IMPORTANT UPDATE 2: Korg just released a software-only version of Wavestate with a discount for people who bought the hardware version. IMPORTANT UPDATE 1: You know all the cons in this video? Korg pretty much addressed them in firmware version 2... Here's my full coverage: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-eBCSvTLYF1Q.html
Loopop always has the best reviews! His knowledge on all the gear too tho. The stuff he shows off he does with it almost always give those 'insta-buy' vibes
What I really can‘t understand are people which are giving this kind of review a thumbs down! Really, I don‘t get it. They might not like the reviewed device, ok, fine. But this guy has spend so much time on an excellent and professional review. What‘s wrong with that. Just haters and idiots I guess. No friends, no fun, no life. Anyway loopop: excellent review, as always. A lot of usefull information. I already ordered the Wavestate even I do still have some concerns in regards to modmatrix and menue diving.
Yeah, some people expect every review/demo to just be playing - which is dumb to me because I don't care what someone else can do with an instrument. I want to know what I can do with an instrument. That's where @loopop is awesome -- he shows us what we can do with things.
I had a chat about this the other day with another YT regular and the conclusion was that in a lot of cases it is ire at the item being reviewed not the reviewer, having said that is this not what the comments section is for? But when you see virulent reaction from fanboys who have someone chip away at their perceptions it then becomes more understandable.
@@NineHellHeaven won't fit, its 3" too wide and already cluttered. maybe if they dump the pitch/mod wheels and squish everything over o top of that lonely help button
Is the price confirmed to be $1,000? I can't seem to find it anywhere. I expected it to be $1,200 - $1,500. $1,000 sounds about right too. If it were any less this would be quite a steal. My eyes are currently on the Lyra8 and Argon8 though. My wallet... It's hoping I don't even buy a Behringer Neutron/Model D, let alone something like this. :D
You made this confusing instrument seem pretty approachable. I really love that this thing is just UNIQUE, and can do bizarre things that an analogue synth can't even scratch. And it gets into the strange territory that retro romplers explored, but it in a way more approachable way. That asynchronous sequence and effect concept is out of this world. I may end up getting obsessed with this puppy. Time will tell ;) Thanks for a great review!
Got my hands on a Wavestate to add to a couple analog synths for the purpose of sequencing Berlin school, 80s pop etc. it takes a while to master this beast but wow! You can get very good results very quickly. Amazing synth. Just be patient and spend the time you will be rewarded fairly quickly. Combining this with a knob for knob analog synth makes this synth the best I’ve seen in over 20 years. A timeless synth that won’t get old. Then there’s full midi implementation… blows my mind.
Thank you Loopop. I ordered a wavestate and your video has been extremely helpful. I'm still surprised that something with this much depth is around $700! Seeing your update video is also a blessing, because now we can get multisamples from analog synths into the wavestate! A very wonderful, deep and portable synth in my opinion. Cheers.
You did it Loopop...your review made me pre-order a synth for the first time in 25 years. And I've never seen such a massive new synth unveiling by a company. Korg must have over-nighted dozens of units to YT influencers! Genius!
This synth will be amazing in creating cheesy-lovescenes-in-90s-horror-movies! On a serious note, I had the original wavestation,and I am happy that KORG respects their people by recreating the old stuff in a good way unlike *cough*Roland*Cough*
@@alexsartandmusic While the wavestate may seem like another "rompler" I assure you that it is not. It will choke doing a roland TB3 but so does the clones. Not a TB 3. Not a rompler. It truly synthesizes and is designed for programmers. It is a different beast than any I ever owned or own. I LOVE analog too.
No I think Roland did the right thing but they did the wrong thing by not using the form factor that they presented in the reissues that they did to percent newer concepts and that form factor. I think the JD 08 they finally got a ride and if they were smart they would actually develop newer modules and actually try to revolutionize. I mean they're blowing a huge market and a huge opportunity to capitalize. I mean who wouldn't want like an electronic maybe not as full-blown because the form factor will be a little bit smaller but something comparable I mean you got all kinds of ways you can run without form factor.
