Ah the unmistakable sound of phase distortion synthesis. I had the cz5000 and I couldn’t believe I had 8 track sequencing on board with both step time and real time recording. My ‘workstation’ of the 80’s
Me too, except that I never used mine. My CZ 1000 was also my first synth purchased at a Circuit City about 1986 as a special order at the suggestion of a sales clerk who claimed that it was like a Yamaha DX7 but at a fraction of the cost. I didn't really like the CZ user interface without actual buttons though. So I bought a DX7 which I traded in at a Guitar Center mid '90s for a Fender Guitar. Go figure... The CZ is still in the original box in absolutely like-new condition -- or so I assume since it's not been touched since 2006. It's great that you still use yours!
YES FINALLY A CZ EPISODE, here in chile it's a super important synth, a lot of pop groups had them in the 80s and the biggest pop album probably of the decade here was made entirely based on the synth thanks so much for a video on this synth (the album btw is called Pateando Piedras by los prisioneros)
The CZ-1000 was my first proper polysynth. After saving up some money, it cost me almost $500 brand new back then and that in 1980's dollars was unbelievably cheap. I ended upgrading to a CZ-5000 and then a CZ-1. The sound always reminded me of a PPG and it sounded a lot warmer than a Yamaha FM synth to my ears. The analog metaphor used on the synth engine sure made it a lot easier to program. I remember the synth brass with its fake reverb sounded quite big (in a time when synths didn't have built in effects, other than chorus sometimes). And finally some trivia: the 8-stage digital envelopes on Roland's S-series and W-30 are nearly identical to what was first available on the CZs.
Same. Except I started with the CZ-101, upgraded a year later to the CZ-1000 for the full size keys (otherwise they are identical except the membrane buttons) and instead of buying a CZ-5000, I opted for the CZ-1. Good move on upgrading from your CZ-5000 to the CZ-1. A year after buying the CZ-101, I got a Yamaha FB-01 FM synth. Sort of a budget table top version of the DX7 (small and light too), but it had 4 operators instead of 6, so it's patches weren't compatible but many of the famous DX7 patches ones were included and sounded very similar. After it disappeared after a gig, I upgraded to a the full DX7 engine. Anyway, the CZ's sounded very little like the DX7 in general. But the CZ's were capable of some of the DX7 sounds. I found the CZ's to sound more like analog synths, but with the advantages of stable tuning, more reliable, far less expensive, MIDI sysex bank loading, etc. We have to remember $500 in 1985 would cost $1,240.96 today with inflation. But the CZ's were still a great deal for as much synth as you got for a small cost compared to most other synths. Around 1987, I bought a whole collection of effects pedals from a guitarist to use with my CZ's, FB-01, and Amiga soft synths. These included a 16 bit digital reverb pedal, phaser, chorus & distortion. I later got a flange pedal too. The reverb was by far the most important and something I recommend adding to any synth without build in effects. Made a huge difference. I used the chorus typically with my FB-01 to simulate a Leslie speaker spinning fast for Hammond sounds as it was all I had at the time, and the phaser was pretty cool especially on synth string patches. I didn't use the distortion pedal too much and the flange rarely too. Be sure to add a reverb unit to your CZ. Many mixers like my Yamaha have built-in reverb in this day of age. I did a lot of famous analog synth simulation with my CZ's in the 80s. I'd say that was it's strongest point. My friend's Oberheim Matrix 6 didn't seem capable of reproducing a lot of the famous sounds in rock I was able to reproduce on the CZ's. He paid a lot more money for it, and it lived half it's life at the factory for constant repairs and was extra bulky next to my CZ's. The CZ's were rock solid, and perfect for use in my live bands to simulate the sounds of Moogs, Oberheims, ARP's, etc. The only thing I didn't like about them was the Casio logo on the back. If it wasn't there, no one in the crowd would assume I was using Casio's. To most people, Casio's mean cheap home keyboards. Not professional synths. They were certainly best known for their cheap home keyboards in the 80s. Few people knew they made real instruments, and many people that never tried the CZ's were skeptical about them being from Casio. Be sure to check out these great CZ comparison videos from Retrosound. What they demonstrate was exactly.....what I used the CZ's for in the 80s. Far too few people knew what they were capable of. Retrosound reviews tons of "expensive" classic synths and knows their stuff. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-yKuT0UpAxIc.html
This was my first synth too - I was in High School and it was between this one and the Korg Poly 800. This is what taught me programming synths. Lots of menu diving but it was fun. They did need external chorus to fatten up the strings sound. The brass and flute sounds were the best right out of box.
