Alan Parsons: From The Dark Side of the Moon to The Alan Parsons Project

hey everybody I'm Rick Bato and today's episode I sit down with the legendary Allan Parsons known for his work with Pink Floyd on their iconic album Dark Side of the Moon and his contributions to the Beatles Abby Road Allen has also left his Mark in music history with his own group the Allen Parson's Project we talk about his career as an artist his Innovative production techniques and the stories behind some of the most influential music and history here's my interview Alan welcome thank you pleasure nice to be here pleasure to meet you I have this

thing on the table here it's a studio layout from Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon from ABY Road Studios and I asked you when you sat down is that your handwriting and you said yes would you write this for every single project this was very common ABY Road was like run like a mil military operation everybody had a a job to do the if you were the were the engineer you had to do a layout sheet other people would set the studio up according to this specification on the on this a sheet like this

on orchestral sessions that that that was that was pretty challenging to you know make to make sure that you trusted the people who would do the setting up to to get it right now if you did something like this uh and then the band leaves the studio and then comes back a few weeks later you just refer to this sheet and set everything back up like it was yeah that was the advantage of of doing that of course there was the potential slight difference between two microphones of the same type yeah I mean every 47

was a little bit different that was my always my vocal mic of choice 47 okay so I want to ask you about these things but I want to kind of backtrack you got your job at abood Studios and when you were what 19 18 19 years old that were you living in London at the time I was yeah not far away from Studios actually Hamstead which is just 2 or three miles from from St John's Wood where ABY road is you mentioned you saw The Yard Birds play yeah I was still at school then um

I I did a two-year period uh at a sort of connected Department to uh to ABY Road it's called tape records and we made real tooreal copies of of of emi's product including Beatles and Pink Floyd and everything else they sounded really good they were the little plastic spools he bought it in a little square box and uh tape speed was 3 and 3/4 and S it sounded really good when you got your job at ABY Road Studios was was this like the dream job to have at the time yeah I mean they always had

um a system of of training you you you would start uh in the tape Library know just logging tapes and and it taught me how important it was that uh tape boxes had to contain every last piece of information otherwise it would get lost or forgotten or something would get wiped or of course it was easy when I first started there was only four tracks right okay so when did things go to eight tracks were the late Beatles records on uh were any of on eight track Abby Ro was eight track and they had uh

just before I got got the job um they did a couple of sessions for The White Album on eight TR but uh that was you know that was a new Revolution you know going from eight from four track to eight track and then 16 track came along a couple of years later and everybody said oh we'll never need that that many tracks but of course it just went to 24 and then to two 24 tracks running together and then now we have unlimited tracks so what was the system of how you moved up at Abby

Road you'd start where would you start out well I started at the tape Library logging tapes then then they would send me down just to be a fly on the wall just watching watching sessions um the very first session I ever sat in on with a British band called The Gods Ken Hensley was the uh was the keyboard player not the guitarist the keyboarder the uh basis for doing the sitting in was is more watching the uh the tape operator than the engineer because that would be the first job I would do actually working on

a session is being a Tape Op and would you stand with the tape operator and they would say this is what you do and they teach you yeah yeah teach me how to thread the tape through the guides and uh how to uh how to punch in to record that that was that was an interesting thing which I didn't I hadn't anticipated know that you you started in playback mode then you would go into record of course back then the moment you went to record everything that was on that track previously is history it's gone

yeah but noways we have this this magical function called undo okay so how much would people punch in on performances was that very rare to do that no no no it became especially uh when eight track came along it became quite normal to to do a vocal track for a verse and then punch in for the second verse or whatever you must had so many tape reels must have been a massive room of tapes what usually happened was that uh the the four tracks would be usually I just as an example the bass and drums

might be on the first two tracks or maybe in mono on just one track okay then you would leave uh you know three tracks for overdubs I mean if you wanted to double track the vocal that was another track if you did run out of tracks you transferred from one for track to another for track mixing but mixing everything down to a stereo pair of two tracks then you had another two tracks to play with if you needed still to do it again you had to go to an a third for track then you started