With all those sequencers i totally can see this thing controlling a new form of nuclear reactor. So basically you could use it in some way to create music with it? ;-)
I have a mint wavestation , I want this also. Maybe I am being greedy but I want another wave sequencing machine. I only have a hand full right now from Waldorf, Fizmo, wavestation... I could sell the ws if this can do even more, but I like the yamaha keyboard the tech spotted doing a small repair. Flat out yamaha in mine.
You nailed it. Great technology bending waves and the magic of the randomisation tools but how does it work within the context of music? Perhaps background music for a video game?
It doesn't but lets be honest, these people care about nothing sans their own opinion. Leave them to it. Wavestate is a bedroom gimmick at best. 37 keys with GB's of piano sounds from mainline boards? Sure. Ok. Would you like some octaves and actual customization with that rehashed 90's breakfast at all?
Jay Keel well considering I don’t see anything of significance of your expertise on synths posted here, I’ll assume you’re a troll, and take your words of wisdom with a grain of salt. To each their own. Now yes the ease of sound production: ASM > Modal >> Korg. Look and feel of the synth: ASM=Korg>>Modal. Generated sounds:Korg>=ASM>Modal. Modal and ASM wave morphing, Korg wave sequencing. Each synth has its pluses and minuses but they are all fine synths. I just prefer the Korg personally.
Bravo on creating a structuring yet another in-depth surperlative review on such a dynamic instrument. No better RU-vid channel destination to gather a no non-sense feature value proposition for this vertical. Gratefully.
Thanx for this review, now I realise they are 4pt multi instruments. This has, & is more like the original Wavestations than I had thought. My 2nd synth in about 93... was a Wavestation EX. I learned to properly create & time my own original wavesequences with it. Most who tried or purchased one for this feature, failed the learning curve of the synth... or found wavesequencing & headache to master & understand for programming. I've honestly found most hardware synths especially... Usually to be at least a few notches easier to work out than those Wavestations were. Wavestates aren't the 1 track wonders that I had mistaken they were tho. So this has great appeal now, & I can get the old school Wavestation tricks working too with these. Top marks & review thanx
The wavestation and it's kind makes picking out a square wave and a couple of triangles and using a filter look like a walk in the park.This looks like a nice way to spend a weekend making a patch or two....
@@PutItAway101 I try that once in a while, I needed a sound that was a combination of synthesizer, voices, strings and a gong every few random beats and this did it easily. I had to add the vocoderized track separately and over dub but it blended OK. Then it was a matter of fitting it into a mix with moog and novation BS2 and some other bits.
My last digital synth was Roland V-Synth. Mostly buying analog gear now, but this tutorial review has convinced me that Korg Wavestate is a necessity in my studio! Well done, as usual, Loopop! Much respect!
I'm in exactly the same boat. Really trying to focus on analog gear, especially with Behringer making it so cheap to experiment and try it out. I'm 50 and I've been playing keyboards since around 1984. But unfortunately that was pretty much the same year that digital slammed the market. By the time I was affluent enough to go buying and experimenting with various synthesizers that was pretty much all there was on the market. The first since I bought with my own money and also the first I gigged with, was a Korg N5ex. A few years later I bought at least I on because I had always wanted to try analog gear.... But it was the closest I could get in my price range. I think I spent 500 bucks on each of those two synths. My first experiences with true analog in my own studio still weren't actually completely analog. I eventually acquired a Kawai K3 and a Korg DW8000, both with analog filters but the waveforms were sampled. 2 years ago I bought behringer's Crave and Odyssey, finally getting to sink my teeth into true analog at last! I'm interested in getting a Moog Subharmonicon, Dreadbox Nymphes or similar as my next analog synth...but Wavestate is making me rethink that a little! 😏
I am loving this synth, finally managed to get hold of one despite Covid, and it is really a breath of fresh air: great sounds, and very well thought out, quick to navigate around, easy to program. Even the voice allocation is smart (like a Nord Lead 3), for example you can have a mono bass sound on the lowest note you're playing, a pad in the middle and a mono lead on the highest note, use the 4th track for drums and you have a band-in-a-box!! KORG are going to have to issue a big-brother version of this synth with a full keyboard 😘
The wait was agonizing! Still wish it had more keys or was a module...sigh ....Super nice to work with but a little intimidating at first glance.saving up for that , Korg! Performance controls rock my world!
