Roland "The Roland Rack" catalog, May 1980

Roland "The Roland Rack" eight page catalog including SPA-240, SPA-120, SIP-300 and SIP-301 amplifiers, SDD-320 Dimension D, SBF-325 stereo flanger, SVC-350 vocoder, SPV-355 pitch-to-voltage synthesizer, SRE-555 chorus echo, SMX-880 line mixer, SST-120 sound system, and SEQ-315 and SEQ-331 equalizers from May 1980.

Oh man... after scanning that last Roland catalog, I just couldn't stop. I became a whirlwind of scanning... and this one got caught up in the tornado. Okay - a glass or two of wine might have helped too.

Point is - the result is another excellent Roland catalog for the blog!

As a teen I always ran into these racks in pawn shops. They looked awesome but I just couldn't afford them. That's not exactly true... I did end up finding a SVC-350 locally back in the 90s. Snapped it up immediately and its never left the studio. But there is just so many other racks from this series that I want. Unfortunately prices have gone through the roof on most of 'em, so it's just a fantasy to find them all now.

For me, the centre of that fantasy is that lovely KS-300 display stand! You'll find it on the last inside page in the bottom left. Take a look... I'll wait...

See... what I tell ya. Wouldn't that thing look great filled with all those rack units?!?! I've expressed it before, but it can't be said enough. I. LOVE. ACCESSORIES. And this Roland Rack is on the top of my "want" list.

I have never seen one of these in someone's gear shot or in an advertisement. But I want to.

If you have one of these, please snap a photo and send it to me! I will add it to the post with a link back to your page/bandcamp/wherever!

Please!   :)

End note: Did you find the System 100 synthesizer?

Roland SVC-350 "Have a say in your sound" ad, International Musician and Recording World, 1980

Roland SVC-350 vocoder "Have a say in your sound" full colour advertisement from page 91 in the July 1980 issue of International Musician and Recording World.

No offense to my first love - Keyboard Magazine - but lately I've been spending a bit of free time flipping through some of my other magazine archives. That's how I came across that CR-68/78 ad I posted earlier in August.  And now I've got this lovely vocoder ad.

This ad doesn't have the same sense of humour as the previous one I posted, but I gotta say I find it just as interesting. Full disclosure - I own an SVC-350 and *love it*. So, you may wanna take my interest with a grain of salt.

So, one of the most interesting things about this ad is summed up in that ol' saying: "You can tell a lot about a person by the company they keep". In this ad, Roland has chosen a photo of the SVC-350 pulled out of a rack that includes some of their other rack gear - a guitar pre-amplifier, stereo flanger, pitch-to-voltage synthesizer, digital delay and Dimension D. Together, Roland has named these and a number of their other effects, the "Roland Rack" system. I hadn't heard this term used to officially describe their rack gear before.

The word "system" was a buzz word that appeared in many gear-related ads during the 70's and 80's. For example, Korg used it in their 1984 "The Korg MIDI System" ad that included their Poly 800 and EX800 synthesizers, RK 100 remote keyboard, KMS-30 synchronizer (a personal favourite) and computer software.

Oberheim used the term "The System" in a 1982 ad to describe the proprietary multi-pin technology used to get their OB-Xa/OB-SX/DMX/DSX gear to work together. They continued using it in 1983 when they swapped out the synths for their OB-8.

Even earlier sightings can be seen in a 1978 ad where the Oberheim SEM teamed up with 360 Systems' Slavedriver to create their own "The System". And it wasn't just in ads - just look at the name of some of Roland's early synthesizers like the System 100, 100m and 700. Or Moog's System I, II and III modulars.

One more thing I noticed. After reading the ad-copy over a few times, something was nagging at me and I couldn't figure it out for the longest time. Then it hit me. At no point does Roland mention the model number of their vocoder in the ad-copy. Its always just referred to as the Roland Vocoder.  It would be like calling your synthesizer "Roland Synthesizer" in the ad-copy of a JX-8p ad.

I checked the ad for the pre-amplifier that is part of the rack system which ran prior to this one, and its model name - SIP-300 -  is referred to multiple times. Maybe because there are other Roland preamps but only one vocoder?

