A Perfectly Trippy Ambience

July 21, 2023 2:11 AM

But like a dream, the Mellotron’s time was fleeting. Just as it proliferated in psych-rock, what we know as the modern synthesizer was coming into its own ... As the rest of the world turned to burgeoning digital technology in all other facets of life, the clunky, temperamental Mellotron soon became dated. It popped up every now and then on singles, but the last Mellotrons—due to a copyright dispute, sold under a new name—rolled off the factory floor in 1986. from Tape Heads

Previously

posted by chavenet (26 comments total)

Oh my god I don't know why it never occurred to me that the cello in Wonderwall was a Mellotron!

I love the Mellotron sound. I use a sample of the flute tapes all the time in my music -- it's on the cover of Karma Police I did for a MeFi Music Challenge "a few" years ago as well as a Christmas track I did for a music library that gets heavy use every December (you have maybe even heard it!)

But now I know exactly what I'm going to do with the cello tapes.
posted by uncleozzy at 4:19 AM on July 21, 2023 [3 favorites]

I had a Mellotron decades ago. It was fun to play around with - you could get some really strange sounds out of it by leaning a bit on the case while playing. The case was a bit rickety due to many miles of touring with King Crimson. It was the white one played by David Cross and had a second rank of sounds that included pipe organ and men's chorus ("aaahhhh").

Fripp kept the black one that he played. The two Mellotrons facing each other on stage made quite an impression.
posted by Surely This at 4:36 AM on July 21, 2023 [18 favorites]

Mellotrons are still being made now! MkVI since 1999, MkVII since 2005.
posted by remembrancer at 4:55 AM on July 21, 2023 [4 favorites]

I used to wonder if you could turn a Mellotron into a "sampler," by recording your own tapes. I guess it's not really made for that, but I still wonder if there might be some way to create an analog sampler with tape loops.
posted by bitslayer at 5:00 AM on July 21, 2023 [1 favorite]

Pretty sure modifying or replacing the tapes and adapting them to work as loops was part of the appeal for a lot of Mellotron enthusiasts. A lot of prog bands had custom sounds, one way or another.

Nord sell some of them as sample packs now.

(Edit: they are apparently free to download, not for sale!)
posted by Dysk at 5:10 AM on July 21, 2023 [5 favorites]

Mellotrons are still being made now! MkVI since 1999, MkVII since 2005.

why does the keyboard have two CDE groups at the start? i’m incredibly confused by what notes are expected there
posted by dis_integration at 5:35 AM on July 21, 2023 [1 favorite]

why does the keyboard have two CDE groups at the start? i’m incredibly confused by what notes are expected there

The lowest note is G, not C.
posted by remembrancer at 5:37 AM on July 21, 2023 [3 favorites]

Starless, Bible black
posted by Artw at 5:39 AM on July 21, 2023 [6 favorites]

If you want an analogue tape delay just get an Echoplex, bitslayer.
posted by evilDoug at 5:45 AM on July 21, 2023 [1 favorite]

Stray Apparitions
Twilite
Mysterious Semblance at the Strand of Nightmares
The Devil's Triangle
posted by remembrancer at 5:49 AM on July 21, 2023 [1 favorite]

I immediately thought of King Crimson's "Starless" as well. But the Mellotron sound is just one of my favorite things ever. I'm pretty picky when it comes to Prog Rock, but some Prog is my favorite music ever. The Mellotron sounds so warm and otherworldly. I'm sure people can replicate the sound digitally these days. But part of its warmth was simply the way stuff was recorded back then. Not so many things were polished to perfect timing perfection. No click tracks for the drummers, no digital "fixing" of every last detail. The music was perhaps not as "perfect" a product in the end, but the human element made it better for me, personally. Thanks for the post. I know what I'll be listening to today.
posted by SoberHighland at 5:57 AM on July 21, 2023 [3 favorites]

> The lowest note is G, not C.