@@JohnBillington I think you made the right choice. I had a chorus pedal for mine, but didn't use it too much, but I imagine it could have helped on a few sounds. The reverb pedal made a huge difference, and I liked phase too. Also had a flange & distortion pedal as I bought a whole set of pedals from a guitarist for my synths. I ran them through my mixer to share with FB-01 and Amiga soft synths. I found brass & flute sounds in the sysex collections I liked even better, but those presets weren't bad.
Always loved my CZ-1000, got it shortly after they came out, and you HAD to have the extra memory pack! That and a Korg Polysix were my 80's polysynths. Still have both - I even have the original blue gig bag Casio made for the CZ.
Wow, memories from when I was at school back in the 80’s we had a CZ101 I was the only one who could use it, even the teacher didn’t know what to do with it! Sounded amazing then and still does now!
Espen, you did it again! I have been waiting for a long time for you to do this and you did it will style and class. You brought back so many great memories of my teenage years. Since like many other here, this also was my first synth. Many hundreds of hours programming it, which I thoroughly enjoyed and learned the basics of sound and synthesizer theory. I saved for a year to buy the CZ1000 and it was soooo worth it. I then got the Atari ST so I could record multitimbral tracks with it. Next to a Prophet 600 this gave me so much creativity in sound design. I greatly appreciate you and your awesome work at doing justice to an old friend.
This is a very nice sounding synth even to today's standards. I believe alot of new gear has lost this soul that the early gear spewed. Very accurate DA converters aren't always what they are cracked up to be...
CZ-1000 was my first synth and I liked it so much I bought the CZ-1 when it came out (velocity sensitive keys). I gave the CZ-1000 to my Dad and it got lost somewhere over the years, but I still have the CZ-1.
It was also my first synth but I hated it. A month later I bought a used Yamaha DX7. I traded the DX7 for a Fender guitar but I still own the CZ-1000 that was put in storage in 1986, in its original box, and has not been opened since 2006! I might take it out one day and give it a spin...
I'm glad to see you getting around to the CZ. As I previously mentioned, the CZ-101 was my first synth. I had it in high school in the mid 80s after getting my Amiga when they came out. The CZ's engine turned out to be a much better than I was expecting. I upgraded to a CZ-1000 for full size keys the following year, and bought a 2nd one the year after. In the early 90s I was after the top of the line CZ-1 and a year after my request a large music store got one as there was no Internet yet to find them. In the later 90s I bought a 2nd CZ-1 to have a pair of each for home and my band's practice studio. I still have the four of them. I found the CZ's sounded drastically different than the DX7, and the CZ's excelled at recreating analog synth sounds such as Moog, Oberheim, ARP, etc. I found a lot of great lead patches, often MiniMoog style brass leads. Unison mode helped, portamento and added reverb. I had a whole set of effects pedals. Phase sounded great too. I used my Yamaha FB-01 for more traditional digital sounds. The CZ's often sounded analog, unlike the DX7. I loved how you could start with the very affordable CZ-101 and upgrade to any other model and retain your sounds, gaining new features. A huge lesson other synth companies should have taken notice of! Upgrading should not mean loosing your patches. Korg especially, take notice! The CZ's were the best kept secret as so many assumed a toy maker wouldn't put out a serious synth at a bargain price, and many people didn't discover them until decades later with RU-vid. Playing in rock bands, I found with the tons and tons of sysex collections, I was able to duplicate many famous sounds from the radio, originally done on much more expensive, bulky, unreliable synths. The CZ's in the 80's are what Yamaha's MODX is today. Raised the bar on the most synth for the money ratio. I highly recommend anyone reading checkout the series of videos comparing the CZ to expensive analog sounds with famous sounds, such as the Oberheim "Jump" sound. The series also included the CS-80, Mini-Moog and others. Synth collectors minds were blown when they learned what these affordable CZ's were capable of, more compact and reliable too. Back in the day, assumed to be just toys by serious collectors. Not viewed that way anymore. Plus MIDI and the ability to load sysex sounds with thousands of sounds. My cartridges held 64 sounds too by flipping dip switches for banks of 16, but the CZ-1 holds 64 patches without needing a cartridge.
Oh yeah, that Oberheim patch from Jump -- so many people think that some sort of unique Oberheim thing. It's just a couple of sawtooth waves ( run through a bunch of chorus and reverb of course). That's the easiest sound in the world to make on a synth, including the cz1.
