Roland JV-1010

The JV-1010 is like Las Vegas. Lots of sparkle and polish, affordable to get there, but my short vacation with this unit is ending. (I got this 1999 half-rack at a used music store for $175 a few months ago [2008]).

And it really isn't a synthesizer, in the traditional sense, despite what it says on the panel. Yes, you can get into the JV-1010 and start raw with the waveforms and create new sounds by modifying what happens to them, "like" a real synthesizer. But editing the sounds on this is limited for me by the fact that there is no reasonably priced Mac editor software for it these days. Not surprising, because this is so old it has a serial computer connection on the back!

It's basically a "ROMpler." It plays back bits of samples of natural instruments or actual synthesizers from ROM to mimic natural instruments, synths, sound effects etc. And it does it really well for $175 (what I paid in 2008). By God there are over 1000 patches in this, probably every sound you've ever heard on a record or in performance! Drums, pianos, organs, clavs, guitars or all kinds, and plenty of synthesizer sounds. The specs are truly awesome.

That's pretty much how my ebay auction reads. Sure, it's great for producing recordings. You have all the sounds right in here. But I'm in this for the fun, and I want to do something, not just play back canned sounds. And yes, composing and arranging is doing something, but somehow the overstuffed library of sounds in the JV-1010 makes it just too easy to randomly pick and choose and get a comfortable sounding track going. Like Las Vegas glitter, it's hard for the individual personality to shine through the prepackaged glitz.

I feel like I have a brick of gold on the table, but I needed groceries. See, the folks down at the Shoprite won't accept it at the register. It's just not the currency I need right now. I'm in the market for a tweakable, knob-ladden synth or sampler serving immediate sound mangling satisfaction.