b3halt

The true comparison should be how those clones sound compared to the real thing. The XK5 can sound very very close to my B3 after tweaking as well as the SK(X) Pro. I have not used the Mojo for a long time because two units I received had problems again and again. It's all about how satisfied you are with your rig. After trying almost all the clones, I found what I like. Some people say it sounds thin, but how? If you shoot a video with a crappy mic or some EQ settings, it can sound very different. It's not a credible source. I always use the real maintained B3 as a reference, then compare those clones, and if possible, I tweak them to see how close they can sound to my B3. About the Leslie sim, it's a sim. If you use the sim, you have to compromise. If you use the vintage Leslie, the 3300, the 2101mks, the Tornado 315, 115, the Vortex, and some others, it's not a sim, so it's a different story. The sim can never beat the real thing. Again, if you use the sim, it's all about how you tweak and how much tweakablity those clones can offer. I think this type of discussion or comparison is not so much meaningful...

Nah, I disagree. Listen to his live recordings from Blue Note like Incredible Jimmy Smith at Club Baby Grand and Groovin' at Small's Paradise. He was smokin' and this is incomparable to his late recordings. His playing changed over the years. He played a little bit more bebopy during the Blues Note years, and then he played a lot more bluesy during the Verve years. I personally like his playing from Blues Note and Verve. After around 1965, he started playing more modern stuff like quartal voicings and lines. I probably have all the Jimmy Smith albums, and I usually don't listen to his late recordings. They are good, but I like earlier ones better. Yes, his first organ grinder swing is short, but listen to other tracks. He improvises a lot more and his playing is so solid. Just smokin' and so good. He might not have played many fills back then, but this doesn't mean his playing wasn't better. He chose not to do so. In my opinion, it's not a good observation.

I love Charles's playing. He played very solid bass lines. Each note of his bass lines is solid. The length of the notes is pretty much the same, so it's tight, in my opinion. His bass lines are very simple. Mostly R 5 3 R or R R 5 Ch(half step above or below the next note) in 4/4 swing. For funky stuff, he often played R - 5 Ch. I really like how he played each note. He played tenuto like Jack McDuff did, and it was bouncy. They didn't play many grace notes like Jimmy Smith and Jimmy McGriff, but they also grooved so hard. I used to play with former members of Charles's band for a long time in Chicago, and they told me how solid his left hand bass was. Also, he was really good at improvising a lot with blues scales. I transcribed a lot of his playing and got a lot of ideas. I think he had a great sense of time. Also, he was good at arranging pop songs. In addition, on one of his live albums, he used the wah wah pedal on Smilin' (by Sly), and that's so cool.

C/V: C3 on both manuals No percussion 888000000 (Upper) 838000000 (Lower) 80 (Pedal) I'm not so sure about this Leslie: Stop (At the time of the recording, two speed Leslie wasn't available. The 122 and 147 were released in the 60s. When he started using Slow, he stopped using C3 on the C/V. He didn't use the C/V at that time. So, late Jimmy's setting is different from early his.) Rudy Van Gelder used his typical setting. He miked the Leslie and also used the direct line out from the Hammond, so he mixed both. I believe he had the C3 in his studio.

I cannot list all those recordings. But, check out his live performance in the concert hall Sally Pleyel, Europe/Paris, May 28, 1965. You can listen to Blue Bash (the first song). Check the tempo of the beginning, the middle, and the end. I find this a little bit too much in front the beat. But again, it's up to players how they feel. I find it that way. I cannot argue how I hear and feel vs how you hear and feel.

First of all, I personally don't like that bass line you are talking about. It's completely up to what kind of bass lines organ players like. Check out the very first recording of Midnight Special. Jimmy played more like Chicken Shack bass lines. Tony played more like that version. We know how Jimmy played those bass lines, but we decided not to copy because we all play differently. Right? I like the bass line of the first version, which Tony played.

Sorry, but I disagree. Most of the blue note stuff was recorded at Rudy Van Gelder's studio. Thus, Jimmy Smith, Big John Patton, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Jack McDuff, Don Patterson, Rueben Wilson, and other organ players recorded there. Check out some stuff by Big John Patton, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Reben Wilson, and Baby Face Willette. You can hear their bass lines well. Also, it's not blue note, but Jack McDuff, Groove Holmes, Don Patterson, Jimmy McGriff, and Hank Marr played great bass lines too. I know this because I transcribed those bass lines. Also, if you listen to Joey DeFrancesco and Tony Monaco, you can hear good bass lines clearly too. There have been tons of great players besides Jimmy Smith. Check out other players. They all had their own style and sounded great. In fact, I love how Jack McDuff and Jimmy McGriff played their bass lines more than Jimmy. John Patton played really solid bass lines too. Sometimes Jimmy Smith played his bass lines way too much on the top of the beat. But some other played very solid.

