Re: RE: [Mellotronists] mice... and a big synth
2003-09-17 by ferrograph@aol.com
<< This band the Mice seems to turn up every once in a while concerning sleepy Mellotrons... Andy - do you know anything ? Y'wot? I know Julianne Regan played Mellotron on All About Eve's 'Ultraviolet', about ten years ago... Or should I know better, and just ignore this? :-) Andy T.>> guys- gotta chip in here. mice was a short-lived neo-goth-prog outfit with julianne joined by christian "bic" hayes, late of the cardiacs and levitation, and before dark star, his last outfit before joining the pet shop boys as hired gun. I saw them once at the water rats; it wasn't great. julianne may have retained possesion of the eve-tron or found one later; I don't know, but if I ever run into bic again, I'll be sure and ask. at the time of mice, though, he knew I had one and never mentioned knowing of another, and this would be around 8 years ago. I think he woulda- we used to talk about gear a lot. we both bought jam-mans around that time. but I might be mistaken. in which case there's this maria-something... andy, you must've met her.... she was something to do with a fanzine called "the organ" & dedicated to certain genres of keyboard music that I can't remember what specifically but so anyway she claimed to know where every mellotron in london was and was apoplectic when mine appeared out of the blue at the monarch one evening in 1995.... she might know where it is. or if this happened in their native leeds.... hmm.... steve whitfield, where are you now? he'd know. the one I tended once or twice in crouch end, with the sky-blue lid, belonged to a mate of mine who lent it to someone for a private studio and for some obscure reason he can't retrieve it but he says it's ok. it had the old motor board and was in the high 700's, and had been in a small theatre, to judge from the rather orchestra-pit selection of french horns and choirs it had in it. I don't know what became of the cocteau-tron either, but the engineer at september sound told me it had gone "to liz (fraser)'s gay boyfriend". this too had the old motor board. robin guthrie bought it on petticoat lane market for £1. >>From the spec it looks like the innards of four VCS3 / Synthi AKS's with a few extras. I reckon you could have nearly as much fun with one of these for far less cash...<< afaik, there were only three or four built like this, and one of them was "delaware", famous for it's part in the boomtime of the bbc's radiophonic workshop, and recently sold by them. the 'shop was run down and disbanded a few years ago, but their best-known works have been issued as two cd's. curiously, this lot never had a mellotron despite the bbc use of them elsewhere. their fondness for work involving tape manipulation and found-sounds suggests that it might've been fun. another big putney was normally resident at the putney home of ems, though eno was taped using this one during roxy's whistle-test tv appearance performing ladytron, if I remember correctly. his eventual repacement, eddie jobson, had to make do with the more famous single vcs3, which they probably made eno leave behind. like he'd care. jobson himself was taped using eno's by-then standard pair of revoxes in a special stand, so perhaps it was a messy divorce for the two brians. the little geordie fiddler brought a 400 with him, a clavinet and an sh1000 (the first japanese synth), and used the vcs3 to process his transparent electric violin to great effect. his 'tron oboe allowed mackay to do more with keys himself or play the sax. in terms of value for money, more than a match for eno, if less glamorous. rick "pyrotron" wakeman had a minature vcs built, with an integral keyboard that perhaps his miniature likeness barbie would've been more comfortable with. many accounts of the ems range label this one-off a disastrous concept, but I'd sure like to know what became of it. duncan/400nr1098, not afraid of mice but those vcs3's look heavy. sh1000's fine though.