Korg Volca Bass 5-stars Reviews

Powerful Bass Synth

Powerful Bass Synth - Definitely NOT A Toy!!!

One of the first and one of the best Volcas

There are many many synths in the Korg Volca lineup and it becomes a bit tricky to keep track of them, but the Volca bass, together with Beats and Keys, is one of the first. Out of those three, the Bass is definitely the fattest sounding one! Its sequencer is also quite nice, but I also had huge amounts of fun by plugging a pitch to midi controller into it and playing the instrument using my guitar. In short, this synth has balls!

I have two of them to play in stereo. I love analog synths and vert happy with two of this and two keys. They r not as beefy as a Moog, but way less expensive. I wish they would send them with power supply and big jack outputs, because almost nobody would play this with phones, and If u want to record u have to find one adapter... Other then that I think they r great value.

dont let size and name fool you - this is a versatile synth

Yes, it is called Volca Bass. No, its is not bass module only. Remember Novation Bass Station? Know those lush pads and nice arps coming ut of it?

This is different story sonically, but there is much more than just bass. Yes you can make any bass sound with 3 oscillators , but also you can get very nice analogue sounds that are far from low end. I like using this as detuned pad, to go Boards of Canada style.

I own more high end analogue gear but this one was my first Volca (have a few now) and gotta say it is a part of every track that i make.

Cons - it would be cool to have external input on that nice filter, no midi out, more features in envelope, but still it is a great device for the buck.

LOVE IT

This Vocla Bass is a lot of fun and sounds great, for anyone who is into music production and wants to get started this is ideal to learn the very basics. Even my father has enjoyed playing around on this.

Fun synth

I really enjoy this Volca synth. It's very versatile with the 3 voices and it's a lot of fun and easy to play. It lends itself well to live jams. You'll sound like an Acid House superstar in no time, as the sequencer is very user friendly. Being a very compact unit, it's sometimes difficult to get to the small knobs but that is to be expected. All-in-all, I really recommend it.

My First Synth

I got into hardware (and analog) synthesisers recently and after some weeks of research and following recommendations from expert friends, I bought the Volca Bass as my first instrument.

I spent several months learning it inside out and I am in love with it. I had the chance to learn a lot about subtractive synthesis thanks to its simple flow that yield to exploration and experimentation.

It is limited compared to more expensive instruments but it has lots of depth and can be used for a lot of sounds, from wobbly basses to some spacey pads. It is so simple to do some acid techno but it can also create soundscapes and drones.

The filter is amazing considering it's simplicity and with a bit of resonance at the right spot, it can be really gritty and distorted.

The only drawbacks that I can list are the limited ribbon keyboard (the Volca Keys has a better one) and the very small knobs that limit the fine tuning of some parameters. Additionally the lack of motion recording is a pity.

All in all, it is a very nice little machine for beginners and for who wants to express their creativity through constraints.

Wonderful

It is a nice underrated synth.

You can do very good bass and lead sounds with it.

I'm using these volca essentialy to make bass lines.

EVEN WITH THE PRICE HIKE!!! STILL A WINNER!!!

Can't go wrong....it ain't a 303 so move on....

But it's one HELL of a beast...

See my mate Nick@sonicstate review this thing...

EPIC 3 OSC MADNESS!!!!

Great little machine!

The volca bass totally surpasses my expectations by leaps and bounds. It's an extremely versatile machine for it's size and really packs a lot in. There are specific dials for each desired control to give you great accuracy in weaving your desired sounds, as well as great function settings to toy with, like active step, which I personally use to create much faster hard-hitting techno loops. Teaming VCO's together gives the volca bass a much richer sound than I imagined it would have.

Pros:

The vast amount of possibilities for such a small price.

The built in speaker & battery power options that make this synth 100% portable and useful for people who want to make music on the go without a laptop - great for bus journeys etc with headphones.

3x VCO's that can be used individually OR in tandem for even more diverse sounds.

Built-in sequencer. Hook this machine up through MIDI / sync and sequence like mad with the rest of your studio. Let it play while you toy with the sounds for some off the cuff deep-house and techno vibes.

Cons:

One positive about this machine is it's size - it's small and portable, but with that comes even smaller dials. It can talk a bit of time to get the tempo dial to be at the exact number you want, for example.