No percussion. Just 888000000

Jimmy McGriff all the way! [video:youtube]

Thanks guys! Spider76, thanks again for your idea. I didn't think it is that difficult or requires a lot of patience. This film is pretty durable. I had to tear it off before I fully tried this whole thing. It was pretty strong, and actually it really sticks hard. It's possible to get this stuff off, but it's not that easy. It's not very hard, but you do need some strengths to peel it off. I don't know how strong this surface is, but if it gets scratched, the original surface gets probably scratched as well. I waxed the end caps after I did this modification because it prevents from some light scratches. We'll see how durable this is. If you go back to the original end caps again, I don't recommend this mod. It probably leaves some sticky glues which you have to get off.

Thanks to Spider76, I tried his modification. I also used the dc-fix film (Golden Walnut which looks closest to the vintage Hammond organ to my eyes). This wasn't easy to me, and took a long time. It took about 8 hours to do both end caps, so I couldn't do it faster like Spider76. The end caps are so irregular, so I had to use a hair dryer to stretch this film a lot, especially for corners. I did okay. There are small bubbles and wrinkles here and there, but overall it looks great. The actual color is more like brown, but it looks brighter in the photos.

Spider76, This looks very nice. Actually it looks better than the real wooden end caps. I should try this. Is it pretty difficult? There are many corners, so in order to make no bubbles and smooth surfaces, it requires some skills?

Yeah, my wooden end caps are the same as the Dr. Lonnie signature one without his name. If you have the SK2, it's interchangeable, but like BBblues's end caps wound't work because you need the original metal brackets from the SK2. I heard that another company in Holland will soon start making wooden end caps, and I think they look better. I haven't replaced the original end caps yet because the whole for the screws are bigger on the wooden caps, so I need to go to a hardware store to get bigger screws. Also, they are 1.5 kg heavier than the originals, so I cannot fly with the SK2 with no extra cost...

The half-moon from HS is made of plastic. I might be wrong, but I think the spacing is probably different. Also, the size of the screws are different. I'm not sure because I've never measured it. Maybe somebody else can help on this. If you would often gig with the organ, I would take the half-moon off when I put the organ in a case or a gig bag. The tip of the switch is plastic as you know and that sometimes comes off because it's not glued on both Nord and HS switches.

I use the Nord half-moon with the SK2. I even painted the Nord logo black on it. I have both, but I prefer the Nord one because it's solid. But, I never use the screws to attach it to the SK2 and the C2D. Instead, I took those screws out and put the velcro, so it's very easy to attach and detach when you set it up or pack it. I never ever used screws to attach any half-moon switches to all the clones I owned. Anyway, it's stable enough. By the way, with the Hammond Suzuki half-moon, you cannot do this. The back side of it is not flat. You can only do this with the Nord half-moon and the ones from Ashby Solutions. And, Bruce from Ashby told me this idea when I bought his half-moon long time ago. You can even do this with the SK1. So, some people want to use the half-moon switch with the SK1, this is a good solution too. Here is the video and you can see it. [video:youtube]

I've never had this kind of problem. Everything works perfectly with my SK1 and SK2 with the OS 8.4. Maybe you can check with the Hammond Suzuki dealer in your area or contact the HS service in your country.

The bag for the C1 by Nord is too heavy. I don't recommend it at all. With the same money, you can even have a custom made gig bag from Colorado Company. Or I would order the SK2 gig bag from Hammond USA. It's 15kg, so I don't think it's that practical to use a bag with rollers because it gets so much heavier... Or maybe you can find some other gig bags. That works as well.

Unfortunately this one doesn't solve the problem I'm talking about. I do the same thing. I turned off the patch load lower/pedal, drawbar effect, so the patch load upper and drawbar are on. However, there is no way that you can make one of preset buttons like the B preset key on the upper manual. If you turn off the percussion off of the preset with the percussion, use another preset, and go back to the first preset you used, the percussion is on because it's linked to the patch load drawbar. If I turn off the patch load drawbar, it creates another problem. For example, if I use the first preset with the percussion and switch to the second preset without the percussion afterwards, the percussion is still on. Therefore, this creates another problem. The other day I've emailed Hammond Suzuki engineers about this and the percussion button which some other people talked about. They said that they will consider these suggestions, but I really don't know if they make these options available for new updates.