to noce that the tape noise would be built building up would you be adding high-end with the with the engineers when they were doing the bounces would they add high-end what would they typically do most likely uh just just to make sure that nothing's getting lost and would you ever go back to those old tapes or once those were done they just get filed away absolutely and um I think uh the the the recent Beetle releases have been uh exceptional because they did go back to the previous generations cuz they they can syn them up

these days but we never would have been able to sync up the the the first generation tape with the second generation tape well I noticed that your handwriting is incredibly neat was this something that they stressed on there um I don't think so I uh uh I think it was important for people to be able to read to read what what mics are going on what instruments and stuff what would you typically use back then what was like that well it's interesting because um for some reason during this period I I had uh an 87

on the snare and I I used to favor an 84 more more uh after this period but I've got a pair of 84s uh no three 84s left Center and right overhead in 86 I usually used to use an 86 on uh on guitars on piano as well this layout is is kind of designed to be flexible you know so I mean it wasn't always tracking sessions every day it was you know we do tracking and then we do overdubs and we do other things sometimes just literally playing the tapes and trying out effects you

know when you worked with the Beatles on the Let It Be sessions right Y and that's and you were Tape Op yep and uh helping to run the cables up up the stairs to to the roof how was the Apple Studios there was it uh chaos chaos I mean Glenn Johns was uh scratching his head trying to make this console built by the infamous magic Alex trying to get it to work but in the end uh ABY Road saved the day and moved to uh to old uh tube consoles into the into the control room

one was for the mics one was for monry that's what you're hearing on the recording then yeah yeah yeah I mean not a not a note got recorded through the manic Alex console I don't think was rumored that it uh was sold in the the electronics uh Department of or the electronics store area of London fetch 50s apparently I I've seen uh pictures of you or a picture of you up on the rooftop did you realize it was historic that uh it was the beas of course it was of course it was historic but um

no I I I was enjoying every minute and I I I said yeah thank you this this is the this is the greatest greatest experience I've ever had did you ever interact with them at the time or not really not not so much not not not in the Let It Be days um but you know uh the the following summer we did Abby Road and that was much more intimate much more involved with with the the guys and and myself I mean that's I it's really hard for me to imagine that you were actually there

during these things it's hard for me to to imagine that I was there yeah it was uh it was magical time what songs do you remember recording I I kind of remember that Maxwell Silba Hammer didn't go down very well with the other three uh but Paul uh persevered with it did a I thought he did a great uh moo solo on it um we actually tried a a backwards delay echo on the on the intro which which got shell didn't work it was going to go Jo Jo was physical that nobody liked it so

so they like to try things like that yeah yeah well yes the I mean I I guess I ended up with the the two most experimental bands ever Beatles and Pink Floyd I mean they were all all famous for their experimental sounds I'd like to take a second to talk to you about this channel Believe It or Not 57% of the people that watch your regularly are not subscribed so I would encourage you to hit the Subscribe button now this will help me get even more of my dream guests in the future thank you when

I went into ABY Road into Studio 2 I got a tour of the entire building but going into Studio number two I couldn't believe how big it was because when you see the pictures of the beetles in there they're typically shot close up almost like they're in a little set area you know they'll be set up all together but then you walk in and it's this enormous room with a high ceiling with a high ceiling yeah it it is a magical acoustic though number two interestingly um just just be it's the the period that uh