Synth manufacturers are living in the 90's still when it comes to the output screens on the synths. The are in monochrome text like a raster or vector monitor and about 2"'-3"" . Event top end workstations and arrangers have a small output monitor with no option for an external monitor.
The 45k $ Fairlight had a screen but the Emulators for 7.5k $ won the day. Had to buy a computer and software to really dig in . Went for an Atari, Akai X7000 and 400 software for 2k. total. Mac was that much alone. Not sorry!
Thanks for the review! I'm glad that you like the synth. Re sample sorting: when in the Sample Select list, use PAGE + to go to the Filters & Sort Order page.
Excellent! I was so overwhelmed with the complexity of this machine when I saw all the controls, but now I fell confident enough to purchase it. Thank you very much.
I hope Korg will listen to user feedback, and continue to support the Wavestation with software updates, to address unforeseen shortcomings, and provide extra features. That is the kind of thing, that I really appreciate from a company. I for one, am willing to pay for updates that add features, as long as the updates that fix bugs, are free.
New update is amazing. Just made Wavestate into ultimate sample-based synth by allowing user sample building. Wavestate and Oktatrack - you are set for life when it comes to sample manipulation. Also, it is important to notice how much Elektron's sequencer resembles wave sequencing, in its core.
@@n_o_ The damn screen should be at least 2x bigger. It's the XXI century, wtf are they doing? it's worse than some home computers 40 years ago! Small displays are no big issue in synths that do not involve so much complexity, but that's not the case here. With so many samples, sequencing etc, Wavestate begs for more space on the screen.
Amazing review and tutorial. Probably the best I’ve seen for any keyboard. I am so excited to pick up the 61-key version of Wavestate as soon as it becomes available. Very inspiring! Thank you! This will be my first foray into synthesis.
I wanted to tell you about the garage sale I went to in the 1980s. Found a 14 inch celestron and equatorial mount on the rafters in the shed. they did not care about. , they wanted 800. True story! 4 bottles of windex later.
Very good tutorial. I just recently purchased one of these great machines, but there was only a very abridged manual added.. So by watching this video I can learn much more about this magic music box with all the capacities it contains!
I don't know. I own an original Wavestation (and the software version) and this really isn't all that different from either. So, I'm certain that there's been a hardware synth around for about 25 years that can function fairly similarly and a softsynth for nearly a decade as well. It sure would be nice to see Korg or Roland or Yamaha or any of the big synth manufacturers actually do some real R&D and advance the state of the art instead of digging up their back catalog to repackage old ideas as new ones to keep their lights on. The smaller players are certainly trying to do just that in some cases, but the big guys with all of the money and resources are like Disney: they play it safe by looking back instead of being courageous and taking a chance on something new and novel and different. Where are the FPGA additive or spectral modeling synths? Where are the hardware units with dedicated processors and RAM sufficient for true real-time physical modeling and additive synths? Where are the next - gen DSP chips that are commensurate with modern PC and server processors? If Korg and their contemporaries won't do it, then they'll have no right to cry when someone else DOES and wipes the floor with them in the next few years.
Brian McCalla I hear you. I got my WS 30 years ago.... the approach to synthesis is really a different paradigm here. Every synth since the 90s has a certain disappointment, ‘ what no vectors, no 256 stage envelopes or lfos only 4 waves shapes... ‘ Yeah... where’s the additive synths?
