Korg Krome review

INTERFACE

The Krome has a resistive touchscreen, and while it doesn’t have the responsiveness of an iPad it is still responsive for a resistive screen. It’s a colour touchscreen, but colour is used sparingly so that it accentuates certain items but doesn’t obfuscate. Sadly, you can’t tilt the screen, so some of the screen did appear washed out when were seated. We had no problem viewing the screen when standing, but you won’t always want to use the Krome while stood.

The Krome uses a windowed interface, with users able to move through different screens via tabs. Pressing certain buttons will display extra, context-sensitive dialogs. If you can use a computer you’ll have no problem getting to grips with the Krome’s interface.

We found we could select vast majority of the interface’s onscreen controls without problem, but some controls, such as those at the extremes of the touchscreen, proved tricky to press. Some onscreen controls, such as the 3-band equaliser present with each program, can be controlled with physical controls too. You can select the low-frequency equaliser, for example, and use the Krome’s dial control to cut or boost the frequency band.

With the Korg Krome, you can use the instrument in a way that suits you and your workflow.

SEQUENCER

One area where we did wish we had access to a mouse, however, is the Krome’s built-in 16-track sequencer. The Krome provides you with some advanced sequencing features, including the ability to select and edit individual notes that you’ve recorded, as well as velocity information. You can cut and copy bars from one location, for instance, and paste them into another spot. It’s possible to do this on screen, but it is fiddly, and the use of a mouse would make this process easier. The ability to connect a mouse would be a great feature for the next generation of the Krome.

You can either record your performances in real-time or use a step sequencer, and you can view and edit changes in a piano roll view, where you can insert, change or delete note and velocity data. The piano roll screen looks just like the ones you’d expect to find in a regular DAW, and mobile apps such as FL Studio. Again, there’s a great deal of flexibility in the way you construct, edit and create songs, and you can either take a more pattern-based, building block approach, record entire songs in real-time or use a combination of the two.

You can even assign patterns to individual keys and then record songs in real-time by playing the notes to which those notes are assigned.

The Krome really does give you the freedom to just switch on and perform, and its powerful sequencer and large touchscreen make the Krome an excellent machine on which to create songs or simply perform. The Krome’s interface and touchscreen are starting to show their age and we’d prefer a capacitive screen, but otherwise the interface is easy to see and use, with all the features you’d need. The Korg Krome proves there are still great reasons to buy a workstation keyboard in this age of dumb controllers and software instruments.