Short Yamaha Seqtrak review (Patreon exclusive)

A portable groovebox without a screen. Bold strategy. We haven't done a review in a while, but we were genuinely curious if this is something we could recommend as a one stop shop for drum machine beginners, so we ordered one. I bought this with my own money, so here's a short unbiased and honest review.

Why not a video review?

After spending the first day with the Seqtrak it already became painfully apparent that it was meant to be used with the accompanying app. My Android phone (although only three years old) is not supported by the app anymore, so my only option is to use the app on my computer - and for me that defies the purpose of a portable groovebox. The Intern and I decided that making a video on the Seqtrak was not worth taking production time from the videos we're working on right now.

For the same reason I will also not be making a Cheat Sheet - the app makes the machine more accessible and provides on-screen help. Since I'll be sending it back for a refund I wouldn't be able to update the Cheat Sheet anyway, which would make it obsolete as soon as bigger changes happen in the firmware.

The Good

• The sequencer is surprisingly capable (swing, microtiming, substeps, pattern length of up to 128 steps, parameter locking including velocity and pitch, polymeter, probability)
• The sound is good (not over the small internal speaker though)
• The effects are good (and there are plenty of them)
• Apart from 2/3/4 substeps it also offers you 16th triplets. I've never seen this before and it's a brilliant idea! Technically this is not a substep though because it makes three notes stretch across two steps.
  Yamaha somehow got the note values wrong in their manual: The Seqtrak does 16th triplets (three notes over two steps) and 32nd triplets (three notes over one step, i.e. 3 substeps) - not 8th triplets and 16th triplets.
• The three touch strips are a lot of fun - and they can be controlled externally via MIDI CC
• The patterns of each instrument track can be switched independently (just like on the Polyend Play), e.g. you can switch patterns on the Snare without affecting the other instruments. And you can synchronously switch all tracks if you want to.
• The drums can be played chromatically via external MIDI (each instrument has its own MIDI channel)
• It has two choke groups (Hi-Hat 1/2, Percussion 1/2) that you can turn on and off - but only using the app
• I don't know of any other device in this price range that has that many features crammed into it (drums, synths, effects, sampling, visualizer, portable, battery-powered, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, ...)

The Bad

The Seqtrak as a standalone device suffers from not having a screen. Parameter values are visualized mainly via a row of 8 LEDs, which simply can't convey enough useful information. A cheap three digit display could have done wonders here.

Can you guess which of these 8 vertical LEDs stands for the Mixolydian scale?

Here's an example: Microtiming can be adjusted in sequencer ticks. One step consists of 120 ticks. And since there are only 8 LEDs, a lot of these values are not represented at all. You only get a rough idea of where you are right now. At least the center position of a parameter is clearly shown when the two LEDs in the middle light up.

This approach is perfectly fine for experimenting, but it will frustrate you if there are specific values you're aiming for. As you can imagine digging through lots of samples like this isn't a delightful experience either.

• The UI design is convoluted and unintuitive. The many side buttons really don't help with that.
• Only 6 patterns per track.
• To place substeps you have to hold a step for a few seconds, after which the steps in the other row become the selectors for the substep division. This delay is long enough that it becomes frustrating when you are placing many substeps.
• You can't set the amount of swing to a specific value or even adjust it in a specific direction. Pressing the swing button cycles through all available settings - including negative swing. If you ever tried maximum negative swing on a pattern then you know that this is not a path you want to take during a performance ;)
• Project switching is not instantaneous and it stops playback
• Only 8 projects (not a problem when you use the app to export/import)
• Samples can't be reversed or looped
• The USB audio output only gives you the stereo mixdown, not the individual tracks
• There is a single minijack MIDI port. If you connect the supplied TRRRS breakout cable (with FOUR rings on the minijack) this will give you full size MIDI IN and OUT. I didn't even know this existed and I imagine it could be hard to find a replacement.

The Design

The first thing that seems to pop into people's heads is how much this looks like a Teenage Engineering product. But TE didn't come up with that design style either - not by a long shot. It's been around since the 1950s. Take a look at the fantastic work that Dieter Rams did for Braun - he's one of the most important product designers of the 20th century.

Build Quality

Will I ever get over the fact that the colour scheme makes this look like a giant plastic cigarette?

Yes, it's all plastic, very lightweight, and the build quality is on the cheap side. It's not quite as horrible as some early reports made it out to be, but it's clearly not built to last. I'd rank it a tad lower than Behringer's 303 and 606 clones which seem to have thicker plastic walls. The step keys are wobbly, but at least they have some tactile feedback and a defined click.

Other devices in that price range like the Elektron Model series or the Novation Circuit series feel a lot more robust - but the Seqtrak is packed with a lot more features. It would have been nice if the build quality reflected that.

What really bothers me though are the LEDs they used. During normal eye movements I can see the white lights breaking up into separate red, green and blue trails which irritates the hell out of me. It's a bit like a real world overuse of a chromatic aberration filter.

Here I'm moving the Seqtrak in total darkness so you can see the rainbowing effect on the LEDs.

Sidenote: For their video tutorials Yamaha obviously attached the Seqtrak to the table in some way. Otherwise it would move when pushing the side buttons due to its low weight. This is not a bad thing per se, just be aware that this won't work if you try it at home ;)

Firmware update

Here's a fun little story: This is officially the first device that crashed on me during a firmware update.

I swear I didn't opertate!

"Have you tried turning it off and on again?". Yes I tried. And imagine my surprise when I found out that the power button doesn't actually turn the power off - it apparently only sends a message to do so. Which of course does absolutely nothing when the system has crashed and no one's there to hear that message. So... I saw no alternative than to wait a few hours until the internal battery was drained. After charging it back up for another few hours I could then retry the update. A good time was had by all. Only later when looking through the Seqtrak app I found a clue to a button combo that forces a shutdown, so you might want to try that first: Press and hold PROJECT (right side) + PLAY.

Bottom Line

So, would we recommend this for beginners? Definitely not as a standalone device. The accompanying app helps a lot, but then you should ask yourself: Wouldn't you be better off using a standalone music production app instead?