Fire along with one of those Saturday Night Fever-style illuminated dance floors and the huge neon lighting rigs they had in the late 70s and early 80s :)
@Please Complete All Fields Maybe not video walls, but projectors were popular and affordable, I reckon, to the more popular music clubs in the 80s.
They didn't sell it to commercial/professional markets, they tried to but no one was remotely interested in either the audio industry or the hospitality industry.
They sold thousands to individuals though.
Goes to show the "logical" inference of somethings market isn't always right.
Something like this hooked up to a massive projector would probably make certain concerts a lot more interesting.
It'd be a pretty good way to quickly and easily make music-responsive lights.
A 100% completely low resolution blown up on a projector? Are you insane
@@2Guys1ControllerShow I don't know, it would work well at a concert playing music from the late 1970s-early 1980s.
@@2Guys1ControllerShow I think that would add to the effect tbh. I think it would be interesting to have it hooked up to a projector just on a wall for a party or something
@@davidgoeller5843 I agree. The chaos of colors would just add to it.
I presume you haven't been to a nightclub, then? EDIT: or gig!
Back in the early 90s myself and friends would spend entire evenings listening and watching stuff like this. And I still think its quite good lol
The intro always reminds me of when I was 16, and went over to a friend's house. His dad had had a ton of old stereo equipment out, including a large reel to reel unit with an enormous collection of 60s and 70s rock. He told me he was trying to clear out the garage, and planned on throwing all this stuff in the trash! I immediately asked if I could have it, and he said yes. Then he watched me turn into a kid at Christmas, inspecting the unit and marveling at the music collection. Not ten minutes later, he decided to keep it all. I should have kept my mouth shut, and just dug it out of the trash later.
Ha! Well, at least you inspired him not to junk great equipment and music!
@@skylined5534
I suppose so. Good optimistic take honestly. Thanks.
In addition to the content itself, one of my favorite parts of these videos are the old advertisements and magazine pages scanned or photographed in. It's a tiny, precious window into the past for a young'un like me.
Devo used a Video Music screen as a background in the video for "The Day My Baby Gave Me A Surprise". It appears again, connected to a vocoder, in the music video for "Beautiful World". Daft Punk also used a screen in their video "Robot Rock". The diamond pattern visuals from Video Music can also be seen in several scenes from the 1979 movie Over the Edge where the mute character Johnny watches the visuals in his bedroom. The same pattern also appeared in an episode of The X-Files (Season 1 Episode 7, "Ghost in the Machine") as part of a video surveillance system.
Immediately thought of Devo when I saw this video come up, glad to see someone else did as well.
This is the kind of obscure, old tech stuff I love this channel for! That and the puppets, of course.
I had no idea Atari made a music video graphic machine! Thank you once again for doing these videos. You're got yourself a proper intro and outro now. It's shaping up to be a professional studio production. I know I've set it before, but you should have your own TV series. Thanks again!
They also did video phones, holographic game systems, medical systems (briefly).
FYI: The track being played is "Aurora Borealis", and it's available on Spotify.
May I see it?
@@justsomeguywithkaminasshad7145 aurora borealis? At this time of day? In this part of the country? Localized entirely within your kitchen?
@@rowe4x4 _auroraborealis…_
Cool video! I see you got to use my "retro cassette" in a "retro manner"! Just lovely! :D
Cool music, such a nice a track :)
For others who are seeking for this specific song, it's "Aurora Borealis". soundcloud.com/eox-studios/aurora_borealis
There were a lot of good tracks to choose from on the tape...I picked that one at random, but it worked out well.
