As beautiful and haunting as it is, the Game Of Thrones theme song composed by Ramin Djawadi is liable to be a source of anxiety for many viewers around the world. When fans hear it, they cannot help but worry about what’s to come. Who will be killed this week? Who will be nude? And which plot twists will send them to social media in fits of rage to spew their bile to every corner of the internet? Very few pieces of TV music outside of the Jeopardy theme are likely to cause so many sweaty palms and quickened pulses. So a version of the Game Of Thrones theme played entirely by scanners, hard drives, and floppy drives should by all rights be an audio nightmare. But guess what? Someone has done exactly that, and the results are downright beautiful.
Poland’s Pawel Zadrozniak has combined 64 floppy drives, eight hard drives, and a pair of scanners into a gargantuan, Rube Goldberg-esque instrument known as The Floppotron. Through various blips and squeaks, it is capable of producing a very credible rendition of the Game Of Thrones theme, right down to the pounding percussion. The sound is somewhat reminiscent of MIDI files from the ’90s. But don’t think for a moment that Zadrozniak and his Floppotron are limited to this one song. He’s done similar versions of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” and the Hawaii Five-O theme as well. Check it out.
Veteran internet junkies will likely be familiar with the most famous recording in this vein, i.e. a computerized version of John Williams’ “The Imperial March” from The Empire Strikes Back. That was accomplished with just two floppy drives and had a flat, buzzy sound. It seems rather primitive now, compared to Zadrozniak’s later, more nuanced work, but it still has a certain throwback charm.
[via Laughing Squid]