8bitSF resurrects the Freq.Fest monster for a third summertime marathon of chiptune madness! Each evening features a wide and eclectic lineup of artists devoted to making new music with old hardware. Started as an ill-advised solo project mashing fuzzy guitar rock, orchestral instrumentation and the sounds of 80's and 90's video game hardware, Curious Quail has evolved into more of a musician collective than a band proper with contributing members spanning the west coast of the United States from the deserts of the Coachella Valley to the Bay Area and even the Pacific Northwest. Their missions has remained one of writing music that showcases an ongoing storyline told through lyrics and musical motifs while over engineering every technical decision from how can we add more violin to yes the Gameboy needs an overdrive pedal. They're releasing two records this year; Empty Victories, and a nontraditional monthly writing exercise called Twelve Months, which is partially available on YouTube as you read this. Rules bend before they break, like baby bird bones. In the pause between your words, there is Gnarboots. Down the drain, if your fingers could just stretch another half inch, there is Gnarboots. In your mirror as you mouth silently, fuck you, there is Gnarboots. We are all the same being, exploded out one thousand times and lied into believing we are not. You are gnarboots, and you are gnarboots. And You. Are. G.N.A.R.B.O.O.T.S. We Are All Gnarboots. G.N.A.R.B.O.O.T.S F.O.R.E.V.E.R. Amen. 4 gameboys, some guitar pedals, and a Nick Drexler. Our goal is to explore the giant sounds from small machines. Let's dance! In the year 199x, Nikola Whallon was born of two dragons into the age of the SNES. His love of SNES, N64, and Gameboy music would have such a great impact on the child's life that when he came of age, these feelings of love and nostalgia would fuse and give birth to music that has the power to bring out the child in anyone. From classic video game music to modern pop, his Gameboy knows no bounds, and loves to party on the dance floor. From San Jose, CA, Petriform has brought energetic NES-style chiptunes and synth music to the California chipmusic scene for years. Drawing unapologetically from a grab-bag bursting at the seams with genre influences including bubblegum pop, 80s-90s VGM, third wave ska, prog metal, happy hardcore, and turn-of-the-millennium pop punk, no two Petriform releases are the same -- and neither are the live shows, for that matter. Telepathic Birds is a dreamy, melancholic, ambient, synth pop, shoegaze-y, new wave, space rock trio, with punk rock undertones. Telepathic Birds are space explorers who have come here to Earth to bring people together through their mysterious, bird-like, insect, space-y, Persephone-like presence. They have come to be a Beacon of Light and Love to guide others in reconnecting with their essence and stepping fully into peace, love, and vulnerability. Their music is both dreamy, melancholic, and uplifting -- bridging the shadow and the light -- the underworld and the heavens-bringing light to the darkness, and depth to the light-creating opportunities for worldly Beings to transition in peace. Violence Mars: Jeremy W. Kaufmann grew up in the hellpits of Michigan, hid himself in Detroit techno, synthpop, Motown, punk rock, Commodore 64, sci-fi and horror films. Now he bleeps and bloops as Violence Mars in San Francisco, where the air is poison and dog shelters send robots to harass homeless people. Claire Kwong makes shapes, videos, and memes melt onto the screen. She is also a performance artist who works with code, projection, and bodies. Mediapathic is a collection of neural impulses channeled through a bioelectrical interface utilizing visual semiotics and synesthetic neurolinguistic reprogramming techniques to realign memetic calibration of the observer and provide methodologies for navigating ontological disaster areas. You can call him Steen. New to the FreqFest visualist lineup is Neon Death Cat, a cyberspace magical girl trapped in a low poly paradigm. Based in San Francisco, visualist Noukon infiltrates your eye sockets with nostalgic malfunctions, tenebrous obscurities, and synthetic nebuli built into a rhythmic, layered textile of light, darkness, and 8-bit teletubby entrails. Based in Oakland by way of 'Hell-A', Vismancienne has bridged the gap between analog and digital art since 2014. They wield an arsenal of obsolete, circuit-bent hardware to curate a cerebral visual experience through glitch media and found art. Vaccinate your fucking kids; abolish ICE.