Brian McCalla To address the first part of your comment, I’m looking forward to a proper comparison between the original WS and this one. I’m primarily interested in how this DAC sounds versus the one of the original in an A/B comparison. The original Wavestation has an almost magical sound to it, with a pretty warm tone for being digital (although the JD-800/990 has it beat in when it comes to warmth). While this new one does appear to have expanded capabilities, I’m not sure it’s to the extent that I would get rid of my EX. As for the rest of what you said, I think Korg has taken a cue from Behringer and is going to push further into revivals and remakes. Behringer has a set of consumers with a voracious appetite for clones who will go on to rebuke the original companies for not reissuing what Behringer has cloned. Music companies like Korg see this and want to get in on the money while reclaiming their former glory in the eyes of consumers hungry for rehashes. Yamaha is catapulting further into this foray as well, with a poll back in Summer 2019 that asked if people wanted to see a CS-80 remake amongst other, more modern takes. But you’re absolutely right in asking where the new technologies are-the music tech industry appears to be a dog that gets paid to chase its tail. Hey, I like this old stuff a lot myself, but I concede that too little focus is being put into true innovations. In fact, it seems most companies are not pushing into new sound creation territories at all! It’s a shame, because in this world saturated with clones and vst repros, we need something fresh more than anything. We need new sounds with new ways to make them!
@@darklightprojector2688 if he was talking about behringer I can't help but laugh. Behringer has over 10k employees and an actual city full of factories manufacturing chips and synth parts. They are NOT "the little guy".
cubis Nah, it was crucial to talk about the company that all the other companies know is putting numbers on the board. I wasn’t really thinking about the ones OP refers to
Amazing lesson. Have been here a few times and will be coming back many many more for awhile. May be most watched youtube video ever for me and I have been here for 15 years or so, so that is a pretty high compliment sir!
The age of advanced modulation digital synths has begun for the under $800 market. WaveState - HydraSynth - Argon8 - maybe also the MinilogueXD when including the motion sequencer. I have been waiting for the digital revolution of deep modulation synthesis for 30 years - available in analog modular for over 30 years.
True that. I had a jx3p and it sounded good whatever I did, basically. I can get stumped for a bit using the modular/semi modular set up, but at the end find the sound I want to make. Modulation has it's place. Funny, I have been shopping that exact list all this week. I am drawn to the wavestate because it offers a ton of choices, that will keep us busy. I just want 1 more unit, just...1....more...more...
lol. I made a general comment 3 months ago when I first watched this video in "overview" mode. It was a large part of my decision to order one. I finally received my wavestate, and this video has much more meaning and I am working through it slowly now. This video really takes a lot of the scary out of operating the beast. btw, the momentum is building for your journey to rule the world of synth reviewers. I am seeing other videos where the author basically says to go see loopop about how, whatever they are playing with that day, functions. If you watch the korg tutorial series, you will see so many things they could have done better = bush league. lol stay safe...…..
Oh well hell, just when I thought I would never buy another synth... I absolutely love the Wavestatation but came to despise how predictable it sounded. This seems like perfection to me.
Yes, wavestation way overused, very tough to program. But, it can nest side by side now with it's genealogical descendent, if you kept one. Wavestation SR a real bargain right now. Maybe an EX if you have a few bucks.
@@TheSynthZone I still have an SR, I consolidated many years back and acquired it for my “compact essentials rack” I would love to have the full unit, but it’s hard to justify taking up the space as I also own Korg’s quite capable software emulation of the WS. 😀
amazing again ! wavestate + opsix could easily make one dive into a state of completely loosing the notion of time and space for days... thanks for another great review LOOPOP ! 👏
With every new synth announced, only two youtube channels matter. SonicState to check PWM capabilities (kidding), and Loopop for the full tutorial. And not affiliated with large german webshops, haha. This one nails it again. Keep up the good work man, much appreciated.
Some reviews are all talk and no play, some are sounds and no talking, but loopop reviews are more or less perfect, you get to hear what's on offer as well as a great tutorial on what does what. IMO the best Wavestate demo there is. And with a contents list on the side as well !!
Another Con: no aftertouch. Almost all of the WaveStation got ported over, but the 61 keys and the aftertouch. Hope Korg make a desktop/rack/app version with A/D input and sample loading.
as much as i'd like to order one of these right now, i'm going to wait on it. what i'm hoping is, that Korg released the current Wavestate to see how it sells. if it's a hit, perhaps they will release a expanded version of it later, with 61 keys, a bigger display, and more goodies.
