How about a drummer that never misses a beat and will never mess up a song during your performance? Sounds cool, right? Well, as cool as it might sound, I'm afraid that no human drummer could become that perfect as to never miss a bar in live situations. Some cannot afford a drummer (or simply won't play with one) and rely on programmable drum machines; and for a drum machine to be a good piece of audio technology, some features are direly needed. We're talking portability - it's no point in carrying with you large and heavy equipment, especially if you're moving from club to club or worse, from home to the studio or rehearsing place.

At the same time, this tool must definitely serve your purposes, and this means advanced programmability and customized functions, to let you explore your wildest creative side and be able to obtain what you're looking for.

Well, you can now find all of the above and even more inside the XR20 beat station from Akai Professional. This nifty piece of electronics could easily become you drummer of choice, no matter whether you're in the R&B or Hip-Hop fields, even soft rock and so many more. Designed from the start to offer complex and complete solutions for those in search of a portable and easy-to-use tool for their beat needs, the Akai Professional XR20 boasts more than 700 independent sounds especially produced by Chronic Music and comes with an impressive 198 presets, divided in two - 99 factory presets and 99 user-defined presets.

You can even access functions like reverb, compression or EQ to trim the response of your XR20; and if you need vocal parts, just plug in a microphone and mix that voice with your custom beats. Bright backlit glowing pads will give you instant data on what's cooking inside the Akai Professional XR20 right as you play and at the same time will make your gear look cooler in the dark.

The Akai Professional XR20 supports Pattern Play Mode that can be triggered from different pads as you need. Drum roll and note repeat functions add to all the above; you also get 32-note polyphony, MIDI in and out ports, dual Aux ports to be used with standard 1/4” (TRS) jacks, and a headphone output. This drum box can be powered using a wall adapter but it will also run on batteries thus giving you even more freedom and letting you explore your creativity in more places, at any given moment you feel inspired.

The MSRP for the Akai Professional XR20 is a dollar short of $500 but the street price will most likely be lower, especially after the first weeks go by.

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