Sequencers / Grooveboxes

Quasimidi are delivering on their promise to provide new goodies for owners of the 309 dance box. Derek Johnson raves a bit...

Like the Doctor in the TARDIS, Yamaha's newest Walkstation sequencer is small but deceptively spacious. Martin Russ dons his floppy hat, winds his stripey scarf a little tighter, fortifies himself with another jelly baby, and enters a different dimention...

Is it a hi-tech bathroom scale? Is it a 21st-century computer game? Is it Darth Vader's toilet seat? No, it's an innovative LED-laden MIDI step sequencer, with the power to wring new life from your old synths. Paul Nagle pulses and flashes with excitement.

Quasimidi have distilled the experience gained from their successful dance-orientated keyboards into a one-box solution of concentrated rave power. Derek Johnson gets on the ravy train.

The latest MIDI and percussion combination from Akai is the first not to feature Roger Linn's signature, although it clearly takes its inspiration from those that do. But Paul Wiffen discovers that, although this unit adds a feature he's been waiting 10 years for, it's missing the high price tag of its predecessors.

Roland's MC8 began electronic music's move away from the limited compositional scope of the analogue sequencer, and left its stamp on some of the seminal pop of the 1980s. Chris and Cosey's Chris Carter, a pioneering MC8 user himself , fires up the 20 candles on the MC8's birthday cake...