The Roland SP-404 Sampling Workstation is a discontinued sampler made by

Roland Corporation is a Japanese manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, electronic equipment, and software. It was founded by Ikutaro Kakehashi in Osaka on 18 April 1972. In 2005, its headquarters relocated to Hamamatsu in Shizuoka Prefecture. It has fact ...

. Released in 2005, it is part of the SP family and successor to where

Boss Corporation Boss is a manufacturer of Effects unit, effects pedals for electric guitar and bass guitar. It is a division of the Roland Corporation, a Japanese manufacturer that specializes in musical equipment and accessories. For many years Boss has manu ...

’s

SP-505 The BOSS SP-505 Groove Sampling Workstation/SP-505 is a sampling workstation made by Boss Corporation, which is a division of Roland Corporation. The digital sampler is part of the SP family and was released in the year of 2002, as a follow-up to R ...

sampler left off. The sampler was succeeded by the

SP-555 The Roland SP-555 is a discontinued music sampler manufactured by Roland Corporation. The 555 is part of the SP family, which includes Boss’s popular SP-303 and Roland's SP-404 installments. The sampler was released in 2008. Features The SP-55 ...

in 2008, but was later given its own upgrade as the Roland SP-404SX Linear Wave Sampler in 2009. Another upgrade, the Roland SP-404A Linear Wave Sampler was released in 2017. A third upgrade, the SP-404MKII was released in 2021. The Roland SP-404 has played a huge role in influencing the sound of popular music genre Lo-Fi Beats.

Features

OG / SX / A

Having the traditional features of the Roland Grooveboxes, the 404 has the ability to record audio directly via line/mic, or import/export industry-standard WAV and AIF files via CompactFlash card. An onboard pattern sequencer allows up to 8,000 notes to be recorded in real time. Pattern data can be quantized and up to 24 patterns, each 1–99 measures long, can be stored in the internal memory. Using a 1GB CompactFlash card, sampling times can be as long as approximately 772 minutes in Lo-Fi mode, or up to 386 minutes long in Standard mode. However, the 404 (along with its own upgrades) lacks the

D-Beam The D-Beam was originally manufactured by Interactive Light, as a stand-alone unit, around 1996. It was then soon purchased by Roland Corporation, becoming trademarked and rebranded as D-Beam Controller for their own music equipment. Background Aft ...

feature of the previous SP-808 and SP-606 installments. Although the first bank comes with preset samples that are protected, these samples can be removed by holding "cancel" as you turn it on
This allows you to delete the samples from the protected bank.

MKII

Released in 2021, the 404MKII was a significant upgrade, while retaining the unit's original form factor. Among the new features were an OLED display capable of showing sample waveforms, USB-C and 32-note polyphony. The device was also given a new "Skip Back Sampling" feature with the addition of a "Mark" Button. This feature provides users the option to record the most recent 40 seconds of usage with the press of the button. The sampler itself holds up to 16 GB of internal memory, with an OLED screen display for visual editing in real time.

In popular culture

A number of musicians have used either the SP-303 and/or the SP-404 as part of their production and performance. These include

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, Odd Nosdam, Alias, J Dilla, Madlib, Joji, MF Doom,

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, Milo, Flying Lotus, James Blake, Samiyam,

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, Grimes, Pictureplane, Four Tet, Beck Hansen, Bradford Cox of

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and

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, Spindrift, Toro y Moi,

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, El Guincho, Illmind, Dibia$e, Jim James of My Morning Jacket, Oneohtrix Point Never (Daniel Lopatin),

Matt Mondanile Matthew A. Mondanile is an American guitarist, singer and songwriter. He is best known as the former lead guitarist of the American indie rock band Real Estate (band), Real Estate, with whom he recorded three studio albums, and for his solo music ...

of Ducktails,

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, Mad Professor, and many others. Jan Linton was hired by Roland in 2005 to produce a promotional European sound card for the SP404.

References

External links

Roland SP-404 Sampling Workstation, Roland SP-404SX/SP-404A Linear Wave Sampler

SP-Forums.com - An active forum dedicated to Roland's SP range
{{Roland Corporation SP-404 Samplers (musical instrument) Roland Workstations Grooveboxes Music sequencers Sound modules Music workstations Hip hop production Japanese inventions