The Windows 95 start up music: you might not know that it was composed by none other than Brian Eno. Fact. We’ve just stumbled upon something more amazing than that, though, that suggests he’s not exactly the biggest fan of PCs…
Brian Eno, in an interview with John Lloyd and Sean Lock on the BBC’s ‘The Museum of Curiosity’ in 2009, was presented with the Windows 95 ditty and asked the obvious question: did you write it on a PC?
“No I wrote it on a Mac,” he replied, quickly. “I’ve never used a PC in my life; I don’t like them.” Quite the revelation for a noise that’s ingrained in the minds of any 90s PC user. Eno went on to say that he and his Mac pulled together 83 different bits of music to try and meet Microsoft’s lofty ambitions for the sound.
He said that he received a brief from Microsoft with “about 150 adjectives” to desribe the desired noise. “The piece of music should be inspirational, sexy, driving, provocative, nostalgic, sentimental…” said Eno.
“…And then at the bottom it said ‘and not more than 3.8 seconds long.’” If you’re having difficulties remembering the noise in question, you can listen to it below.
