I was looking at the latest Roland offerings and wondered to myself what was the last synth they made that stood on its own?, is it the jdxa or is that mostly made up of past synth sounds too?.
It seems like they are obsessed with the 80’s/early nineties and every device is a new package of those classic sounds, are they not interested in making new 21st century tones and kits?, or is this a wider problem that effects all long standing synth makers and innovation is traded for “sure things”.
Only a few years ago, before Aira and the Boutiques everybody was complaining about the exact opposite.
“Why isn’t Roland making new versions of their classic synths and drum machines like the TR-808?”
“Why are they making stuff like the Fantom -series? Nobody wants those!”
And Roland, true to their old slogan “We Design The Future” told everybody that they’re not interested in visiting their past glories. They’re only interested in designing completely new products. Just goes to show that you can never satisfy the audience.
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Are Fantoms not the best hits of Roland then?.
If I scroll through presets on a Roland device they are full of synth emulations from past models, what was the last synth they made that you will see as a preset on a modern one?, I assume there is not a jdxa bass preset(or similar) on an mc707 or fantom x.
They say they design the future but it always contains a massive portion of the past in terms of sound sets, I know the tech moves on each time but the inspiration doesn’t, do they not believe in their ability to make popular modern tones worthy of copying anymore.
In my opinion the last truly inspirational synth-products from Roland were the VSynth, the VP9000 and other products in their Variphase line, but assumably none of them were big sellers and many of them - like the VariOs - are remembered with horror. At least they brought something completely new to the table. But even they relied heavily on TB-303 and D-50 legacy sounds.
I love myself some Roland. I have the XV-3080, the XV-5080 and a bunch of Boss guitar fx in my setup but they’re there mostly for the “classic Roland sound”. Then again my Boss SY-300 guitar synth is truly exceptional and unlike anything else before it.
I guess I like to buy different products for different purposes. If I want classic Roland pads I buy a Roland rompler, not a Dreadbox monosynth. If I want great creamy and boomy synth bass, I tend to think that a Moog would be my best choice. There are different profiles for different manufacturers and there’s nothing wrong with that.
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There is definitely a place for it, especially right now, I just wondered where people thought the new Roland classic sound might come from.
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Yeah, I have the GP10 and I have similar thoughts about it.
Roland seem to cater a lot to the professional player’s market, much like Yamaha and lately Nord. Stage keyboards where you can easily access the vintage (or modern, or realistic) sounds when they’re needed for a song. They don’t have to think about innovative synth products anymore—I mean, when was the last truly innovative synth anyway?
The boutiques and grooveboxes are just fun toy* projects for them to keep their toes in that side of the market.
*using toy as a positive word here
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Synth companies like Roland (I guess you can include Korg, Yamaha and maybe Nord) seem to follow a trajectory where they released a bunch of “classic” sounding synths/drum machines through the 80’s and into the 90’s to the point that they could leverage all of those classic sounds/synth engines into big old workstations and romplers that are much easier to produce/maintain than all those horrible old analogue circuits full of dodgy transistors.
Companies that don’t have enough of that “classic” sound must continue to innovate until they can either join the workstation giants or disappear completely.
What motivation do Roland have to take massive R&D gambles on seeking out new innovations and fighting their way into a market they already feel that they’ve transcended?
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I don’t expect them to reinvent the wheel or even go back to analogue, more that they used to make synths that had a distinct sound and now they make devices that contain the latest emulation of those sounds without adding any new ones, surely there comes a time when people are fed up with the 80’s at which point what does Roland have to offer, its not like they have been making big steps to create novel ways of manipulating sounds or sequences like other companies have(unless I missed something).
Roland synths are capable of making a huge range of sounds. I suspect what you refer to as a “distinct sound” are merely patches which have been used on 80s/90s commercial recordings and hence are popular.
I think it is up to the end user to come up with the new distinct sounds (which will be old hat in the 2030s).
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While I’ve owned four of the Boutiques in the past, I agree that Roland is done in terms of innovation and new ideas. I took a look at the Roland Cloud the other day and was appalled by how shitty the skeuomorphic designs were. I left the site pretty quickly. They are 100% reliant on their 70s/80s/90s heyday.
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What happens is Roland release some stuff, sometimes it is excellent, sometimes its a bit meh, no matter what though people complain anyway, then long after it is out of production everyone asks them why they don’t “simply remake it” again, because secondhand ones are too expensive now and everyone always wanted that thing. 
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Yeah Roland! Bring back the D-Beam!
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B-Deam?
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many of the old rolands sounds are simply great. They are timeless, full of character, full sweetspots, sit in the mix etc
I didn’t make or listen to electronic music when these instruments were on the market, still I‘m into these sounds and I‘m happy that there are options now to get modern versions with these sounds without the need of buying the over expensive, often unreliable originals.
Future, present or past sounds… if it sounds good, it sounds good 
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There is no denying the character of those old Roland synths and other devices, I was just interested in the point in which they decided (deliberately or by chance) that new tones were not something to focus on, just new ways of remaking them. What was the last synth or drum machine that they considered great enough to enter the presets of future machines?.
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When this discussion pops up I always point to the Aira modular effects from a few years back. They’re not synths as such (although they can be configured to be) but they are really interesting original hardware designs that seem to get massively overlooked.
Roland does a lot of stuff, of varying innovativeness/originality.
I actually find the ACB tech really interesting and good-sounding, but apart from all the reissues the only application of it has been the internal engine of the System-1 and System-8, and it seems people aren’t that interested because they have green lights and it’s not “real analogue”. I wonder what they could do with it in a hardware virtual modular synth where you could tweak the behaviour of different “components”.
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Doesn’t really answer the OP question, however a great documentary on Rolands history.
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Yeah those Aira FX modules are really good.
I do think Aira stuff gets a bad rap, quite unfairly so for the most part, I am not a fan of the green LEDs (thankfully they toned the styling down a bit on later/current Aira stuff) but other than that it is solid gear, sounds great and works well. Also as you say there is some innovation there too.
A lot of people slag off the Boutiques too, all I can say to that is that is their loss. Quite interesting that discontinued models often sell for more than new price, yeah they definitely aren’t perfect, but neither were the originals. I do think as someone who has extensively used the originals and made records with them, and still own some of them, the Boutiques stand up very well, and in some cases I prefer them to the originals. I like the enhancements and modern features that have been added, such as full midi CC, audio and midi over USB as well as din midi and analogue audio, battery power, and stuff like extra parameters. I think the ribbons and voice count on the earlier ones were a bit of a mistake, at least the ribbons are not on the new ones, I can live with 4 voices personally.
The new TR and MC Airas are very good products in their own right, and the MX-1 is also pretty good too, I think that compared to previous grooveboxes by Roland these are pretty well thought out.
I think for a while it was a thing to diss Roland, I think they seem to have learned from past mistakes though.
Definitely think some of this gear will become sought after in the future.
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I’ve only had one boutique in my life (The JX03 which I sold despite liking it a lot), but I often dream of getting three of them (D-05, TR-08 and maybe TB-03) and a three tier stand. It’s the best space saving way of owning all those classic sounds in a hardware.
I also love the way the boutiques reference the original designs. That makes them very desirable for me.
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