Matt Berry explains the creation of the iconic sound used in his album *Oxygen*, rooted in the Eminent 310 organ’s unique three-chorus design, which produces a rich, layered string ensemble effect. He achieves the album’s signature sonic texture by combining a minimal, dry organ sound with the vintage Small Stone guitar pedal, known for its silky, analog phasing. The stereo effect is built by panning the original dry signal to the left and adding a delayed version to the right, with half the track relying on this delay. The original Small Stone pedal, especially the Soviet-made model, delivers a deep, warm, and organic tone that evolves subtly with battery voltage, contributing to the sound’s character. Berry modified the pedal to offer adjustable sustain and chorus levels, improving performance across different tempos and keyboard ranges. The updated version is now MIDI-enabled, allowing precise control during live performances and studio recording. This approach reflects a pioneering idea—borrowing guitar effects for keyboards—demonstrating how simple, analog processing can produce profoundly expressive and distinctive electronic sounds.
Hello everyone, I'm Matt Berry, and this is the final episode of a series of conversations
with John Michel Jar at his studio in Paris.
So this is the Eminent 310, and as you were saying, it's one of the basic sound of Oxygen
and the Queen Ox and lots of my album.
Actually, this instrument has a story, it's a Dutch instrument at the beginning, and these
Dutch people, this brand, they reinvented and created the string ensemble concert.
What is it? It's actually adding on an organ three choruses, three choruses, called orbitones,
that creates this kind of very quick shifting of frequencies, creating the sound of strings,
of strings playing together, and then they solve this to up, and then the up, there
is then the first up string ensemble based on this, but actually what's different from
the Eminent to anything done after that, including the Solina, it's actually, everybody else
are using just one chorus where the Eminent are using three, and this is the reason why
the sound is very rich.
So the only idea is to start from a very basic organ sound, and then adding the three choruses,
so you have the three choruses like this, and then sustain, so you have the release creating
a little more kind of reverb sound, and then on Oxygen what I did is I used a guitar pedal
called the small stone, which is one of legendary phasor, and the first generation has that
kind of silky sound that you can't find on the more recent ones, and then you lose probably
half of the level, so I have to adjust the level here, and then suddenly you have lots
of noise, it's going with it, and then the trick and the process what I've done for Oxygen
is actually using the delay, and most of the Oxygen album is actually the left side
is dry, and the right side of the album, of the old album actually, is the delay version
of the dry sound coming from the right, so actually 50% of the album is actually made
of delay, and then if I put, the original ones were these revoxes, but they are not plugged
in at the moment, so I'm replacing the delay, but it's going to be more or less the same
thing with a digital delay with this, and by just adding this, then suddenly we'll have
the dry sound here, the delay sound here to get the stereo, and then you will have
the sound I use for Oxygen like it.
So this is it, this is it, coming from this kind of very, very minimized
poor organ sound, which is very, very dry, and then just by processing with very simple
things, suddenly you have the most extraordinary white sound, but that was your idea, that's
the point.
Yeah, exactly.
You put that with that.
Yes, and that is actually in days where you had no way to process sounds of keyboards,
so I actually, the idea was, and then lots of people are doing this, but the idea was
to steal from the guitar players, their pedals, and to put these pedals with keyboards and
organs, where in days it was not really done at all, I mean, people were, I mean, the
guitar world is still a bit the case, but the guitar world was on one side, and the keyboard
world was even not recognized as such, so I mean, what I did, I used some pedals and basically
from Electro harmonics, and the guy from Electro harmonics was a kind of crazy guy, he really,
he really created fantastic pedals such as the small stone and the electric mistress,
and you have actually very different generations of small stone, like, which is interesting
in electronic music, actually, you have lots of series of instruments.
