Why does Steve have two Keyboards

This is a bit of a trainspottery question...

In the past, in pictures and on DVD, Ive noted that Steve Morris has always had one synthesizer on a stand that he plays on select songs.

Well, nowdays, in concert, Steve plays synth less than ever. usually he only plays on BLT and BM, and drums on all the other songs.

So I am very curious to know why, on the current tour, Steve has a huge rack of one Roland and one Kurzweill synthesters. Im wondering why he needs to giant synths, since he barely touches them, and in the past, he has only used one.

Indeed, I was also curious because Steve's synth rack, which he hardly touched during the show, looked a lot more heavy duty than Phils little Roland XP 80 on its cheap little X stand. And Phil plays(or mimes) on several songs...

So does anyone know why suddenly, on this tour, Steve has a huge synth rack that he barely touches?

Also, did they play Blue Monday on the Canal + show, because Steve has a synth set up for that show as well..

Just something Ive been wondering since the Chicago show. I like talking about gear and what not.

Different sequencer settings. Maybe all the drum sounds are controlled from there or something. Haven't paid too much attention to the rigs this year yet though to be honest. Steve has always been the sequencer controller rather than the synth player.

Thats a good point. But all of the unplayed string and synth parts coem from a backign track on a lap top dont they?

So what would Steve be controlling on his synths?

I just thought it was odd, two big synths set up to his drum kit that he barely touched....

Could just be as simple as they only have a certain device in keyboard form rather than rack, therefor there has to be a keyboard.

Are you sure it's a lapper BTW, I always get the vibe that the stuff is being played back MDF-fashion from one of the KB's.

at the Chi town show there was a dude on the side of the stage monitoring a laptop the whole time...

if they control the backign tracks from they synths, who does it? Certainly not Phil. I know Gil used to do it, and I dont think Steve was doign it, I didnt see him touch the synths except for BLT and BM.

The offstage laptop is likely to be something else entirely, lights? tard-o-prompter? gig recording? Feedback control on the monitors?

As for controlling, well as I say, it's likely to be little more than a straight midi data dump, so control really amounts to pressing "go".EDIT: probably worth pointing out that no one can press "go" better than Gillian at the start of WAS on PFD :)

I believe for the Get Ready shows the backing tracks were provided by an Akai hard disk recorder - no MIDI.

Ah oh well, it's been a fun 20 years. Suppose I have to look for a band who aren't theieves a conmen now.

That geezer who wears the headphones and has the laptop in front of him digitally records the gig I think. He's somewhere on the left just behind the band on the Finsbury DVD, also seen in many other gigs.

One for the black keys, the other one for the white ones. Oh sorry that was Gillian. :D

Ronald Kirsch wrote: One for the black keys, the other one for the white ones. Oh sorry that was Gillian. :D

Really, how hard is it to play black keys? You just press them down. Every scale uses at leat one of them, except for C.

This blue-eyed boy that wants to be wrote:

Ronald Kirsch wrote: One for the black keys, the other one for the white ones. Oh sorry that was Gillian. :D

Really, how hard is it to play black keys? You just press them down. Every scale uses at leat one of them, except for C.

This comment is based on history. For many years Gillian did not play either the white or was it the black keys. I can't remember which it is.

Gillian played the black keys. Steve is trying to compensate for something, so two keyboards.

You have inspired me to the true answer:

It's a "missing man" symbol for Gillian. :)

BTW glad to see the regeneration went well a few weeks ago there your papalosity.

Steve Campbell wrote: The offstage laptop is likely to be something else entirely, lights? tard-o-prompter? gig recording? Feedback control on the monitors?

As for controlling, well as I say, it's likely to be little more than a straight midi data dump, so control really amounts to pressing "go".EDIT: probably worth pointing out that no one can press "go" better than Gillian at the start of WAS on PFD :)

The laptop is controlling Bernard's autocue - sad but true!

