Electribe
S ES-1
Rhythm Production Sampler
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This box is the bomb! I am very fond of "lower grade" samplers, because of the characteristics they add to samples. One of my favorite samplers is still my Roland W-30, which samples at a maximum of 30kHz - very similar to this little Korg sampler. The ES-1 is part of the first wave of Electribes, together with the ER-1 drum machine, and EA-1 synth. It is a rhythm sampler, very immediate and easy to use. The on-board effects are phenomenal, especially the most "extreme" ones like Ring Modulation, Distortion, and Decimator. The separate Delay is musical and lends itself very well to electronica styles. The concept of Motion Sequence is superb, and it's possible to record and play back your edits and "tweaks" in real time - |
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The sampling memory is a generous 90 seconds. I know that this doesn't sound much in these days of gigabyte-streaming soft-samplers, but compared to old school samplers, is certainly more than adequate... plus, this is not meant to be a full fledged sampler, but a sampling drum machine, so the majority of sounds you will load in it will be extremely small drum, percussion and effect samples... It's now been superseded by the ES-1 MkII and the new ESX1, but it's definitely a very useful piece of equipment. |
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Korg ES-1 audio demos
Here are the three on-board demo songs.
Korg ES-1 Factory Patterns
| Pattern name with audio demo | My comments |
| A01 Hardstep | Classic Drum 'n' Bass pattern |
| A02 Darkside | Variation on the above, with typical sub-bass line |
| A03 Crumb and Mace | Here the Motion Sequence is used to great effect to obtain the "robot" drum fx, via the Delay unit |
| A04 Sizing it Up | Super pattern reminiscent of Roni Size style (contrabass line) |
| A05 Tribal Step | Nice and happy Drum 'n' Bass |
| A06 Mad Walking Bass | Another superb Roni Size influenced pattern |
| A07 Cyber Funk | Superb rhythm programming and cool robotic effects |
| A08 Rave Jump Up | Cool D 'n' B |
| A09 Filter Bass | Fantastic pattern that employs Motion Seq to control the Resonant Filter effect in real time... starting from an innocuous synth bass sample |
| A10 Dark & Cyber | Another fine D 'n' B loop |
| A11 Boosted Jazz | Interesting and powerful |
| A12 Flangungle | Very good Drum 'n' Bass pattern utilizing the Flanger unit |
| A13 Digimix | Happy mix |
| A14 Steppa | Modern D 'n' B style |
| A15 Bass Jacks | Very nice House style |
| A16 Tek House | Sensational Deep House pattern |
| A17 Tribal House | Nice breakbeat |
| A18 Phased House | The great Phaser on board |
| A19 Crazy House | Crazy bass ;-) |
| A20 Garage House | Phenomenal Garage House pattern |
| A21 System “R” | Excellent programming, Kraftwerkian, robotic |
| A22 Tech Garage | Another great House pattern |
| A23 Two Step | The typical British style |
| A24 Warped Two Step | Variation |
| A25 Deep Space | Showcasing the beautiful Delay on the ES-1 |
| A26 Sweep Trance | Charming late 90s/early 2000s Trance |
| A27 Epic Trance | Classic "hands-in-the-air" Anthem Trance |
| A28 Barealic | Harder Ibiza |
| A29 Minimal | Very good, classic minimal Techno |
| A30 Breakbeats Trance | Nice snare programming |
| A31 Psychedelic | Very busy |
| A32 Filter Breakbeats | Love that ES-1 Resonant Filter |
| A33 Distorted Slice | Superb Techno pattern |
| A34 Machine Music | Powerful Techno |
| A35 Boom Room | Reminiscent of certain Kraftwerk atmospheres, mixed with more modern Electro |
| A36 Hardcore Electro | Definitely Hardcore! |
| A37 Can We Come Up | Nice 16-beat |
| A38 Glow Stix | Classic Rave style |
| A39 Brooklyn Style | Fine Techno |
| A40 DJ Hop | Psychedelic Hip-Hop here |
| A41 Wah Hop | Very nice guitar line utilizing the on-board Wah-Wah |
| A42 R&B Vibe | Mellow and good |
| A43 Muddy Hop | Hard |
| A44 Rock’n’Hop | Harder |
| A45 Hum Ring | Swinging cool |
| A46 Baggy Pants | Fantastic, classic Gangsta Rap pattern |
| A47 Bristol Beat | British Hip-Hop variation |
| A48 Swingy Breakz | Regular beat |
| A49 B-Boy | Nice old-school rhtyhtm |
| A50 Future Jazz | Very nice and jazzy |
| A51 Boomy Big Beat | Nice Big Beat |
| A52 Pushin’ | Cool Acid line |
| A53 Rollicking Breakz | Awesome beat programming ;-) |
| A54 Sweep Rockin’ Beats | A nod to the Chemical Brothers :-) |
| A55 Big Red Beets | More Big Beat |
| A56 Spot | Abstract |
| A57 Hardcore BreakBeat | Can you say "distort"? |
| A58 Digital Punk | Evil! |
| A59 Expanded Onion | Love the name, and the 303 line |
| A60 Xplosive | In a tin can |
| A61 Rx Bros. | Another tribute to the great Chemical Brothers |
| A62 Industrial | Yep |
| A63 Latin Funk | Great congas! |
| A64 African Desert | Stupendous caravan in the Sahara |
Korg ES-1 specifications
| Year of release: | 2000 |
| Polyphony: | |
| Sound generation method: | PCM |
| Preset memories | |
| MIDI: | |
| Sound expansion capabilities: | load/save samples via SmartMedia card |
| Sequencer | yes |
| Arpeggiator | no |
| Effects | yes |
Korg ES-1 pictures
(click on thumbnails to enlarge)
Korg ES-1 manuals
available at www.korg.com
Links
| SITE | Type of resource | DESCRIPTION |
Korg ES-1 review with audio demo