Nordischsound has taken Van Halen’s synth anthem “Jump” and reworked it through the gritty, electronic lens of the Commodore 64’s SID chip—times two.
This cover wasn’t built with soft synths or plugins. It was recorded on a USBSID-Pico, a hardware device capable of running real SID chips. And for this track, two 8580 SID chips were used side-by-side, giving the song more range and presence than a standard single-chip setup.
The 8580 version of the SID chip—used in later model C64C systems—is known for having a cleaner signal path and less distortion compared to the earlier 6581. That clarity works well with “Jump,” which is all about that driving synth line and tightly arranged rhythm.
Nordischsound’s arrangement doesn’t try to mimic the original one-to-one. Instead, it feels like a version of the song you might’ve heard playing from a cartridge on a tricked-out Commodore 64 at a demo party sometime in the late 80s if that machine had stereo SID output.