For instance, here are the different models, this model is the first one, this model is
the first one, and you can recognize it because of this minimalist type of writing, and
this is, this has the most silky one, then you have the second model, which is this one,
I think this one you have it, and this one is quite good, quite close, not as good, but
quite okay, this one is not as good, it's even worse, I would say, and then the new ones
are just to forget it, and then, which is, I would say number two is this one, and this
one has a story, it's a Russian, it's a Soviet Union pedal, small stone, and this one
has a story, because this guy, this guy designed, I met him in Moscow, it was a big fan
of oxygen, and by, just by listening to the music, he actually conceived the pedal to try
to, until he would find the right sound, and actually, he did it so well that, actually,
I use this a lot, because it's much more, sorry, it's like coming straight from the Soviet
Union Army, and it's very, like, very heavy stuff, and then we used it a lot on tour,
and the sound is almost as good as this one, very similar, but that's the one to get,
but that's the one, that's the one, the original one I used, and actually, we had, it's
actually, I had two, the other one had a special switch, because the real sound of oxygen
is when the battery, nine volts battery, is slightly used, and when you go down to eight
volts, it has even this kind of silky phasing sinus, that makes it so soft, and this one
is, because you can feel that the battery being a bit, is totally new, and it's a bit harsh,
where, if you wait the three hours, it's going to be, but you have to record in three hours,
one hour later, it's too weak, so you have just a slot, so here we're, here we're, here
we're, and then I have five of those ones, because on stage when we play, but that's the
one that you use, but that's the original one, yes, and you've modified it here with,
I modified it quite recently, to get actually, because the fact is, the sustain, the length
of the sustain is always the same, so sometimes, so it's okay, but because it's quite long,
I wanted to be able to set up the length of the, of the sustains, because when you are
playing on, I don't know, faster track with the faster BPM, you need to have less sustain,
otherwise it's, it's creating quite lots of mess, and also to, what you have in, in the
lower keyboard is the fact that you can have, I don't know if you, if you're, yeah, you
know, here you don't have the, the organ sound at all, you just have the strings, and more
you push this, more you have the, just the chorus, and then, and that you can actually,
of course, set up the, the, the, the, the, the amount of organ sound you, you need, where
it doesn't exist there, so I, I asked the guy to, to, to do the same thing of this for
the upper keyboard, so just mine, mine are things, and also this one is now MIDI, so which
is great is actually I can, I can also control it, and also playing MIDI files, I've, I've
recorded at home of somewhere, and then going back to the studio, and having the, the real
eminion sound when I want it, when, when I want it, so it, here it is, good, happy, that's
Podcast Summary
Key Points:
The Eminent 310 organ uses three choruses instead of one, creating a richer, more complex string-like sound unique among string ensemble organs.
Matt Berry achieved the distinctive texture of the Oxygen album by combining a dry organ sound with a guitar pedal called the Small Stone, known for its silky, vintage phasing effect.
The final version of the Oxygen sound relies on a stereo technique where the left channel is dry and the right is a delayed version, giving the track depth and space.
The Small Stone pedal has evolved through generations, with the original Soviet-designed model offering a heavy, organic, and nuanced tone unmatched by later versions.
The original Small Stone’s sound is enhanced by a slightly low battery voltage (around 8V), which creates a soft, phasing effect that adds warmth and character.
Berry modified the pedal to allow adjustable sustain length and chorus levels, improving control for different song tempos and keyboard sections.
The updated pedal is now MIDI-compatible, enabling remote control and integration into digital recording and live performance setups.
The core idea was to borrow guitar effects for organs, a practice that was revolutionary at the time and helped shape the signature sound of electronic music.
Summary:
Matt Berry explains the creation of the iconic sound used in his album *Oxygen*, rooted in the Eminent 310 organ’s unique three-chorus design, which produces a rich, layered string ensemble effect. He achieves the album’s signature sonic texture by combining a minimal, dry organ sound with the vintage Small Stone guitar pedal, known for its silky, analog phasing. The stereo effect is built by panning the original dry signal to the left and adding a delayed version to the right, with half the track relying on this delay.
The original Small Stone pedal, especially the Soviet-made model, delivers a deep, warm, and organic tone that evolves subtly with battery voltage, contributing to the sound’s character. Berry modified the pedal to offer adjustable sustain and chorus levels, improving performance across different tempos and keyboard ranges. The updated version is now MIDI-enabled, allowing precise control during live performances and studio recording.
This approach reflects a pioneering idea—borrowing guitar effects for keyboards—demonstrating how simple, analog processing can produce profoundly expressive and distinctive electronic sounds.
FAQs
The Eminent 310 uses three choruses (orbitones) instead of one, creating a richer, more complex sound that gives it a distinctive and lush texture compared to later models like the Solina.
The sound was built from a basic, dry organ tone, processed with simple effects like delay and a guitar pedal called the Small Stone, which adds a silky phasing effect.
It was used because of its unique, silky phasing sound—especially in the first generation—which is not found in modern pedals and contributes to the album's distinctive texture.
The original pedal has a soft, silky sound when the battery drops to 8 volts, creating a subtle phasing effect that adds warmth and organic depth to the sound.
The right side of the album features a delayed version of the dry organ sound, creating a stereo image where 50% of the album is made of delay, giving it a wide, immersive feel.
The sustain length was adjustable to suit different tempos, and the upper keyboard section was modified to allow control over organ and chorus levels independently.
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