Roland R-8
Human Rhythm Composer Drum Machine

The Roland R-8 was the next generation of drum machine issued by Roland in 1989.  

 

In the 1980's Roland had released a number of drum machines that at the point of launch were considered commercially unsuccessful.  As such their production runs were relatively short only lasting 1 or 2 years.

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Of course you know I am referring to the machines that are now considered classics in the house and dance music arena's; The Roland TR-808 and Roland TR-909 plus other smaller drum machines that carried the TR prefix.

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These machines produced their tones / sounds using electronic circuitry.  They were adopted by dance orientated producers and used to produce many of the classic dance and pop orientated records of the 1980's right up to the modern era.  These machines now exchange hands for £'000's as is the demand.

 

The Roland R-8 was the next generation of drum machine and was designed to add in a more human element to the way that the drum machine produced its sounds.

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The machines borrowed their sound generation technology from Roland's digital synthesisers.  At the heart of the sound generation is a PCM sample.  This of course allowed Roland to issue a number of sound library cards that allowed the musical to load additional drum kits into the drum machine quickly.

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The rack mount version of the drum machine (the R-8M) allowed 3 sound library cards to be loaded into the instrument at the same time.  The R-8 by contrast could only accommodate 1.