Howdy

Well, I picked up a [="http://www.Korg.com/gear/info.asp?A_PROD_NO=microKORG"]microKorg[/]="http://www.Korg.com…"]microKorg[/] a couple of weeks ago. I thought I'd share my impressions with you.

If you want the nitty gritty specifications, check out Korg's [[url=http://="http://www.Korg.com…"]microKorg[/]="http://www.Korg.com…"]microKorg[/] page.

Initially, I was drawn to it becuase it did vocoding. I've been playing with a band that wants to do some Zapp tunes and rather than haul around a talk box, I wanted to see if I could be Roger with a vocoder. I haven't been able to get it to sound _exactly_ like that but serendipity led me elsewhere.

Good Lord, this thing is fat. I took it to a rehearsal and showed the bass player some of the bass patches. The only way to describe his reaction is to say that I think the microKorg f**ked his sh*t up. He was blown away to the point of wanting to get one. Saturday night, we broke into an impromptu rendition of "Flashlight" with him on his 4-string (and octaver) and me on the microKorg. I mean, it was damn near a perfect emulation of _that_ sound. Even cooler is that you can kinda pick it up and play it in your lap. I'm not really into the whole "keyboard as guitar" thing but sh*t, can a brother get some strap locks?

Since I couldn't be a poor imitation of Bernie Worrell all weekend, I took on another project recording a German '80s rock band (think "Europe"). I'd recorded half their album in September and they were back to "Rock und Roll" the past week. A couple of the more keyboard intensive tunes were well served by the microKorg. We used it to cover everything that wasn't B3 or CP70. A few tracks ended up with 4 or 5 tracks of it. One for the vocoder, one for a blipping arpeggiator part and two for a stereo string line. Man, it rocked. I'll try to get permission from the boys and see if I can post some examples.

Korg has a free editor for it and its not a bad little analog synth. I mean, they say its basically an MS2000. You have a decent control matrix with four simultaneous routings. No, you can't route anything to anything else but what's there is sensible. Almost anything can be sync'ed, LFOs, the arpeggiator and delays. MIDI control changes can go to almost any parameter.

So there it is, a micro review of the microKorg. For $400, I don't see how you can go wrong.