Roland Boutique TR-08 The Missing Manual – A User’s Guide to the TR-08 Rhythm Composer

A USER’S GUIDE TO THE ROLAND TR-08 Rhythm Composer

THE MISSING MANUAL

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PDF FORMAT – Version 0.01 August 2018 THE MISSING MANUAL

I think it was 1992 when I was handed a milk crate with something broken inside of it. “What’s this?” I asked. The man in the bright red member’s only jacket with what we used to call a “phat” gold chain around his neck, and diamond encrusted Gucci sunglasses looked like he couldn’t decide if he was going to slug me in the face, or tell me what it was. I took a step back, and he said “808. Busted.” I grinned, and my benefactor grinned and I ran down the block to my apartment, down the hall to my bedroom and poured the contents of the blue Berkeley Farms milk crate out onto my bed. Indeed, wrapped in a square piece of denim was a bonafide Roland TR-808 Rhythm Composer. Of course there were no buttons or knobs, no power cable, and someone had taken a wood burning iron and melted their social security number into the plastic side panels, but when I connected a cable and plugged it in it worked. It was Too Short’s broken 808 with his social security number melted into it, and it worked, and now it was mine.

I dug up the service manual, and called Roland Parts and ordered new side panels, new buttons, knobs, switches and most of the other things I needed. The fellow on the phone thought it was funny I wanted all these old parts, and kept talking about how great he thought the R8 was. I just agreed with him, and every time he found one of the parts I needed we cheered. We were on a land line, and he was walking around in a warehouse. It was another time.

Taking the 808 apart was like deconstructing the engine in my Dodge Van. It was a metal box inside of a metal box, with mystery screws, and the strangest connected components. The service manual didn’t really help with taking it apart, but I got it all open, and cleaned it, re wired the power, fixed the switchboard, and then put it all back together with the new side panels. It looked pretty good, and it sounded amazing.

I’ve always loved the sound of the TR-808. Yes I love Planet Rock, Cybotron, everything on Sleeping Bag Records, and Marvin Gaye is kind of the sound of my insides, but what I really love about the 808 is the end of the 80’s house music and techno made with it. Voodoo Ray, Bones Breaks, B-sides on NU Groove, and weirder… I tried to play live with it, but the kick was way too much for those crummy rock and roll based club systems from the late 80’s with no bass bins to speak of. I hadn’t put it into a compressor or a distortion pedal yet, so I imagined needed a 909 to thump the mids for a main room, but this TR-808 came with me to every single Come-Unity party and down in that chill out basement I explored, and experimented, and tried things at 90 bpm that wouldn’t have dared attempt in a club set. A baseline played with the kick drum, only a bongo and maracca pattern while I played the piano and whispered, just a big, long kick on the one, and the SH-101 did all the rest. It fired my imagination, and changed the world musically for me.

This is user’s guide number six – The User’s Guide to the Roland TR-08. I expect it will be the last of these.

This one here in front of me isn’t mine. I drew the line drawings about a year ago, and waited for mine to arrive. It never came. And as I would not release a manual without going through the features and confirming them, I just sort of sat on the drawings. After 8/08 day I admit I’ve been a little obsessed with them. They’re limited edition and I fear soon to be gone (and probably double in price,) but before I scored one, I asked a friend to let me spend the weekend with it. They agreed, and I have been at it for about 24 hours now. I couldn’t have it front of me without going over the manual and preparing it for release. So I’ve collected all of the information I can about the TR-08 Rhythm Composer and compiled it into a PDF document for you which is in the form, and in the spirit of the original TR-808 Rhythm Composer manual. All of this information is in the leaflet that comes with the drum machine, but this is formatted like a classic manual and for those of us who relate to that format better, here it is.

I started doing these because the first leaflet style manuals which arrived with my Roland Boutique synths were too small to read, and so abbreviated that I was left feeling a little underwhelmed. I wanted more. So I learned more, and tried a bunch of things and eventually took my notebooks and turned them into the missing manuals for these lovely little things.

I hope they open a world for you, and guide you through the features, and serves you as a reference guide for things you forget, or wonder about.

At the end there is a “pattern” memo” which is meant to allow us to transcribe the actual patterns we write. I hope these are useful to you, and make writing beats, and sharing ideas easier, and more fun.

PLAY LIVE! Join me.

I LOVE YOU.

Sunshine Jones

AUG 20 2018

San Francisco, California