I bought one a CZ101 and an Emu Drumulator for $1.00. I worked for a guy who had a studio who was going through a divorce. He bought these instruments to make karaoke tracks ( i did the tracks). I loaned the Drumulator to someone, and I never got it back, but I still have the CZ101. Great synth. It makes lots of great sounds.
When I bought my Juno-106, I was selling keyboards at a music store. There was one of these on the rack next to it. A lot of customers associated Casio with cheapo consumer products at the time, so I was pushing the Roland. This is an interesting piece, thanks for the demo!
It doesn't seem that Casio did much to disabuse customers of that notion. In fact, it may have been casual musicians and folks on a budget who they were after. I probably might have thought of them that way. Interestingly, Yamaha came out with the PSS series in the same year that the Casiotone series was released - 1980. I think that the CZ series might have been a very furtive attempt to unseat the DX-7 - at least at the consumer level.
Epic video Espen. CZ-1000 was the first synth I bought with my own money back in '86 and followed it up with a CZ-230S. I still have them both. I recently pulled the CZ-230s out of storage and made a See You Depeche Mode cover using only CZ sounds. It stands the test of time. You demonstrated some very nice patches, well done, you showed the true CZ potential.
My very first synth was the CZ5000. Mel, the guy who owned a hole in the wall used gear shop off Santa Monica and Van Ness told meet it was better than a DX7 because it had a very clean sound like a DX7 but was also multi timbrel with an 8 track sequencer like a RZ-1 possibly. I had the CZ android software (with randomizer) and an Atari 520 ST. This was1986. This sparked off my passion for synths. Mel also sold me an OB-8 for $150. Odd thing is I couldn't get an audition when I told them I was using the CZ5000.
I love the 8 steps for each envelope. I could combine them to simulate delays, reverbs, aftertouch effects or even touch sensitivity, depending of how fast you play and release the keys. I could even use those steps as mini sequencer. Those 8 steps are really powerful!
Yeah, the other keyboardist in my Synthpop band had a CZ-101. It was too expensive for me, I got a used Polysix. It' was a good combination, with the incredible warmness of the Polysix and the sharp digital leads from the CZ.
With all the shit going on in the world today, I must say, It is really nice to just kick back, forget all the troubles for a moment and take in something that makes you feel good like this. Keep up the good work!
Great video Espen! I have the CZ1 that i bought as a teenager in 1986. Ive just moved house and now have a bigger area to set it up. Great timing with your video :)
Great video. The CZ101 was my first synth which I bought in 1990. I still have today in storage. To get around the small keys problem I mounted it on the wall next to me and used it as a sound module with a Roland controller keyboard to triggr it. I used to have an editor that ran on the Atari ST called CZ Andriod, which was a full graphical editor and made programming the synth way more easier. Not only were the envelopes 8 stage but they were also lightning fast. I was able to convincingly model all TR909 drum sounds (apart from cymbals of course) because the envelopes are so well suited to creating percussive and bass sounds.
I used to have a CZ-101 and an RZ1 Drum Machine. Loved the Casio kit, the RZ1 gave me 4 drum samples. My first method of getting decent bass and snares into my music! I do miss the fun of setting up tape decks to the samplers to grab drum sounds. The 12" remixes were a great source of drum sounds that could be easily sampled.
I started in the late 80's with a CZ-101with broken midi in, I have another one since 10 year or so,, I like the organ preset and for the basses, I found them like the TX81z latency bass for use in a track,, Great Track,, COngrats,,,
These are underated synths! And sounds Erasure! Still have my CZ-230S in pristine condition and will never get rid of it even though its 'only' a preset machine. Thanks for the great vid!
I used to have a CZ-101 back in 1986. Sold it in the '90s. I used it mainly as a bass synth. I hated having to change all those big D-cell batteries all the time just to keep the Internal Memory intact!
Oh Espen - you finally did a CZ! The 101 ( wish I'd got a 1000 for the bigger keys but I was a skint teenager ha ha ) was my very first synth, this video is super nostalgic for me...nice one!