I was involved with usually all the instruments were being played in the room at the same time I mean we had baffles the little screens that would uh attempt to uh increase the separation between the instruments but generally speaking everybody played together if a band was there they were interacting with each other you know actually listening to each other others performance what about that got that got like in later years that became rarer you know you record a drum Loop and then stick real drums on then a bass part then a guitar part and then

then start thinking about vocals and stuff it was it was it was better back back then the the way the way it used to be done B all playing together what about headphone mixes I I always wondered about that like what kind of headphone mixes would they have had would everyone have heard the same mix yep that was only one that was only one mix and would they say hey I can't hear myself can you turn up the base can you turn up my vocal everybody wanted more of themselves okay so just like like pretty

much every session yeah it was it was a compromise back then but in of course in later Years everybody got the exact mix they wanted and even later they actually got to mix it themselves how did microphones change between when you started you know in the Let It Be ABY RH era to Pink Floyd to Dark Side of the Moon all all the ABY Road Engineers C had sort of favorites and uh I think uh that those favorites rubbed off on me I mean I if I heard uh a C12 on a on piano sounding

great then I would use a C12 on piano next time I recorded a piano the mic phone choices really didn't change very much I mean I'd be perfectly happy recording today with this the same the same set of mics that so what would you use on the bass drum what would be a microphone for the b d a D20 D20 AGG yeah and a km84 on the snare normally or you said on here it's in later years yeah 87 but the the this clearly says that I was using a 6 87 on the snare and

then for the overhead mics would be nearly always 40 38s again uh yes I had not started to use the 40 38s at this point obviously yeah I love I love the ribbon sound on overheads whether it's the figure8 pattern that that does it or what if it's the the quality of the mic itself the Cole's mics are very dull sounding I mean you you think uh it sounds D but so the first thing you do is put 10 DB of 10K on on on onto it before even listening to it I would do that

eqing for tape is kind of a lost art these are just things that you would do naturally you'd boost the high end if you're using ribbon mics like that that are dull and adding that 10K which just kind of an automatic thing and it it was a also a a question of of not just uh how how each microphone was eqed or how it sounded but you had to balance it I mean because you didn't have enough tracks a lot of the uh tracks on Dark Side ended up being bass and drums on on the

on the first pair of tracks wow I mean so you're just locked in then yeah yeah I mean you had to get it right it'd be mixed at the console they would be combined then and they would go down on tape that way Dark Side did go to a second generation of 16 tracks so okay first 16 track would have probably be had a SE separate Kick Drum snare and then everything else so four tracks on the second 16 track couldn't afford four tracks for drums had to just say let's get it right and stick

the base on there as well and then then we've got 14 tracks to play with which which which we needed Dark Side of the Moon is one of the most popular records one of the greatest sounding records of all time it's got to be so gratifying to have been involved in making that record it was it was and uh that satisfaction would culminated in getting my first Grammy nomination so didn't win but I was nominated is it true that the eight track of Dark Side of the Moon is a different mix or different version somebody

had told me that the eight track cartridge you mean yeah there was a quadrophonic mix which was released on N track yes that I did that I did that on my own with uh no band members there no producer just just me and uh Peter James the the tap hop so there's a couple of things missing because I just couldn't uh handle all the all the inputs and finding all the tapes that made up the the final stereo mix and how long did it take to make this record we do uh two weeks at a

time two three weeks at a time and I was actually going out with the band to do their front of house to to do their live sound and I was still doing other sessions at for other people but I I worked very hard to make sure that I never missed a Pink Floyd session because didn't want to share the credit with anybody else would they typically do overdubs in the control room how would you do that as far as uh David Gilmore's guitar overdubs I mean we did most of it actually in the studio be

out there with the headphones on but uh on occasion we ran a long cable into the into the control room would they listen to to songs over and over and say I like this I don't like this let's change this they they were all all critical of each other's performances and uh not afraid to to say you know if um if David Gilmore produced a incredible guitar solo on something Roger might say I think that might be all right David thank you pretty pretty sort of low lowkey uh congratulations you know how would vocals typically

be done at that time period well obviously the the lead vocal was the first thing to to happen what's interesting to to note and most people have not really noticed the first appearance by Roger Waters as on vocal is on the lunatic song interesting through to the end yeah and everything else has been David up to that point wow and you didn't you hadn't realized that right I did not realize that no that's amazing then we we I mean David did all the all the you know third above or Harmony vocals three-part harmonies and then

