Korg Volca Drum Digital Percussion Synthesizer w/ 16-step Sequencer and Active Step

Not a standout for composition, but fun for practice or jamming. It has a few limitations which stand out to me. The compact interface is always usable, but often awkward. Creating sounds is easy but adjusting them is tedious. Liberal use must be made of a hash in the LCD which marks the saved position of a setting, which is not trivial when using micro-potentiometers assigned to a resolution of 255 in a nested interface. This also obligates you to operate the controls deftly and save a kit after each adjustment to prevent your settings from drifting widely and mysteriously. You get 16 triggers/steps per pattern and 16 pattern slots, which feels claustrophobic. Patterns can be chained to create more complex progressions but with only 16 sets of 16 triggers and no data I/O, memory management is an issue. For instance, creating a 4-bar drum line with 16th-note resolution and a consistent fill on the 4th bar would generally use a quarter of the memory and require you to select the 4 bars sequentially each time you turn on the unit. Then, that memory is consumed until you delete the progression forever. Kits and patterns are marked only by their slot number. The gold-side "Send" physical modeling controls are impressive but are adjustable only per full kit, which in practice limits them to either trippy delays/reverbs and performance effects or to use on only one or a few drums. Time signature can be fudged, but only within extreme limits. This unit is mostly practical for us because it allows us to avoid computers in a few situations during jamming or practice. Far superior performance in every respect can be had from free or trivially cheap software on any phone, tablet, or PC; judged as a component of a modular setup and especially in the context of Volca as a system, I find it useful and likeable, but unwieldy. The sound generator is excellent only in its simplicity, and the sequencer is inflexible. Integrating this unit's stark limitations into a multi-hundred-dollar instrument could be fun but does not seem efficient or practical. However, we are very happy with it. We are not using it as a musical instrument, but as a configurable metronome / backing track. It feels more personal, predictable and charismatic than an automatic drummer, and less sterile than a metronome. The sound generator is a minimalist masterpiece, with only enough moving parts to create a wide array of convincing or pleasing drum sounds and effects. Probability and slicing controls push this Korg over the finish line between toy and tool, but no further.

Make sure to use good speakers for the low ends! The speaker that comes in it is cute but not practical. Also the quality is unmatched. It’s heavy and designed to be very durable. Big things come in small packages! Definitely get its case. Ima make sure this thing lives forever and pass it on after I die lol This thing beats any drum machine pedal by a million miles. You can make any noise and store also record knob movements. There are infinite features no joke. Idk how it retains percusion like noises even when extreme parameters are being used. I hope this review helps. In the attached video I have a TD3 Behringer Bassline synthesizer with the midi attached so the tempo stays on point it’s really easy just buy the cable. ChatGPT if you need help for which midi hole lol

Thing is pretty ridiculous. You got 6 tracks, each with 2 different layers/voices. You can have up to 16 hits in a single step (per track), you have probability, parameter step locking (can play melodies and even chords by tuning sounds specific to their step), random track/sound generation and a great sequencer packed with features for live play. The only 'drawback' is only 16 steps but with probability, split steps, and the live playing features it doesnt matter. Dont listen to negative reviews. This thing can do a lot and is probably the best volca overall. I have made several of my own kits from scratch and i can get great thumping kicks and super snappy snares and high hats. And AMAZING fx sounds. I'm beyond impressed. This thing for $109 is a steal. Not the best 'beginner' volca but it is friendly enough to invite you in with the preset patches to have fun with the sequencer until you decide to dive into sound design. Then you can start doing wacky generative and ambient stuff if you want too. All on this little synth.

EXCELLENT machine--great sound (louder than any drum machine I've had--really SLAPS!), and I enjoy getting to make drum kits "from scratch" using digital waves. The interface is small of course, but you get used to it, easier to read than most small-form Roland instruments, for example. More than anything--it is CHOCK FULL of character--there are sounds and patterns I made pretty easily that I wouldn't have imagined coming out of a cheap drum machine. Why 4 stars? The whole storage problem--with only 16 slots for patterns it's hard to have to delete some of the beats I've come up with! Still, it's worth it (especially for the price) because it's the most fun I've ever had making beats. Would give 4 1/2 stars if that were a thing on here.

