AN
INTERVIEW WITH
FELX OF MJJ PROD
----------------- carried and translated from French by STS -------------------
Some time ago, a scener called FEL'X appeared on DHS bulletinboard and
announced the rebirth of famous French crew MJJ PROD. First he opened an
official website and then told us about a private convention due to be held
next August. In the meantime a first MJJ PROD release was made available,
namely a slideshow. Should we wait for more ? Who is this guy almost no one
knows ? Answers are supposed to follow :)
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STS : Hi Fel'X ! As usual let's start with introducing yourself. Give us
your real name, age, occupation, Scene status and anything else that you may
find of interest to our readers.
FEL'X : My name is Auer frederic and I turned 33 yesterday, May 28th (never
too late for birthday presents). I work at the FNAC (French chain of stores) in
the computer department of course and I am a huge nostalgic of the ST Scene...
I've always been the "brain" in MJJ PROD and I've been preparing our comeback
for more than a year...
STS : While we mention MJJ PROD, could you tell us more about your homepage?
what can we find there and what can we expect in a near future ?
FEL'X : the website was mostly planned to be the HQ of MJJ PROD members but
then I realized that many other people also visited it. Following these people
suggestions I adjusted the homepage content. As for the future, I'll tell you
about former members (Wilfried's current activity on GBA for instance). Of
course you'll also find all our productions, news and photos taken at the
MJJPARTY 2...
STS : Getting your MJJ fellows gathered, once again, seems to be your main
motivation. What about the convention you plan to hold in August ? Do you think
all former members will attend ?
FEL'X : Things are going as planned for the Mjjparty2... It'll be held from
August 16th to 18th. It's going to be a really friendly and cool party, less
stressing that the first edition. Even though we plan a release, we'll not
feel pressured this time... Actually the mjjparty (I) was completely assembled
within a couple of days (even tho some screens were already done of course).
So, YES, we will bring you a little "something"... We even have thought about
what it's going to be even if I'll wait until I meet the others again and make
sure they'll take part to this project...
STS : Btw what happened to Niko ?? Are there some projects hiding behind
this convention ??
FEL'X : Niko can't be found anywhere... If anyone has info about him, please
let me know... After the convention, we will decide about further projects...
Still I can tell you that there will be another slideshow with -exclusive-
pictures this time.
STS : Talking of the slideshow you recently released (a collection of not so
new and already seen piccies by Wilfried and Niko) : who had the idea to
release it ? And who is this newcomer called Zorro 2 ? Can we expect to see new
pieces of code from him ?
FEL'X : the idea was mine... Browsing thru some ftp, I happened to find some
pictures I didn't have anymore. We never claimed we would be as good as we were
back in 1992 but we still want to have fun and we hope you'll share the fun as
well. I think that first you were all surprised to hear about us again... This
slideshow can be directly copied from an emulator to an ST (any kind of ST)
quite easily. If I remember well I think that's the only demo that works like
this. Zorro 2 accepted to code the slide without hesitating and he assembled
it in less than three weeks. Zorro 2 is a new member that never gave up his ST
so that today I can rely on him if I want things to be done fast and properly.
I'm very grateful to him for his work...
STS : Let's go straight to the point : MJJP PROD was mostly known thanks to
its amazing gfxmen (Wilfried and Niko) and its coder Bigfoot. You claim to be
the founder of MJJ PROD but as far as I know your name has never been mentioned
in the credits of a single MJJ production. What's exactly your crew status ?
FEL'X : "The boss is me" (as written in the French interview). Well have a
closer look at the member list. The crew was created by both me and Wilfried...
But truth is that I am not a coder, nor a gfxman. I am just an organizer... The
first MJJparty was held at my place and so will the second edition. These days
I'm mostly in charge of the OFFICIAL homepage of the crew... I used (and still
do) to make sure everyone was happy with the others work or just agreed on what
was to be done. For instance, the MJJparty 1 was turning to a gamers party on
ST so that I had to threaten to rape them mentally :) before we could start
working on the demo...
STS : The only screen in which I could read your name was 'Little Marie' in
the ANOMALY demo by MJJ PROD (thx to MC Laser for the tip !). Tell us... How is
Marie going now ? How old is she now ? I hope she doesn't have heart problems
anymore.
FEL'X : I'm feeling emotionnal here. This is my favourite screen ! Marie is
fine even though she'll be operated on another time (nothing serious though).
