A 1965 UK-built Continental. Photo: Docrobbie, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Vox Continental
Discontinued 1971Released 1962
The combo organ everything else is measured against: 49 reverse-colour keys, four footage drawbars and two voice drawbars, and a fixed vibrato you can only change with a screwdriver. Thin, reedy and cutting where a Hammond is warm, which is exactly why it owns garage rock, 'Light My Fire' and the 2-Tone revival. UK and US builds have wooden keys; the far more common Italian ones use plastic keys on metal shafts.
Specifications
General
- Manufacturer
- Vox
- Status
- Discontinued
- Released
- 1962
Keyboard
- Manuals
- 1
- Keys per manual
- 49
- Key action
- Waterfall
- Keybed
- 49 reverse-colour keys (black naturals, white sharps), no separate bass section; unweighted spring-return organ keys, wooden on UK and US builds, plastic on metal shafts on Italian builds
Sound
- Drawbars
- Physical
- Sound engine
- Transistor organ: 12 top-octave oscillators feeding frequency dividers (germanium transistors on most builds)
- Organ models
- Transistor combo organ; six drawbars: 16', 8', 4' and IV mixture (2 2/3', 2', 1 3/5', 1') set the pitches, Flute (~) and Reed (M) drawbars set the tone
- Polyphony
- Full polyphony
Connections
- Pedal inputs
- Expression
Features
- Features
- Reverse-colour keys, Fixed single-speed vibrato, Chrome Z-stand, Volume pedal, Stand and pedal pack into the case, Made in the UK, US and Italy
Size & weight
- Colours
- Orange, Black, Grey
Heard on
Artists and records that used it, as Vox tells it.
- Alan Price (The Animals), “The House of the Rising Sun” – The organ solo on the Animals' arrangement
- John Lennon (The Beatles), “Think for Yourself”, “I'm Down” – 'I'm Down' was the live set closer, including Shea Stadium in 1965
- Ray Manzarek (The Doors), “Light My Fire” – Paired with a Fender Rhodes Piano Bass early in the band's career