Curious. Probably just to me. :)

Roland Vocoder Plus "The Human Factor" ad, Contemporary Keyboard 1979

Roland Vocoder Plus "The Human Factor" full page colour advertisement from page 7 in the November 1979 issue of Contemporary Keyboard Magazine.

This Roland Vocoder Plus ad has a lot in common with other Roland advertisements from the same time period, like that Jupiter-4 ad I blogged about last Monday. Title, large photo of gear with coloured background and three columns of well-written white ad-copy all on a black background.

Unfortunately, lasting power was not one of the features it has in common with the Jupiter-4 ad. The JP4 ad ran five or six times over a year or so, but this Vocoder ad only lasted through one winter - October, November, December and January 1980.

Some would say that four ads in consecutive issues is better than five or six spread out over a longer period of time. Plus, the Vocoder Plus also had the additional promo bump with it's appearance in the December 1979 Spec Sheet.

"Roland Keyboard. The Vocoder Plus is a polyphonic instrument which has a built-in vocoder and two tone-generating systems, one for strings and one for human voice-like sounds. Each of the three sections may be independently assigned to cover the whole keyboard or one of its halves, top or bottom. Each half of the keyboard also feeds into its won output so that the Vocoder Plus can be run in stereo. The tone and attack time of the strings section is independent of that of the human voice section. The two sections share release times. The upper half of the keyboard has one female and one male chorus and the lower half has two male choruses. The vocoder section processes the spoken or sung human voice and uses this program information to modify the carrier signal (which for the instrument is provided by the human choir tone-generating system). A balance control is supplied for balancing the output levels of the different sections. The microphone input to the vocoder section accepts either a phone plug or an XLR connector. Price is $2,695.00. Roland, 2401 Saybrook Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90040."

Enough about the ad. I'm more interested in the machine itself.

I love vocoders. Probably because many of the things I love in this world revolve around vocoders. Kraftwerk. Robots. Eeeerrr... Did I mention robots?!? Robots are awesome.  Okay, maybe I also love vocoders because I can't sing and its really the only excuse I have to to put a mic in front of me.

Believe it or not, my love for vocoders started with a Korg DVP-1. I picked it from a friend who found it too limiting, but I was more than happy to take it off his hands for a nice price, and it got the job done when needed. I don't even remember what happened to it. Must have lent it to someone a long while back once I found a Roland SVC-350 - in the city even!

What I didn't know (according to Vintage Synth Explorer's page on the Vocoder Plus) is that the SVC-350 is related to the Vocoder Plus! I've never hunted down a Vocoder Plus to listen to but VSE commenter "mike" came up with an ingenious way to get the SVC-350 to sound very similar to the Vocoder Plus:"

"Here is what I done so I can get same tone out of VP-330 in a SVC-350. I bought a AKAI S5000. There is a AKAI CDROM called “History of Roland” in S1000 format. It has all the VP-330 sounds. Load the VP-330 programs up on the S5000 and Plug this S5000 up to your SVC-350 and BAM you have a VP-330 with the same carrier sound on a SVC-350. That is just if you want to have the same sound you get when you turn on a VP-330 and use vocoder without any ext sound. 5/5"

Smarty-pants! Gonna definitely try this!

This then got me even more curious to exactly how the Vocoder Plus sounds. Especially when the ad itself says that "The Human Voice section literally defies description with its uncanny resemblance to a chorus of human voices".  Add to this the fact that another commenter from VSE says that the Vocoder Plus was used extensively by Vangelis on the Bladerunner soundtrack. And another says it was used extensively by Underworld. I just had to know how this thing sounds.

Thank you Youtube and Retrosound.de for a great little demo of its functionality.

Yup. Very Vangelis.

I'm hooked.

Synton Syntovox "High performance vocoders" ad, Contemporary Keyboard 1984

Synton Syntovox "High performance vocoders" 1/4-page black and white advertisement from page 86 in the March 1984 issue of Keyboard Magazine.

I got to say, trying to write a last minute blog post while watching Survivor is a lesson in futility. But "Survivor" is kind of a good theme for this post. On a few different levels.

On one level, these Synton vocoders have survived for over four years with just a trickle of advertising. The first half-pager appeared back in March 1980, and its little condensed brother appeared a month later and only ran two or three times. Both of those ads were probably paid for by Parasound, their American distributor in the early days. 

