Korg Wavstation EX and Wavestation A/D brochure, 1992

 

 

 

Korg Wavstation EX and Wavestation A/D 8-page brochure from 1992.

I gotta tell ya. I'm all Wavestation-ed out. It's been a good run of blog posts, but I think my curiosity has reached its limit.

Actually - I thought I was already done with everything "Wavestation" on the blog. I even ended that last blog post with what I thought was a relatively witty Madonna/Britney Spears analogy that I was quite proud of. All wrapped up nice!  :D

But then I came across this brochure. Gah. Maybe it just looked too similar to the 1991 Wavestation/Wavestation A/D brochure I posted back in December, camouflaged, hiding from the world. Well, too bad. Like a crazy-assed Toddlers and Tiaras mother, I'm gonna shove this baby on stage whether it wants it or not.

Again - I'm surprised this brochure didn't get produced until 1992. I always thought the Wavestation EX came out *before* the A/D, as a response to customer feedback that the original Wavestation didn't include drums and other more basic sounds. The last sighting of the Jan Hammer Wavestation ad that appeared in July 1991 included additional EX ad-copy: "Now with expanded memory and more sounds". Also, the ad that followed in August 1991 featured BOTH the EX and A/D, suggesting they may have come out at approximately the same time. The Wikipedia page for the Wavestation includes 1991 production dates for both, and always seems to list the EX before the A/D in tables and such.

But then why did the Wavestation-Wavestation A/D brochure come out in 1991, but this brochure with the EX didn't appear until 1992? Also, why did the Spec Sheet for the A/D appear in March 1991 but the Spec Sheet for the EX didn't appear until November 1991.

Was it just that the additional awesomeness of the A/D, including an extra RAM bank and analog inputs, give it a leg up in getting promoted over the EX? Huh.

Hey - I seriously just noticed something on that Wikipedia page. Near the bottom of the page, it says that Korg's OASYS and Kronos also include wave sequencing and vector synthesis! I quickly jumped over to Ebay to check prices... oh. nevermind. The OASYS, released in 2006 still commands about a $5,000 price tag, and the Kronos is running at about $2,500.

I think I'll stick with my Wavestation A/D.

Okay, *now* my Wavestation curiosity has come to an end. And just in time - been getting a few requests lately - mostly for Oberheim stuff. Time to jump back into the 80s.

I'll end with a summary of my Wavestation posts. A good run.   :)

July 1990: Wavestation 2-page "Make Waves" intro ad
September 1990: Wavestation 1-page "Make Waves" ad
April 1991: Wavestation "Portraits" Jan Hammer ad (July 1991 version includes EX info)
August 1991: Wavestation A/D and EX "Top Ten Reasons" ad
November 1992: Wavestation SR "15 Sounds" ad
November 1993: Wavestation A/D and SR "5 And A Half Amazing Racks" ad

And, don't forget about the brochures!

1990: Original Wavestation brochure
1991: Wavestation and Wavestation A/D brochure
1992: This Wavestation EX and Wavestation A/D brochure

Korg Wavestation EX and A/D "Top 10 reasons" ad, Keyboard and Electronic Musician 1991

Korg Wavestation EX and A/D "Top 10 reasons" 1-page advertisement from page 1 in Keyboard Magazine and page 23 in Electronic Musician August 1991.

My brain doesn't always work properly. Names are a good example. Once I start using the wrong name for something, I can't shake it. Humans. Gear. Magazines. And even when I correct myself, its like I'm reinforcing the wrong name, not the right one. This may be why you will often read "Computer Musician", when in fact I'm referring to the magazine "Electronic Musician". I equate "Electronic Musician" more with computers, and as I write quickly, I'll often flip back and forth between the two names. Gah. I think I've cleaned up everything now.   :)

Anyways, you will remember that the last time the Jan Hammer "Portraits" ad ran, it included a small band of text that referenced the fact that the original Wavestation now had expanded memory and more sounds. I suggested that they were referring to the new EX version of the keyboard, and sure enough, a month later Korg came out with a new ad that promoted both the Wavestation EX AND the Wavestation A/D.

But Korg seemed to be running out of steam with the Wavestation brand in terms of advertising. Or maybe it was just the fact that the Wavestation was so different from other synths that it was selling itself at this point. Either way, Korg didn't push the EX and A/D as much as the original Wavestation. The ad ran off and on between August 1991 and November 1991 in Keyboard Magazine, and only seems to have appeared once in Electronic Musician in August.

