When a badassss teenage crack dealer, pimp and AK-totin' gangsta laid down the wailing Hammond solo to a Masterbass joint in 1986, I had little idea that sixteen years later, a balding, overweight version of myself would be listening to the fifth album by the offspring of that collective, Zoid and Krom.

The bassbitch I was packing that day was the Yamaha PSS-780. No-one could pretend that A Guy Called Gerald was going to perform with a 780 on a shoulder strap, but the its feature set and price were ground-breaking at the time: 100 preset (synthesized) sounds and rhythms, sound editing, basic sequencing, rhythm programming and MIDI capability.

Mostly though, only da dopest shit made the cut: presets 28 (tremolo organ), 13 (clavi) and 99 (sine wave), hi snare (popping of paper bag) lo snare (brief wet fart), bass drum (workmanlike, acoustic, slightly clicky), hi-hat (too metallic and 'barky' for dance use) and the occasional rim (oo er). Personally I also liked to add a hi timbale to the snare, giving more of a funk splang to the sound.

For the most part, the preset rhythms and accompaniments were insultingly poor, 'barbershop quartet', 'rock baroque' and 'bluegrass' being perhaps even worse than you might think. Others were badder, notably 'funk 3' - essentially a tiny, plastic Japanese tribute to 'Superstition' that later made a risible appearance on 'The Invisible Man' by Queen. Such white-bread deployment did little for the street rep of the 780, but it will always have a special place in the hip-hop mythology of south-west Birmingham.