Wasn't expecting too much for the price, just a little something to make beats on, but this device is just plain fun to use in general. On top of making beats, the built-in synth engine lets you modulate each individual part of a preset kit, even while the beat is playing. Playing back a created beat and twisting the dials to create different effects is a ton of fun and can make songwriting even more interesting. Very pleased with this synth/drum machine.

None of the presets sounded like actual drum kits. The videos make it seem easy to make an awesome beat with a few taps and knob twists, but after hours of researching, note-taking, and fiddling with the frustrating controls, it still sounded like a toy. Every positive review video I have seen shows the volca attached to a better synthesizer or drum machine. THAT SHOULD TELL YOU SOMETHING. I would be ashamed to publish anything I created with this. It would be a ripoff at half the price.

Alles bestens

Reçu dans les temps.... Petite BAR qui permet de faire des sons bien barrés !

Korg Volcas are addictive, and this is the third one I've bought after modular and nu:bass - of the options for providing drums/beats, the Volca Drum is the most original and powerful, though the sample offers a lot of flexibility as well. It adheres to the standard Volca form factor and battery requirements, with the usual audio, sync and MIDI input. The pattern sequencer is also familiar, with 16 patterns of 16 steps for up to 256 steps in a song. There's no means of backing up the kits or storage, but you can get a third-party editor and VST which helps with that. What it does: Six-parts of synthesized drums consisting of two 'layers' each, each layer having its down sound character modified through the wave source, envelopes and other parameters accessed via the edit button. There's enough control to change sounds on the fly, and it's a VERY powerful drum synthesizer for the money, rivalling the likes of the Nord Drum 3P for sound and texture creation. Editing the six drum sounds is remarkably easy, though getting truly accurate or characterful original sounds can be tricky, it just needs a subtle touch. Bolstering the sound of the drums is a single resonator that affects all of them, which can be tuned and changed from tube to string, for bassy or reedy tones. This is really the only limitation of the sound generation, you can't have one part in a tube, and the other via string. It's intuitive to play basic beats, with 10 preset kits of straight electro/pop sounds with some wierd and wonderful squawks and breaks for good measure, but it rewards in-depth thoughtful programming. How does it sound? Remarkable. High-quality and clear, the bass can shake and the high pitches can ring with no aliasing or crudeness that you might expect of cheap PCM samples, this is true drum synthesis with rich harmonics and a lot of flexibility. It's at home in synthwave, garage, dubstep, grime or whatever, really, capable of being very solid or just plain bizarre. How vital is it to a Volca setup? This should be your second or third one alongside bassline and melody, but you could buy this for use alongside other synths and find it stands alone as an excellent drum machine. It's one of Korg's best yet and incredibly good value; I'm still finding more depth months into owning it. It's more enjoyable to program than the Nord 3P as well... Anything it benefits from? Effects of course - the Volca Mix has send/return, but I'd probably use this with a Kaoss KP3+ or kaoss pad for glitch, delay and grain effects if I weren't using the minikp2 for that via the mixer. It really suits that style of dynamic, effected playing and becomes a simple drum and bass machine if you take the time to program it. It also works well with the Volca Modular as an additive percussion synth for additional character. Think complex, shimmering and harsh metallic hits like early industrial music, backed by more 2000s-style heavy, long-decayed kicks from the Volca Drum. Any downsides? Not really, apart from the lack of sound bank/pattern backup. It stores them fine, but doesn't have much storage on board and there's no MIDI out or audio backup option. It would be nice if it would play an audio file of the memory contents for later restoration, in the same way that firmware updates are applied. You want it, basically. The Korg Volca Drum is one of the best Volcas yet; it's powerful, flexible and original - the sounds are versatile, and it could add something to any studio, not just a starter project or basic Volca layout. You could sample patterns from this until your fingers wear out.

I love it big thanks