Isn't the geezer with the glasses at the Finsbury Park do Roger Lyons? the interview with him in SoundOnSound last year was quite revealing regarding New Order's past and present set-ups. a good pointer to how they achieved their gated synth sound in days of yore (as discussed on steve campbell's alternate thread). and also covered some of what new order play live as opposed to how their 'backing tracks' are constructed. if anybody's interested someone posted up some rough scans somewhere in the archive or I could mail them if you let me know your e-mail. I'm not sure what the other synth is for but steve uses his kurzweil for samples on BM and arpeggiated sequences (possibly synced to an output) on BLT - although these could just be samples he seems to play chord shapes on that song. I would doubt that he takes an extra synth on stage to hold his drum samples - if he didn't use the practical option of having his v-drums trigger samples from a rackmount device for songs such as atmosphere then he would use the kurzweil. maybe the Roland is a back up as a nod to the days when they needed to take 5 synths to a gig just in case. so my answer would be - I don't know. but these are the stupid questions I'd ask if I met him.

I would really love to read that article you mentioned.

What issue was it? I have a few SoS from last year here, some bought, some DL'd. I dont recall that article, so most likely it's not in one I have physically.

Might be on their website.........checking......aye it is.....

sospubs.co.uk and whack "lyons" into the search box

the presence of the kurzweil makes sense, if they are still pursuing the same line of research they were when last I bothered to read up, their equipment is configured to be variable architecture, that is to say that not only can you tell it how the synth should sound, but also what sort of synth it is just now. Pink Floyd scared me half to death with a much old Kurzweil on some gig I seen on TV, it made the EXACT same noise as the original VCS3putney on "on the run".

or directly roger lyons article in sound on sound

did you not get the scanned article I e-mailed to you steve? sorry if it didn't get through, I sent it in response to your gated synths query.

Why does steve have a tank?

Kurzweil - sampler (well synth too, but Steve and particularly Gillian used it for sample mangling), Roland XP-80 - sound presets for live shows (I seriously doubt this sound engine to be used at all when Barney's assembling the keyboard parts for each track in the studio).

Facsimile wrote: or directly roger lyons article in sound on sound

did you not get the scanned article I e-mailed to you steve? sorry if it didn't get through, I sent it in response to your gated synths query.

I didn't you know, hmmmmmm twas the "slightlynarrow" address? ( it's just I'm convinced my old NTL address is still foating around on here somewhere.

Cheers anyway :)

The part I find hilarious in that interview is this:

"Many of the older songs Roger was recreating for the tour required pitch and tempo changes to make them more playable. "We speeded some of the older tunes up and took some up a semitone, because then they sounded a little more upbeat and seemed to work better like that."

Heh, high-speed dubbing did that just as well. I can't count how many NO bootlegs run fast.

My first thought on reading that was.... "errrr how do the string playing folk take to that, don't they always prefer open string keys?....won't a semitone transposition freak them out"

Wonder if that's why beardy had the capo on at the NME awards.

EDIT: RE:boots, don't you think it's about time someone cleaned up all the old boots and pitch corrected them and noise scrubbed them and so on? there is an abuncance of clever restoration software out there, it should be a doddle.

I got the programs, what I don't have is all the low generation masters that others here have. And while it's a tempting thought, I'm not about to say "send me your boots so I can clean them", even tho it would be a good way to expand my collection :) I'm sure there are others here who have done more restorative work anyway....I tend to be a bit ham fisted at that sort of thing :) I DID do a decent job cleaning up and compressing "when I'm with you", but that's all so far.

"Many of the older songs Roger was recreating for the tour required pitch and tempo changes to make them more playable. "We speeded some of the older tunes up and took some up a semitone, because then they sounded a little more upbeat and seemed to work better like that."My first thought on reading that was...."errrr how do the string playing folk take to that, don't they always prefer open string keys?....won't a semitone transposition freak them out"

to my mind the only two songs on the finsbury park gig that I can see/hear have been transposed up are 'crystal' and 'lwtua'. 'brutal' has been transposed down from F to E as far as I can tell. 'lwtua' (a full tone) I think for vocal reasons. barney always had some trouble pitching that and sometimes went up an octave rather than be inaudible at natural pitch. 'crystal' is pitched a semitone up to be playable in Am rather than the practically unplayable album key. (I told you I was a shonky musician!)

steve: yeah it was your slightlynarrow address. maybe the attachments held it up. you've seen the link now though. I'll just resend the dull text bit.

lemme know if you got my reply ok, i got some sort of public key/certificate grief when I went to send back. Said it sent tho.

What´s this?? Why does Steve have two testicles....????