ROLAND VK-8M

Dec 1, 2003 12:00 PM, By Nick Peck

Overall EM Rating (1 through 5): 4

The VK-8M ($995) is a 3.75-pound tabletop organ module that's part of Roland's VK (“Virtual Tone Wheel”) line of Hammond-organ simulators. At about 9 inches wide and 11 inches deep, this desktop unit won't take up a lot of your studio real estate, and it gives you real-time performance control that's difficult to equal with a software organ plug-in.

The VK-8M's intelligent layout puts all the important knobs and buttons where you can easily grab them. The controls are big and easy to see, and there are plenty of useful LED status indicators. The casing is metallic gray with wood side panels.

Wheels and Bars

The most important controls on any tone-wheel organ are the drawbars. The VK-8M has one set of nine drawbars (not four sets as on a real Hammond), but they can be assigned to control any of the three sounds that the VK-8M can simultaneously emulate: upper manual, lower manual, or pedal (bass).

Rather than using sampling technology, the VK-8M physically models the 91 tone wheels that actually generate the sound in a traditional organ. This approach means that the VK-8M is fully polyphonic and can change drawbar sounds convincingly on the fly.

Above the drawbars are six preset-selection buttons, as well as controls to edit and write your own presets. You can store a total of 36 presets, which can contain custom settings for the drawbars and the VK-8M's other editable parameters. There are two channel modes: Single-Channel Mode sets the VK-8M to play a single sound, and Multi-Channel Mode allows different incoming MIDI channels to trigger separate upper manual, lower manual, and pedal sounds.

In the Rotation

I was knocked out by the VK-8M's Leslie simulation, which really captures the spirit and sound of the real thing. It's controlled by a Brake button and a Slow/Fast speed selector. A pair of LEDs blink alternately in time to the speed of the virtual rotor. The Leslie simulator has 15 editable parameters, which gives you plenty of tweaking potential — but even the stock settings sound great.

The two other primary tone-shaping attributes of the VK-8M are the Vibrato, Chorus, and Percussion effects. The VK-8M does a pretty good job of emulating a B-3 or C-3's vibrato and chorusing. I wasn't as impressed with the percussion simulation, which was too bright and pingy for my taste.

Roland's COSM amplifier-modeling technology mimics four amp types. The Overdrive and Tone knobs let you dial in a wide variety of sounds from classical organ to Deep Purple raunch. Reverb section choices are Room, Hall, Church, and Spring. The reverbs sound good, but parameter control is minimal. In the studio I would probably choose to turn off the internal reverb and use an external processor during mixdown.

Beam Me Up

Roland has included one of its theremin-style D Beam sensors on the VK-8M. It lets you use hand motions to simulate a series of Hammond-specific effects, including the sound of the motor being powered down and of a spring reverb unit being smacked. You can also use the D Beam to create a crescendo effect and switch Leslie speeds.

The rear panel includes stereo audio outputs, a volume-pedal input, MIDI In and Out jacks, and a stereo pair of keyboard inputs for mixing your MIDI keyboard's audio with that of the VK-8M.

Getting the Sound

Is the VK-8M indistinguishable from a Hammond B-3 or C-3? Well, no. There is a certain meatiness to those keyboards running through a tube-Leslie speaker that no emulation can duplicate. That said, the VK-8M is right up there with the best organ simulators I've heard. It sounds musical, which is ultimately what counts.

Roland has done a good job with the VK-8M. The organ tone, while a bit less beefy than a real Hammond, is serviceable. The Leslie simulation and the Vibrato and Chorus settings sound accurate and really animate the sound. The amplifier section has a wide variety of distortion algorithms that markedly change the color of the instrument, and the drawbars and D Beam add the element of real-time control. Best of all, I can take it from my studio to a gig by tossing it on the front seat of my car with one hand. Try that with the real thing.

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Roland Corporation U.S.
tel. (323) 890-3700
Web www.rolandus.com