Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: Mellotronists
Subject: Iceberg Show
From: kenmerb@...
Date: 2002-02-08
I had the good fortune to catch Michael Iceberg's show at the South Florida Fair last Friday in West Palm Beach. For those of you who don't know, Michael Iceberg is kind of a one-man-band, keyboard prodigy who used to perform quite a bit at Disney World in Florida during the mid 1970s. Back then, he used synthesizers and at least a couple of Chamberlins.
Now, he's strictly using all electronic keyboards - unfortunately the Chamberlins are gone. He played for about 40 minutes or so, doing three shows a day at the fair. I talked to him after the show, and he doesn't seem to miss the Chamberlins, says he's "moved on". I bought his "Michael Iceberg Live" CD which he was selling after the show (along with two others), and the Chamberlin sounds on the recording are great. On that older CD, he had violins (which didn't sound like Mellotron 3-violins), flutes and trumpets. All sounded very "accurate" (unlike the TRON) and were loaded with reverb (probably too much). These were the sounds which were missing from his show on Friday (to me, anyway).
For his current show, he pops out of a giant, smoking Pyramid (or Iceberg) on stage which contains his seat and the keyboards, which surround him. There is a camera overhead and a giant screen behind, so that you can see him play. The great thing about Mr. Iceberg is that he is very entertaining, and he explains what he is doing just about every step of the way. Yes, some of it was kind of corny, geared toward the kids and the older folks there in the audience, but how often do you get to see a 62 year old man in a tuxedo pop out of a giant smoking pyramid and start wailing on a rack of synths? Not too often, these days.
After the show, someone mentioned the Moody Blues (who he covers on the live CD), and I heard him say that if it weren't for the Moody Blues, he wouldn't be doing what he is doing now. So, chalk up another one for Mr. Pinder! Iceberg had another interesting comment, this one from the live CD (recorded in 1978). When talking about his keyboards, he said that he had electronic machines (synthesizers) and mechanical beasts (Chamberlins), and compared changing sounds on the Chamberlins to changing gears on a bicycle. You could tell that he wanted to become all electronic back then, and that's what he eventually did.
While down in West Palm I got to meet JP "TronLord" of our list, and he showed me the famous "Microtron". I took some photos (and even a QuickTime movie), which will all be posted on my web site one of these days. Thanks JP, for showing me all the gear.
If anyone has a chance to see Michael Iceberg, he is very entertaining and is a great showman & musician.
Ken M.