Polyend announced Drums at Superbooth 2026 in Berlin — an 8-track hybrid desktop drum machine housed in an aluminum chassis, priced at $2,699 with pre-orders open against a refundable $500 deposit. The pitch is a genuinely even split between analog and digital sound generation rather than one bolted onto the other: four tracks run true analog circuitry, four run a large digital instrument library, and both sides share a single sequencer built for deep per-track control.
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The analog half
The four analog tracks are built on SSI chips, each carrying two VCOs, a noise source, a multimode filter, and an envelope-controlled amplifier — a genuinely complete analog voice architecture per track, not a simplified subset. Each analog track also includes an additional digital oscillator available for layering on top of the analog signal path or for FM synthesis, giving those tracks a hybrid character even within the “analog” half of the machine.
The digital half
The remaining four tracks draw from a library of more than 40 instruments, each with sub-mode mutations that extend the practical sound palette into the hundreds — enough range that the digital tracks aren’t just a sample-playback afterthought next to the analog synthesis, but a comparably deep sound-design space in their own right.
A sequencer built to treat effects as rhythm
Sequencing spans 8 tracks with probability, micro-timing, parameter locks, pattern chaining, generative tools, and multiple track play modes, with projects holding up to 64 patterns, 64 sound kits, and 48 songs. The detail worth calling out specifically: effects run across three chains — send, insert, and master — and the insert effects are sequenceable per step, meaning an effect can be triggered as part of a specific step in the pattern rather than applied as a static, always-on treatment at mixdown. That turns effects processing into a compositional tool available at the same granularity as the notes themselves.
Where it sits in the market
At $2,699, Drums is positioned well above entry-level grooveboxes and squarely against machines like Roland’s TR-1000 and Elektron’s Analog RYTM — the price of admission for a drum machine built to be a centerpiece instrument rather than a secondary sketchpad. For producers who’ve been choosing between an all-analog machine’s character and an all-digital machine’s flexibility, Polyend’s bet is that most people actually want both, in the same box, sequenced together.