Today she's 9, has a sister and two brothers... You know, I'm a real ATARI
freak even if I'm -unfortunately- nothing more than a user. However I'm very
proud to share this passion with my kids, friends and above all with the whole
ST scene... I'm proud MJJPROD brought you fun and I hope we'll bring you some
more.... (I'm not proud of my soundtracker pro, Wilfried).
STS : Do you know where the others are ? What is their current job ? I think
we would especially love to know what happened to Niko !!
FEL'X : Niko went on painting on Falcon and then I lost track of him. I
have no idea about where he is today. Goldenboy is still a "beetle maker".
Wilfried only lives a few kilometers away from my place. He is playing around
with Photoshop and goes mad sometimes when Zorro2 asks for a 16 color logo. My
biggest regret comes from Bigfoot as he almost stopped coding at all (visit
his homepage for more info). Since he was our best coder you should *not* hope
for miracles, we won't live up to our former reputation. Future will tell...
Blinis wants to be active again, Squale doesn't have enough time for that and I
have met Ultra not such a long time ago. C-Rem is a new gfxman. He's very good
and really active too (maybe too much sometimes). Smith released two records.
Floopy will maybe be active again. We're ready to accept new members
STS : Do you remember funny or strange stories from the active years MJJ ?
FEL'X : here's the story of the creation of MJJPROD... Wilfried and I were
two demo freaks who used to hang around on RTEL (one of the services offered by
the minitel, the French ancestor of Internet). WILF was already a gfxman and I
was already a loser. I was a fan of MICHAEL JACKSON (ok, I confess, I still am)
and I thought that the name of his publishing house was funny... MJJPROD... We
had a mailbox named MJJPROD on RTEL and I told Wilfried that I could make our
name famous. Fenris was the first coder who thought we were a real crew and
his coded our first screen for the Trancebeauce demo (refuse). We became really
addicted and sometime later we met BIGFOOT. It was too late to change our
crewname and so we went on with MJJPROD...
STS : You've spent more than a decade on ATARI. How would you describe the
evolution of the Scene ? Why did MJJ PROD leave ATARI computers for the PC ??
FEL'X : MJJPROD is not on PC... The ST state of mind can survive on PC
thanks to Steem or SainT. It even keeps demos alive (see Leonard's example).
Our next demos will work on ST and PC but, once again, I need to add that every
PC production will stay close to our ST vision. New demos are impressive but I
miss multicrew productions. Working on a guestscreen is really interesting.
STS : Except for your own convention, do you (either you or the whole crew)
plan to attend other ATARI parties ? Of course here I am thinking of the
rumoured Error In Line 3, especially if you keep in mind how friendly and
productive the two previous editions appeared to be !
FEL'X : Why not attend a party ? I haven't planned to so far, but I have to
say that I would surely like to ! The MJJPARTY 2 isn't 100% MJJ restricted
since MOA of Megatari and Brume will be there too... Ajt of HMD should also
stop by for a while. Do not hesitate to invite us to your next convention. We
have several liters of coke at hand :)
STS : Do you think it's time for ATARI computers to die ? Oki PCs are much
more powerful but I see no challenge coding stuff under DirectX.
FEL'X : you can be amazed by any computer. I love to watch the layest PC demos
as much as I enjoy Spectrum demos. Newcomers won't be drawn to the Atari but
I'm sure that none of us will ever leave it. Even if we sometimes forget about
it. Thanks to websites like PACIDEMO, MEGATARI, DHS and magazines like Alive
or Toxic mag (yep strider) it's still easy to find stuff. Not to forget every
crew or independent coders, whatever the production...
STS : Time to overheat braincells with our homecooked brainstorming. (I
asked Fel'X to answer in English here for logical purposes).
F : FRANCE
E : ECTOPLASM
L : LOSER (not a lamer)
'
X : HUM HUM
O : OVERBOOKED
F : FUN
M : MARIE LORIS MANON JEREMY
J : JOYPAD
J : JOYSTICK
P : PARTY
R : RASTER
O : OPEN
D : DEMO
STS : pfouuuuuu have a deep breath now :) Do you have a message to all
these guys out there who keep fighting to defend creativity ?
FEL'X : some time ago I was asked if I would have created MJJPROD if we
had not been on the Scene forefront. Soon after I remembered that MJJ Prod was
about having fun, making funny things and like it. Then enjoy yourself... Join
us... Let's brace and make love... And the Atari will rule...
STS : Thanks for the time you gave us to answer all these questions ! Let's
hope we'll hear more from MJJ PROD in next August.
FEL'X : thanks to all of you...
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