The Days when Factory Demos Ruled

These days, it seems easier than ever to research your next potential synthesizer purchase. For every new model, a legion of videos are released on YouTube; patch flips, deep dives and reviews offer the synthesist a fairly good measure of an instrument's sounds and idiosyncrasies - it's true that nothing tops trying it out for yourself, where you might suddenly decide that the shift key placement is a complete dealbreaker; so synth events & (declining) physical shops remain an important resource.

Back in the 90's however, physical shops were all we had (outside of magazines & promotional VHS/audio tapes) - along with an array bizarre music shop customs and rituals. Manufacturers knew that shop assistants might have a tough job; internalising all the key strengths & features of a gazillion synths, so created a single button that allowed the synth to sell itself - the demo button.

I thought I'd talk stylistically about 90's factory demo music, because it could only exist within the context of selling an instrument. An evolution upon the chintzy demonstration tunes of home keyboards, the following examples exhibit these interesting musical traits:

• Concepts like musical taste, minimalism & restraint operate differently in this universe. Factory demo songs may change genre 4 or 5 times within a 2 minute piece - it's something that only the most-ADHD of audience members might usually put up with, but in the context of selling a synth, suddenly it's impressive! Look at all the styles this box can do!
• In a similar vein - demo makers love to use every damned sound on the instrument. Partially, this is to demonstrate the "one stop shop"/"all you need" nature of their box'o'sounds. Listening carefully however, I can feel their real excitement in being able to arrange bombastic music with "realistic" sounds. This saxophone patch sounds so real, I'm going to absolutely RINSE it mate!
• For all of my mirth-making, there's usually some really solid (even beautiful) musicianship and harmony usage within these songs. This makes them (not so) guilty pleasures in my eyes!

Korg Trinity - "Ready for Radio"

This feel-good ballad throws everything but the kitchen sink at the listener - saxophone, lead guitar, organ, even bird whistles! It brings a smile to my face whenever I listen to it, alone, having made sure that no one is watching me.

Kawai K5000W - "BADD"

The Kawai K5000 came in a few variants, the W featuring less knobs and more PCM waves - it certainly has an ear-catching opening demo! Big additive swooshy noises seque into some kind of spy-chase music. Love it!

Yamaha TG77 - It's Cool!

It's Cool (2:02) will be my winning at life song, I'm sure of it. Delicate EP & metallic percussion sounds give way to naive choir pads & the funkiest fretless bass line - it makes you nostalgic for a time that never existed. The brass kicks in and I'm there with my arms in the air, wind in my face.

Yamaha TG500 - "RYO"

Much had changed in the 5 years between the TG77 and the TG500. The 77's interesting FM engine had been completely jettisoned (although the 500 had a pretty deep ring modulator) and, like elsewhere in the industry - the focus was placed on "real instrument" sounds. The TG77 featured a 2MB PCM WaveROM, but this size was quadrupled to 8MB in the TG500 (plus 1MB of optional FlashRAM for your own samples) so basic sounds like piano, guitar & strings all received a makeover. It looks like Yamaha were especially happy with the piano, making it the main focus of this intro track - a ballsy move!

Roland D5 - Central Park

Central Park (2:29) - this one's melancholy. It's a cold winter's day in Central Park and your wife has met you here, to tell you that the marriage is over. You're sad, of course, but you know that it hasn't worked for a long time. A vague hope of finding new love tempers the stinging cold of this day. Who said that factory demo's couldn't be art?

E-MU Morpheus

The piece at 3:00 and the harmony it involves, always makes my brain light up! The rest of the demo is an entertaining showcase too - the Morpheus, featuring 3-dimensional Z-plane filters can make all sorts of unique evolving sounds from samples or simple waveforms, but it has a pretty usable "basic" factory library too.

Thanks for humouring me - let us know your favourite factory demos and see you next time!

Posted by MagicalSynthAdventure an expert in synthesis technology from last Century and Amiga enthusiast.

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