Then, what appears to be a very long break, this third ad made its first showing in mid-1983, popping up again once or twice into 1984. But this time, Synton's distributor had changed to Bob Moog's company Big Briar, Inc.

And there we see that theme of "survivor" again.  I'm talking about Bob Moog.

Walking away from Moog Music must have been tough. But he was definitely a survivor. Starting Big Briar near the end of the 70s until he finally acquired the rights to use the Moog  name again in 2002. All the while taking on consulting gigs with companies like Kurzweil. Dang good. That's a lot longer than I would survive in the woods. For shizzle. 

The ad itself is alright. I miss those luscious lips that used to appear in the name "Syntovox". But what should I expect - this ad did show up three years later. And not sure about the background image of four 222's stacked on top of each other in the top half of the ad. In fact, no model names are mentioned at all. Until I read the line about a choice of models, I wasn't sure if both were still offered.

I figured the best way was to find out when exactly Big Briar took over Synton distribution (and which models were on offer) was to look through old Big Briar catalogs online. Well... that was easier said than done. The easiest one to find was this 2000 catalog hosted on (where else!) Moog Music (that also features Retro Synth Ads' ads!). But, unfortunately, 2000 is long after Synton stopped producing vocoders I think.

But, after a bit more digging, I finally found this 1983 Big Briar catalog (17 MB PDF) on Synthfool.com. Be warned - if you click on the link it takes a while to load. It includes a Synton modular and vocoder price list near the end (yum) - including both the cadillac model 221 20-channel vocoder ($6018.00) and more moderately priced 222 10-channel vocoder ($815.00).

The first section of that PDF also includes some great history and insight into the direction Bob Moog was taking Big Briar. Remember, this is 1983, and Bob Moog is not just taking about electronic music, but COMPUTER music.  And I believe that last paragraph on the last page of the catalog pretty much sums up the support and respect Bob Moog had for artists (and scientists) from all walks:

"Big Briar custom-designs and produced a wide range of one, -two,- and three-output touch surfaces, multiply-touch-sensitive keyboards, and position-sensitive controllers. Applications include music composition and performance, interactive sculpture, dance, computer graphics control, and psychological testing. Inquiries are answered with written proposals and quotations. We welcome the opportunity to collaborate with artists who wish to incorporate touch- and position-sensors in their work."

Interactive sculpture! Psychological testing! Awesome.

While looking for those catalogs, I managed to come across a comparison of the two models (and other models) written by Synton's own Marc Papin on Hypereal.com:

"221 - Big, 20-channel unit. Matrix-panel on the front allows analiser-synthesizer channel patching. Internal VCO, noise generator, Voiced/Unvoiced detection, 40+ LEDs for spectrum monitoring, etcetera. Also, it has a 50-pin connector on the back which provides CV in and out for each channel. I've got one, and I  think it is superior to Sennheiser, Bode (Moog) and EMS. Original RRP: HFL 12000,- (US$ 7500.00)

222 12-channels. Not very flexible, but they have a very musical sound. Original RRP: HFL 1000,- (US$ 625.00)"

The 222 was 12-channel? Not ten as described int he Big Briar catalog? Bah. 10. 12. It was a lot cheaper. That's what mattered most.  :)

I also found some good comparison info on dutchsynth.nl, which seems to be a Web site for most Synton products, and some excellent photos on effectsdatabase.com.

Well, Survivor is almost done - first episode of the new season.

And I'm done too. Dinner time. Then bed. 

Synton Electronics Syntovox 222 and 221 vocoder "You do the talking..." ad, Contemporary Keyboard 1980

Synton Electronics Syntovox 222 and 221 vocoder "You do the talking..." half-page black and white advertisement from page 26 in the March 1980 issue of Contemporary Keyboard.

Never heard of them. Well, maybe I have. But if I had, these vocoders didn't leave much of an impression. And I dig vocoders. My Roland SVC-350 has been in my rack for years and years, and I always try to find an excuse to patch it in. And one of the big reasons I love my Korg Wavestation A/D is because of its audio inputs and vocoder effect.

But these Synton Syntovox vocoders... drawing a blank at the moment.