Other than that - no cons. You're getting what you pay for and it works well!

good for starters, campers, travellers....

Enormous value for little money

It's a 3x oscillator, 100% analogue synth, for less than 150 euros. We can stop right there - it's a must have.

Plus it has a really cool sequencer, which is very intuitive and easy to use. Although limited to 16 steps (or one bar). However, you can connect it to your DAW via midi cable, have your sequences running from there, and have as many bars as you want.

Oscillators sound really nice, as well as the filter, which turns into a beast with a lot of resonance. Without running it through any external devices, you can get an overdrive, which is a nice little bonus.

It is marketed as a monophonic bass synth, but it's a lot more. Actually it has a secret. It's not completely monophonic. You can sequence different notes for every OSC if you're using it's sequencer, or set different semitones for every OSC. By these methods you can even get triad chords out of it, which could be useful if you're making dub / techno dub music for example.

Another great thing is that it has an LFO which can go very fast, you can enter the audible range with it. It allows you to get all kinds of weird sounds.

The only complaint would be, that it's build doesn't feel very solid, it's plastic, wobbly, feels cheap. But hey, for this price, it's OK. If you take good care of your equipment, it shouldn't be a problem. And despite all of that, it looks very good.

There's also a little speaker integrated, and it can run with batteries. But I personally, find these features useless.

Overall, excellent product. Definitely a must have if your budget is limited, but you want a proper analogue synth. And Korg Volca Bass is exactly that.

Utility bass machine at unbelievably low cost

To be honest i want expecting to be that good (for the amount of money)! got it just to play around cause of it's size and finally it became a studio resident and a replacement of all my soft synths for the bass duties.

Instant hands on, very easy to learn, understand and come up with a superb sound that will shake bodies and walls! Fantastic filter that can scream very loud and be also very pleasant.

The little knobs feel a bit fragile but no something to worry about. For the price i dont think it could get any better! weldone Korg!

Exceptional

Can't say enough about this. I'm a newbie and the ease at which I've picked up using this little grovebox is ridiculous. Synced with the korg volca bass its just hours of fun and and great music.

When I opened the box my first impression was that its very small but that's a bonus also batteries included. I would recommend getting the power adapter for handyness sake.

Simply it's a party in a little box!

Little synth, Big sound!

Okay this little volca is a great tool and opens up new worlds when having to take the time to process the sound through analog paths. Add a reverb, delay or a wah wah on this little beast and you get the next level of sound exploration. I like to add this Volca to different sources like amps and different effects pedals. I also record everything on a 4-track tape machine for that retro effect and i gotta say that most of all it is just fun. This way i can keep up my signal flow skills and find creative ways of doing different effects whether it is recording a reverb from a new space or dubbing stuff on one track and feeding it back to different formats like VHS (great for drums). I love the Volca series and am waiting for the new Sample to arrive someday :) Great bass, good tweak ability and a cool thing to wrap your mind around. Keep discovering something new everyday!

big bass from a little box

the korg volca bass is brilliant.

the features included in this little box, at this price point are excellent.

it has three tunable vco's to enable you to, in effect, layer three different bass parts down as well as having the function to play live over the top. you can have one, two or three vco's all seperate or uniting and playing together.

ultimately a very powerful little package.

a 6 octave range, lfo, step sequencer and midi-in complete a super machine.

again this volca doesnt come with a power adaptor but comes with 6 batteries to get you having fun out the box, and a lot of fun it is to play with.

the volca bass is fantastic....

Handy toolset for home studio (about all Korg Volca series)

Volca Bass produces rich series of analog bass sound that I can classify as from "classics of acid" to "smooth dubstep" range.

Front panel of Volca Bass have very easy to use, intuitive interface. Almost all controls available instantly but only some of them via FUNC + button.

Any product of Volca series uses 16-step build in sequencer with 8 additional memory slots so you can store your latest work just in few seconds. By the way, you can always restore factory default by pressing special combination of keys when powering on your Volca device.

Volca Bass equipped with MIDI IN, SYNC in/out, headphones out. No additional audio inputs/outputs available for "in set" connectivity, so features is only at "okay" grade.

It can be powered by AC adapter (KA-350, costs about ~30euros) or with six AA alkaline batteries.