Garbage Hammond Organ

The Hammond J-522 came out in 1971.

Curbside, late one November night, this lonely organ called out to me. It was drizzling, so I knew it was at least a little wet, but seemed pretty much intact. Could it possibly work?

I gave it a nudge to see if I could maybe lug it up the street to my house. No way. This sucker was heavy. I trotted home and five minutes later I was back with one of my son's old skateboards. Barely averting a hernia, I tipped the instrument onto it and rolled the organ up the street to my garage. Wiping it down I hoped for the best.

A few days later I went back for a closer look. I plugged it in and bingo! It worked.

But wait, was that the classic rotating Leslie speaker sound I was hearing? And look, a little brass "H" nameplate on the front! I had found myself a Hammond organ.

Sure, it's a living room, church lady model (J-522, circa 1971), but this was a genuine Hammond. Cool. I dragged it to the cellar.

The top register was a little rough, some of the keys did not sound all the tones available from the rocker style drawbars switches, but it mostly worked. The built in rhythms, the bass pedals, volume pedal, the Leslie, the spring reverb and the entire lower register were all in good shape. O.K., the knobs drove crackling potentiometers, but they were functional.  It had what looked like a 12-15" speaker in there, and it was pretty loud. I flipped through the cheesy beats. Very analog and vintage sounding. These where getting looped into Ableton, for sure.

Vintage dust balls.

I decided to open it up.  Inside: 40 years of dust balls. Now, I'm not too experienced with this stuff, but what the hell, it was free, so I dug deeper, removing set of screws after set of screws, and finally, the keys off of the top register.

This was a well built instrument. Everything was holding together snugly after 40 years. And the details were interesting: Every white key was held in with two tiny black screws and every black key by two tiny silver screws. Each key was molded with a number and letter on the underside to identify its place in the musical scale and on the physical keyboard. I applied some contact spray here and there, did a little vacuuming, cleaned up the keys and other surfaces.

Open Sesame

I couldn't fix everything. The keys that didn't fire every tone must have had bad contacts somewhere I couldn't access, I figured. After trying to tunnel into one bad key I lost the tiny spring that worked its action. An hour later I found it perched on a transistor, only to have it boing away 3 more times. I finally got it back in place and called it a day.

All and all it did help. I got a few keys to work better on top, all the knobs now sound clean. The reverb was crisper with that layer of dust removed from the spring and chamber.

So now I'm having fun trying the combinations of tones you can get. Attempting bass lines with my feet. Quite exciting.  I look forward to recording this beast.

Cool fisheye shot.

But what's going on here? Why would someone throw something like this out? I suppose there's little market for it. This wasn't the first time I'd seen this kind of thing either. In addition to this beautiful Hammond, I've found a nice guitar, a banjo, a vintage Ampeg tube amplifier and tons of drums  in the trash. All usable.

I'd like to think they were left there by people knowing they would be rescued by someone like me. Someone who'd appreciate them.

The thought that this was tossed to be ultimately crushed under a heap of disposable diapers in a landfill makes me oh, so very sad.

Ye Olde 5.25 Inch Floppy Disks

Here they are, Ye Olde Voyetra Sequencer Plus mkIII 5.25" Floppy Disks

A few years ago I fondly remembered my first midi sequencer, Voyetra Sequencer Plus, which I ran on the PC XT way back in the mid 1980s. Well, I finally crawled up into the attic in my mother-in-law's house where I thought the disks were. And alas, I found them, along with DOS boot disks!

The next step will be to go back up there and retrieve the PCXT computer that is still sitting up there, find a DOS command crib sheet and hope the thing fires up.

On the hunt now for a vintage midi interface from that era. I hope to recreate a semblance of the midi studio I had at home back then. Should be interesting.

Watch for updates.

MKB300 Redux

Back in the 1980s, midi was young, and so was I. It was then that I fell in love with the Roland MKB-300 controller keyboard. You can read Chapter One elsewhere on this blog.

I'd used it for years, but other synths and controllers eventually took its place. I'd tried, and failed, to sell it on Craig's list and Ebay. Shipping and packing seemed daunting anyway, so eventually the MKB-300 was just sitting in a closet gathering dust.

Chapter Two for the MKB-300 began when someone else fell in love with it. A Gearchild reader named Anonymous.

Anonymous, it turned out, had an actual name, Peter Ehrlich, and it turned out he was looking for one. He rocked a mellow techno groove, was into vintage synths and it seemed he really took a shine to the controller keyboard. Emails ensued, I posted the video, above, to show him the keyboard in action, we settled on a price. He was game.

 From Mr. Ehrlich:

"The Roland MKB represents to me the pinnacle of midi controller design because it sits at such a transitional period in the history of midi.  It is an instrument in its own right and, as such, is geared towards players rather than producer/engineers, where I fall. I enjoy the idea that I may be able to assist this instrument in continuing its musical journey.  At least I intend to give it my best shot.

But I was still wary about shipping the hulking monster keyboard.  Its hugeness was one of the main reasons I'd resisted putting up on ebay. It would likely be expensive to ship and be a huge hassle as well.

But Peter's enthusiasm won out and his shipping tips convinced me it would be possible: Hit your local bike shop trash for huge sized cartons, use a lot of bubble wrap, tape and ship it via the post office. The post office? Yes. He said he once even got a stove shipped through the post office.

Low and behold, the U.S.P.S. web site seemed to suggest they'd take a package of this size and weight. Unfortunately my local post office EMPLOYEE would NOT take it. The clerk with the tape measure said it was too big. I sensed ineptitude and my instinct was right—the post office two miles down the road had no issues with it. I heaved the coffin-sized box over the counter, and off it went.

After a a week and 3000 miles on mail trucks, it arrived without a hitch. The MKB-300 was home again.

Garbage Banjo

Once again my instrument finding Karma has surfaced. I spotted this banjo at the curb on bulky-waste trash day in my New Jersey hamlet. I don't know what it is with this town, but they sure throw a lot of musical gear away. I've previously found a vintage Ampeg tube amp, a replica of a Gibson Dove acoustic guitar, and many, many drum set parts equaling more than a full set.

Banjo has always been cool to me, way beyond bluegrass, which I do enjoy. Check out Bela Fleck, who takes it to another level. Of course there's the Steve Martin thing that's brought the instrument into the spotlight now, his banjoism gone "serious" with his collaborative album that pulled in tons of high profile musicians.

I hear the instrument as koto-like Asian, as African, of course, and in it's chime-like twang there is also a celtic flavor. It's got a  raw worldliness that, with this particular banjo, extends the instrument's history to the midwestern U.S.A.

I wonder what adventures this instrument has known. Unknown U. of Wisconsin student who at one time cared enough to proudly and carefully letter their school's name this instrument's case: I don't know why you threw this out. I don't even know if you're alive. Perhaps you peered from the window as I plucked this treasure from the curb? Perhaps you knew someone would grab this?

In any case, thanks. To me, this is treasure.