Blue Monday on Vintage Casio Instruments

I thought it would be a fun challenge to do a cover version of New Order’s Blue Monday using only vintage consumer-grade Casio instruments. This is an edited and compressed adaptation. I left out some sections of the song and combined a few things to make a shortened rendition.

What you see me playing in the video are the actual instruments I used to make this multi-track recording. I layered different keyboards for most parts. I didn’t do anything to significantly change the sound of the instruments. I only used basic effects, such as equalization, reverb, delay, chorus, compression, etc.

I programmed the main drums using the built in rhythm programmer of the HT-700 keyboard and supplemented them by playing along on the DP-1 drum pads connected to the MT-500 keyboard. I used the SS-1 drum sticks to strike the pads, but you can also connect these sticks directly to the MT-500 and trigger drum sounds by striking anything or even waving the sticks in the air.

New Order sampled the Kraftwerk song “Uranium” for the choir-like sound in the original song. I also sampled ”Uranium” with the SK-1 keyboard. This is the only thing I sampled.

Here is a list of the instruments I used (in order of their first appearance):
HT-700 keyboard
MT-500 keyboard, DP-1 drum pads, SS-1 drum sticks
VL-1 mini keyboard/calculator
MT-400V keyboard
Casiotone 1000P keyboard
DG-20 digital guitar
SK-1 sampling keyboard
PT-7 mini keyboard and Casiotone M-10 keyboard
DH-200 digital horn
Casiotone 201 and MT-40 keyboards
MT-65 keyboard
KX-101 and CK-500 keyboards/cassette players
Casiotone 701 keyboard
MT-35 keyboard
MT-52 keyboard

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