Anders Enger Jensen awesome tunes
You're helping out a lot of my favorite RUclipsrs! Thank you, and I'm always glad to see you appear in the comments too!
kaza12345678 Thanks :) I use MOTU Digital Performer 8 and 9 as my main DAWs. Some songs were done in FastTracker2 and Cubase 3.7 and Roland MC-50 sequencer.
thank you for the great trip down memory lane.. l still find my self memorized by effects like this today. I especially loved all the old adverts you dug up
That could easily be one of my favorite end of video puppet skits you've ever done - a genuine LOL IRL. Also I was impressed to see Curt's book in the video - I know him of old and have fond memories of the time one of his displays almost killed me at a PhillyClassic. Yes, FOND memories! It's a good laugh now looking back.
one of my favorite things! We used one here in Ohio for additional video enhancement for our 'installation parties' (raves) in the 1990s...Anthony Dandrea (who owns an arcade in Portland) was the guy who introduced me to the Atari Video Music...and when used with television feedback? MAGIC. :)
Takes me back to the days of getting mashed and watching winamp
braksator 👌🏻😂😂😂
And Winamp is still the best programm for playing back and organizing music, lol
It continues to whip the llama's ass.
Is winamp like the new visualizationa for windows media player ?
brx8r i
You can see the full length version of the track featured in the video played on through the Atari VM here: ruclips.net/video/cNpt9Abnmf4/видео.html
"Atari Video Music: it really whips the llama's ass!"
... wait
Ah, WinAmp.... back when Windows Media Player hadn't been updated since Win 3.1 and literally had no idea what the hell an mp3 was.
What's amazing about WinAmp is that it's still updated, I use it surprisingly often
Mmmmmmmm ,llamatron.
@@orangejoe204 when was that? By the time I knew what mp3s were in '98 I think Windows Media supported them.
But it seemed Winamp remained the higher quality option for years until iTunes took over.
@@ewthmatth I might be remembering wrong. I've had a lot of beers since then, of course. lol But I remember pretty clearly that prior to mp3s there was no WinAmp and having it (in association with Napster) seemed like the Second Computer Age appearing right in my bedroom.
there used to be a radio station (i believe in new York) that would run a TV broadcast using this visualizer alongside the audio of their radio broadcast, though their TV station shut off in 2021 as it was still analog, which is a broadcasting format that is no longer in use
there's footage of the channel & it's shutoff online, it was the WVOA 87.7 radio's analog station
It's odd because it's such a low-fi visual from that chip (obviously to our eyes 40 years later, even the clunky Atari VCS graphics mesmerized me at the time) yet it actually works and grabs attention when playing alongside that music.
I wonder if any DJ bought one and then had to lug a massive tv with him to his gigs only to quickly rue his decision...
One of the other commenters claimed his band did exactly that.
Windows Media Player's distant cousin.
or Winamp's
Think of it as MilkDrop ver 0.0003.
Funny you mention WMP-right as Techmoan mentions its legacy being lived on in programs like Winamp or iTunes, he shows a screencap of a WMP visualizer! =)
g-force is better then milkdrop.
More like distant ancestor.
Love the subject. Love the content. Loved everything. LOVED THE PUPPETS. Please never stop doing them! :)
Yes, I had one when they first came out and quite honestly I bought it as a curiosity.I found it a little simplistic even then. The best use I got from the unit was at halloween when I would play my Vincent Price record with the lights off and the shades drawn to give the harsh screen frying display some dispersion. But it ended up in a thrift shop well before the next year. Thanks for showing it and justifying my quick separation.
Also love the fact you've used Anders Engers Jensens Retro Grooves tape, bringing 8bitguy and pals one step closer to the UK!.
Wow! Watching the patterns... It's like I'm living in the future!
Your video brought back old memories... We still have our Atari Video Music that was modified to have a composite video output, not RF. For three years on weekends, we used our AVM on a local cable TV channel playing music requests. Our program was called "MidNite Lite". It was an instant success with the kids and community watching our local channel.
I'm getting a little emotional with the capturing of the setup because it is very good music and it reminds me of the time when my best friend showed me Infected Mushroom and then later some electrowave. I'm gonna have to send this music to my best friend when I get the chance. It's beautiful.
Great video about a silly device. Your documentaries about retro HiFi will be watched for decades into the future.
I hope you're right...it's a virtual museum that anyone in the world can visit.
I like that he does what he does for silly tech from back in the day. There's a real culture which has become increasingly popular of going back into the past and finding old games and tech and just trying them out. It's awesome!
