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Bargain gear (1997)

"What's the point of a synthesiser that you can't synthesise with? If you want a trumpet, go and get someone to play the trumpet. Analogue synths are there to create new sounds, and it's the sounds that do it for me," he insists. "On stage I've got a Fender Rhodes and a Hohner Clavinet; then I've got a new Yamaha CS1x which is like a programmable analogue digital synth, a Nord Lead and a Moog Source. Obviously for live stuff, the analogue synths I use have to have programs -- originally, I played with a Mini-Moog, but it was just a nightmare because I could never get there in time to change the sounds between one tune and the next. So the Moog I'm using now has 16 programs which is very cool."

Smith uses the Suitcase 88 version of the Fender Rhodes, but complaints from disgruntled roadies meant he had to make certain modifications. "I had to take the bottom bit -- the amplifier -- off, because the roadies got so fed up with carting it around. It was only a glorified stand anyway because I wasn't using it. So now I've got this little box which takes a direct out, including all the vibrato and tone controls, which makes it a lot easier. I also use an Electric Mistress phaser and a wah-wah pedal on the Fender. For the rest of the stuff I use an Ibanez Autowah which gives a great '70s sound. It has an auto filter which produces this wow-wow-wow sort of sound. Then I've got delay on the Moog. I have all my keyboards plugged into an in-line mixer, a rackmount thing, so I can mix my own monitor which is important as I've got six instruments on the go a lot of the time." For piano sounds, however, he makes an exception to his anti-digital rule. "Actually, I use a Yamaha P150; it's definitely the best-sounding piano I could find. I ended up using it on the album, too. We wrote Virtual Insanity on it and when we went into the studio to record the song properly I tried it on a Steinway and on a Bechstein, but it just wasn't happening, so I stuck with the Yamaha.

"The Moog Source I found in Canada. It was $100! I've just got an Oberheim OB1 which I bought yesterday in LA. I had a field day in Japan, too -- in every city, I go off and explore the music shops."

Quaveringly Quantized on a Quasar with Jamiroquai's Toby Smith
Keyboard: February 1997

On tour Toby brings his Moog Source, Hohner Clavinet, Novation BassStation, Yamaha CS1x, and Fender Rhodes 88, mixing up his smooth piano chord rhythms with cartoonish analog space bleeps. Attached to his Rhodes are an Electro-Harmonix Electric Mistress phaser and a wah-wah pedal. To appease the roadies, Toby took his Rhodes 88 stage model on tour without the speaker cabinet. "I also bought a Mutron," says Toby, "which is like a bass effects pedal, but I can use it on one of the keyboards as well, maybe on the Clav to get a really envelopy 'bow-wow' sort of thing."

Vintage Collector.

Why did Toby dump the digital gear to go the way of the Moog? "Because they sound so much better. I just prefer the sculptural ability of getting the sounds; there's something simple about it." At home, his catalog of analog includes two Moog Sources, Sequential Circuits Prophet-T8 ("the supreme mother of synths"), Memorymoog, ARP Odyssey and ARP 2600, Roland SH-101 and SH-7, and a Minimoog, "which I didn't use so much, because it was buggin'.

Ibanez AutoWah Toby mentioned is Ibanez AF9 (Auto filter, it is also called an "envelope filter").
Its out of production now, but now theres a reissue of this pedal
made on Maxon label (Maxon AF9) - Maxon is the same company as Ibanez but for sales in Japan market.