Since I only have one (unless samplers count) I’ve got to say Roland R-8 McTwo.
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I no longer own any hardware, but if I could own only one it would be the Rytm
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More:
https://www.elektronauts.com/search?q=drum%20machine
I’d have to flip a coin between the MDUW+ and the TR-8s. Both are great in slightly different ways.
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This is the second time this week I’ve heard R8 mentioned. The first was in relation to Aphex Twin’s COLLAPSE ep, which was fantastic and had a great drum sound.
What makes it special or better than the standard sample based drum machine?
Acidlab drumatix
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Good question! First off, it just has a great core sound I’ve not heard from the later Roland boxes. Super tight and hits very hard. Great for industrial stuff at one end and for ambient stuff at the other, because everything keeps its definition very well, even into a full wet reverb or whatever.
The pitching is pretty high quality interpolation but unusual on many sounds, because a lot of them are actually made up of a single sample split into two - a high frequency component and a low frequency component. On paper this is for the ‘nuance’ parameter to emulate striking things at different points so you can get more realistic sounding drums (the main aim of the machine on release really) but in practice it’s actually amazing for weird stuff, because the high and low frequency parts don’t get pitched by the same amount, so it’s not the usual case of the sound just getting slower and longer/faster and shorter as in most samplers. You get a completely different sound when pitching around. Added to that, you can also set separate decays for the higher and lower components on sounds with nuance, which can get some very odd results.
You could replicate that in a DAW with enough work, but I’d rather just use the R-8 for that kind of thing which is why I still have it.
The sequencer also essentially has parameter locks (for velocity, pitch, overall decay, nuance, pan and micro-timing - though you can just record in unquantized) and is incredibly fast to come up with interesting stuff. The downside is having to stop the sequencer to edit a lot of things (not the parameter locks, thankfully), which is common to most of the old Rolands I gather.
It sits in a funny spot for most people in this day and age, because the desktop version has sloppy timing so should really be the master if you’re doing stuff live. The rackmount version apparently has great timing but then you’re losing all the fun of the sequencer and slider.
This video is worth checking out from about halfway through if you want to see the sequencer in action, I usually use it this way but there’s a step mode too.
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Rytm or Jomox Alphabase have best overall drum machine for widest range. I love modular drums with Eloquencer sequencer and mixer as well.
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Damn straight!
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Nord Drum 2. It’s wonderfully flexible, I like the way it sounds, and most importantly, it doesn’t want to be a sequencer too. It plays nicely with the Torso T1.
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I‘d also say Rytm MK II, which feels the most like a dedicated drum machine among all of the modern Elektrons.
Syntakt is a close contender though because it has the FM sounds on top. But the digis overall feel more like grooveboxes/composition tools to me because they can do so much and are so versatile.
Rytm doesn’t want to be that, but is probably the deepest drum machine. With analog plus sampling plus the performance functions.
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Syntakt gang.
But I still love the 808.
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I also love the r8. Would love to get a rackmount one day.
TR8-S. Thats what I have, and I dig it.
Everyone is different though.
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If I had to choose only one it would have to be the rytm mkii but I’d be unhappy making that choice, there are quite a few tied for close second place.
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motion record is og elektron live-record p-locking, with the bigbox elktrn stuff there is slides with it also.
step loop is the best thing ever for performative stuff, especially with sub-steps scattered around the pattern. I just really wish ROLAND HAD A WISH BOX cause volca drum step loop has the one single thing up on tr6s/8s, you can have active step set to 1 step, where step 1 doesn’t even have anything on it (pattern is silent), but the rest of the pattern is full of ratchets and crazy shit, just waiting to dance on it with your fingers at random. but silent until you touch it. idk anything else you can use like that. on roland, if active step (pattern length) is set to a window, step loop doesn’t work on steps outside that window. on volca drum set up like that each button is a tempo synced 6 voice ratchet bomb waiting to pop off. and the swing knob interpolates ratchets apart in real space time while they’re firing off. volca drum is a sleeper
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Drumbrute Impact. Freeing up the dough from moving the Analog Rytm II, which got me into the OP-XY
Zero regrets - best purchases of the year
Fully Analog, sounds Dope.
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I’m with you, CR-78 rules them all!
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I love the ratchet/ repeat (or whatever they call it on there) on the impact! It’s implemented really well and is a great performance tool, simple, fun, and effective.
Great sounding machine too. When I had one I played a few gigs with it through proper PA systems and it sounded wonderful.
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Picked. Now what?
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