Chris,
Thank you very much for the story.You must be so happy to have it!
Congradulations.
Pete
Chris Dale wrote:
> Sorry I'm late to the party..
> I'll try to shed some light.
> Wakeman never owned a MK V. Supposedly, the only reason the MK V was
> ever built was because Wakeman put two existing M400 machines together
> and demonstrated that there was a demand for a double unit again. I
> have no independent facts to verify this though.
> The definite facts are: The "Wakeman Double-Tron" was made from two
> separate M400 models which were completely dismantled. The innards of
> both were put into a much thicker wooden cabinet with thick aluminium
> inside. The electronics are also completely customized, and new tapes
> were put in that have the sounds eq'd slightly differently / errors
> removed (like the bang on the high F cello. He probably did this with
> the support of Mellotronics, though). Some of the people at Packhorse
> / Birotronics were also involved. These were part of Wakeman's Complex
> 7 business group.
> The machine does sound different than the regular M400's and fixing it
> was extremely arduous and frustrating for everyone, and took a VERY
> long time between myself, former YES tech Frank Levi, Professor Jerry
> Korb, and support from both Dave Kean and Streetly because of the
> customizations and the fact they had different people working on it at
> different times. Jerry Korb however, deserves the very special golden
> credit for getting it going. YES technician Michael Tate was the man
> who did the initial re-build work.
> Wakeman claims it was used on all his solo efforts and all YES
> material except "Fragile", which had used two earlier Mellotrons. The
> actual dismantling / re- assembly took place in 1972, and the Tales
> tour is the first appearance of the instrument. The production
> certificate states "Black YES Machine # 3) so it seems to confirm
> Wakeman's claims. It was apparently stolen at some point by some of
> Wakeman's tech crew (along with at least two other Mellotrons) when
> Wakeman was going through a divorce and during the Birotron struggle
> when they were losing money and it appeared he couldn't pay some of
> them. The machine had experienced neglect, and badly needed to be
> refinished. The Birotron multi-turn pitch knob appears to be a direct
> idea lift from the multi turn pitch knob of the Double Tron, and there
> is some "comparison crossover" between the two.
> The unit is visible on the front cover of the Journey Album supporting
> two minimoogs, and appears in Yesyears, and in a Rockschool video, as
> well as the Rock Hardware book. Wakeman seems to have special affinity
> for it over his other Trons.
> I initially received the machine as a mouldy and rusted wreck when
> purchasing a broken Chamberlin. I was threatened that if I didn't take
> it very soon, it would be in the Detroit city dump. I didn't believe
> the seller at first, but then he called and screamed nightmarishly
> down the line at me, and I went back to get it thinking he was
> probably lying about it being Wakeman's old machine and I was being
> suckered, though I still felt sympathetic because he was going through
> a divorce / losing his business etc. I've since heard he's died of cancer.
> After cleaning the rust, mould, food spills, dirt, and corrosion I
> took some pictures and began to wonder after seeing what looked like
> the same machine on an old Wakeman concert video. I contacted Wakeman
> to verify that it used to be his. He told me it was and that he was
> shocked I had it, because it went missing years before.
> I've copied the details from two interviews:
>
> RW:
>
> The RMI, I have a lot of equipment stolen, about eight years ago. My
> RMI was stolen, a lot of it was stolen. I have heard that some of it
> is in private collections. In the same way I was speaking to Keith
> Emerson <http://www.interstellar9.com/emerson/> about this last year,
> who's friend of mine, you know there's certainly a situation where ...
> almost like people who collect paintings, there are people who
> collects equipment. I mean, I had a double Mellotron
> <http://www.mellotron.com/> that was made for me. It was stolen many
> years ago, and just recently a man wrote to me in America, and he just
> bought it and he wanted me to authenticate it. And it was in a quiet
> bad condition and he wanted to repair. So I wrote him back and I said:
> "You know, I'm really glad you've got it. Actually it was stolen. But
> don't worry, I'm not asking to give back, I don't want it back, but it
> was stolen from me.
>
> The above is from http://yesmuseum.org/WakeView3.html
>
> So what sort of stuff did you lose?
>
> RW: “I lost about six minimoogs, a couple of Mellotrons, a Fender
> Rhodes, a huge long list of stuff. And some of it’s resurfaced. One of
> the Mellotrons, the famous double Mellotron resurfaced. And a guy got
> hold of it and rebuilt it, and that’s in a museum somewhere in
> America. And he contacted me to verify that it used to be mine, and I
> wrote back to him and said, ‘Yeah, it was stolen in nineteen whatever
> it was.’ And it completely freaked him out. He called up and said, ‘I
> didn’t steal it.’ And I said, ‘I know you didn’t, ‘because you’re
> hardly likely to have stolen it and then ring me up.’ And he said, ‘Do
> you want it back?’ And I said, ‘No, if you’ve rebuilt it, good for
> you. I’m glad that it’s got a good home, and I’m glad that it’s in a
> museum.’ So there you go.”
>
> This is from http://www.pertout.com/Wakeman.htm
>
> Somehow he heard of my other things and believes my place is a museum.
> (I don't recall telling him, but I might have.)
>
> After getting it working, I recorded the the Double Mellotron sounds
> on DAT tape which over time I gave to him backstage at several YES
> concerts. I thought it only right that he have his old sounds back as
> there was some custom stuff that's not available elsewhere. I was able
> to meet all of YES several times and had them autograph the underside
> of the lid. I showed them the pics of the almost decade long
> restoration process and Jon Anderson was quite surprised, uttering the
> word "AMAZING!!" as he looked them.
>
> There's a lot more to tell, but I intend to do this on a proper
> website at some point and not monopolize everyone's time here.
>
> I've attached some before and after pics (the control panel was being
> examined by YES tech Frank Levi.at the time)
>
> I hope I've answered a few questions.
>
> Chris
>
>