First off, shoutouts to Homestuck, clppng., The Stanley Parable, FreeMusicSoftware.org, and SynthEdit. All these things have made my winter break far more interesting then it would've been otherwise. I would've just spent all my time being bored as fuck and not having sex but now I can not have sex but at least not be bored all the time.
The other thing that has made my winter break awesome is the Korg Volca Beats. I got this bad boy for christmas yesterday and I spent the rest of the day playing with it and ignoring my family. When I first heard that Korg was releasing the Volca Series, I was like "oh fuck, analogue hardware for less than 200 hundred bucks?" I decided that I would fixate on the Volca Beats because my setup was missing a hardware drum machine.
As you can see from that blurry ass photo, (sorry about that btw but you know that the legitimacy of a review is directly proportional to the number of photos it has) the Beats is about 1 by 1.5 fx pedals in area. Its about like an inch tall. Idk exactly. The point is, its tiny AF. The unit is portable as a motherfucker. It also has excellent battery life. I left the unit on for at least six hours yesterday and then some and today it shows no signs of slowing down. That's off of six double A batteries that came prepackaged, mind you. The piece of shit digitech pedal in that picture can't even go four hours off of equivalent voltage. Together with the compact size, this unit can be taken literally anywhere. I even went outside in the freezing ass weather yesterday and jammed in the cornfield behind my house. It is absolutely possible to take this thing everywhere with you and make all your friends hate you. But if you wanna be lame and shovel out the cash there is a DC adapter plug that can be purchased. I'm sure if you found some kind of portable generator or were some kind of electricity god you could still rave on the metro.
As for the sound, it sounds pretty vintage and whatnot. It got six analogue sounds and four PCM sounds (thats pulse control modulation you uneducated fuck), for a total of ten sounds that came straight out of the 80s. They claim that it really is an analogue drum machine, and I'm not smart enough to dispute that, but it sounds really good. The knobs allow for a fair amount of customization, and with enough tweaking you could definitely make a beat that wouldn't be out of place in today's music. I don't think its as rich of a sound as the MicroKorg (shit barely needs any mastering), but it was only 150 dollars. I also somewhat get the sense that Korg didn't design this as a super professional piece of equipment. That said, it wouldn't be out of place in your two person retro lo-fi indie house band, and I'm certainly gonna use it on some songs at some point. I will certainly be making use of it in a live set-up however, because the thing is super easy and super fun to play.
Theres a normal Step Mode for constructing beats part by part but there is also a straight up live recording mode (which records and quantizes parts real time) and a step jump mode which is hella cool. It basically lets you retrigger the sequence (the whole thing, all the parts) from any step, and if you hold down multiple steps itll just play those steps over and over, skipping steps between them. However, it quantizes the jump, so you can only hit it as fast as a sixteenth note in whatever tempo your at, and also the touch sensor is bit janky.
You can also record automation, but only on the Stutter Time, Stutter Depth, and PCM speed knob, and the automation can only last one cycle of sixteen steps. The fact that you can only use those three knobs seems like a missed opportunity. Also, automation recording isn't on by default, so if you forgot to turn it on before you started jamming you'll be hella plexed. That said, whats nice is that PCM Speed knob will only apply to the part you have selected, and you can choose whether the Stutter effect will apply globally or just to the part. The Beats also handles automation prioritizing really well. You can record some Stutter automation on a single part, then enable the stutter globally, fuck around, and when you turn turn the depth knob back to zero your automation on that individual part will still be there. However, There is no good way to delete automation without clearing the part. Recording more automation over it doesn't really work because you'll have to move the knob someway in order to get it to actually record what your doing, and it'll have to go for the whole bar too, otherwise it will default back to whatever other automation you had recorded at the parts where it didn't detect any movement. While clearing the part is easy in the studio, in a live setting its a huge boner. A delete automation button would've useful AF.
The other that would've been useful (or at least cool as shit) is a global pitch bend. The stutter effect is cool as balls but its only good for one thing. A global pitch bend would've just eliminated the need for circuit breaking all together. That and a distortion button. It wouldve been so easy. Luckily, there are all sorts of pedals and VST Plugins that do one or both of those things (LIKE THIS ONE) so it should be no problem to rectify this mistake. Heres a picture of me doing just that:
The Volca Beats running through FL 10 (Shoutout to ASIO) running through The Madshifta and my personal VST. Using a Novation SL Compact to control the pitch bend and also play this chill as fuck 3xOsc. Check below to listen.
All in all, I am hella satisfied with the Volca Beats. For 150 bucks it is an absolute steal and while its not perfect (really, only a 3.5 mm out, how can you call this analogue?), you should give Korg your money anyway or at least write them nice letters to show them you support this kind of thing. The Volca Beats is pretty self sufficient in a live performance context (unlike the Kaoss Pad, which doesn't open up in a live setting until you get like five) and you don't get the feeling you need more than one. While not particularly robust on its own, when paired with other instruments (LIKE THE REST OF THE VOLCA SERIES BETTER GET OUT YOUR CREDIT CARD) it is a great addition and fun as fuck. 8.5 aphex twins out of 10. Or something like that. Here's a pros and cons list for you lazy fucks who can't read.
PROS: great interface, easy to use, compact as shit, sounds good, pretty versatile for 150 bucks, memory features saves all the parts and automation, good automation features, stutter is cool, excellent battery life.
CONS: only output jack is a 3.5 mm (are we in kindergarten?), stutter is cool but limited, can't delete automation without clearing part, quantization is a little janky which is a problem in step jump mode (but i might just have no sense of rhythm so WHO KNOWS), can only automate three knobs (in which case why are there six white knobs and six black knobs what was the point of that if the only difference is that white ones light up? seems discriminatory if you ask me. I know japan isn't big on africans but damn...)
If you're still here, go check out the mash-up, and download my vst plugins, which are at the bottom of the music page. happy holidays again, and a merry new year to all yall.
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