[ETHAN HOLTZMAN PERFORMING WITH DENGUE FEVER]

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: I'm Ethan Holtzman. I play keyboard in Dengue Fever.

PATRICK OGLE: I’m making the assumption that people don't know what a Farfisa is.

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: Oh yeah. A Farfisa's like a '60s Italian compact organ similar to a Vox or, you know, there's some Conn organs. There's a whole bunch of different compact organs. Elk, there's something or there's like this one it's what's called a ComboOrganHeaven.Com that has all these old combo organs, Farfisas one of them. It's one of the best ones.

I have the Farfisas at home but they don't really survive the plane rides anymore. They get too cold so it takes like a day or two for them to thaw out and get in tune.

PATRICK OGLE: So you can't use them too or?

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: I use them in the studio now and just the Nord Stage Compact. It's got a Farfisa patch and a Vox and Wurlitzer 200A, a Rhodes, a synth, it's got everything, B3, so.

PATRICK OGLE: So it's okay. How does it compare though with it? How does the Nord compare with the use of the real Farfisa?

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: I mean there's things about the Farfisa that are better, you know. It's more unique. It's like it's just there's something unique about it. You shake it, the reverb's underneath it, and it's [IMITATES SHAKEN SPRING REVERB TANK SOUND] you know, and it reacts to it when you hit it, but the Nord is definitely way more reliable and it's got a lot more options, you know. The Farfisa's great, you know, it was good for like the first record. The second record we started branching out and --

PATRICK OGLE: So, what do you use as far as amps go?

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: Well, when we're recording at home, I use a Leslie a lot, a Leslie, it's just a big, you know, with the horn, the rotating --

PATRICK OGLE: Right, right, right, right.

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: I forgot the model, maybe a 710. That's probably about it. I should have -- sorry about that.

PATRICK OGLE: No. [SOUNDS LIKE] Really it's all right.

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: Yeah. I use a Leslie and then I also use -- we have a variety of amps in the studio, but what I play live with is a Fender Vibrolux.

PATRICK OGLE: And why?

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: It's -- It does the job. It's, you know, it seems to just [OVERLAPPING].

PATRICK OGLE: You don't bring the Leslie out on the road the same reason you don't bring the Farfisa.

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: Oh no. No. Yeah, the Leslie's, you know, the Leslie sounds like nothing else. It's incredible but you don't -- I don't move it.

PATRICK OGLE: Do you think that it's -- Do you find that you ever have a problem when you're going to duplicate the sound in the studio when you're using stuff like that live? Do you find that there's any difficulty in that?

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: Not too much anymore. Yeah, you know, the Nord is really -- it really managed to get the samples from all these vintage keyboards so they're pretty accurate so it's pretty good. It's, you know, there's a couple of settings on the Farfisa that like I would like, you know, if you just have the 16' pipe down setting alone, it's a real like buzzy kind of higher tone that's incredible. It's like a little miniature nest of bees working for you, but the Farfisa, every time you plug it in and, you know, and then the sound man's like, "What's that noise?"

PATRICK OGLE: Yeah. I can imagine every sound man that improvises [OVERLAPPING].

ETHAN HOLTZMAN: Yeah. They're always like, "What is that? Let me try to get rid of that," so it's like, you know, and then go on overseas international, you know, so now it's kind of just getting to the point where this makes sense, good option, lightweight, you don't have to pay extra to fly, but the Farfisa is definitely useful in the studio as well as Wurlitzer 200A and whatever we can get our hands on. A little Casio battery ones, you know, everything can be -- You can make most things sound pretty cool.

[ETHAN HOLTZMAN PERFORMING WITH DENGUE FEVER]