For example, I often start with 888000008 w/ percussion (this is saved as a preset), use 888000008 w/o percussion (take the percussion off), press another preset like 888888888, and then press the original preset which is 888000008 w/ percussion. You see, this last one should be 888000008 w/o percussion. This is why, I would like to have one live preset button. The XK-3 and the XK-3c have this. The Nord C2 and the C2D have this kind of function as well. Even the Mojo has this. But, you cannot do this with the SK1/2. This is why, I think if they have one live preset button, this solves the problem. As you know, on the real one, only the upper B preset key can have percussion, and in order to imitate this, the SK1/2 should have one live preset button. I don't know, but this might not be a big deal with some players, but I have some situations like that, and when it goes back to the original preset setting, it kind of messes with my playing.

I'm gonna email the engineers at Hammond Suzuki Japan about this percussion button thing. I also felt the same thing. Also, I would love to have at least one of the preset button as live setting. It's because I would love to have one live setting, so I can feel it as the b preset key on the real one.

I think Hammond USA carries different types of bags. I have one from Japan, and yes, they are not sturdy. If you take good care of it, it's okay. Plus, the original price in Japan is so much cheaper. According to the photo, it looks different. I've checked Hammond EU, and they seem to carry the same one as the one from Hammond USA. http://www.hammond.eu/products/accessories/casesbags/sk-2-gig-bag/ The best way is, contact Hammond EU and ask them for more infos. Since I also live in Germany now, if mine breaks, I will contact them as well.

The only thing I wonder about the design is the place of the preset buttons. I wish they put them on the left side instead of the right side. I'm really used to having those preset buttons on the left side just like the original. So, this is the only thing I find it a little bit different. Except this, everything looks very cool.

Does anybody think it's kind of easy to scratch the fatar keys? I owned the C1, the C2, and the Mojo, and there are some small scuff marks because there are some spots where my nails sometimes hit. One spot is pretty bad because I can feel the gaps. It's hard to explain, but the key C5 often get a scuff mark because I play my right hand chords around that range, and my index finger nail sometimes scratches the surface... This often happens when I play outside because the surface of the keys get dusty, and it gets harder to slide. I never experienced this with the piano keys like Yamaha, Kawai, Roland, and Casio, and the XK-3c.

They really should have a B3, C3, or A100 w/ Leslie as a reference. Clones should be connected to the same amp with a mixer. They also should use the internal sim on each clones because anything through the real Leslie sounds great. If they really want to compare each clone, they shouldn't use the Ventilator because it's not fair in my opinion. I compared the XK-3c, the SK-1, the C1, the C2, and the Mojo with the A-102 w/145 a couple of weeks ago. The XK-3c sounds better than the SK1/2, and of course, the C2 sounds better than the C1 in my opinion. I like using the Mojo lately. By the way, they also should think about playability and portability as well. I was interested in the KeyB, but it was heavy for me to carry around, so I didn't get curious about it after all...

I needed some keys because those keys made noise when I released them. It wasn't that bad, but it was a little bit annoying since they were on the lower manual, and I often played those keys. I opened up my Mojo and found out what was making noise. There is a little tub which holds an entire key, so it makes stable. That little tub was missing. I don't know why. I'm pretty picky because every time I played gliss, I could hear that noise. I asked them to send me some keys for replacement, and they took care of it. The great thing is, I could see how the Mojo is constructed. It made me realize how easy replacing parts is on the Mojo, and it's easy for many people to replace parts because the construction is pretty simple. If I need to replace some parts on my Mojo, I don't need a tech because it's simple enough for me to fix it. This means, I don't need to ship my Mojo to Italy to fix something, which saves a lot of time and money. I use my Mojo every gig and rehearsal. It's a nice shape, but there are dents and scratches on the wood panels here and there. That happens when you play more than ten gigs every month even if you are pretty careful. The system is very stable, and I never had a problem. Indeed, Guido updates the VB3 2 often, and this is one of the greatest things because other companies don't updates often and don't listen to users much. Tony Monaco will start using it soon because I talked to Tony a couple days ago, so the VB3 will improve more and more in the future, I guess.