Roland GR-100 Electronic Guitar

"It’s little, yellow, different."

Introduction to the GR-100:

The Roland GR-100 is the least known of all the vintage Roland guitar synthesizers. The GR-100 is basically a one-trick pony, a super hex-fuzz machine. If six fuzz pedals with six -12 dB low-pass filters can make a guitar synthesizer, then this is a guitar synthesizer. But Roland wisely decided to call the GR-100 an "electronic guitar," whatever that means. I would have to say it is a fuzz box with an adequate filter and a very nice chorus and vibrato circuit.

The GR-100 Synth Engine:

The GR-100 has its own internal hex-fuzz circuit. In this way, it is very different from the GR-300. The GR-300 generates its hex-fuzz sound by using the hex-fuzz circuitry contained in the guitar controller. For example, the G-202 has a different hex-fuzz circuit than the G-808. And the G-707 has no hex-fuzz circuit at all. But none of that matters with the GR-100, as it has a slightly more sophisticated version of the G-303/G-808 hex-fuzz design.

The hex-fuzz in the GR-100 is smoother than what you hear with a GR-300, and it also has an additional sustain feature. With the mode switch in the down position (mode 1), you hear guitar only. In the middle position (mode 2) you hear the basic GR-100 hex-fuzz sound, and with the switch in the up position (mode 3) you hear the GR-100 hex-fuzz sound with an additional sustain/compression circuit. As a side note, the hex-fuzz circuit in the RC-1324 is designed to emulate this overdriven, mode 3 hex-fuzz sound.

The other addition to the GR-100 is six -12 dB low-pass filters, one for each string. If you have listened to filter sweeps using the GR-300, you may be a little disappointed with the GR-100. The GR-300 filter is a -24 dB low-pass design, meaning you can get fairly dramatic sweeps. The GR-100 only has half of the range of the GR-300, so the effect is rather more like sweeping the tone controls on your amp. Like the GR-300, the GR-100 has the ability to modulate the filter cutoff with string dynamics using the sensitivity control, and control can be inverted as well. The GR-100 also includes an adjustable frequency peak as well. It sounds good, however, one cannot but wish that it had the same -24 dB filter range as the GR-300.

The nicest feature of the GR-100 is the chorus and vibrato circuit. What can I say? This is vintage Roland analog sound. Owning a GR-100 just for the chorus and vibrato sound may be a bit extreme, but like so much of the analog world, there is nothing else quite as sweet and unique as the GR-100’s chorus and vibrato. And, in a nice touch, the Vibrato LED does not glow until the Vibrato circuit is actually engaged with the touch pads. Cool.

Features of the GR-100:

Complex Hex-Fuzz Circuit

Addition Sustain Overdrive (mode 3)

6 Individual -12 dB Low-Pass Voltage Controlled Filters, One Per String

Frequency Peak and Sensitivity Controls for VCFs

Built-in footswitch controls the VCF mode (on, bypass, or inverted)

Low Frequency Oscillator, for Vibrato Effects

Lush Analog Chorus Mode

Stereo Ouput

Pedal control input for the VCF

The GR-100 can output either the guitar, the synth, or a mix of the two

Synchronized, flashing LED status indicators

All-Analog Construction

The GR-100 and G-202:

One of the rarer G-202 guitars in a clear finish. The G-202 was the "budget" guitar synthesizer controller from Roland.

The GR-300 was packaged with the G-303 or G-808 controller, and the GR-100 was similarly released with the G-202. The GR-100/G-202 setup was presented as a more affordable version of the Roland guitar synthesizer family. This package could also explain why the G-202 has a simpler hex-fuzz circuit than the G-303/505/808. The depth and control of the GR-100 made a complex hex-fuzz circuit in the G-202 unnecessary.

Who uses the GR-100?

You would be hard-pressed to find a lot of people playing the GR-100. The most prominent use of the GR-100 that I could find was in reference to Andy Summers, the guitar synth innovator and genius six-stringer in the Police. The "Y-splitter" referred to in the quote is a Roland US-2.

Engineer Hugh Padgham had this to say about Andy’s guitar rig used during the recording of Every Breath You Take:

"A lot of the synthesizer parts on the Police records were played through a guitar synth that Andy would play," Padgham continues. "It was a Roland guitar synth with a pick-up either put on one of his guitars or they actually made their own guitar with a pick-up on it. Roland made two guitar synthesizers in those days - one was blue and one was yellow - and Andy would split the guitar signal: Come out of the guitar, go into a Y splitter into the blue synth and into the yellow synth, and they would, in turn, both feed their own Marshall amplifier with a 4x-12 cab turned up very loud. Then we’d mike the cabinet, so we got a subtly different sound coming out of each Marshall, again one going to the left speaker and one going to the right. So a lot of those swelly synth sounds would be his guitar amp, although we did have a Prophet synthesizer and some Oberheim synthesizers, as well."

GR-100 Block Diagram:

Click on the above diagram to open a much larger picture in a new window.

Details:


Front panel controls for Filter modulation, Vibrato and Chorus.	Three audio outputs: Chorus, Mix E.G. and Direct guitar. Filter pedal input.

Video Demos of the GR-100:

	XJ-S with GR-100 and delay effects.
	In this video the XJ-S drives a Roland GR-100, with 800 ms delay effects added on the Yamaha 01V mixing console. After clean guitar, mode I and mode II are heard, then chorus is added and filter modulation.
	IMG2010 with GR-100
	This video is a quick introduction to the sounds and features of the IMG-2010 and GR-100. Each IMG-2010 control is demonstrated: CV1 filter, CV2 resonance, balance, etc, and you can hear the effect on a Roland GR-100.

GR-100 Musical Samples:


First, chords played with basic hex-fuzz, then sustained, then sustained with envelope modulation.	Mode 2 (basic hex-fuzz) with filter modulation. The melody is "The Red One" by Pat Metheny.	Mode 3 (sustained hex-fuzz) with filter modulation. The melody is "The Red One" by Pat Metheny.	Singing, sustained lead using Mode 3 from "Flight to Paradise." by Ricky Green.

Audio samples recorded with Digital Performer. Digital Performer adds the reverb and delay. I used the Mix/E.G. output and the Chorus output panned hard left and right for a stereo image. Some of the phrases have GR-100 vibrato swells. The last demo is from the track "Flight to Paradise" by Ricky Green. I played the GR-100 using the sustained hex fuzz mode, with the filter closed for the mellow tone.

Short Audio Samples from Ebay:


Vibrato and Decay	Touch Vibrato	Harmonics	Envelope	G-202 Clean Sound

Well, as it turns out, I do not know anything about these demos! They were posted on ebay with a GR-100 and G-202 sale. I saved them, and now present them here without comment.

Filter Sweep Samples:


Mode 2 (basic hex-fuzz) filter sweep.	Mode 3 (sustained hex-fuzz) filter sweep.	For comparison, a -24 dB filter sweep played on the Roland GR-300 with a G-808.	Also a -24 dB filter sweep played on the Roland GR-300 with the RC-1324.	For comparison, a -12 dB filter sweep played on the Roland GR-33B.	For comparison, a -24 dB filter sweep played on the Roland GR-33B.

These samples were recorded with the resonance control set to maximum to emphasize the sweep of the filter. Samples were recorded in Digital Performer.

Download the Roland GR-100 Manual

Complete Mix Magazine "Classic Tracks" article mentioning Andy Summer’s Guitar Synths (GR-300 and GR-100 with US-2).