Seriously...

A plumber eating a mushroom, and a spiny mammal jumping on a golden ring - you'd be forgiven for thinking these actions would make pretty indistinct or ambiguous sounds. But comedian, writer and musician Isy Suttie discovers why - thanks to Super Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog - they're some of the most evocative sounds of the 1980s and 90s. Along with these sounds, the plinky plonky music of early video games buried itself inside a generation of ears growing up among Commodores, Ataris, Segas and Nintendos. Loosely referred to as "chiptune", many musicians and producers now use the jagged, electronic textures in their songs, going to great lengths to deliberately limit their audio palette for the sake of authenticity; some even rip apart old computers and consoles to build instruments faithful to the original sounds. Its ubiquity in film and TV scores is another testament to its efficiency in evoking that era.Isy traces the evolution of chiptune from early electronic music, looking at how composers like Hiroka