The "CZ-3000" was my very first real synthesizer🎹 not knowing how to program it, and it being a bitch as is to do so!😵😅 Made it very awkward to medal about with it? But I managed to make some interesting sounds, particularly a lot of insane synthesized "thunder sounds"🎹🎧💫💨😵 that I wish I still had.. Most of the time since I couldn't control it in real-time, I use the pitch band a lot in my playing granted I had no music training at all, and played mostly one note at a time. That's all I could do.. But I still have a soft spot in my heart for that synthesizer🎹 I wish I still had those recordings.... But I still have the memories.🎹🎧💫😵👌😎👍👍R.I.P.🙏✋✌
I bought a second-hand CZ-3000 and then traded it for my first motorcycle. My previous and first synth had been a used Korg PolySix, whose sound was full, rich, warm and fat, and which was so easy to program. If you could imagine a sound, those knobs made it feasible. No MIDI, though.
Wow what memories, I owned the CZ3000 and then the CZ5000 (CZ3000 coming with a multitimbral sequencer onboard). The long spatial sound you have created I did it too by transforming the B6 preset on the CZ3000, I was impressed and I am still impressed.I love this sound! There's one thing I experienced with the CZ3000, you can create a sort of more punchy and kind of analog basses by pluging your Midi cable to rely the MIDI IN and the MIDI OUT ports of the CZ. Yeah I remember on french Keyboard magazine the couple of sounds I could get every month, once Jean Michel Jarre offered two sounds to prove the CZ serie wasn't a toy but a powerful keyboard if you know how to program it. His sounds were awesome. Thank you very much and I'm glad for the CZ owners you offered tons of patches. Ah yes I was going to forget this one, there's a RAM card option for the CZ serie, and a curious thing happended once when the battery cell was dying, when I restarted the CZ there were crazy patches coming from the memory card and the data I used to see on the screen were totally hilarious, bizarre symbols, some in japanese, but the sounds seemed to go further than the machine could produce normally, some patches were completly chaotic even psychedelic. Too bad, no way to save them into the internal memory slot and I didn't own a sampler at this time.
Thanks for the hommage to a great synth, very well done. The CZ-5000 was my first synth. After it was stolen, I filled the gap years later with a CZ-3000 from the bay and I doubt, that we will part again. But luckily the loss of the CZ led me to my AN1x, which I still have as well. ... to be honest I still have all the synths, I ever aquired. :D
Thank you thank you thank you! I’ve been waiting for your review of this synthesizer. This is one of of favorite “football player, no neck, keytars”. The eight step editing is a phenomenon to program.
Back in 1985 i had this synth along an Alesis HR16 drum machine and a Yamaha QX5 sequencer. It was first foray into music equipment. I had no clue on how any of it or how it worked. I did play around with the synth and the HR16 especilally. The sequencer i was completely lost on. A few years later a former friend sold my equipment for some c#rack. I notice drum machines don't have some of the same basic functions as the HR16 like tuning capabilities and combining multiple sounds on one pad but also containing plenty of other features that the HR16 dosn't have. It had a really good sound as well.
The CZ-101 was my first synth. The eight stage envelopes was a dream for me. I could create some very long pads and sound FXs. My sequencer, at the time, was the Yamaha QX-21 and my drum machine was the Korg DDD-1. Those were the good days of my youth.
Thanks Espen! Casio of that era were cool, bit limited in sound palate but very useful (& a bit era defining)....so strange to me Casio pretty much let their pro-audio synth market die & they never followed up with another PD-like synth.
@@africkinamerican VZ was the next step for PD. If I remember right, it was renamed iPD. Unfortunately it came out at the wrong time, when the Korg M1 was more or less dominating things. If they had done something like what Roland had done with the D50 - using a sampled attack grafted onto a synth sustain sound - it might have extended PD's life for a year. As it was, there was so much untapped potential that never got realized. Plus for all their tech prowess, nobody really took Casio seriously as a synth maker, and to this day, they still don't. One of the only ones to take Casio and PD synthesis seriously was, of course, Yamaha; they went so far as to sue Casio, claiming that PD synthesis infringed on their method of FM synthesis. Of course, when the guy who pioneered FM synthesis, John Chowning, pointed out that BOTH methods infdinged on his patents for FM (which Yamaha was licensing), Yamaha clammed up. I wish that I had been able to own one of these back in the day. Nowadays the prices are completely jacked up if you want a hardware version. True, you could go for Arturia's CZ, but I really like dealing with the hardware.
The envelopes on these. I have a 5 minute track that I made on a CZ-1000 that is basically just a building, sweeping sound the entire time until it glitches out lol.
I recall a mail order catalog from my adolescent days that promoted pairing one of these CZ's with a C64 w/ MIDI interface or Atari ST...unfortunately I couldn't cut enough lawns that summer to afford it all...but still dreamed about this synth nonetheless 😎
I had several CZ 101's and a 1000. They can make really great sound effects and bass drums. The eight step envelopes were really cool. Other great sounds in general especially basses I would say.
