The Roland TR-909 Rhythm Composer, commonly known as the 909, is a drum machine introduced by Roland Corporation in 1983, succeeding the TR-808. It was the first Roland drum machine to use samples for some sounds, and the first with MIDI functionality, allowing it to synchronize with other devices.
The 909 was a commercial failure, as users preferred the more realistic sounds of competing products such as the LinnDrum. Roland ceased production after one year, having built 10,000 units. The 909 influenced the development of electronic dance music genres such as techno, house and acid house.
Development
The TR-909 was designed by Tadao Kikumoto, who had also led development on Roland's previous drum machine, the TR-808, and designed the Roland TB-303 synthesizer. Makoto Muroi was a chief engineer, the software was developed by Atsushi Hoshiai, and the voice circuits were developed by Yoshiro Oue.
The 909 was the first Roland drum machine to use samples, for its crash, ride and hi-hat sounds. Hoshiai recorded his own drum kit for the cymbals, using a pair of Paiste and Zildjian hi-hat cymbals for the hi-hat and a Paiste crash for the crash and ride sounds. The cymbals were recorded in the Roland office after the employees had left for its natural reverberation. It has 11 percussion voices and offers sounds for bass drum, snare, toms, rimshot, clap, crash cymbal, ride cymbal and hi-hat (open and closed). It omits the clave, cowbell, maracas, and conga sounds from the 808. The sequencer can chain up to 96 patterns into songs of up to 896 measures, and offers controls including shuffle and flam.
In its review, Electronics & Music Maker found the 909 easier to use than the 808 and felt it offered the best analog drum sounds on the market. It concluded that it offered a good combination of analog and sampled sounds and that the addition of MIDI brought the 909 "as up to date as it needs to be".
Legacy
Whereas the 808 was important in the development of hip hop, the 909, alongside the TB-303 synthesizer, influenced dance music such as techno, house and acid. According to Gordon Reid of Sound on Sound, "Like the TR-808 before it, nobody could have predicted the reverence in which the 909 would eventually come to be held." the electronic album S-F-X by Haruomi Hosono, and the EP Remission by the industrial band Skinny Puppy. Another early 909 user was Kurtis Mantronik, who used it on records by his hip-hop group Mantronix and records he produced such as Back to the Old School (1986) by Just-Ice. Mills said its design made it possible to "play" the 909 rather than just program it, using the tuning controls to imitate the feel of a live drummer. That decade, the 909 was adopted by pop musicians such as Madonna and Pet Shop Boys, and Radiohead used it on "Videotape" from their 2007 album In Rainbows. Electronic artists such as Kirk Degiorgio and Cristian Vogel created sample libraries by recording their friends' machines.