Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: Mellotronists

I recently read, with some amusement, a detailed review of the Spring album
on Amazon.com. It was actually a very good review, the amusing part was the
reviewer's assumption that Spring owned and used three Mellotrons at once.
This would have been back in the MKII days I guess (unless M400s were around
in 1971), and the image of these poor guys lugging around three MKIIs from
concert to concert was too much for me.

The reviewer's assumption stems from the fact that 1) three individuals were
credited with playing the Mellotron on the album 2) the liner notes say that
there were no Mellotron overdubs (guitar overdubs only) and 3) at times you
∗can∗ hear what sounds like three different guys playing Mellotron at once,
although I think there were no more than 2 ∗sounds∗ going at once.

Is it possible that there were, at times, three different guys playing one
double keyboard MKII at the same time? This would be the infamous "Spring
chicken" machine, I'm guessing. If so, this would be a very interesting
playing technique that I'd love to see. Three guys on a 'Tron.

I know that KL and I occasionally each grab our own side on my double
keyboard MKII and do our own thing separately, making a horrible sound, but
it is possible to get three sets of hands in there playing the same song on a
MKII. It could put a strain on the capstan, for sure, but not if it were
played to minimize that (w/ short notes instead of chords). Anyway, I was
just wondering if anyone had any first hand knowledge of how these guys
played live. And if they ∗did∗ lug around three MKII's, I guess they never
made the big time because they all ended up in the hospital with hernias.

Martin didn't you see these guys live once? Did they only use the one MKII?
If so, was more than one guy playing it at any time? Any M400s on stage?


curiously,
Ken M.