Physical Quest Studios CDs and lossless digital preservation

[Alderem]

Thanks for the updates, Spikey. I know you're detail-oriented enough to trust you implicitly on these things.

It looks like I didn't research the corrections for the Inca soundtrack enough. It looks like Douieb should be credited for most of the music on Inca I, but Callet did a few of the tracks - SierraHelp.com has the official soundtrack CD for the first game which notes which tracks are whose, and I missed that. Although its credits are not entirely correct either, as I know J. M. Marrier should be credited on Inca People. IMDB has Douieb as arranger for both albums, and only mentions Callet for SFX on the second game. Ugh! Unreliable sources. It also looks like the track named "Accla" should instead be "Aclla".

On all the soundtracks where we know there were multiple contributors, it would be delightful to know whose tracks are whose. I could guess of course (I've noticed each of Sierra's composers have a bit of their own style you can follow from work to work) but I'd love to know for certain.

OK, so that's:

• Inca & Inca II now credited to "Album Artist: Gilles Douieb & Charles Callet" (in that order) with per-track tags marking whose is whose, and listing J.M. Marrier for Inca People.... though it might deserve to be Marrier & Callet together, but I'm leaving as just Marrier until/unless I get confirmation.
• LSL5 all tracks credited to collaboration between Craig Safan & Chris Braymen
• QFGII all tracks credited to collaboration between Chris Braymen & Mark Seibert
• SQIV & III credited as "Album Artist: Various Artists", with SQIV tracks as Ken Allen, Mark Seibert, Rob Atesalp and SQIII tracks as Bob Siebenberg

Whew. All of these changes made, downloads updated.

Now that all of this is done, I'll leave it in someone else's hands to get all of this information into MusicBrainz. They have albums for just a few of the QS CDs on their site, sometimes with incomplete or differing information... for example, they have a KQVI album listed, but have a "Seagull Theme (Opening Movie)" entry as Track #2, which causes my album imported into Plex to show me as missing a track.

[Spikey]

Actually, Marten:
"It looks like Douieb should be credited for most of the music on Inca I, but Callet did a few of the tracks - SierraHelp.com has the official soundtrack CD for the first game which notes which tracks are whose, and I missed that."

Nope, the Sierra Help page is incorrect. If you look closely, you'll notice the credits are based on QuestStudios tracks, Inca People and the Katchampa/Ayers Rock Medley were both QuestStudios releases back over the years. Charles Callet has nothing to do with either Inca score. I would assume Sierra Help incorrectly had Callet as the composer from Tom's original Inca 1/2 credits, and added Douieb in lieu, assuming Tom's credits were correct (which we now know they weren't).
Katchampa/Ayers Rock is certainly not on the Inca 1 soundtrack, either! In fact, it's a medley of Inca 1 and 2 music that only ever existed on QuestStudios.com- because Tom himself digitally edited two games' music together.

So, TL;DR, Gilles Douieb is the sole composer. I spoke to him about it many years ago, but he mainly speaks French with limited English, so we never got very far. The series creator Yannick Chosse (sp?) confirmed to me via email, back in the days when the original QS forums still existed, that Gilles was the sole composer, Charles did sound effects.

The correct attribution for Inca People should be "Composed/arranged by Gilles Douieb, lyrics and vocals by J M Marrier", or words to that effect.

[Alderem]

Currently working through further corrections to the Inca soundtrack with Spikey. Stay tuned folks!

Also, if you can hear any distortions, pops, or clicks in anything I've posted, please let me know which discs, tracks and approximately how far in (by seconds).

[Alderem]

Updated: Inca & Inca II.zip with credits corrections courtesy of Spikey's awesome research.

Again, if there are any pops or clicks in any of these tracks, please let me know. I'm not hearing any issues myself, but my ears aren't young.

[goatmeal1]

Wow. Just realized it's been a whole year since Marten put out the call to archive the lossless Quest Studios music trapped on dusty, decaying 20-year-old CD-Rs...

Would truly have been a shame -- not to mention a historical loss -- if they could not have been rescued!

Many, many thanks to Marten for the herculean task of gathering said lossless files, properly labeling them, and then hosting them until Andrew can add them to the MMAS/QSA website.

And, of course, a hearty "thank you" to Andrew for hosting this site, where those of us interested in Sierra game music still have the opportunity to meet in a forum setting.

Cheers to everyone in this holiday season.

[Spikey]

Likewise, Goatmeal! And thanks again to Marten and your good self for your hard work on this endeavour. With Tom MIA these days, it's important and good work you're doing.

Thanks also to our fearless leader Andrew, as you say.

Hopefully I will have various bits of Sierra music news between now and the New Year.

[goatmeal1]

Likewise, Goatmeal! And thanks again to Marten and your good self for your hard work on this endeavour. With Tom MIA these days, it's important and good work you're doing.

Thanks also to our fearless leader Andrew, as you say.

Hopefully I will have various bits of Sierra music news between now and the New Year.

Thank you, and looking forward to the upcoming Sierra music news.

(PS - Really enjoying the interview you recently did with the Space Quest Historian!)

[Spikey]

Hah, I wondered if anyone would've seen that. We talked for 5 hours, 3 hours were recorded, and then about 2.5 hours was edited down for the 6 part interview. So we spoke a lot longer. Many things were unprintable, though.

The news in brief is I may be rerecording the GK1 score, and also may be releasing it on vinyl, as well as an expanded digital only version.

[jaffa225man]

(PS - Really enjoying the interview you recently did with the Space Quest Historian!)

Thanks for mentioning that, goatmeal1! Since reading your post this evening, I've watched all 4 available so far, finding them quite fascinating.

Hah, I wondered if anyone would've seen that. We talked for 5 hours, 3 hours were recorded, and then about 2.5 hours was edited down for the 6 part interview. So we spoke a lot longer. Many things were unprintable, though.

The news in brief is I may be rerecording the GK1 score, and also may be releasing it on vinyl, as well as an expanded digital only version.

I'll certainly be interested, although I have yet to play either GK1 or 2!

[Spikey]

Yeah, I still haven't played 2 or 3! On my to do list.