we got the girls in those those three great great singers that did the backing vocals when you were mixing that record would everybody be at the console moving the faders for their own Parts yeah of course there was no automation back then so yeah if if something needed to be nudged and everybody only had two pairs of hands you know so everybody only had one pair of hands sorry would you mix songs in sections and then edit the the master tape together typically yes there would be too many changes to get get right through a

three minute four minute song let's say you get a verse right and then you do the and you'd say okay we have that verse let's cut it put it on a reel here go set it over there this is kind of how it would go down then let's work in the chorus yeah and then you do that and then you pray that the edit would work when you when you had to join the two bits together where would you like to typically splice on a bass drum on a snare drum what yeah usually a downbeat

there are plenty of edits in the if you if you play the master tape you you'll see little white uh tape joints going through all the time as soon as you would join these sections together you'd listen to it a bunch of times anybody hear anything was that kind of like how's that sound yeah I mean uh there was one uh new new boy that came in there that was Chris Thomas he was an influence there he he he wanted to use compression rather more than I did and uh I'm I'm in case you didn't

know I'm somewhat anti-compression you're anti you're anti-compression talk about that a bit I just like the music to breathe in in its own way compression is is okay if it if it's literally just to take the extreme high level elements down but I don't like the sound of limiting and compressing on a mix I love it on vocals I love it on bass guitar but so almost invariably I would uh compress a bass and automatically any any vocals you would do it on the tracking it yeah and what would you use typically for something like

that for fair always a fair child always a fair child yeah we were using um keex expanders on the uh on the transfer from one to the other and we used the them on on the mixx as well occasionally I used the Alison research gain brain just a tiny little thing 6 in high and an inch wide what is that it's a limiter it's just a limit and compressor it had a nice sound to it used that on a couple of occasions Now The Beetles would they use compression on the mixes at the time Jeff

Emer did did enjoy compression quite a lot more than I do yeah I don't remember whether he actually compressed overall on on the mixes on AB road but uh you think that's why Dark Side of the Moon has a lot of punchiness to it still I remember saying to Chris um Can Can we please not use the compressor on this mix I said it's it's going to destroy the drum sound I don't I'm not going to enjoy the listening to the drum he said okay well compress everything except the drums and that's what we did

on a on a couple of occasions when you would have the final two trck master of it that's been edited together how many edits would there be typically in to put together one Final Mix oh no more than three or four okay I remember soon after dark SL I I well a couple of years after I started getting involved with a an American band called Ambrosia yeah they had recorded did a a very complex uh record themselves um talking about the the first record that they did yeah which is amazing signing record and uh that

had to be edited and you know mixed in sections because there was too much going on there's still no automation right in the late 70s that didn't really happen till SSL consoles in the early 80s is that right yep um the the first automated console we had at h Road was was a a a Neeve console had uh motorized faders be like a VR or something like that it or pre it was they were actual faders with with audio going through them they weren't voltage voltage controled okay so that was that a revelation oh it

was it was it made things a lot easier yeah cuz you could store store mixes didn't have to push up one line of vocal every pass you know the console would remember that you what You' done the the previous part well I mentioned to you when you walked in that this particular song I'm going to play here was this song that I played in my very first band I wouldn't want to be like you [Music] [Music] if I had a mat [Music] you I wouldn't want to think like [Music] you and if I had time

to I wouldn't want to talk to you oh I don't care what you do I wouldn't want to be like you yeah okay okay so this is 1977 what happened between the you know early '70s Pink Floyd record in here as far as how would you have recorded this is it still 16 track oh no it's 24 Track by by this time okay wouldn't want to be like you came from our second album I I Robot which was timed impeccably because Star Wars came out right almost the same week right Al did yeah yeah it

was uh our attempt at sort of almost disco funk you know it was the the what I call the Pea Soup high hat and where did you record this record all at AB Road all at AB Ro we we did everything at ABY road until the last two albums I think uh gy was done at my own studio in in the south of England in Kent what studio at Abby Road did you record this in then pretty sure we're in number two for the for for most of the uh ioot album Now isn't it odd

to go from tap op to being the artist recording your own music there's an intermediate stage which is being a producer so I had a couple of hits as as a producer pop records a band called U Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel John Miles who was an amazing artist that appeared on many of the project songs and there was pilot I had this big hit with right and the the the song which is called Magic is now used as an OIC commercial oh ho hoic yeah how appropriate right answer to your next question is no