Techmoan Make sure the future visitors replace the caps before they leave.
Techmoan its my favorite museum!
@@hezekiahramirez6965 😂
Please keep videos like this coming. I know quite a lot about (vintage) hifi, but you make me come to know all these thigs I never even knew existed.
What a fun time it was back then.
Just in 1977 consider this:
Atari releases the Video Music.
Studio 54 opens.
Saturday Night Fever premieres.
The first Star Wars film.
Apple launches the Apple II.
Shame I was born exactly 20 years later.
Thank you so much for the epilepsy warning at the beginning of your video, it saved me having to go to hospital. I wish more youtubers were as considerate as you.
I enjoyed this very much as it really brought back memories of the '70s disco culture of that time. Thanks for posting !
I don't know why, but the end music always gives me goosebumps. and I love it.
These videos are so much fun and brilliantly produced, nice one TechMoan Man!
+Techmoan I really enjoy watching your videos, the way you show to us the results of your investigation is pretty good, no boring at all. I do see an improvement on each video you make, keep the good job!. And before I forget, keep the muppets at the end of your videos, they do rock!.
8:35 it's like what you see if you close your eyes and press too hard.
wardrich haha true
Phosphenes
Lsd
In the early days of the Playstation I think it was Psygnosis who created a program which was on a CD stuck to a gaming magazine. it did much the same thing but had some incredible 3D graphics bouncing along to whichever Music CD you chose to play.
I remember that now....I used it a lot.
There was also Vib Ribbon.
LemonSlice Yes, I should have said two. I loved them.
the original ps1's (big square grey ones) had a built in visualiser you could use while playing cd's and the face buttons of the controller would change the effects and stuff. Sony removed it from the PsOne for some reason.
jedixo Yeah, that's the one I have.
Another great video about some cool retro tech. Love your videos. It's great that you go into such detail. The background, the operation and the tear down (or opening up). I enjoy every video you make!
Wow, amazing credits, I will look forward to watching that every time! (great video too, as always)
Am I the only one who misses the wood and plastic cases for electronics? Or wood and any material, for that matter. Back when I was arrogant enough to think I could build my own analog synthesizer I was actually planning on using wood paneling.
I hate the move away from wood and silver. Past the 1970s, everything became black monoliths which were hard to tell apart. I think the Natural Sound receivers from Yamaha in the late 70s were exceptionally beautiful. The Black and silver beauty of a Marantz 2265 is hard to beat. I still gawk at the line of Realistic receivers from their catalogs from the late 70s.
Moog still makes synthesizers with wood sides.
Definitely not the only one. Woodgrain is kind of LGR's thing.
I love my old six switch Atari 2600 for that, retro cool!
Hey Techmoan, I really appreciate the epilepsy warning at the beginning.
I have epilepsy, not photosensitive, but I really appreciate the proper warning for the epileptic community.
After it made me feel a bit odd displayed on the large TV, I thought it better to be safe than sorry.
Techmoan You did a fantastic job with the warning, many major RUclips videos I watch will go straight from a 1 second warning right into some strobing lights and colors- keep up the good work!
I'm only 19, but love old tech; and you, LGR, The 8Bit Guy and Ashens just do such a fantastic job covering old tech I never got to experience myself!
Yeah thanks!
You should not tell people that.
"epileptic community"
Are you for real? Not everything is a community smh.
A few local radio stations in the U.S that also broadcast through TV used this right up into this century.
That is such a clean looking circuit board. Amazing piece of retro tech, thanks for sharing.
Wow proper retro! Reminds me of the dodgy TOTP video effects in the early 70s. Fabulous bit of kit!
I think I love this? Imagine a timeline that predicted the EDM scene and we got a whole lineage of hardware based visualizer devices alongside synthesizers through the 8 and 16 bit eras.
Better yet, imagine if they'd had the smart idea of putting this functionality on a cartridge for the 2600 / VCS. I can't imagine it would have been difficult or expensive.
Thank you for putting links into all your references and music that you used. The Outro music was very moving to me, and I really enjoyed Anders music too.
