Korg Volca Drum

The Korg Volca Drum is a drum computer with 6x tracks, 2-layer synthesis and waveguide resonator. This instrument creates varied percussion sounds on 6-parts, which are composed of 2x layers and go far beyond the sound palette of typical analogue drums. The digital DSP Synth Engine generates various waveforms, including noise, which can be pitch modulated, enveloped and bit crushed. This is followed by the Waveguide Resonator, which defines properties such as body shape, pitch, feedback and decay, giving the dual parts the finishing touches and transforming the sound to a new level.

Parameter Automation
The Volca Drum records 16x patterns with a total step length of up to 16x steps in its memory. By concatenating patterns, lengths of up to 256x steps are possible. Up to 69x parameters can be recorded per pattern. In addition, there are memory locations for 16x drum kits.

Summary from Sound on Sound magazine October 2019

PROS

• Great range of digital percussive sounds.
• Probably the most powerful Volca sequencer to date.
• Parameter lock-style programming, at last!

CONS

• Other than the MIDI channel bug, none.

SUMMARY

The new Volca on the block gives you a complete six-voice digital drum machine. It is capable of some excellent sounds, is fun on program and offers some new features only available on drum machines many times the price.

CONCLUSION

The Korg Volca Drum reminds me a lot of Korg’s Electribe ER-1 and I suspect that somewhere, under the hood, there is some shared code. The synthesis engines have many similarities. One of the things I liked about the ER-1 was how, with just a handful of controls, you could coax out kick drums, hi-hats, snare drums, claps, zaps, lazers, pings, zoops, whoops and other onomatopoeic percussion. The synth engine was efficient and well designed. The same is true of the Volca Drum engine. It manages to create an impressively wide palette of sounds with just a few controls. It’s not perfect. An extra couple of knobs or buttons would have gone a long way to making it easier to select modulation and sound sources. The lack of filters can be frustrating too. There are many times when you just want roll off the top or bottom end of a sound. A basic high-pass and low-pass filter would have been very welcome. But I suppose the art of Volca has always been which compromises to accept and Korg have done an amazing job of squeezing a most capable drum machine into a small and very attractively priced box.

I’d describe the sound of Volca Drum as clean and digital, whilst retaining a thoroughly electronic edge. I found it came alive when treated by some extra effects. Some compression, perhaps an analogue delay, spring reverb or some extra drive and distortion will really help glue everything together. The high-frequency content can occasionally sound a little harsh, a common artefact when experimenting with digital audio-rate frequency modulation without filters, but it’s easy enough to avoid once you learn the synthesis engine.

Performing live is fun. Despite only allowing one-bar patterns, there are enough cool tricks to build up drum tracks in real time. Everything can be programmed, recorded and tweaked whilst the sequencer is running and interesting fills and glitches are easily added using the Step Jump and Slice features.

Overall, the Volca Drum is another great addition to the range. It delivers quirky, flexible electronic percussion by the bucketload and the sequencer is probably the most advanced Volca sequencer yet. I suspect this will be yet another winner for Korg.

- Rory Dow, SOS October 2019