From mikekent Sent Thu, Apr 25th 1996, 21:45
From mikekent Sent Thu, Apr 25th 1996, 21:45
> > >> All the people who knew how to design analog have either died or > > >> retired maybe? :) > > > > One of my bosses designed the SH-1000. Another of my bosses that I met wi > > last week designed the System-700 and the TB-303. They're both alive and > > well in product research and development. In fact many of the people who > > designed older analogs (including most of those at Roland) are still in t > > business. > > >Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm................ maybe Mike could, perhaps, ask his boss a few >polite questions on behalf of the list, about their time with Roland, and >their philosophies behind the instruments that they designed. I'd love to >know how they feel about the fact that synths that they developed nearly two >decades ago, are still admired, and used as much today as they've always >been. Most are somewhat amused at the trends that make analog so popular. The TR-808 situtation was interesting, I think the TR-808 probably was the first product to start these trends. But the TB-303 has a more amazing story. The TR-808 was fairly successful as a product. It became a classic sound for dance music and a couple of years after it had been replaced by digital drum machines it regained it's value close to the original selling price. The TB-303 was a flop in the marketplace. I thought it had some cool ideas, introducing new ways of thinking about composing in a unique non-linear way. But I never liked the user interface. When it was new most people thought it sounded terrible. The TB-303 didn't last long, it jut seemed that nobody wanted it. I guess some people lost some face (and money) over the TB-303. Today, TB-303 has the cool sound that so many people want. The unique sequencer controlled pitch bend timing, accents, etc are hard to duplicate with other products. Whoever thought users would dump the batteries in and out to create patterns? Roland certainly didn't design it for that. What about the latest AH thread telling how to use several thousand dollars worth of serge modules to emulate just the sound protion? $1200? Sometimes even more! The world has gone crazy! So we think it is amusing, but you can see it's also a little bit frustrating. The same is somewhat true for early Roland synths. They were often not respected or even recognized, especially in the U.S. music media. They apparently didn't have the sound. They were considerably more successful outside of the U.S. (Canada, UK, Europe, Japan, etc.). I think that instrument designers are artists. Sometimes they give us incredible masterpieces (Jupiter-8 in my opinion). Sometimes they produce bad art (I won't name any in case I offend someone from Crumar). Sometimes fashion changes and what was not popular becomes a desired masterpiece (SH-5). Unfortunately, in the case of many old synths, they were not fully appreciate in their day, when the companies could enjoy their works of art and benefit directly by profitable business. Some of todays most sought after analog synths are the rarest. They are often the rarest because nobody bought or wanted them so the company only made a few. It's good to see someone excited and in love with an instrument that years ago was not appreciated. Now I'm getting nostalgic and sentimental... does anybody make a "Hug your Synthesizer Today" bumper sticker? :-> Regards, Mike. ........ http://www.pacificrim.net/~mikekent/ ........ .......... Wanted: System-700, System-100m ............