Man that really messes with my pattern matching to find C position brain but I guess I'd get used to it quickly.
posted by dis_integration at 6:36 AM on July 21, 2023 [1 favorite]

My very first bong was named Mellotron after the Stereolab song. I didn't learn for years that it was also an instrument.

La sensualité, noyée dans la tendresse, est illimitée
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 6:45 AM on July 21, 2023 [4 favorites]

The personalities Eric Robinson and David Nixon explain:

The Mellotron: A Keyboard with the Power of an Orchestra (1965) | British Pathé
posted by philip-random at 6:50 AM on July 21, 2023 [1 favorite]

Starless, Bible black

My god, I love this song. I have been on a life-long quest to replicate Welton’s tone on the bass.

Another fave: Watcher OfThe Skies
posted by Devils Rancher at 6:57 AM on July 21, 2023 [5 favorites]

Pretty sure modifying or replacing the tapes and adapting them to work as loops was part of the appeal for a lot of Mellotron enthusiasts. A lot of prog bands had custom sounds, one way or another.

Mike Pinder of the Moody Blues actually worked at the mellotron factory -- the resident musician who would do the test "driving". For use in the Moodys, one of the first modifications he made was to swap out all the sound fx etc for more string and orchestral options.

Here he is making it all work, and powerfully so at the Isle of Wight (!970) ...

cued to dramatic part ...
posted by philip-random at 7:03 AM on July 21, 2023 [3 favorites]

The Mellotron was (is?) something so complicated that it shouldn't have been possible at all. Yet it was, though not without careful handling and almost infinite patience. That it was essentially a studio instrument that some bands actually took on the road is a testament to how great it sounded when it worked.
posted by tommasz at 7:07 AM on July 21, 2023 [6 favorites]

Back in my youth in the late 60’s, I went to an open house at the music department at Mills College, in Oakland, famous for electronic and avant garde music. There was a mellotron there that somebody had recorded pitched sound effects - bang, meow, whoosh, etc. Some guy started playing, as he announced, Mozart. You could hear the melody because everything was pitched, but what a glorious cacophony!
posted by njohnson23 at 8:18 AM on July 21, 2023 [5 favorites]

I have one of these. It's a joy to play with its wooden hammer-action keyboard. It has all kinds of modes to mimic the tape-driven Mellotrons including wow and flutter because those imperfections were key too many iconic Mellotron masterpieces from Crimson, Genesis, and The Moody Blues. So much nicer than a DAW plug-in.
posted by 3.2.3 at 8:59 AM on July 21, 2023 [2 favorites]

My favorite song with Mellotron currently.
posted by black8 at 9:00 AM on July 21, 2023 [2 favorites]

There was also the Optigan, which used celluloid discs for the sound.

Optiganally Yours: Wichita Lineman

The Optigan and its more professional follow-on the Chilton Talentmaker were used in composing the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind score.
posted by snuffleupagus at 9:03 AM on July 21, 2023 [4 favorites]

Optigan was also a good bit less expensive and more robust I think?

I had a lot of fun with the iOptigan iOS app a while back. It's goofy but fun, there's even a mode to let you put in the discs upside down, for wonky backwards playing!
posted by SaltySalticid at 9:31 AM on July 21, 2023 [1 favorite]

Yes, it was originally made by Mattel for home entertainment.
posted by snuffleupagus at 9:52 AM on July 21, 2023 [1 favorite]

"Tuning a Mellotron doesn't."
-Robert Fripp
posted by indexy at 11:18 AM on July 21, 2023 [4 favorites]

Optigan app is tons of fun. Tape is having such a resurgence both physically and as inspiration for different kinds of digital buffer systems. There really isn’t a more straightforward way of understanding time and sound than with a few tape machines.
posted by q*ben at 12:12 PM on July 21, 2023 [4 favorites]

i added the mel-9 to my effect chain last year. it's so much fun. highly advised for pedal-heads.
posted by j_curiouser at 5:00 PM on July 21, 2023 [2 favorites]