The other famous example of the Mellotron in the charts of 1967 was, of course, Mike Pinder's unforgettable Rimsky-Korsakov inspired string line that transformed Nights In White Satin and gave the track its distinctive ambience. Mike Pinder had previously worked on Mellotrons and the like at an electronics firm and was an early advocate of these Heath Robinson creations with their eight-second tape samples on a rack, often prone to malfunction and less than reliable in a live setting.

 

King Crimson claimed them for progressive rock with their blockbusting, seminal In The Court of the Crimson King album in 1969, using primarily the string tapes and experimenting wildly with the swell and varispeed functions; the classic mellotron string rush can be heard after the second verse of Epitaph from this work, it blew my head off as a teenager and still gives me goosebumps whenever I hear it! The Devil's Triangle from the second Crimson album, In The Wake of Poseidon employs what sounds like an army of Mellotrons and again, much use is made of the varispeed function: likewise the Lizard suite from their third release.

 

Genesis took a leaf out of Crimso's book and Tony Banks favoured the Mellotron heavily on the band's early seventies releases, preferring it over synthesisers to the point of not using synths at all pre-1973, relying on the Mellie, electric piano and his trusty Hammond organ to forge that distnctive early Genesis sound. When he did add synth to the band's sonic palette (on Selling England By The Pound), the sound 'smoothed out' to a degree and lost some of its former uniqueness. The best examples of Mellotron in the Genesis canon are The Fountain of Salmacis and the beautiful coda of the somewhat neglected Seven Stones from their brilliant third album, Nursery Cryme; Watcher of the Skies (of course!) and Can-Utility and the Coastliners from Foxtrot and the lesser used choral settings on the opening track from Selling England... , Dancing With the Moonlit Knight.

 

And then there was Stackridge, one of the loves of my life and all-time fave live band, who introduced the Mellotron into their sound in early 1972 and it made a startling difference to tracks like their theme tune, Lummy Days and the progtastic epic Syracuse the Elephant, both from their second (and best) album, Friendliness. It also provided additional colour to the band's majestic instrumental Purple Spaceships Over Yatton and gave a nice symphonic backcloth for Mutter Slater's incomparable flute forays on this track. Andy Davis was the keyboard meister for this period and the pastoral instrumental God Speed The Plough from the George Martin produced album, The Man in the Bowler Hat is another great recorded example of the Mellotron, this time combined with real 'organic' orchestration and Mutter's peerless flute runs. 

 

After a line-up reshuffle in 1974, Mutter Slater swapped to Mellotron and played it on the notable No-One's More Important Than the Earthworm from the Extravaganza album and there is some priceless TV footage of the OGWT version of this track included on a compilation made available through the Rhubarb Thrashers network a few years back, with Mutter playing the Mellie, bowler hat perched atop the keyboard - wonderful! The band had their fair share of Mellotron mishaps on the road though, I remember it breaking down in the middle of a performance of Syracuse the Elephant  at Dagenham Roundhouse in 1972, to be coaxed back into life before Purple Spaceships by roadie Dave Lear. The curse of the Roundhouse also struck Genesis when they played there a few weeks later, as their Mellie broke down on the intro of Watcher of the Skies and considering that section consists solely of Mellotron, it couldn't have got any worse for Tony Banks that night!

 

I can't sign off on any tour of early seventies Mellotron pioneers without mentioning Rick Wakeman, as both the Strawbs and Yes made the sound of the Mellie part of their signature in that era. It was Rick who brought it to Yes as the first three Yes albums didn't feature one at all. Heart of the Sunrise from the Fragile album featured it heavily and on their masterpiece, Close To The Edge the classic break in And You And I will forever be associated with the Mellotron sound. The Strawbs continued to lean heavily on the Mellie after Rick quit them for Yes and the wonderful Grave New World album of 1972 has some sterling playing by Blue Weaver. Also of note is the more percussive use of Mellotron on the dramatic title track of the band's Hero & Heroine album from 1974.

 

There was something about the sound of a Mellotron which retained the 'organic' element that synths tended to lack, despite being something of a glorified tape recorder and the forerunner of the ubiquitous sampler that ended up dominating popular music of all shades - in a strange way, the Mellotron was the harbinger of the future, in musical terms. I retain my affection for this instrument and as a final anecdote, when I had my first trip into a recording studio in 1976 with my then combo, the Barley Wine Band, to record a demo, as soon as I saw they had a Mellotron I replaced the organ arrangement I was proposing to employ and replaced it with the good ol' Mellie!

 

Long Live the Mellotron......

 

 

i believe there is a german company recreating them for sale atm.

 

 

 

 

http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2007/09/make_a_mellotron_out_of_w.html

 

 

do you want a mellotron but can't afford that vintage gear? make your own!

DIY!