15. ADVENTURE IN JAPAN-1

 

Confessions of a Studio Rat

One mans journey through a world of recording studios and musicians in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s – without a net!

TOKYO: I had a Japanese client who would come to London to record and mix  his projects with me. On this occasion however, he asked if I would travel out to Tokyo to record an album with one of his biggest acts, a Japanese rock guitar player. I had never been to Japan before, so I readily accepted the opportunity.

I was briefed by the record label that this artist was regarded as something of a “wild man” of rock, and I should expect anything by way of outrageous behavior. After a long flight from London, I was delivered to Onkyo Haus Studio, a major and very modern facility owned by the electronics manufacturer. When I arrived at the control room door I saw seemingly dozens of technicians, scurrying around setting up for our tracking session. There was a sense of anticipation as not only had they brought over an engineer from London to do the recording, the label had booked some famous Japanese sidemen to form the band. Every preparation must be perfect!

Bearing in mind the artist’s “wild man” reputation, I decided to fight fire with fire. I immediately dropped my bags at the studio door and yelled out ”ROCK AND ROLL” at the top of my voice, and immediately the entire crew hit the floor, stunned! After a moment of silence folks got back to their feet, and a slim, meek young man came over and bowing, politely introduced himself. This was our Artist, the “wild man” I was warned about. Suffice to say we got along very well from that moment forward.

To Be Continued…


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

7. JINGLE FEVER

  C onfessions of a Studio Rat One mans journey through a world of recording studios and musicians in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s – without a net! London (1980) I engineered many advertising jingles during my career, in major studios like A&R in New York and Marcus Music, my base in London. In London I was picking up a lot of work from a music company called Air-Edel, the British arm of HEA in New York with whom I also spent countless hours recording jingles. Air-Edel had their own little demo studio where their writers could present jingle ideas to their advertising agency clients. It was no big deal as studios go. Perhaps there was a small Soundcraft board and multitrack, a vocal booth and a couch and coffee table in the back for the clients. They needed to make their demos as presentable as possible, so they would employ the services of the engineers with whom they would normally work on the “real” dates around town. I was part of that cadre of off-duty mercenaries, and it w...
Read more

18. The Mermaid in Topanga (1990)

Image
  Topanga Canyon, CA (1990) My wife Claire and I were living in the mountain community of Topanga Canyon in southern California. The location was magic: while it was commuting distance to Hollywood and downtown LA, it was still remote enough to retain the trees, creeks, animals such as bobcats and coyotes,   and general woodsy feel. Artists and musicians loved it, and there were parties and crazy scenes going on all over the place. Many famous entertainers lived there, well, the ones who preferred something other than Beverly Hills luxury. A great many of the properties were originally built as vacation homes, cheap and cheerful but don’t look too closely for adherence to building regulations! For example, if we ran a hair dryer in the downstairs bathroom, a circuit breaker would pop in the upstairs apartment, which wasn’t even our accommodation! We once had an entire window fall out-frame and all, because someone foolishly tried to clean it. I guess it was never properly in...
Read more

6. BACK IN THE (SWEDISH) HIGH LIFE AGAIN (1979)

    LONDON (May 1979) I was working in the little studio in Worcester with my friend Pete Green (a.k.a. Daniel Boone), and he said to me “You know, I heard Abba are opening up a studio in London and they’re looking for engineers”. I was ready for a change from the present routine, and a big new shiny studio in London had a certain appeal. I somehow made contact with their studio manager Chris who confirmed they were still building the place but definitely interviewing for staff engineers. An appointment was set up, and on the given day I took a very early morning train to London from my in-law’s house in York. The place would be known as Marcus Music UK, and it was a sister studio to a very beautiful facility of the same name operating in Stockholm. The Swedish studio did in fact count ABBA as a client, but the band did not have any part in the ownership of Marcus Studios. The owner was a Swedish bandleader named Marcus (oddly enough) who was very popular in that part of...
Read more