If you want to be inspired to discover more futuristic potential lurking inside your everyday Roland machine, where better to look than Detroit’s legendary Underground Resistance? Recon X produced a free Production Pack for the TR-8S that’s pure fire.
It seems like the Japanese Roland channel at least carried this:
Underground Resistance: Escape the Chains by Recon X
Now, I’m not one for these sorts of packs most of the time – the whole fun of instruments is often making sounds yourself. But it can be really instructive to see what someone else does with patterns and sounds, to push your own technique. This flew under my radar, partly because Roland seems to have largely not told anyone, but I noticed it while grabbing a Roland Cloud update. And speaking of under the radar, Recon X has apparently been working behind the scenes, which explains why this pack has such a distinctive Wavejumpers sound:
UR’s Recon X has been a secret weapon behind the scenes, working with Wavejumpers and other collective projects. Now he steps from the shadows to serve up this hard-hitting collection of techno and electro rhythms that encourage you to take your music beyond what’s been done before. For the first time, the battle-tested, performance-ready TR-8S patterns used in UR live sets are yours for jamming, remixing, and driving your own creations.
Just listen to how good this sounds:
I feel about this as I did about the Phuture pack Roland did – they’re great study tools for learning your instrument, right alongside the records. Know where you came from, know who you owe – every time you turn on a Roland drum machine, for sure. Use that to propel your own productions forward. Uh… yeah, about that, back to practicing!
Electronic Beats did a great feature on UR ten years back that’s just as relevant today – with some vintage Roland and vintage Korg gear in the mix:
Live jam means live jam:
And this never gets old:
But don’t stop, as there’s a lot of new and far less-known music from Detroit to hear this week, too, so stick around.