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Roland TR8S anyone using one sequenced externally?
Just purchased the above and whilst it is an awesome sounding and versatile drum machine I was shocked to find it has no song mode, even after the massive software version 3 which has finally added the CR-78. Version 2 added FM drums, 2.5 added the ability to create your own FM drum sounds.............but no song mode, where you can build patterns and then chain them together and make a full song and save it for recall instantly later on.
I have had numerous HW drum machines over the years, Roland, Boss, Yamaha and they all had this simple facility, yet in 2023 Rolands latest creation can not do this!
So has anyone found a way to sequence a song in a DAW or HW sequencer and midi the data to the TR8S so its basically being used as a sound module only?
Any tips, tricks?
Thanks in advance.
Comments
On the 6s you can chain variations, you can access sounds as note numbers on the correct channel and also various CC’s to alter sounds and effects.
I have used program change to switch between patches, this can be tricky though, you sometimes have to preempt the successive bar to avoid loading problems.
The CR78 sound is fantastic. A classic like the MiniPops.
Thanks for the help.
Back in the eighties I used my Yamaha RX8 drum machine to sequence a song on my Yamaha DX27.
Every drum sound corresponds to a different note on the keyboard. So I turned down all the drum sounds and recorded the synth riff into the drum machine. Chained all the patterns into a song and used this method when playing live so I could play guitar over the top and it worked flawlessly.
Hey! I've just recently purchased a TR-08S as well.
Song mode is not really the point of the machine. It's meant for live performance, hence the "performer" in its name. It's not a hands-off machine, it's a very hands-on machine. I bought it to force myself back into actually interacting with something rather than just pushing a button and walking away.
It's still possible to chain the 8 pattern variations together in various ways to build a song. I mean, just set up the variations and then while it's playing, it's minimal effort to just select the variations here and there to introduce sections.
But really it's designed to be a realtime performance machine. Takes a bit of practise and getting used to again as it demands constant user input compared to how I got too comfortable working on an iPad. But stick with it. It really is an amazing and fun machine.
I was shocked when I realised you can actually make generative ambient stuff on it with the tuning p-locks, probability settings and different track lengths for each instrument! It's an amazing machine and I'm really loving it. Only had it for two weeks so far. Still a lot to discover.
Good luck and have fun with it! 😊👍
yeah , in fact you can chain the patterns as well , but only the ones in the same visible bank .. so its basically restricted to 16 x 9 patterns ie: you can program 8 variations PLUS one of the the 2 fills or a cheeky “scatter” pattern into a pattern
( don’t forget about them , needs a bit of manual reading to work out accessing them to edit and they can be auto inserted every 2/4/8/16 bars ) . and then the actual patterns containing those 9 variations , so 16 x 9 = a chain of 144 
.. unfortunately the variations will only use the kit programmed BUT the pattern chains WILL switch the kits automatically ( you can switch this off if needed ) which is nice , though i like ‘performing’ kit changes live which as you say is part of the whole ethos of this machine , 
love my tr-6s ... so much i’m thinking of sc(r)aping the money together for the bigboy 8s ! even though i am allergic to large hardware in theory
p.s. i’m pretty sure the 8s & 6s both respond to midi note numbers for sequencing externally , 6s starts at note 36 with an alt range too OR you can go in and configure yr own notes for the 6 or 12 sounds .. don’t forget to do ‘write’ if you change settings else it forgets on power off .
Thank you guys for your replies, they're most helpful.
@Spidericemidas I appreciate your points about it being a live performance tool but there are many of us who are set in our song writing ways. being able to chain patterns into a song and being able to save it to memory is of great importance to me.
From your comment it does seem like I should give it a shot first before I send it back. All the videos I have watched have been inspiring, just rankles a bit that something that's been implemented in drum machines for 40 plus years gets left of because of so called modern approach to making music.
BTW if you check out a f lot of the demos on YT there are many negative comments regarding the lack of song mode.
@RockySmalls Thanks for that, can you make the variation patterns any length or are you limited to 8 measures?
I will have to experiment I think. I have an Alesis SR-16 which has Song mode
I'm hoping to midi the two together and use the TR8S as the slave!
Well, you never know.....it probably wouldn't take much to implement a song mode. Maybe if Roland get enough requests, it could be a future update? I know a lot of people would love to see it get that facility, although that was never Roland's intention for it.
It would be a pity to send it back. I still think it's possible to record or make a song with it. Just needs a bit of planning. I wouldn't give up on it too easily. If I wanted to use it to construct a song, I would probably plan it out in advance, set up like 8 pattern variations then hit record with it plugged into a DAW and start manually triggering the pattern variations and counting the bars! Just like the old days! Then go back and make the overdubs with other things.
But in the end, if it's not the workflow you were hoping for, I agree you're better off returning it and researching something that has a song mode. It's no good and no fun if it's a struggle making something do something it was not designed to do.
Wow. I remember the SR-16. My first drum machine. Hang onto that one, I think it's quite respected still these days.
i’m afraid the pattern variations are limited to 16 step measures , though you can shorten that to any length but not 32 , 64 etc , each instrument track can have a seperate ‘last step’ for polymeters , and the pattern can have an overall ‘last step’ below 16 .. i’m not sure how seperate/distinct you can have that in ‘variations’ ? and how those complex last steps retrigger on pattern changes etc I haven’t payed close attention to (yet!)
there are separate scales of notes ( 8t, 16t, 32 ) but they are just relative to the tempo and don’t put any more steps on the grid.
sub steps up to 64ths are there but you can only put one type on each step so it’s not completely flexible and they are only repetitions,
there is nudge +/- , so steps can be ‘off grid’ , but i haven’t messed with that at all yet !!
nope! was misunderstanding the Nudge thing , it’s just playback timing nudge for dj syncing blather , nudges whole pattern and only temp! shame .
In this case, I think it would work best if you triggered the TR8S from your DAW. To do this, select a midi output channel in your DAW and select the midi channel to control the TR8S (this is referred to as the pattern channel in the TR8S and is usually channel 10 by default). If you open your piano roll in the midi channel, you’ll find specific notes will trigger different instruments. The mapping of instruments to notes is listed in the TR8S under Utility > MIDI.
Using it this way will mean you can program any level of complexity or sparseness for your compositions.
I hope this helps!