My first poly! (joining the "family") :) Together with a DD-3 and a CE-3 it sounded awesome! Too bad I didn't save any patches... Bought a CZ-5000 a couple of years ago to bring back memories and to remake my old songs. :)
I own a 5000 in real good condition. It's a monster, big and heavy. But I hope I never have to get rid of it. I was drawn to this synth ever since I saw a picture of a guy playing one in Keyboard Magazine in 1986.
Edisyn is a great editor/librarian for the CZ and even allows to access the hidden waveforms ringmod modes and out of bounds parameter values. It's written in Java and should run on any platform.
@@africkinamerican Waveforms that are otherwise not accessible from the panel but can be only accessed via Midi SysEx. Why that's so is beyond me. I imagine that the developers thought the extra waveforms would not be very useful and even redundant, which I highly disagree with. The extra waveforms occur when different waveforms are passed through different "windows" (inverse waveforms), resulting in new more or less interesting waveforms. Other cool things you can do via SysEx is put in out of whack values and turn the last step of the envelopes permanently on, and you have different noise and ring-mod modes too. Just try it out and go bonkers with it 😜
Not everyone had one - I certainly didn't. However, I did have the CZ-3000 which I later got rid of and replaced it with the CZ-5000 as that had the 8 track sequencer on board. I certainly made good use of that back in the day :) I now have the Virtual CZ vst which covers all the CZ models :)
I love my 101. What a versatile sounding machines they are! And how great that you can edit them realtime (!) and use the library on your computer on 2022? Fantastic.
I love the sound of the Casio CZ synths. There don't seem to many videos on the other ones except the 101 and 1000 to my knowledge. I'd love to hear more of the CZ-1 or the 5000. Of course to get that, I'd need to acquire one (which would need me to have more money and space.) Or someone else would need to get one (which would mean they would need the money or space to get one)
The synthengine is the same on any of these (excluding the CZ-1). The 3000/5000 only have twice the voices of the 101/1000. Also: there are videos of the e.g. CZ5000 on youtube.
I should really make a demo video of my CZ1. I use it all the time, especially for clunky basses and texture. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-2fRbi8zK3vc.html Custom bass and mute guitar in this track both from the CZ1 just to give an example.
Out of all vintage synths out there, this is the one I would love to own one day. I am hoping for some garage sale/flea market deal, where whoever is selling it isn't aware of this machine's potential. I also wish Casio made an updated CZ series with more polyphony and the USB & SD card ports & a built-in audio interface. But, as far as I am concerned, they could keep everything else pretty much the same.
Nice! I have one I picked up for $50 that boots up frozen a few years ago. I still haven't gotten around to troubleshooting the problem but, this video inspired me a little bit. Thanks!
Thanks for the news about this website. Loaded some new patches to my CZ 101. Its been a very long time since I've done so.Very cool patches on the site. I normally use CZ Lib on Linux via Wine to transfer the patches. However, the website (LASER Mammoth ) is much more faster and enjoyable. Thanks again!
I broke down and picked up a 101 on Reverb. A local guy was selling it. I'm having so much fun with it. Such a great little box, and so tweakable. The Ring Mod is the secret weapon. Even on the built-in flute. Select 1+1', Turn it on, and suddenly it's a better flute.
I'm a happy owner of a CZ-101 and I don't see it going anywhere soon. Even though that means I keep a ton of synths. I suggest replacing the LCD with a drop in OLED replacement. it looks beautiful.
I had a CZ101. I picked it up for £20 used and really enjoyed it, its was a bit of a wolf in sheep's clothing, looked like a toy but made sounds heard in pop music of the day. I enjoyed it for 6 months and sold if on Ebay for around £250.
I was still a student when this synthesizer was released. I got a part-time job and finally bought a CZ-101. However, I was greatly disappointed when the CZ-3000/5000, which had twice the number of polyphony and twice the program memory, was released the following year.
I spent many hours in my teens tweaking sounds on our CZ-101. I remember the midget keys. The section where Espen presses a button then touches the keyboard to hear what it sounds like brings me back. I think String Ensamble(?) was my favorite preset. I also liked that you could program the LFO to use square wave form and set the parmeters to max to get an "arpeggio" that sounded like you were jumping from the note in one octave to a higher octave. Memories!