Yeah, just got one and it definitely feels like a crappy toy. I wish it was built like the Hydrasynth. Shit, even the all plastic Korg DS8 feels 100 times better than this thing. It seriously feels like if it fell off a stand once it would shatter or if you shook it real hard it just wouldn't work at all. It's weird to me because it seems like if you're building a synth very small and light you are aiming for the easy tour synth market but if it's meant to go on the road it probably shouldn't be make out of cardboard and tissue paper.
I just bought a Minilogue xd and when I saw this video thumbnail, not knowing what it was yet, I immediately got scared and thought "nooooo!". I was thinking I would want this instead... upon watching this video I'm thinking "nope, I'm definitely good with the xd" :)
They are very different synths. The minilogue is more for basic bread and butter synth sounds, this is for more convoluted and evolving textural sounds.
@@sacredgeometry I'd say it can do a lot more than the "bread and butter" stuff, especially with the custom oscillator section. Also, love your name. :)
This synth looks incredible, a monster for pads and evolving sounds, but I worry it will be overhwelming - too many options, menu diving, etc. - I don't know if I'd have the patience for it.
More likely Steve's nightmare. He once swore off of soft synths and non analog gear because he forsaw people grabbing a program or machine and making inroads....his sales not too high lately, I enjoy the personal feel of his attitude and sound. I want to emulate his stuff a bit, must admit. No one has a strangle hold on a sound anymore, very personal. I like my own as well as certain others? Allrighty then!
CO5MA You should check out some of the iOS apps out there. You’d be surprised how great some of them sound. Although, I always find hardware feels and sounds better, but isn’t this digital, “software in a box”? The $800 price point surprised me, I was expecting around the $650 price point. I preordered mine, but wasn’t given a ship date.
After Nothings End I have tons of hardware synths and tons of VST/Apps on my MacBook and iPad. But at the end of the day, when i need/want instant fun, I only use my hardware synths or my modular. I love Falcon, Omnisphere, Dexed, Animoog, Korg Gadget... but I could not live without my Waldorf Quantum or my Elektron Digitone :)
Well, if you have a 500 dollar sound card and a 1.5 k computer you can make a 50 dollar program rock your world. Or just buy a piece of gear and have at it. I love choices.
AUM and many iOS great synth apps allows you to construct 4,6,8-part multi-timbral synths/arps/seqs. But hardware is always more fun - turning real knobs is much easier.
It’s a really good tutorial for people who already are advanced tech people. For a musician without earlier experience it’s like most RU-vid tutorials - a slap in the face. The problem is that the performer knows it all and the reciever don’t know anything. 👨🎓🎶
You do need to know synth basics before watching a review about an advanced synth like this, but you certainly should not see that as a slap in the face
loopop I’m sorry, I didn’t feel that way myself. But I have had that feeling during some years when I have tried so hard from 0 knowledge to grasp a home studio and now I start to understand better. But it would be great with different levels on tutorials in general. From beginners to pro. So many musicians get their own home studio now and most tutorials are for advanced users. That was my point of view! I will watch your very good tutorial over and over until I can control my new instrument. Finally - Thank’s for sharing! 👍🎧🎶❤️
I totally agree. I am still waiting for desktop... The 61-key version will be expensive, but that is what Korg should have been doing all the time: desktops and fully functional 61-key AT versions instead of those crippled 37-keys in Opsix, Wavestate or minilogue xd. At least they did minilogue xd desktop.
I find the Wavestate a bit mind boggling but I am getting to grips with it. However, this has made things much, much clearer. What would we synth users do without loopop. Once again thanks for a very useful video.
Thanks a lot - I appreciate the time you spent getting busy with the Wavestate to get familiar with the features and then even bring it to such a level to be able to do a very smooth 45min performance without stumbling around. Really good!
While there's a Steep learning curve, you learn it with practice. I want to buy it and use but English is not my first Language. More challenging I guess for me. Don't give up before even having started mate!!
Sounds like someones changing the preset knob while I'm tryin to jam. Enya revival anyone? Does it do the Seinfeld bass slap? Enigma cover band anyone?
