In November 1993 CU Amiga profiled Volker Tripp as “one of the most admired musicians on the scene”. Under the name Jester, it said, “he’s known to thousands for his tunes that have graced numerous classic demos, many of which have been collaborations with the well-respected demo crew, Sanity.” He wrote that music in four-channel modules, the Amiga’s tracker format, and by then he was trying to turn it into a career: he had just released a cassette of pop songs, made on the Amiga and sold by mail order for £6.
Fast facts
- Real name: Volker Tripp, from Germany.
- Discipline: tracker music on the Amiga.
- Groups: Sanity from 1991; earlier Treacl, Proton and briefly TRSI, according to Demozoo.
- Known for: music for Sanity’s Elysium, World of Commodore and Roots; the music disk Jesterday (1992); the cassette Minimal Art: Simplicity (1993).
From Treacl to Sanity
The scene database Demozoo lists Jester’s first modules in 1990, for the group Treacl, and then for Proton. Its notes say he joined TRSI from Proton one October and moved on to Sanity the following month. His Sanity modules begin in February 1991, and in April 1991 he wrote the music for Sanity’s demo Elysium, which came third at the Amiga Summit Convention that year.
His tunes travelled well beyond Sanity’s own productions. Demozoo credits his music in dozens of intros, disk magazines and music packs by other groups, among them Extension by Pygmy Projects in 1993, and in Atari ST and Falcon productions that reused his modules.
Jesterday
Sanity released Jesterday, a music disk of Jester’s tunes, in April 1992. Amiga Computing reviewed it that August, finding the graphics “somewhat limited” but absorbing, “as is the music - a selection of Pet Shop Boys-ish numbers, which sound in turns layered, professional and tuneful.” British public-domain libraries were still selling the disk in 1994. One described it at the end of 1993 simply as “nice peaceful tracks”.
That November he wrote the music for Sanity’s entry in the demo competition at Commodore’s World of Commodore show in Frankfurt. The untitled demo came second there, and in May 1993 it was the best-selling demo at the British library 17 Bit Software. At The Party in Denmark in December 1992, his module Molecule’s Revenge was among the unplaced entries in the four-channel music competition.
Minimal Art
In 1993 Tripp took his music out of the demo scene. Minimal Art: Simplicity was a cassette of seven pop songs, which CU Amiga called “surprisingly good”. He named the Pet Shop Boys among his influences, the first track sampled them, and the vocals were sung by Carsten Klein-Hitpaß, who also recorded and mixed the tape. Amiga Format noticed it in its public-domain pages in September 1993, although it was “not PD at all”: Jester, it explained, used his Amiga to control MIDI instruments as well as tracker programs. It found “fairly tame electro-dance music, with lots of blips and pops and swirling keyboards, and a lead singer who doesn’t sound unlike Neil Tennant.”
He had a bigger plan. CU Amiga reported that he wanted to re-record some of his best demo tunes in a professional studio, “expanding the original 4-channel tracks with the help of plenty of MIDI synths and modules”, but was about £1,000 short of the studio fees and was looking for a backer.
Roots and after
Jester stayed with Sanity. He wrote the music for Roots, the AGA demo the group brought unfinished to The Party 1994, where The Australian Commodore and Amiga Review noted “a dance-type orientated soundtrack by Jester”. Demozoo also credits him with the music for the finished Roots 2.0, released in April 1995.
According to Demozoo, the disk magazine The Charts ranked him sixth-best musician in February 1993, and Brain Degenerator ranked him first in October 1994. He kept writing after the Amiga years, under the name Oddjob as well as Jester. Demozoo credits him with music for productions and small games into the 2020s, and lists him as a member of the groups DENS Design and Rosebud.
Sources
- Tony Horgan, “Profiles”, CU Amiga, November 1993, p. 124: Volker Tripp, Jester, Sanity, Minimal Art: Simplicity, the studio plan, price and supplier.
- Amiga Computing issue 51, August 1992: public-domain review of Jesterday.
- Amiga Computing, Christmas 1993: public-domain library advertisement (“Sanity Jesterday. Nice peaceful tracks”).
- Amiga Format issue 59, May 1994: public-domain library advertisement listing Jesterday.
- Amiga Format issue 50, September 1993: public-domain pages, Minimal Art: Simplicity.
- Amiga Format issue 46, May 1993, p. 170: “Top 10 Demos of the Month” from 17 Bit Software.
- The Australian Commodore and Amiga Review, volume 12 number 3, March 1995, pp. 92–93: demo column on The Party 1994, Roots.
- The Party 1992, results (web, secondary copy of the organisers’ file): four-channel music competition. https://files.scene.org/get/parties/1992/theparty92/results.txt
- Demozoo, scener entry for Jester (web, secondary): groups, the move from Proton to TRSI and Sanity, the disk magazine rankings, the alias Oddjob, location, and credits including Elysium, Jesterday, World of Commodore, Extension, Roots and Roots 2.0. https://demozoo.org/sceners/1695/