Simon Green, the electronic artist better known as Bonobo, released his eighth studio album earlier this month: Distance in Static.
Featuring a varied cast of collaborators that includes Pakistani-American Grammy-winner Arooj Aftab, Joy Crookes and Nilüfer Yanya, the sonically diverse record is described as a “moment of transition” that may well be Green’s final Bonobo project after 25 years working under the alias.
In an interview with the Tape Notes podcast on the making of the record, Green opened up his Ableton Live sessions to explore the production behind several tracks, including Talk To Me, Fire on the Water, and Me and You, a dancefloor-friendly cut built around a sample of 1950s field recordings made in Malawi by ethnomusicologist Hugh Tracey.
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Speaking to host John Kennedy about the song’s instrumentation, Green reminded listeners that the most expensive piece of gear isn’t always the right one for the job, even when you have it sitting in your studio.
When laying down some chords to flesh out the track’s arrangement, Green reached for the Yamaha Reface CP he keeps on his desk – a tiny $499 keyboard that emulates classic electric pianos like the Fender Rhodes – even though the real thing was only meters away.
“This is the Yamaha CP, the little series of reissued keys that they did,” Green tells Kennedy while playing back the track. “The thing about this is, I have an actual Rhodes sitting here in the studio, but I have the CP on the desk, because it’s right there and it’s closer.”
Despite its diminutive size and affordable price point, the Reface CP (much like the entire Reface range) is a well-regarded piece of kit.
Equipped with six emulations of classic electric pianos – including models of the Rhodes MK1 and MK2 – the keyboard packs the same sound engine that you’ll find in Yamaha’s larger and pricier CP Series, leveraging a blend of physical modelling and sample-based synthesis to deliver its convincingly vintage-style tones.
As we can hear in Me and You, the Reface CP does an excellent Rhodes imitation, and while its size might be a limitation to some, it’s also a clear benefit: the CP is perfectly proportioned for placing on your studio desk, remaining within arm’s reach while working on a project. As Green tells Kennedy, when you’re deep in the creative flow, speed and convenience often trumps authenticity.
“This is a big lesson in hardware,” Green says. “I just used [the CP] because it was there, instead of the real thing that was sat across from me. Plugging in one cable is the difference between using the real thing [and the imitation].”
Watch our hands-on demo of the Yamaha Reface CP below.
For more track breakdowns and interviews with artists and producers, check out Tape Notes’ YouTube channel or subscribe to their Patreon, where members can access full-length video episodes, exclusive offers, merch discounts, artist gear lists and behind-the-scenes content.
