Roland "You simply don't outgrow the best" family ad, 1978

Roland "You simply don't outgrow the best" full page black and white family advertisement including the MC-8 MicroComposer, and SH-7 and JP-4 synthesizers from page 5 in the July 1978 issue of Contemporary Keyboard Magazine.

 Like I was saying at the end of my last blog post on the introductory MC-8 advertisement, with all of Roland's diverse products it must sometimes just cheaper to throw them altogether into one large ad. And today's advertisement is the one I would have linked to, rather than this 1983 Roland ad. But I hadn't posted this ad yet. So, here it is now.  :)

I love family ads. I used to call them 'orgy' ads, but I was uncomfortable with the term. Plus, I really don't think the instruments were doing too much of the nasty (hmmm - maybe someone should start a "synthesizers humping" blog.

Better go register that domain right now... nah. Too lazy.

Anyways, where was I... oh yeah... orgy.  "Family" just has a better ring to it.

So many of the synth greats came out with family ads - here's just a few to remind you of some.

Granted, this Roland ad may not have had the luxury or even availability of a good Photoshop production artist. Or, what looks like a lack of any type of artist for that matter. Its hard to believe this ad and that earlier MC-8 advertisement came from the same company.

But, no matter, this ad still holds a place in my heart because of its ad-copy.

For one, unlike most Roland ads you come across today, the company is still climbing its way to the top of the synthesizer pile. No, its not at the bottom. But its not at the top either:

"We know these things because the greatest performers in the business are switching to Roland."

Did you catch that word: "Switching".

You don't hear that word come from a company like Coke. You heard it from Pepsi - the underdog at the time of the Pepsi Challenge.

Second, Roland, along with many other manufacturers, were just at the start of the digital revolution. A revolution was that was ramping up quick. And their customers were  already getting caught up in that digital revolution in other parts of their lives - data and word processing. And, just like in that MC-8 ad that came out earlier, Roland throws out their magical term "music processing":

"They're thinking in terms of systems... modules... interfacing... music processing... a whole new world of electronic music". 

It's watching companies like Roland evolve (Oberheim's words), merging the new world with the old world, that really turns my crank. Don't get me wrong, I love my fully analog Moog Modular. Wouldn't trade it for the world. But the most fun I have with gear is when I'm interfacing my Roland TB-303 and TR-808 with other DIN Sync and MIDI gear using tools like the Roland MPU-101. 

In fact, when I think of Roland, I think of "interfacing" more than "music processing" - like most people that got caught up in the 101/202/303/808/909 phenomenon.

All these years later, how could Roland have known that "interfacing" old Roland gear with new Roland gear would still be just as important to so many people?  :D