I don't earn a penny on that when did it switch over to 24 track recording I think uh even the first album was 24 track although dark side was 16 track um I think 24 track came pretty soon after that I I think I remember watching a Tom dowed documentary he was talking about they were using four tracks over in in England still when 16 tracks were being used commonly in the United States why is that I think maybe uh we were a little behind on on technological stuff Emi or ABY Road was particularly behind

well the first 24 track uh sessions that I remember were done at a studio called trident who were much more uh much more up to date than we were every piece of new technology had to go through the technical engineers at AB Road they had to approve you know they would they take the things apart and back together abely yeah they they'd tear them apart and say this is acceptable that's not acceptable when I toured ABY Road they told me they told me that that the that the tech guys would have to go through everything

take it apart understand how it was work how it worked and then before it could be used done sessions we had this um Obsession uh at ABI Road of of always listening to the off tape sound not not the not the sound going into the tape but the sound coming off the tape which meant that there was a delay particularly on a track that's quite a quite a big delay on that on the machine the Record Head was here and the had to go around this this Loop and then the playback head was there but

we would be always listening to the recorded sound not not what's going on to the tape yeah that that was very disconcerting particularly on vocals if you were if you were looking in the studio you you would see a an out of sync voice the well how would you punch in on something like that very good question you you had to anticipate otherwise you you might just miss the uh the exact point where the where the drop in was meant to happen we still say drop in in the UK drop in punch in in America

now were drum takes ever edited together or was that a thing that happened in 8s yeah I think that's more of an a thing yeah now is that something that you would have done back in the 80s I I think I was always old schooled and you know I said earlier that uh once you get a band together play you know get a good take that's it you know why why change anything I mean it was all down to uh all down to overdubs after the after the basic track had been done without exception the

all the songs on the on the projects were band plays get a good take move on this [Music] song ah [Music] [Music] I played that for my 16-year-old son and he's like I know that song the Chicago Bulls Michael Jordan I mean this is associated with many sports I mean this is a huge Sports Anthem this is really the intro to Eye in the Sky though right right it was never never in my wildest dreams did I think it would become a sports theme U it it was just a it was just a a Dy

that uh we we used to open the album with and to as you pointed out it just became the intro to IR on the sky did you think when you he heard where the streets have no name that it was an homage to this in a way or not with you you two there how the song starts out I hadn't made that connection ever no just the way the guitar sound is it's like it sounds like a strat with a delay on it doing doing the rift that that was actually a keyboard sound is it

a keyboard it's a it's a clavinet played on a fair light which sounds like it to me it sounds like a guitar like it sounds like a strat no it's a clavinet is it but uh sampled into a fair light we were one of the few acts that could have that that could afford I me fact is we couldn't really afford it because it was hugely expensive P explain to people what a feralite was it was the first it was the first sampling keyboard the first uh first time you could actually feed in a sound

and then have it have it so that you could play different notes of that sample on on a on a keyboard and who used falay back then they were incredibly expensive Peter Gabriel had one I think Stevie W had one Kate Bush she she uh she made use of it as well how much would a fair light have been back then oh I think £100,000 that could have been used for better purposes like my mortgage when the Chicago Bulls played that and it was on TV would you get money for that only if it was

actually featured on TV um if it was uh just a game being covered and and the that that music was coming through the speakers in the venue no I wouldn't earn a penny from that interesting we've had many um what we call sync licenses uh for commercials feature films I believe there's a Colgate commercial coming up that uses it but I haven't I've yet to see it or hear it you worked with Ambrosia on that on the first record there um the holes what would have been 1974 or so that sounds about right the a

