Was watching this movie over the weekend, and thought, “I never got around to putting my Rhodes through a Leslie.” Fired up C3 and stuck in the Arturia Rhodes I just bought, and routed it through Spin from Blue 3. Loved the sound. Now I want to use it live. Brings back memories.Tried the Wurly through it, yuck, no. What pop songs used this sound? Pop meaning popular songs from the 60’s and 70’s that may make it on a song list.
Thanks
It is a good sound, even though I’m pretty sure that’s not what JPJ was doing- I think he just used a regular old phase shifter set fast and wide. We’re talking about No Quarter, right?
Apparently, a Maestro:
https://www.native-instruments.com/forum/attachments/jpjyam-jpg.31215/
https://www.native-instruments.com/forum/attachments/ps1_01-jpg.31219/
A lot of articles say it was a Hohner Pianet in the studio and the Rhodes live.
That is exactly right. I thought No Quarter was using a Leslie. I don’t know what that is that he has above the Rhodes. That is crazy, because it seemed like the sound. Leslie is Doppler (multiple) primarily to create complex waves with speaker motion. I don’t really know how phase shifting works. I am going to try the phase shifter on the Rhodes. Thanks Fred!
Oh, yes, that is phase for sure. Never listened to it like that before.
I used to do that song with a really crappy Seil electronic piano and all I had was a flanger pedal so I set the feedback high and used that. It wasn’t quite the right sound but it got the job done. I read one article claiming that on the studio cut JPJ was running the Pianet through the filter of a VCS3 but I don’t know if I buy that.
this is the one, it had oberheim DNA 
That sounds fabulous! I looked for it, and it is expensive!
What is that unit that is directly on top of the piano? Not the smaller device on the very top, but the thing that looks like a sort of Rhodes without the keybed.
That’s been bugging me too. I know at one point he had some kind of custom bass pedals with the “brains” in a box on top of the Rhodes but I don’t think that’s what’s in the picture, though maybe it is. But I think that was from a later tour (having the piano there and the Alembic) so he would have had Taurus pedals. Although those sure don’t look like Taurus under the piano, do they.
It looks like his custom built pedals rig to me with the sound module box on top of the keyboard. In this pic it sure looks like it’s on top of a Yamaha CP-80’s guts that are inside another White Baby Grand sort of shell.
Good observation. It sure does.
Yeah I caught the Yamaha piano too. He may be the first person to hide a “portable” cough piano inside a grand piano cabinet!
Maybe the first for sure! But I saw Emerson do it and Leon Russel did it too! Leon had a laptop running some kind of host for the last years of his run all housed in a hollowed out piano shell. His daughters would roll him out to his Grand Piano/ Control center and the music would pour forth!! One of my favorite performers for sure … the Tulsa sound is strong in my DNA since I was raised there and it lives on in my style today. Funny that No Quarter came up, I had a request to do a Led Zeppelin tribute and learn 8 or 9 numbers so I have been working on the patch for a while now.
Found this item while looking around, says JPJ used a Hohner Electra T
Hers’s the link to the vsti, haven’t tried it out but here it is.
Dave
Indeed. The hipster bands of today are not actually doing much of anything inventive like JPJ.
I am going to check that out.
Let us know if it is OK or not, the history included on the site for it looks like it tracks anyway! I read elsewhere that the recordings were made with this beast but the stage show often showed him on the Rhodes.
More background on JPJ various bass pedal rigs he was seen using
http://twocargar.com/MIDI_Pedals/JPJBP.pdf
Dave
Emerson just used a straight-up empty shell to do the spinning piano trick and mimed playing, as far as I know- he had the grand and the upright tack piano on stage but those were both real, right? I mean, back in the 70s. Later, like the late 80s/90s, Paul McCartney had his little psychedelic piano that lit up, that probably had a Roland inside it.
Yep, the digital piano insert stuff came later in the 90’s forward
General Music Pro 2 was his favorite Digital Piano in those days
