The Mellotron’s debut also coincided with a British trend of marrying American blues with a predilection for the nostalgic and the absurd this sonic union asserted a quintessential, mostly invented national identity. Beatles scholars have noted the influence of British music hall on the British Invasion catalog, a campy, silly style that hearkens to Victorian Britain’s industrial and colonial prowess. But the Mellotron’s swift adoption by British bands may also have to do with the country’s musical history, which has always gravitated toward novelty. Part of this was practical: tape loops were heavy, and therefore difficult to export or take on tour. ![]() The Mellotron was at the right place at the right time to become a distinctly British instrument. ![]() The Kinks, the Who, Led Zeppelin, and Pink Floyd inform how many Americans see the UK-a place of rolling hillsides, cozy pubs, and coal-stained cities. Once a bug, the variations in sound afforded by finicky analog technology were now a positive attribute of the Mellotron: The ghostly, uncanny quality caused by natural wear on the tape or external irritants created a perfectly trippy ambience on songs like “ Nights in White Satin,” from the Moody Blues, the Rolling Stones’ “ She’s a Rainbow,” and Bowie’s “Space Oddity.” The Mellotron’s debut took place just at the time that the mystical and the mind-bending was trending in rock music, materializing in records like Cream’s Disraeli Gears, Pink Floyd’s The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, and Sgt. After some tinkering, the more reliable, tricked-out Mk II was released. Its outer casings didn’t adequately protect the tape inside from heat and humidity-making the Mellotron a tough sell to owners of smoky bars and cramped studios-and replacement parts were hard to come by. Its analogue tape strips held recordings from bandleader Eric Robinson in his London studio.īut the MkI was delicate. The first model, the Mk I, debuted in 1963. There’s debate about exactly where the name comes from some say it’s a portmanteau of “melody” and “electronics,” others say it derives from “mellifluous.” Either way, the “tron” suffix was meant to invoke technological advancement. Somewhere along the way, he decided to go into business with Frank, Norman, and Les Bradley, the three brothers who ran Bradmatic-manufacturer of the parts he had come to England for in the first place-and produced a British version of the Chamberlin. In the early ‘60s, Chamberlin employee Bill Fransen went to Birmingham, England, long an industrial hub, to seek out machine parts. ![]() Users could select a setting-a pre-set backing track-and press keys to create a rudimentary kind of synthesized music. The different pieces of tape held varied musical samples-a single note on a flute, for instance, or a trio of violins running a scale. The Chamberlin was an orchestra-in- a-box meant for home entertainment, it featured a black and white, piano-like keyboard, each key of which was linked to a piece of audio tape. ![]() In essence, the Mellotron was a primitive sampler, born as a blatant rip-off of the Chamberlin, an instrument introduced in the late 1940s in California by its inventor Harry Chamberlin. Conceived as a parlor instrument, it made its way into countless formative hits that continue to define classic rock stations today and laid the groundwork for some of our most common studio tools. The Mellotron is responsible for one of rock and roll’s most iconic intros, in “Strawberry Fields Forever,” from 1967.īut “Strawberry Fields” isn’t the only place you’ll hear one in the rock canon. Think you’re unfamiliar with its genius? Think again. It is the Mellotron, the ultimate representation of this moment in music. There’s another quirky tool in the film that’s used extensively on previous Beatles albums, though not at the rooftop-concert rehearsal sessions, for reasons that become obvious later in this story. It’s responsible for one rock music’s most iconic song intros. Think you’re unfamiliar with the genius of the Mellotron? Think again.
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