the air that I breathed was the big song that I did with him and who was the producer on that record with uh uh his name is Ron Richards that's right he did all the hits um and his son ended up working for me when I moved out of ab Road and into my own premises um so this so you recorded [Music] this if I could make a way wish I think I pass can't think of anything I need no cigarettes No Sleep No Light No sound nothing to eat no bus to read making love

with you has left me peaceful all and T what more could ask there's nothing left to be desired [Music] He Came Upon me and [Music] then Allan the strings on that so you would have recorded the orchestra as well right and the the we didn't get to the chorus but um the Tom Phils were overd I want to listen to [Music] that so s silent Angel go to [Music] Sweet sometimes all I need is the yeah that I breathe and to love you all I need is the air that I bre yes to love you

all I need is the air that I [Music] [Applause] [Music] that's a beautiful arrangement everything about that the recording I think it was influential on uh on the project actually because that that that horn solo French horn I I grew to love uh horn horn parts we would usually have six of them the layering of the vocals on that has a really distinct sound and to me it transports me back to that time it just is there anything special that you did or is it just the just kind of the blend I remember that they

had a mic each who's a probably an 87 each and the and the um the producer Ron Richards would would adjust the balance himself off no vocal performance would go on it on its own track it was always mixed at the time I remember uh I managed to persuade them they they would always double track their Harmony vocals but I persuaded them to do triple tracking just to give a little extra so that's why it has that huge sound well maybe yeah and where did you record this record that would have been number three I

don't number three yeah so I noticed when I went into the uh the echo chamber at uh in in number two that um I asked if these things are all connected I think that they told me that all the rooms could access the different chambers so this number two number two chamber I think was the favorite one it's a huge place these would be incredibly long cable runs yeah they they were but um all the all the uh patch points ended up in in in a room okay with the two big racks full of uh

you know you could patch any any Studio to any any uh tape machine Any you know it was all very very flexible I me I mentioned number two chamber being popular but it was unpopular with the neighbors I bet cuz you the the the chambers used to sound best when driven hard and it was right on the edge of the uh door to the outside side World in studio 2 and ABY road is in a residential area so we would get complaints people hearing these strange echoey voices coming through into their living rooms what kind

of speaker or speakers would be in the Echo chamber playing the music I seem to remember that uh they were it was an All Tech speaker in the in number two that's a speaker that had been used previously uh leading right up to Sergeant Pepper in the in the control rooms and would be would there be One mic or two mics in there oh definitely two mics otherwise it wouldn't have been stereo got it the number one plate was up on the roof um in a a little cubicle on the roof of of the building

and the plates were all in a little room on the top floor as well but you're right long cable runs like really long cable runs hundreds and hundreds of feet how is it that the sound wouldn't degrade over that with just high quality cable it proba it probably did it probably did okay but we just put up with it would they always just work or or would there be a thing you know interestingly I didn't I didn't favor the CH Chambers particularly I I I remember using uh plates much more than anything else on dark

side and and my own stuff and why is that more repeatable more accessible you know just plug in the plate it's there and um I think atmospheric conditions in the chambers would would affect the how they performed when did digital reverbs start being introduced there when did you start using them I remember a uh Strang looking uh digital Reverb I think it was more delays and harmonizers that that that really started the digital Revolution and the original harmonizer was that was that was an amazing machine that you could actually raise or lower the pitch of

something until then that had just been unattainable just how how could you possibly tune a vocal up or down but uh I I normally went analog on on reverbs nowadays I love the uh Universal plugins the universal Universal ABY Road chamber sounds amazing very repeatable right yeah could you have envisioned a future like this with computers recording and undoable edits and and camping things when midi sequencing first came along you know I think that that paved the way for cut and paste audio that that was that was the dream you know to be able to

take audio from one track and put it somewhere else and repeat it and all that stuff I mean invariably people will not bother to do backing vocals on all the choruses in a song they'll do it on one chorus then paste it in I mean it's it's it's cheating but uh saves time it's and it's acceptable it's okay what do you think with the the biggest changes in technology for for example from when you started in the late 60s into the 70s the track count on tape Mach I think probably it's always the track count

