I Need A Hammond! - Making The Most Of What's At Hand:  

A track on my album was just crying out for some Hammond sounds. Nothing complex - just the sound was all that was needed. I already had a great guitar solo on there, performed by my mate David, and I'd come up with a vocal adlib that really made the end section of the song into something special. The problem was that there were a few gaps - a few places that just sounded empty - and the guitar solo, great as it was, had the odd note which although not technically incorrect, just didn't quite carry the day. I needed something else - something to fill the gaps and enhance the guitar solo, without overwhelming or detracting from it. More guitar wouldn't work. Sax would clash with the vocal. The song had a sort of Grateful Dead derived feel to it. But something was missing. It was The Dead without Pig Pen! Yep! It needed Hammond! The problem was: a Hammond I did not have!

What I did have was an old Yamaha DX7synth - mono - with a 'Hammond' sound. Plugging this into the desk made a sound about as close to the sound of a Hammond as the sound of a guinea pig is to the sound of a jet airplane. This just would not do!

O.K? What makes a Hammond sound like a Hammond? A tone source? Check! An old noisy amplifier? How about my Peavey Transtube with some distortion wound in? Hmm? Close but no cigar! No rotary speaker! Too clean! But I have an old Ibanez guitar processor with an incredibly dirty flanger effect on it. Plug it all up - do some tweaking - getting close! More tweaking! I now have a sound booth full of dirty flanging Hammond sound (OK - so it still doesn't sound exactly like a Hammond but it's close enough to perform the same function). All that's needed are a couple of SM58s mounted near and far to take the stereo sound from the room to tape. To hear what I ended up with have a listen to this demo mix.

(Line-up is myself on vocals, acoustic guitar and keys, Neville Messant drums, David Rogerson, guitar, and Murray Loveridge, bass guitar.)