The Roland Boss DR 880 Reviewed
The Roland Boss DR 880 is one of those pieces of equipment which offers everything for all purposes. I’m actually finding it difficult to pin down exactly what this is because it has so many different functions. It can act as a bass guitar synthesizes, keep a drum beat and guitar effects box. If Roland really has tried to pack in as much functionality into this box as they possibly can and they’ve pulled it off really, if you’re a few players short of a full band, the DR 880 drum rhythm machine can act as an awesome replacement bassist or drummer.
Having plenty of features is great but it doesn’t really mean much if they can’t be utilized and applied in a real world setting. So what will musicians get out of using this product? Most notably for guitarists are the built in guitar effects, the DR 880 comes with 50 preset effects to choose from and allows users to actually customize effects for themselves. The effects are access by switching on the button labelled ‘effects’ and turning the master value dial through the various different settings. What’s great about using these digital effects is that the user has superb control over each one; there are various parameters which can be adjusted to hone each one to your preferences. Amongst these parameters are a Noise Suppressor, Chorus and Amp Simulator.
One of the main reasons someone might consider purchasing the Roland Boss DR 880 is because of its ability to play both drum and bass sounds. If you’re a one man band or you don’t have enough people together to form a complete band you can actually use this unit to fill in as a drummer or bassist during your performances. Unsurprisingly this unit feels and responds like Boss drum machine, they offer you the ability to generate rhythm sounds in much the same way. If you just want to apply a nice drum pattern to your playing as quickly as possible the 500 pre-installed rhythms will work, they take seconds to apply and they’ll never skip a beat. If you want to add a little character to these patterns you’ve also got the ability to edit them by applying high-hat, percussion and bass guitar effects using the E-Z compose. It’s a bit tricky to get the hang of at first but there’s not much of a learning curve, a few hours of practice will be more than enough to create a great beat.
Of course it isn’t all good news, ever system has it flaws and the DR-880 is no different. The biggest issue I had with this unit was the manufacturers have left no way to expand the memory. Nowadays there are barely any fixed memory products on the market because modern users want a lot of space. Another big fault is the inability to backup several files at once, the system lets you export the various rhythm patterns you’ve created but there’s no way of actually transferring them all at once. Which means you have to painstakingly upload them one track at a time, which could take a while if you’ve created a lot of patterns. One more trait which really bugs me about this product is that for some peculiar reason you cannot apply the loop feature more than once during any track. I really don’t get why they’ve done this because looping is a basic feature and incredibly useful to scroll through the different sections of a song, now they’ve just made using it a lot more frustrating.
All in all I have to say that I really endorse any musician buying the DR-800, the rhythm sounds sound and feel really realistic and are as good as any other Boss drum machines on the market today. I find myself looking over my shoulder to check there isn’t a really drummer playing behind me when I’m using it. All the guitar effects, recording, tempo features are really useful and easy to apply too. The sophisticated beat-by-beat function is another superb feature which can be used to control and adjust the accompaniment you’re using when you’re performing. The Roland Boss DR 800 retails for around £320 ($500) and I would fully recommend it to any musician who wants to practice or gig with an all-in-one backing band.
Filed Under Mixing | Leave a Comment
Tagged With Boss DR 880, Boss DR 880 Review, Roland Boss DR 880, Roland Boss DR 880 Review
Comments
Leave a Reply