I mean that just opened up the uh the floodgates to you know do more and more complex stuff I mean because the tracks were there to do it previously you just got to a point well sorry no more tracks that's it that's the record you know with each uh hurdle going from 8 to 16 to 24 to 48 to unlimited each of those really made quite a big difference when you get to 24 track how many tracks would you allot for the drums probably do four kick snare and and U and overheads or Toms and

overheads if if if had Mike that on but of course nowadays every sing every single mic has its own track how often did you use click tracks like on Dark Side of the Moon did you use click tracks much occasionally um I'm trying to remember which songs particularly um I think on the Run probably almost certainly actually the synth kind of was it was its own click track but it would have been a mechanical metronome let me know okay one of those it was um partly partly to um identify where you were in a song

okay cuz you do do a count You' record record The Click and a count so no click click 23 click click click 24 click click click 25 you know just a b Camp it was more useful for that than anything else the sound effects like on money for [Music] example would this all have been done separately and then edited on at the as the beginning of the song they actually played the track to to to that Loop they did okay yeah the the loop was was quite quite difficult to achieve it was uh can you

tell me about that we had the basic noises um dropping a bag of money on on a wooden floor tearing a piece of paper all the sounds we had but uh I remember joining them together we we wanted it to go around the room in in forac in quadraphonic sorry the difficulty was that each each sound had a different length if we just simply join them together it would have been completely uh non- rythmic so the only way to get it to sound correct rhythmically was to measure the tape with a with the ruler okay

so it' be like each sound was six and 7/8 Ines you know and measure that do the splice get to the next sound do that splice that Loop would be uh transferred from uh four track stud machine onto uh onto the master 24 track and that's what they played to so having actually create the things piece by piece like that I say they they played to it they only played to it for the first for the intro and uh into the into the point where the vocal comes in CU then it was faded out I'm

play a little more of this [Music] [Music] hear it fading down so yeah that's what they were getting as well so that must have been difficult to play to even more difficult when it was live cuz it was going you know right around the right around the houses when you were doing these songs live and you were the sound engineer would you have a multirack with you playing these things how would they trigger them yep was it a a for track tape a t for track and who was running that uh one of the one

of the other Techs on on the road and he knew the cues and he pressed the button at the right right moment was there a count off for it or would they would just listen to that like how would they know where they were to me that's really confusing I'm not I can't remember if if we actually sent them because they they didn't use in ear they and they generally speaking didn't have wedges either I mean how would they play to that there were a band that played to to the PA yeah I think they

probably just would have found their own found their own Temple we we must have we must have got the loop to them somehow I just can't remember because otherwi I mean it sounded ridiculous with with the space between the front PA and and the speakers at the back and the sides we had we had a interesting sort quadrophonic uh configuration it wasn't left front right front it was front back left right so it was turned turned 45 deges when you hear this get away get a good job with okay does it bring you back to

then yes I mean it's still it's still a thrill to know that it's uh it's still appreciated after all this time I can imagine Pink Floyd I know how they get along now and I can imagine that they probably what probably wasn't that different back then they all got on really well back then did they yeah it was it was I mean making dark side was was a joy I mean everybody was everybody was into what they were doing everybody was friendly it's terribly sad that the rift exists between them now all the producers and