Hi, I must admit that you make me aware of a lot more of equipment and music formats that I never knew existed or that I have forgotten about. Your videos are very informative and entertaining. I find this device interesting but I prefer the eq vu equalizer style. I look forward to your next video. Cheers.
Fun Fact: this machine was used in an analog Franken FM TV station before it signed off for good.
"The colors... the colors...!!! I'm freaking ouuuuut!!!
---Milhouse Mussolini Van Houten
you make great videos. love them. thanks for your love and the information you provide on the equipment.
Thank you for what you're doing. I always watch your videos before sleep
Quick call lgr /Clint
woodgrain!!!!!
Would not surprise me in the least if Clint picked it up for him at the Goodwill.
yea
James Wade I thought he already did and made a video
I think he is subscribed to this channel, so he will see if sooner or later.
Yep
It really whips the Llamas ass!
Love the jacket, the demo, and the puppets (as always, one of my favorite parts!). Keep up the good work.
I can imagine back in 1977, two friends are playing "Pong" for an hour and get bored. Then one says "do you have anything else cool to watch?" Then you whip out this thing and the seizure party started!
I feel like I need to be watching that with some 70s disco for the full effect
TECHMOAN: Thanks for all your videos! Every single time a new video is there for me to watch, I feel like a 10 year old again. Cheers from Chile !
LOL !
I was one of the lucky owners of this device. Have to say that I loved having this running on my TV while chilling out in my bedroom! Yes, I was an Atari fanboy!!!
I have one of these. I went to Burstein Applebee in Kansas City to buy equipment and parts to set up a car stereo repair shop for Car Tunes of Columbia, Missouri. They had a big pile of them with a sign that they were free with a $500 purchase. Even the most stoned of my friends got bored with it quickly and went back to watching the picture from one TV channel while listening to the sound from a different channel, which every once in a while has a weird overlap to the highly stoned.
WinAmp It really whips the llamas ass!
At 12:50 you said Winamp. I used to listen to Ceredwen's Yng Ngolau Ddydd and watch "pretty dots" which was one of the Winamp visualizations of perhaps the Milkdrop plugin...
or maybe it was The Gates of Annwn.
once again, you've knocked it out of the park with another great video!!
I had one of these Atari music visualizer when I was a kid. It sat under my Atari 2600 and was hooked up to my stereo and television. I would listen to my Sesame Street record and watch the neat colourful patterns. I was really young when I got it given to me by a neighbor because they didn't use it and thought because I was so young I might like it.
I actually like the muppets...
I do too!
The puppets are always on point !
I always wondered what actually goes on with those first few downvoters, now I know.... ;)
Indeed, I enjoy the puppets at the end.
Don't ever get shut of the bloody puppets mate.
I like them too, but I've given your comment a thumbs down to show you who's boss.
Love your puppet segments, Techmoan. They always give me a good laugh.
Always pleased with your presentation and production of your videos!
Great video! I love it when you make the shorts at the end of the video. You have a real talent for that.
Anyone remember the CD player/music visualiser that was built into the original PlayStation?
Man, I loved that. Especially when I was in a... "relaxed" kind of mood.
I still use Winamp with the Milkdrop plugin for the same purpose these days. :)
I just mentioned that before reading other's comments..I basically said the same thing
Thats an interesting little effect. I can imagine a lot of clubs in the era projecting that onto a wall behind the DJ somehow. It seems very responsive.
projected using what kind of technology?
betamax80 Projection T.V., of-course... Duh!
This looks incredible! Love your videos.
another excellent piece of sterling video work. you are getting better all the time. keep up the good work
I would love to have one of these to run my synths through...
that device is incredibly ａｅｓｔｈｅｔｉｃ
You are the best, keep up the good work. You certainly bring back very fond memories.
Thanks for putting me on to the Anders Enger Jensen music. I had a listen to the whole thing thanks to the link. Cheers!
I would love to get hold of a modern HDMI version of this. With HD vectors
Am I crazy or did I just hear your voice recording on an insurance company helpline?!
😂
I'm so glad you did a video on this.
