Walk of Life keyboard sounds

[JPROBERTLA]

I have been asked to do this song for a special event and wanted to know if anyone on the forum knows what combination of sounds are used in the synth/accordian/organ lick. I have figured out the sound for the basic Hammond intro and chord sound.

[Joe Gerardi]

When I did it, I believe I tool a Farfisa (Vox?) sound, removed all modulation and effects from it, filtered it a little and then re-modulated with a little Sine to get a touch of vibrato, slight reverb, and that was pretty much it.

IIRC, it was a pretty dry sound, (originally done on a DX5) so less of everything was better.

..Joe

[holdsg]

to my ears, and I haven't built a combi for this yet on a Kronos, I did on my Kurzweil, there are at least 3 sounds here, and live, I've seen video where they had 2 keys players doing it.

So to get it into one package, this is what I would do.

The lower, base tone is clearly an organ sound. That's the tone you hear at the very start of the song. I agree on the farsifa would be a good place to start, or a basic hammond sound with 2' and 4' and no leslie, but maybe some chorus.

Then there is the second tone, the second tone you hear on the record. I also agree that its likely a sine wave (or triangle) based synth patch, as enigmahack says, its pretty round, not jagged sounding like a saw.

The third sound, the highest tone, that I think is played in 5ths above the second sound, is a more resonant synth sound, that I would use a saw or something sparkly with some high pass filter on it. you would change the pitch on this one to a fifth above (if that's what it is, that's what it sounds like to me, experiment), so that when you play #2, you get #3 as well.

you'll want to set these up in a comb with #2 and #3 initially muted, and then bring them in one at a time with the buttons.

[jorgemncardoso]

Hi guys, this is a sound i've often wondered about back in the day. The main riff is basicly a organ patch on the DX7 and an Accordion like patch probably from the D50.

Dire straits had two keyboard players, Alan Clarck who played mainly piano and organ parts and Guy Fletcher who played mainly synth parts. The base chords are played by Alan on a Hammond, the riff is played by Guy, the DX7 organ patch is played in key and the accordion patch i believe is played in 5ths, both hands and in real time (not a stack or layer).
You can watch it better here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nLdK_p2ovI
and here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9a3WyaBmm4o

He is playing on the DX7II and on the SG1 piano controller, probably midi-ed to the D50 above.
BTW he had the DX7II, the D50, SG1, Wavestation, and a Hammond XB-2 on that tour.

Alan had also a SG1, Wavestation, D50, D70, and a real Hammond (probably a modified B3)

Someone also asked Guy about it on his webpage, here is his reply:

"Hi Guy, I always wondered - how is that floating
chorus-like lead sound of walk of life created? Is it double-layer-sound?
It sounds subtle to me, but everytime a tribute band comes up with their
rendition you know something is missing Thanks!
Nic

GF: That's because it's a very difficult sound to recreate.
Luckily I have a sample of the original sound which came from the Yamaha DX1.
FM synthesis at its finest. It was a modification of one of the organ presets in the beast.
Reminds me, I must dig that synth out sometime and fire her up."

Hope it helps