Interview
Handle: Barry Leitch aka The Jackal - http://www.bossgame.com
How did you come up with your alias ?
A local hacker who had a 1541 disk drive called himself the Vulture, he had converted a version of Golden Brown by the Stranglers onto the C-64 in basic. He sold me his disk drive and disks and I kinda picked through the left overs, hence Jackal.
City / Country:
When we (Jackal & Gryphon / Grover my next door neighbour artist) did all those terrible demo's we were in Strathaven, Scotland. Gryphon went to art school when I started working, but rejoined me at Imagitec for a couple of years, then he went to Enigma Variations in Harrogate for a bit. Since then I think he went back to art school.
Born year:
1970
What was your first computer, and when did you get it?
I got a Sinclair ZX81 in 1982, I still have it..
How did you get into the scene and what groups have you been a member of ?
A friend bet me that I couldnt do a cover version of Axel F on the commodore 64. After that I wrote loads of demo tunes and we started making stand alone demos (a pic and a tune was all that was needed in those days) I put my phone number and address in the demos.At one point I was getting about 10 packages of disks a day and phone calls at all hours of the night from people in places as far away as Australia.
What was the proudest moment in your career ?
Proudest moment in the c64 scene was when I came runner up in the Mindsmear competition in ZZap 64. Proudest moment in my actual career was when Gary Bracey hired me at Ocean and admitted that he'd wanted to hire me for years. and when I got to co compose the soundtrack for Inferno (Ocean) with my teen idols goth rock group - Alien Sex Fiend. Just goes to show, you can do anything...
For what specific reason(s) do you think that you are remembered ?
No doubt for the awful demos like the Chicken song, perhaps for the incredibly pathetic scrolling messages I wrote in the Mindsmear Demo's, and definately not because my music was anything special.
What would you like to be remembered for ?
Just for being a part of it all, and for going on to produce something that was actually listenable to. :)
What made you stop the scene activity ? (and do you remember when?)
I got a job with a software company early 1988, I think I made one last demo which was R-Type music and picture. It was on par with our earlier work.
Thinking back on the good old days, is there anything you regret?
No not really, I think that it all lead me to where I am today.
What was your favorite
GAME(S)
Traffic by Quicksilver
Elite
Revs
DEMO(S)
Thrust Concert - Stoat and Tim
Tutenkhamun pic - Bob Stevenson - remember how blown away everyone was because it looked vaguely like the amiga version ??
PROGRAMMER(S) (OR PROGRAMMING TEAM(S))
Geoff Crammond.
CRACKER(S) (OR CRACKING GROUP(S))
Omega Man - TCS - mainly because I think he cracked everything that was ever released. 1001 for having a really cool image.
OVERALL GROUPS :
TCS.
COMPOSER(S)
Rob Hubbard.
BEST COMPOSED TRACK(S)
Spellboud (Hubbard)
Hyper Sports Loading Music (Galway) - when you stopped the tape loading you got to hear some really good arpeggio work.
Shadowfire (Gray)
BEST GRAPHICS
Bob Stevenson
EVENT(S) (E.G. COPYPARTY)
Going to the computer club every week in Glasgow. We went to one copyparty in 1990, the Anarchy party in England. It was pretty crap and all the competitions were won suspiciously enough by Anarchy members.
MEMORY(S)
1986
Wrote tons of demos. Sold my first tune to Firebird software for ICUPS.
Also did SPitting Image for the people who did electrosound (never released).
Beleived that I couldnt get a job doing game music so I got a job as an apprentice engineer at Rolls Royce. Still wrote demo's and hooked up with Mark Kelly (Arcanum Software) and worked on Marauder and Captain Courageous.
Met Rob Hubbard and went into a pub for the first time.
1987
Quit Rolls Royce after I found out how boring being an engineer was and went to Itec to learn business programming. Finished the 2 year course in 6 months. Went to college to do a degree in computing, dropped out. Got a job with Catalyst Coders, they opened an office in Glasgow and started doing the music for their games.
Met Martin Galway and had my first donner kebab.
1988
Moved to Portsmouth as Catalyst werent paying us regularly. Found out that they didnt pay regularly their either. Left Catalyst with a few programmers and artists and moved to London where we tried to set up our own company. Wrote music for Super Dragon Slayer (codemasters) and Battlefield (atlantis) and Emlyn Hughes International Soccer. Failed miserably in setting up our own company but we had all had a job offer from Imagitec Design. So we phoned them up and told them if they sent a van to london to pick us up we would all come and work for them. Lived in Imagitec's offices for a few months.
1989-1992
Worked at Imagitec Design. Did all their music and most of Gremlin Graphics music. Did freelance work through Imagitec for the Bitmap Brothers, Ocean, EA, Domark and just about everybody else. I did the music for about 70 games while there so I wont list them all, highlights - Lotus 2, Speedball 2 (PC), Supercars 2, Utopia, Suzuki, Zone Warrior, Silkworm, Postman Pat, Back to the Future 3.
Got fired from Imagitec for telling someone who was going to quit which companies in the area were hiring. (ridiculous eh ?), anyways, got a job at Ocean and did Robocop 3, Lethal weapon and some others.
1993
Worked on TFX and Inferno at Ocean, got to work with Alien Sex Fiend my favourite band and produced the Inferno soundtrack (available on CD). Friends from Imagitec that were now working at Origin helped get me a job there and so it was off to Texas I went. Got to Origin and worked on Privateer Righteous Fire Mission and Wings Of Glory, ended up composing a few tunes for W.O.G. although I never got properly credited for it.
1994
Did the inflight Speech for Wing Commander 3. I did wing commander 2 and Savage Empire on the SNES using Martin Galways unbeleivably powerful and ridiculously over complicated Snes music driver. Started Apache Longbow AH-64D on the PC (still not released) and probably some other stuff that I'm damned if I can remember.
1995 - Present
Finished Longbow. Left Origin to take up the position of Audio Director here at Boss Game Studios, where I've been doing PSX stuff since then.
DRINK ?
Irn Bru. (scottish soft drink)
What are you doing nowadays ?
I'm Audio Director at Boss Game Studios here in Seattle, USA.
What are you doing on your spare time?
Watching my kids grow up far too quickly.
Is there anything you'd like to say to the public (read: admires)
Sorry for all the crap demo's :)
What is the meaning of life?
Achieve.