Engineers that I've interviewed have very laid-back personalities for the most part if you're doing an or you know Orchestra session with 60 guys and it's uh 27 minutes past the hour and you finish it half past the hour and you've got one one more pass at the uh at the the overd you have to be pretty calm to do be able to pull that off how difficult is it to do orchestral recording I enjoy it because I was brought up with classical music so I I I knew unlike some of the uh firsttime uh new

boy Engineers that would walk in there didn't know what the difference between an OBO and a flute was you know I would be taken to classical concerts with my father and uh classical music was always in in my household I and I got to work with some great classical artists in my early early years at abir the likes of zukan and pelman and siroto clemer uh s John barbari Baron Bo D pre the classical styles of the of the perod tell me about recording classical sessions like that would you be doing caneros would they be

doing solo Works things like there could be anything like that right yeah there there were all kinds of stuff I mean Baron Bo was not just a piano player he was a conductor as well yeah I didn't record classical stuff so the my experience with the classical artist was as a tape operator yeah but I watched you know I got got ideas from the the way that the the classical Engineers got the sound were those stressful sessions for them for the engineers yeah um probably is the answer yeah I mean there you know if you

got a a room full of uh of uh musicians you know up up to 80 musicians at a time you got to get you got to get it right one of the pressures that they had to deal with was they might do uh half half half of a piece on one occasion and then the other half a week later so you'd have to match all the mics and sounds and stuff when I was at Abby Road they were setting up for a uh orchestral session in Studio One pretty elaborate I mean for for a classical

session especially now you know in 2023 the amazing thing when I first started in the in the late 60s early' 70s um most classical recordings were straight down to stereo mixing just the master tape is is being created as the orchestra plays would they ever edit takes together oh sure yeah Al there's plenty of editing okay but but actually physically cutting the cutting the tape yeah joining it together with the conductors come back listen to the playback let's take this section let's take this section yeah the the it was it was a producers uh art

really to to to choose takes and to tell the artist you know we we need we need another take of this section you know looking at the score you know would they ever use reverbs extra Reverb on these recordings in number one unlikely because it has such a magical uh natural uh Reverb by all you had to do is hang a hang a pair of mics up up up high behind the orchestra or in front of the orchestra in studio 2 I think that I the uh the head engineer gave me the tour he said

that that could accommodate maybe 40 pieces something like that a smaller smaller group and the Beatles would sometimes record the uh orchestral players in that room and not use in number two in number two yeah yeah interestingly the the the end song you know the end of the medley yeah the orchestra were in number one and we were monitoring in number two so another example of these patching between Studios and were you there for for that yeah I was I was I was doing tape when's the last time you were at ABY Road Studios it

was July uh last year I was doing uh an orchestra overdub for David pack of Ambrosia who's making a solo album wow cool and a documentary so there with cameras everywhere as well how much has the studios changed I know this the studio you're in here has changed but um but Studio 2 is pretty oh it's similar it's completely unchanged and they're frightened to change it I think otherwise it won't be a beetle studio anymore you know right I think that's there to stay I think they they told me they added one ISO booth there

yeah that wasn't there yeah but that didn't affect the main space at all it was a room that used to be used to store you know recording tape you know blank blank tapes and cleaning supplies and things like that if you were at Abby Road would you get assigned on projects on Dark Side of the Moon I was a a staff on you know on the payroll of ab Studios engineer right and did they say did you say I want to be on this thing or did they say you're Allan you're going to be on

this you're going to be on this yeah okay said you will do this you will do that I mean I had uh I had a certain amount of influence on that okay particularly with Pink Floyd because did you say I want to be on this Pink Floyd record yes right I did I did say that yeah I mean but it could have been someone else right it could have been yeah yeah i' i' worked on U at atam Help Mother the previous album yeah did some mixing on that and uh that went well enough for

them to agree to work with me on on dark side you know right from the beginning right through to the end when you'd finish mixing a song you said it'd be a few edits would be the master takes of it would there be a listening session at the end to listen through everything to make sure that everything that everybody was happy with everything without doubt I mean when whenever you make an album there's a you you say well there's there's there's the master tape let's play it let's dim the lights you know listen listen to

it and who would come into things like that would anyone from the record labels come in the playbacks tended to happen outside the studio okay we did a a press playback of the album at the London planetarium that's cool yeah Allan it's uh been such a pleasure to meet with you and talk to you today I really appreciate you thank you making making the time I so I like to once again thank Alan for being my guest today hit the Subscribe button leave a comment thanks for watching