A shame too, because I really like this ad. There is *a lot* to read - but it still seems short and snappy. And there also still feels like it has room to breathe. Good layout and design.

Plus it includes a few surprises. For example, Reason #5 includes a 1-800 number you can call and LISTEN to a special phone demo. Brilliant. I don't recall see this when I originally saw the ad back in the day, and am kicking myself that I never had a chance to call that number. Another great surprise is Korg's promotion of 3rd party sound designers in Reason #10. Always good to give 3rd party developers some props. But the best is Korg's offer of a free video demo of the Wavestation. Again, never took advantage of that opportunity. Still kicking myself.

Like the original Wavestation before it, regular readers of Keyboard would have found out about the A/D waaaay before the ad appeared. This was most likely due to its appearance at the January 1991 NAMM show. Although this time, the Wavestation A/D had to compete with a lot more new exciting gear for attention. The darling of Keyboard's NAMM article, titled "Retro Mania", was the new JD-800 and it's 59 sliders. And that opened the door to get Roland's other gear to the front of the line in the article too, including the JX-1, S-750, S-770 and Studio-M. Still, Korg's Wavestation A/D managed to get third-billing after Roland's Rhodes division. Not too shabby.

The Spec Sheet for the A/D appeared a month before the NAMM report in the March 1991 issue, coincidentally right at the beginning of the Jan Hammer Wavestation ad-run. It is interesting to see that even as the latest A/D is being hyped at trade shows, the original Wavestation was still being hyped in ads.

The Spec Sheet really gives a good introduction to the instrument:

"Korg rack-mount Wavestation synthesizer. Korg's Wavestation A/D is a two-space rack-mount version of the Wavestation keyboard. It features 32 digital oscillators, 32 digital filters, and 64 envelope generators and LFOs. Wave sequencing allows each oscillator to play up to 255 different sounds, or waveforms, in sequence. A programmable and constantly varying mix of up to four different sounds, each of which may also be a wave sequence, is available within each patch. Up to eight of these patches can be layered across the keyboard with velocity switching. A stereo pair of analog inputs allows external sound sources to be processed through the Wavestation A/D's built-in effects. External sounds can also be used as waves for processing through filters, amplitude envelopes, and pan control. Each input can be independently controlled using MIDI volume data. new effects that have been developed for the analog inputs include two vocoders and a combined compressor/limiter-EQ-noise gate. About $2,400.00. Korg USA, 89 Frost St., Westbury, NY 11590. (516) 333-9100. Fax (516) 333-9180."

Now, here is where things get a little out-of-step. Even though the A/D made it into the Spec Sheet in the March 1991, issue, it would be a full eight months before the EX upgrade would be announced in the Spec Sheet section. A full three months after this ad started to run.

This promo also included some good reference info including prices for both the EX model and the upgrade for the original Wavestation:

"Korg Wavestation upgrade. Among the 119 new sampled waveforms within the Wavestation EX are piano, drums and percussion, guitars, basses, flutes, and alto sax, bringing the total number of waveforms to 484. The EX comes with a program card containing 50 new performances, 35 new patches, and 32 new wave sequences. Also new are eight effects algorithms, including vocoder, pitch-shift, and stereo compressor/limiter with gate. $2,333.00; upgrade for current owners $110.00. Korg. 89 Frost St., Westbury, NY 11590 (516) 333-9100. Fax (516) 333-9108."

I think I've mentioned it before, but if I haven't screamed it from the highest mountain top, I'm a big fan of the Korg Wavestation A/D. I've had one for quite a while, and while other rack gear has been moved from my main rack to the secondary "grave yard" rack, the rack screws on the A/D have never been unscrewed. I still spend hours online looking for new information on this synth, but one of my favorite stories appears on the Wikipedia page for the Wavestation, and explains how the A/D prototype was first developed using a hacksaw and a Prophet 2000 sampler.

"The Wavestation A/D was the brainchild of Joe Bryan, then-Senior Design Engineer at Korg R&D. A guitar player, he wanted "something that worked with a simple midi guitar that would merge the guitar, synth and effects, and could be controlled from one or two buttons on the guitar." The idea was of little interest to his colleagues at first. Nevertheless, he found a prototype of a Sequential Circuits Prophet 2000 sampler and literally hacksawed the analog-to-digital converter circuitry from it, soldered that and a digital interface to the Wavestation's ROM bus to create the first prototype of the Wavestation A/D. The prototype convinced Bryan's colleagues of his idea."

