Revolution 909?

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steevio
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Re: Revolution 909?

Post by steevio »

::BLM:: wrote:909 price is so high now its beyond a joke. How much were they when they first came out?
not sure how much they were when they came out, but theyve always kept their value, i bought mine around 1993 aand it was £900 then, they stayed at that price until very recently.
i almost bought another one from an old chicago house producer a couple of years ago for £1000 off ebay, it had been used on loads of well known tunes (really), and no-one was bidding on it !

as soon as acid house kicked in, the 909 and 303 prices went almost as high as they were a couple of years ago.

if you can get a 909 for £1300 now, it'll be worth twice that in a couple of years - i guarantee it !

ive been buying and selling vintage guitars and music equipment for 30 years and the pattern is always the same, they stay at roughly the same price, then suddenly go through the roof at some indeterminate point, and my prediction is that that point is very close for the 808 and 909.

i'm seriously starting to look for an 808 while i can still just about afford one. for a piece of history - priceless
Casanova808
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Re: Revolution 909?

Post by Casanova808 »

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/1995_ar ... ?print=yes

The article says they retailed for 999 GBP.
Casanova808
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Re: Revolution 909?

Post by Casanova808 »

The 909 is a catch 22. It is a really great thing to have, but it costs a lot for what it does. I like mine, but I always think about selling it to buy something else that does more.

I really need to get a new set of pots from Technology Transplant because mine are scratchy. Part of me wants to get new replacements for all moving parts just to make it mechanically stable for the next 15 years. I just wish they were not so sketchy at the moment.
Casanova808
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Re: Revolution 909?

Post by Casanova808 »

Also, if I had to choose between a 909 and an MPC3000 for the same money, I would take the MPC in a heartbeat. The 909 is cool, but it only does one thing(but it does it very well).

The other thing to consider with a 909 is that it does not sound good unless you send everything to the board to be mixed and eq'ed individually. That is the big different from the 707. The 707 sample kit was eq'ed and mixed to hit tape in a small studio with limited processing. With the 707 I can send the kick to one channel, and everything else to another and it works in a mix.
The 909 is a lot more flexible, but it needs a lot more massaging in order to sound good.
::BLM::
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Re: Revolution 909?

Post by ::BLM:: »

I had always assumed the 909 was dirt cheap when it first came out.

I really do want a drum machine, but I can't make my mind up. I use a variety of drum sounds, so its hard to choose which machine I would use the most.
oblioblioblio
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Re: Revolution 909?

Post by oblioblioblio »

the Metasonix d-1000 is all i will ever need for drums.

You have to give up hope of getting it to sound a certain way and accept it's limitations, but people had to do that with the 808s 909s when they first came out.

Anyways, it's expensive and it has limitations and quirks, so it's probably not for everyone. Nothing else makes bass that sounds like that. Mr Metasonix may be an introverted reclusive asshole, but that guy knows more about tubes than anyone else in the world. And tube technology is probably the most interesting and effective technology for music, despite the fact it's 60 years old or more.

I basically use the 2 left drum sounds for dual kick drums and various bass type sounds, the snare usually gets modulated for bloopy watery percussive semi melodic tones. The cymbal is a huge piece of sh!t but it can get quite funky when the other drums are hitting the output tube, which causes the cymbal to get compressed.

if you can bear to sit thru my dumb music i put a recent jam on the internet as a wav. You can probably hear the subs, every other youtube demo all you ever hear only captures the clicky attack and not the weight. soundcloud.com/diffuse-1
Last edited by oblioblioblio on Wed Jun 29, 2011 11:00 pm, edited 2 times in total.
oblioblioblio
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Re: Revolution 909?

Post by oblioblioblio »

BLM you should try and spend some time on an 808 or 909, maybe you know someone with one.

I'm not a fan of Dave Smith but I reckon the Tempest isn't worth ruling out.
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Re: Revolution 909?

Post by tsankip »

steevio wrote:i think this is really funny..
check out it out, these guys are so enthusiastic, somehow cant imagine anyone being so enthusiastic in 25 years time about the revolution909 software, if you can find a pentium in your attic to play it on that is.

Great vid! ;)
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