[no subject]

[Burberry@wfp.org]

Hi Wim,  <rijnsburger@ecn.nl>

Someone else who remembers Georgie Fame & the Blue Flames? Wow! In Fame's
time I already knew I wanted to play organ in a band but it was Fame who
turned me onto Hammonds first. Georgie battled with the studio techs at
that time because I think he wanted a good screaming "American" Hammond
sound and they thought any distorsion on a recorded organ sound was acutely
undesirable. Heard live with the Blue Flames, Georgie's M-102 with a 147
each side of the stage screamed when needed. Mostly he liked a very cool
playing style with treble rolled off. Remember the Blue Flames had a brass
section and he was playing a lot of Mose Allison songs.

Alan price started off with the Animals playing a one-manual Vox
Continental. When he started with his own band (the AP Set) he had just
covered 'I put a spell on you' with that nice little classic-sounding
intro, and was using an M-102 on stage with a 147 Leslie and a 100w Sound
City stack. He would switch between these when playing live and frequently
use vibrato 'Celeste I + II' through the stack is the 147 was getting
drowned out. I never heard the 'Price to play' album I'm afraid.

Listen to Steve Winwood's B-side 'Giving to you' for one of the hardest
sounding early overdriven spinet sounds. This was his first Hammond
which was (yet again) an M-102 into a 200w Marshall stack. I still get
goose-pimples when I hear the first long note of that solo. No percussion,
vibrato or sound doctoring at all, just plain 787 5000 00 overdriving the
Marshall's input, with its presence full up ...

> About Georgie Fame's sound... Isn't he mostly using rather clean
> registrations, such as 636000000 or so?

In studio yes. Live, that would have been 878 0000 00 or often 888 8000 00.
He used 2nd perc a lot too (so did Price). The studio recording Fame's
organ used rather primitive miking on his Leslie. On one occasion I can
remember 1 Electrovoice 666 very close to the bass rotor and 1 Sure
Unidyne II (!) on the opposite side at horn level (the Pink Champagne
track). Those mixes must have been hell ...

> About the A100... Ever heard a more screaming hammond than Roy Phillips
> on early Peddlers recordings?

You've got me there. I forgot Roy Phillips. Perhaps his strong character
made the recording techs give him the top end and miking he wanted for that
*recorded* screaming. I don't recall being nearly as impressed hearing his
rig live, but I do recall using Roy's sound to prove to a know-it-all that
the A-100 isn't in any way inferior to a B-3 or C-3. Believe it or not
there are still idiots around who swear to hearing a difference because of
the "tone effect of the organ case".

ATB

Keith

The OrganGrinder
<burberry@wfp.org>