Gear of the Year 2015 – Best App: Korg iM1

Our winning app, it’ll come as little surprise to many of you, is the absolutely awesome iM1 from KORG…

Best App – KORG iM1

Best App – Korg iM1

Details
Price £14.99
Distributor Korg UK/App Store
Contact +44-190-8304600
Web www.korg.co.uk/iTunes

The app market for music making is, of course, huge and several of the more traditional companies are dabbling in it, some more so than others. One company that seems to have embraced it a lot is Korg. With Gadget, it has one of the best all-in-one music-making DAW platforms for iOS out there, and according to our writers is something to behold on an iPad Pro.

Korg has also been busy transporting some of its classic synths to iOS, and we’ve seen some analogue favourites go that way, including the iMS-20. Less obvious a choice was the Korg M1, the digital hardware synth workstation from the late 80s that found itself everywhere – on record, in the studio, on Top Of The Pops… its sound very much defined the late 80s and early 90s, so you might either love it or loathe it, but you can’t deny that Korg has transported it majestically over to the iOS format.

You get all the original sounds plus expansion packs (some optional). It’s easier to program than the original and you can even run it from within the aforementioned Gadget. If you are of a certain age, you will be transported back in time to that era, shoulder pads and ridiculous excesses ’n all. Whether you want to go is, of course, up to you, but if you are over 35, we defy you to load up the Universe preset and not try pushing your jacket sleeves up your arms.

Reviewer Andy Jones laid some old ghosts to rest before concluding: “It’s an M1, but like the cars around at the time of the original, Korg has not just added go faster stripes, but a new engine, a new stereo, new reflective paint and a blonde sitting in the passenger seat with more peroxide than the whole of 1989. A page 3 stunner of a synth.” He wasn’t drunk when he wrote that either…

Read the full review of the Korg iM1 here

Here’s Luke Edwards from KORG accepting the award from our editor Andy Jones

Be sure to read the complete list of winners in the current issue of MusicTech Magazine and check back tomorrow for another winner…