After this ad appeared, the Wavestation brand would go silent for exactly a year. Just enough time for mommy and daddy Wavestation to do what comes naturally (in the presence of engineers)...

...give birth to baby.

Korg Wavestation "Portraits" ad featuring Jan Hammer, Keyboard, Electronic Musician 1991

Korg Wavestation "Portraits" 1-page advertisement featuring Jan Hammer from inside front cover of Keyboard Magazine and Electronic Musician, April 1991.

Hard to believe that by the time this Jan-Hammer-endorsed advertisement appeared, the Wavestation had already been in reader's minds for over a year. Sure, the introductory Wavestation ad may have first ran only nine months prior in July 1990, but readers of magazines such as Keyboard and Electronic Musician were hearing the wave-sequenced-buzz of vector synthesis technology months before.

For example, the original Wavestation Spec Sheet appeared a full four months earlier that the intro ad in the March 1990 issue of Keyboard Magazine. And Keyboard knew Korg had something special on their hands, because they opted to print a relatively large photo of the keyboard below the blurb. Only a few pieces of gear get that kind of star treatment:

"Korg WS Synthesizer: The WS Wavestation synthesizer is the first offering from the Korg R&D group in San Jose, which comprises mainly former Sequential Circuits personnel, including founder Dave Smith. The WS incorporates 32-voice, 16-bit digital vector synthesis, which was originally developed by Sequential for the Prophet-VS. Over 500 multisampled waveforms and sounds are included and can be linked together into user-programmable wave sequences. Dual programmable multi-effects, both joystick and wheel controllers, a 61-note velocity- and pressure-sensitive keyboard, 240 x 64-pixel graphic LCD, and RAM and ROM cards ports are included. About $2,500.00 . Korg USA, 89 Frost St., Westbury, NY 11590. (516) 333-9100."

This is an awesome Spec Sheet that not only provides some good technical information and preliminary pricing info, but also shows that either Korg was taking good advantage of the Dave Smith connection in it's promotion of this synthesizer, or that Keyboard knew their shit when it came to the design of the instrument. My guess is probably both. :)

But that wasn't the only early sighting of the Wavestation. Not even close.

If you were lucky enough to pop in to the January 1990 NAMM show, you were way ahead of the game. I don't think I would be out of touch with reality if I said that the Wavestation was one of the top darlings of the show. Unfortunately for readers, NAMM news at the time didn't usually hit the gear mags until a few months later. In the case of the Wavestation, that was April - a month after the Spec Sheet appeared.

The April 1990 issue of Electronic Musician listed it under the heading "The Ten Products People Told Us We Had To See", recognizing it both for the addition of Sequential's vector synth technology and for its PPG-style waveform "scanning". Interestingly, in the same NAMM article, EM also gives nods to the newly introduced Yamaha SY22, another synth offering vector synthesis, by including "...it's good to see that this type of synthesis didn't get lost in the cracks of MIDI history". Agreed!

Keyboard's April 1990 NAMM report gave the Wavestation top billing in the synth section of the article, and introduced the instrument with "Perhaps the most intriguing keyboard...". Not a bad start. They also reported on its PPG- and Sequential roots, also noting it's Prophet-VS-style joystick, and its MIDI-synchronization capabilities.

Side note: I would be remiss if I didn't point out that my man-crush (As my GF refers to Trent Reznor) was also featured in this issue of Keyboard Magazine, posing with his Emax sampler...

But that is enough history for one blog post...

This ad is a major shift in direction from the previous "Make Waves" advertising campaign. And I'm not just talking about design - but also the addition of an endorsement deal from none other than Jan Hammer. Personally, I only knew him from his Miami Vice soundtrack days (looks like he kept a shirt or two from the show), and even though I wasn't a fan, I sure as heck knew the soundtrack. Even more so, the music video. Not so much for his use of the Wavestation.

This ad continued to run for four months - April to July - and in that last showing in the July issue of Keyboard, we see a slight addition to the ad.

Let me read that again for you:

"Now with expanded memory and more sounds"

Whaaaaaat? That's right. As far as I can tell, that is the first sign that the new EX version of the Wavestation is just around the corner. It would still be a good four months before the Spec Sheet for the EX upgrade would appear... but this post is getting a little long, so will save that for my next one.

Oh - and end with this... :D