Pretty Please
Sometimes called Honky-tonk,junk or jangly piano. You used to hear the sound a lot but don't hear it too much anymore.
Wikipedia has a short listing that details its use in classical, jazz, rock and pop music styles as well as use in music and cinema scores.
Wikipedia article.
Yes, there's a place for such a sound.
Interestingly, Burt Bacharach used it for the piano in What's New Pussycat.
When Tom Jones recorded the song, Bacharach had five upright pianos in the studio to choose from. Two of them were tack pianos, and one was used for the musical backing for that song.
Just about any rag time, polka or cabaret song sounds more authentic when played on a tack piano.
Most saloon pianos (think cowboy movies) sounded a little out of tune and tacky even if they weren't.
What's a lot of fun is to do a keyboard split at middle C, with the lower registers mapped to a saloon upright (like Rain Piano MkII by SampleTekk) and a tack piano (like WavesFactory's) mapped to the upper registers. Play boogie woogie with the left hand, and honky tonk with the right. Sounds fantastic together.
That's a big plus one for me, it'd be a huge boon for faster, old time traditional country songs / tunes. It would also work wonderfully well in Dixieland music, so yes please for an old saloon style piana
Agree with all of the above.
+1 - Tack Piano would be amazing for that Abbey Road studio feel, indeed!