Hmmm. What to do... what to do... I usually have two different "go-to's" when drawing a blank:

1. Kick-start some company research on the Internet
2. Jibber jabber about the ad itself.

And since I'm feeling a bit lazy today, I think I'll start by just gaze at this ad for a while. Save the online research for later.

This particular early advertisement only appeared once in CK as far as I can tell. And it's not too shabby. Nice balance, a smart, witty ad-title, and a nice big Synton logo. It took a while to realize what I like best about this ad - the lips in the second "o" of "Syntovox" in the ad-title. I missed it for a long time, but now that I know they are there, its the first thing I focus on. They're a little dirty even.

So, what's not to like? I'm not a fan of justified text in ads. And not a fan of it in this ad either. You get enough of it in the magazine articles themselves. My eyes are tired even before I've begun reading. But for the first time out of the gate, Parasound gets an "A" for effort.

Still knee-jerking from starting any online research, I decided to flip through my database and a few other issues of the magazine to see what came up. I never did come across a Spec Sheet for the 221 or 222 vocoder in my readings, but unexpectedly the next best thing does appear in a later issue of the magazine. A lot later. Like three and a half years in October 1983.

But it was probably worth the wait for readers because we're talking Keyboard Giveaway contest!

Before I go on - did you catch that?

The ad came out in March 1980 in Contemporary Keyboard, but the contest was in Keyboard magazine.  Yup! they took so long that the magazine changed it's name! Hee hee.

Okay, maybe I'm the only one tickled by that fact. So back to that Keyboard Giveaway contest.

Sure enough, the October 1983 giveaway was for a Syntovox 222 vocoder, and the description reads like a good solid Spec Sheet:

"The syntovox 222 vocoder is a professional audio rack-mounted sound modifier that is designed for live performance or studio use in inparting vocal articulation to musical signals. Two speech (program) inputs are provided: one for balanced microphones signals and the other for line-level signals. The articulation and spectrum of the speech signal are imparted to the carrier signal. the carrier input is usually an electronic keyboard or other instrument, but may be any line-level signal with a broad spectrum. The 222's output consists of the articulated carrier, plus adjustable amounts of straight speech and/or carrier signals. An internal "unvoiced sound synthesizer" is included for increased intelligibility.  Articulated carrier and unvoiced sound signals may be turned on and off by a panel switch or external footswitch. List price is $815.00. Syntovox products are sold in the United States by Big Briar, Leicester, NC 28748."

Like I said - a nice little write up.

And... did you catch it (again...)?

Looks like the magazine wasn't the only thing that was going through a wack of change during those long three and a half years. It seems distribution for the Syntovox changed hands too - from Parasound to Big Briar - sometime between March 1980 and October 1983.

Like the vocoders themselves, I don't recall the name Parasound either (yeah yeah, I'll get to that online research later), but I do know quite a bit about Big Briar.  That's the company Bob Moog started after leaving his original company Moog Music back in the late 70s. There are some really interesting Big Briar ads that I'm sure I'll post in the future, including one for the Syntovox 222 vocoder! Yay!

But, any more research will have to wait until the weekend. Because when I knee-jerk, I KNEE-JERK.

Like the year I refused to watch Toy Story because everyone loved it so much. KNEE-JERK.  And then attended Siggraph that year. Siggraph is *the* international conference and exhibition on computer graphics and interactive techniques.

The result: I got boo'd by everyone else in the room during the Pixar session. Even by my best friend, who I swear knew it was coming.

True story. And now that I think about it, I may have already told that anecdote.  Gah.

Moog signal processors "We make sound effective" ad, Contemporary Keyboard 1979

Moog signal processors "We make sound effective" full page black and white advertisement, including the Moog 12 Stage Phaser, Moog Three Band Parametric Equalizer, Moog Ten Band Graphic Equalizer and Moog 16 Channel Vocoder from page 35 in the March 1979 issue of Contemporary Keyboard.

Whenever I first glance at this ad, my mind automatically giggles at the thought of Moog manufacturing a karaoke unit.Come on... tell me that didn't cross your mind when you first saw it.

But then my eyes are automatically drawn to that Moog vocoder. And there is absolutely nothing funny about that gorgeous looking beast. Unless you are using it to tell your neighbour's kids to get off your lawn in a robot voice. Then it's definitely funny.

