RE: [Mellotronists] ProgWest 2002 report for those interested (lo ng)
2002-11-15 by Gene Stopp
Good
review! I think you pretty much hit the nail on the head. This was one of the
best shows I've seen in a long time.
Here's
some tales from the other side of the curtain...
Mellotrons 1023 and 1213 had tape sets Mixed
Strings/Mixed Choir/Brass and BBS Cello/3 Violins/Flute, respectively. Both used
only for RMI's set. They sounded pretty darn good (yeah I'm biased... these
machines do have the latest Marcus Reisch motor controllers). They were going to
be used for Ryo Okumoto's setup also, but then HIS 'tron arrived courtesy
of Brad Barker from ProgRadio. It was donated to him! This was a scuffed up
black M400SM sold by Sound Sales Connecticut, with Flute/3 Violins/Mixed
Choir. Since Ryo uses these three sounds, we figured we'd prefer this to having
the two white 400's with two tape sets to get his three sounds. Given the
time constraints between sets and the lack of DI channels, we decided to take
the simple approach instead of the piles-of-keyboards look. Oh yeah, the
Minimoog was mine too :)
However, the SM was not in the best shape upon arrival.
The Protecto-Muff was in good shape, but the power cord pouch was empty! The
normal power input socket was gone, with a standard IEC socket hanging out of
the hole on about 4 inches of non-strain-relieved wire. There was a blob of
gratuitous electrical tape around the solder joints, at
least.
Next
there were several keys that were doing the dying-cow thing (is there a better
name for that?). We dragged the thing outside into the daylight (the rain having
departed as if it were never there) and I borrowed a set of headphones from the
recording guy. I tweaked the pressure pad settings while Dave Robin (video
documenter) taped me. He asked me if there was hope for this Mellotron, to which
I looked at the camera and replied "There's hope for ALL Mellotrons". Pretty
corny, huh. Sometimes I crack myself up. Anyway the tuning job was a success.
All I had to do was go steal somebody's IEC power cord...
About
the SM - did Sound Sales inherit white cabinets and paint them black?
This one was pretty scuffed up, and I could tell that it was white underneath
the black. It had the liberty-bell-shaped "M" on the control panel, and the same
logo much larger on the rear panel. I think the s/n was 15-something. It was
also missing the tape bin cover plate (see earlier post by me) so we spent some
time looking for a suitable piece of poster board etc. We were ready to try the
top from a pizza box but it was like an inch too short. Oh well, the show went
on with open tape collection bins... no problems.
Tron
1213 had been at another show a couple of weeks before (Rocket Scientists and
Shawn Guerin in Thousand Oaks) and Erik Norlander wanted to do pitch-bended
flutes with it. We discovered however that the pitch knob could not be touched
without causing a severe momentary drop in motor speed. Not good. It was stable
if you left it alone, but if you looked at it funny the motor would practically
stop and then start again. I told Erik that there was a chance that I would make
things worse as easily as better if I messed with it, so normal flutes it was
for the show (he always has samples as backup anyway). It did sound Really
Really good (oh there I go again!) however.
So the
week before ProgWest I took the control panel off and sure enough, the bottom
had fallen off the pitch pot and was sitting at the bottom of the cabinet (where
the mouse poop etc. usually lives). I Cramolin'ed the wirewound element and
the pot wipers and glued the bottom back on, and the pitch control became smooth
and friendly once again. Ha! Easy fix.
That's
it! Sorry for the long-windedness, but I figured it anybody would listen it
would be you guys!
One
last thing - a big thank you to Duncan and Steve from RMI for playing TRON CELLO
live!!! I never hear that sound and it's such a shame. Thanks
guys.
-
Gene
M400S
#1023
M400S
#1213
M400S
#1289