As always ...a splendid video. Thanks for sharing
i need this for my raves
I used to have a program that did similar for the ZX Spectrum. The trouble is that if the output of your audio device was going into the Spectrum then you couldn't plug it into your hi-fi at the same time. I would need a signal splitter. It was inconvenient in the same way this Atari device is.
jezzvideo The Radio Shack TRS-80 Color-Computer had a cartridge that did a similar function, and could be switched to a bar-graph display as well. All audio input had to come through the cassette-tape drive, which was great if what you wanted to graph was on cassette. I still remember watching the highest-frequency meter not even budge, until we put "Cum & Feel the Noiz!" by Quiet Riot in... What laughs!
As long as Techmoan is around, there is no piece of retro tech that will be forgotten.
Mat comes across as a very well spoken and very well informed presenter who makes "mini movies" such as this. For myself, from the other side of the pond, I thank you for the obvious work that is needed to attempt and wildly suceed to make such good content.
Thank you Mat, and may you and yours have a wonderful day.
Steve
Hey bud cool RUclips sub clock in the background :) kept waiting for it to tick over to 457930!
It did go up by five subscribers compared to the beginning of the video.
I imagine a retro NYC dance club would pay $thousands for this box.
its probably now a win amp plug in ,,, crazy world really
. . You get back from work and theres a new Techmoan Retro Tech Video . . . Life doesn't get better then this! . .
Awesome video, i like how you are one of the few youtubers to cover niche technology in a very nice way. Also your voice is so godly smooth .
I'm having Winamp visualization plug-ins PTSD 😱😅
Dear Techmoan,
hope this find you well.
Just wanted to mention, in youtube there is no stop button. There is however a pause one.
In that regard, I wouldn't press it if my life depended on it. Not before the childish puppets!
Best wishes!
P.S. as kids today would have it: MOAR PUPETTTS!!!11!1
Yours truly,
Na RC
i'm a new age radio controller, but thanks for noticing :P
The stop button is the red one in the corner of the browser window.
Surprisingly enjoyable and pleasant visuals and music! Thanks for this! =D
And nice shout-out to Ben as well. =)
Some older analog TV stations (I saw a video of a radio atation that was on 87.7 fm and channel 6) used this visualizer until the very end of analog TV!
subtly inserts Nintendo switch into shot....
I have both an Atari Video Music.... and a Teac A-3440 as pictured in the video logo.
Who's jealous?
Bought both around 1980.
when I was a kid, yes in the 1970's, I had a portable disco record player, it had that prismatic plastic with lights behind it and man did I get a flash of nostalgia when you showed those stand-alone devices with the same design to them. It would flash and pulse the lights to the music and it was the coolest thing in the world. I think my mother still has it in her attic somewhere. I should ask her to send it to me. great video, I also wish she still had my old Pong but she threw out all my atari stuff and pong games I had left back east.
Great video! It's always interesting to see what tech was like before I was even born.
Cool. I got my at Goodwill for $7.99 working.
10p6 Mine came from a garage-sale... Choose it over wireless 2600 joysticks. Only enough money for one or the other, so....
(I'm posting on behalf of my husband, his father made this machine). "This is how I ate as a child. Father's first patent that made money. They sold it in about '75, to an un-named buyer that they later found out was Atari."
Was he right about the drugs?
Vee Chee, maybe Robert Brown was her husband's father?
:D
I'm happy i found your channel, i like your videos!
So here in the US, a low power radio station that shared the same frequency as the television channel 6 (Franken FM) in Syracuse New York, WVOA, was using one of these Atari C240 up until last month.
Since the band of 87.7MHz is technically a television frequency, the FCC mandated that these radio stations transmit along with the audio some sort of video signal. This could be anything, some stations would just transmit the weather information while others would just do free domain videos without their corresponding audio and you would only hear the radio station instead.
In July, the FCC mandated that these low power stations to cease transmission in analog whether or not they already transitioned to digital. It still fascinates me that they used the Atari C240 all these years and never dawned on me that it was the same gadget you had demoed 4 years ago.