The history of the Roland TB-303
Few instruments have as curious a story as the Roland Transistor Bass 303. Originally conceived by Tadao Kikumoto and released in 1982 as a practice accompaniment for bands and musicians lacking a bassist, it turned out to be useless for this purpose. The sequencer was too clunky to program on the go and more importantly the highly artificial sound made it laughable in a band context. This quickly delegated the TB-303 to the bargain bin and production ended in 1984. It was not long before it was picked up by producers and DJs at this bargain price, however, and this gave the device new purpose.
While the intricacies of how this device was used are a subject in and of itself, the short version of the story is that the unique filter had potentials unintended by its creator. People would use it to make harmonically rich, squelching baselines and the group Phuture used this device to create the entire genre of Acid House with their song ”Acid Tracks”. Users would also utilize a glitch in the low voltage failure mode of the device to erase the sequence library and generate new, random ones.
Here is a type of misuse quite similar to the ones I practice within Ableton Live. The device was interrogated for fault as well as for what was able to be excaggerated, which lead to sounds that would not have happened intentionally.13