Of the four instruments featured in this advertisement - Moog 12 Stage Phaser, Moog Three Band Parametric Equalizer, Moog Ten Band Graphic Equalizer and Moog 16 Channel Vocoder - the two equalizers had already been featured in its own witty "All Equalizers are not Created Equal" advertisement.

That equalizers advertisement ran between April 1978 and September 1978, and looking back now, one of the most interesting features in that ad is the branding - the Moog logo is accompanied by it's new "Signal Processors" friend. Comparing it to this ad that ran about a year later and only seems to have run once, and I notice that "Signal Processors" doesn't have its own little logo treatment any more. Now the Moog logo is all alone again, and in the ad copy the units are referred to as "The Signal Processors by Moog". Its a small change, but still interesting to ponder.

The other two instruments in this advertisement are interesting as well.

Readers of Contemporary Keyboard would have been able to read more info on the "Moog Phase Shifter" in the Spec Sheet section of the July 1979 issue of Contemporary Keyboard: 

"Moog Phase Shifter. This phase shifter lets you choose the number of stages (up to 12) of phase shift you can have, in increments of two. The number of resonant stages is also selectable (up to 12). A mix control is provided for adjusting the amount of resonance you hear. You can also select whether you're hearing the phasing stages in series with themselves or mixed with the dry signal.  An internal sweep oscillator is provided which can be linked with an external sweep oscillator or voltage pedal. The cutoff frequency can also be controlled from the front panel. A rotating speaker effect with a start and stop switch is supplied that can be controlled by a footswitch. A gain control is provided on the front panel, as are an on/off switch with accompanying LED indicator, an overload indicator, and a effect in/out switch with LED indicator. Moog, 2500 Walden Ave., Buffalo NY 14225."

And then we get to the main course. The big gun. The Moog Vocoder. It may be at the bottom of the rack in the photo, but its mentioned first for good reason. It is... in a word... dreamy. I dream of adding one of those to my studio.

If you had happened to be flipping around that same issue of Contemporary Keyboard you would have also found this small 1/16-page advertisement from Bode Sound Co.

Look familiar? It should. And sure enough, Google Moog Vocoder and chances are Bode's name will pop up as well. According to Vintage Synth Explorer's Moog Vocoder page, the Moog design is almost identical to the Bode vocoder. And you can see that in the images. Switch for switch, dial for dial. Pretty dang close.

The Harald Bode page on Wikipedia provides a bit more information. According to the page, the Bode Vocoder 7702, Bode Frequency Shifter and Bode Ring Modulator were "also licensed to Moog Music".

I also found an August 2011 MATRIXSYNTH auction post for a Moog Vocoder with a good little write up on the it.  Scroll down the page and you will see a sell-sheet for the vocoder with that "Signal Processors" logo branding. But this time the logos are arranged using the "Signal Processors by Moog" format.

A rather creative demo of what I think is that very vocoder can be found on YouTube.

Definitely a handy device to have around for singing in key. Karaoke machine not included.

:D

Korg VC-10, Contemporary Keyboard 1978

Korg VC-10 vocoder from page 79 of Contemporary Keyboard Magazine November 1978.

This ad began running in CK Magazine in Nov. '78 along with two other Korg ads - the MS-20 and MS-10. Interestingly, as can be seen in past blog posts, these MS-20 and MS-10 ads were very technical in text and design, while the VC-10 ad was largely dominated by artwork and included practically no technical information. Fortunately a bit more information was available in the Spec Sheet section of the same issue.

Although vocoders faded out of the spotlight over time, they never really left us - for example, my 1990's Wavestation A/D contains a fairly usable vocoder effect. More recently, vocoders have made quite a comeback in pop, alternative rock and electronic music. Hardware and software manufacturers have stepped up to the plate to provide updated vocoding tools to bands and producers, including Korg, with their own microKorg and R3.

Basic information on the VC-10 can be found online in the usual places, including Vintage Synth Explorer and Synth Museum. Korganalogue.net also has a good online version of the manual.

Wikipedia doesn't seem to have a VC-10 page, but they do have a fairly extensive general vocoder page for those interested in more information.