Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: Mellotronists

Hi Martin et al,

Although I don't often chip in on the list, I thought that I would answer
the "new sounds?" question with an anecdote:

When Nick and I recorded "Julia" for the Rime Of The Ancient Sampler, we
made a special effort to be creative, and to use the Mellotron in as many
ways as we could. We created swell brass sounds, employed lesser known
tapes such as the piano, the bass guitar, an acoustic (12 string?)
guitar... and used as many effects with those sounds as we could. We also
used a few old favourites: the Mk2 Strings, one of the Flutes, and a tiny
bit of Combined Choir. In the end, almost everything on the track apart
from the percussion track, Clive's guitar, the bass pedals and some
synthesised saxophone was played on Mellotron.

When the CD was released, most people were very kind, and said that they
liked the track, but wasn't it a shame that there was so little Mellotron
on it!

When questioned, it transpired that the only sounds that they recognised
as Mellotron were the Flute and Mk2 strings. I soon gave up explaining
that the piano was Mellotron, the double tracked acoustic guitar included
Mellotron, the swelled brass was Mellotron, the 'synthesiser' ensemble
was Mellotron... This is doubly interesting because most of the people
with whom I had the conversation were Mellotron
owners/players/aficionados, themselves.

In the face of this, I am unsurprised that everybody sticks to the
classic violins/flute/choir of one sort or another.

All the best,

Gordon.

(Who will make a decision about that frame soon, honest!)