TB303 Bass line and TR606 Drumatix

Roland’s original silver boxes from 1982 still sound great today. I’ve had this TB-303 over 30 years ( bought for £60! ) but haven’t owned a TR-606 since 1985. Just got this one off ebay for £400. They are synced in time via the pre midi 5 pin Din Sync24 cable.

— sorry about the portrait format, wasn’t thinking —

The great thing about the Drumatix is that it has 2 x 3.5mm 5v trigger outs on the tom voices so this can rhythmically trigger synth sequencers or arpeggiators. I’ll demonstrate that in a later vid. Also the toms on it are pretty crap so great channels for the trigger outs to be on (as opposed to say the rimshot on the TR707 or TR909 which are very useable sounds). btw the current Roland TR-08 has a very useful dedicated trigger out channel.

I love the TR-606 hi hats and snare. Here I’m just the closed HH, sorry. The Bass Drum, if a little weak, sounds much better than I remembered. Will get the separate output modification done so I can give the BD a little more gain & drive.

So pleased that I have a 606 again. There is something so instantly useable about them, they are fun, there’s no menus and they sit so well with the TB-303.

The TB-303 is of course the massively over hyped acid machine. I don’t show any acid pattern here but will in future vids, also in later vids I will compare the TB-303 with the Boutique TB-03 and TB-3 Aira. (don’t hold your breath, the Boutique don’t sound that good, the Aira is pretty good )