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Unlimited slows. Hello,

0:33

Gary. Hello, Guy. So this is our day off.

0:36

We're recording this the day before,

0:39

the night after, yeah. So

0:42

the night after Brighton, the day before we

0:44

play Ipswich and two days before the Albert

0:46

Hall, which happened, if you're listening on a

0:48

Sunday here, last night. And

0:51

for those of you watching in black and white, the

0:54

red ball... He's about to pop. So

0:59

we've got a producers episode on today.

1:01

We've got some highlight from four of

1:03

our major producers that we've had on

1:05

over the last couple of years. We've

1:07

got Steve Lillywhite, Bob Ezrin,

1:09

Hugh Padgham and Trevor Horn. They

1:12

were good guests, weren't they? They were great guests.

1:14

All very different in their own way. In fact,

1:16

Gary, I'll be interested because you're someone, because

1:18

you get a look, there's different types of producers.

1:21

You get someone like Trevor Horn, where it's

1:23

what I'm interested in, is hearing a

1:26

Trevor Horn record. And I'm sorry, obviously

1:28

the artist is gonna be great because

1:30

his choice of artists that he works

1:33

with is gonna be great. But it's

1:35

essentially, he's so overarching, whereas someone like

1:37

Hugh Padgham, he's

1:40

very much gonna give you a great

1:42

artist. He knows how to bring

1:44

that. And same with Steve

1:46

Lillywhite. Steve Lillywhite has... Steve has a

1:48

fantastically indefinable thing. I know from when

1:50

I've worked with him, where

1:52

you come out, you just

1:55

played a song and you came out. And it's

1:57

amazing. And you're like, what happened? He

1:59

did something. And so I wonder for

2:01

someone like you Gary who or I can't imagine that you've

2:03

ever got in the studio without a very strong vision of

2:06

what you want to do. Yeah,

2:08

I think that's why it was tricky to

2:10

work with Trevor to a

2:12

large extent with with Spandau certainly

2:15

in the early days when when he first

2:17

took on the idea of producing

2:19

the true album for us and it didn't

2:22

really work out. You know,

2:24

Trevor's a musician. I mean, there are two kinds of

2:26

producers, aren't there? Some comes from music,

2:28

being musicians and others

2:30

are engineers primarily. Trevor

2:33

knows the kind of in

2:36

a way, he was always using the

2:38

artists as sort of paint for the

2:40

picture that he wanted to make really.

2:42

And then they would go out and

2:44

sell that record by promoting

2:46

it on whatever it might be. Where

2:48

Steve being an engineer, but also was

2:51

more into the psychology of the band.

2:54

How do I how do I make

2:56

this band happy or how do

2:58

I make this band angry enough to make the best

3:00

record I've ever made, you know,

3:02

what those kind of things. So I

3:04

think I think in the end I

3:06

was sort of we chose Gary Langan in the end

3:08

to do to do quite a

3:10

few of our albums because he

3:12

was Trevor Horn's engineer. So

3:15

he got Trevor sounds, but we could

3:17

then have our own creative ideas in

3:19

the studio. Yeah, because I mean,

3:21

actually, I want to go into this. The first time

3:23

you went into because was Burgess the first producer you

3:25

work with? Yeah, so he was a musician. Yeah. But

3:28

so what was it? That wasn't the first time you've

3:30

been in the studio. I mean, what was it like

3:32

the first time you went in with a producer? And

3:34

then what did you have in your mind? Was it

3:36

incredibly exciting? Were you thinking, oh, no, I'm going to

3:38

have to hand over the reins to someone else? Yeah,

3:41

I think, you know, Richard was James

3:43

Burgess was in a band called Landscape. So he

3:45

was sort of jazz steeped, but really into electronica

3:47

and they were making, you know, they made that

3:49

record Einstein and go go. He

3:52

was hanging out in the Blitz Club. He'd seen

3:54

us play a few times. He

3:56

knew exactly who we were. And

3:58

I think what he wanted. what he said to me

4:01

is, I just want to capture you. I just want to

4:03

make you sound as you are. So

4:06

there was a kind of garage

4:08

quality about what that production, that early

4:10

production. You know, he

4:12

didn't want to fill it up with too many

4:15

synthesizers or, but he didn't also introduce us to

4:17

Electronica through drums. So he introduced us

4:20

to the Simmons kit. So

4:22

we were one of the first bands to use that on

4:24

the track chart number one. But

4:27

I think, yes, we knew what we wanted. We

4:29

wanted to really capture the spirit of the band.

4:31

I don't think we were into too many overdubs.

4:34

You know, it was how we sounded

4:36

live. And we went to Trident Studios,

4:38

of course, which, you know, was thrilling

4:40

for us because it was where Electric

4:42

Warrior and Ziggy Stardust and Hunky

4:44

Dory, where they were all made in that building.

4:48

But I think as we went along, I

4:50

think when we went into our second album, I think Richard was

4:52

probably the wrong man for the job then, because

4:55

he wasn't being, he wasn't

4:57

allowing us to sort of be more

4:59

adventurous in the studio. So

5:01

we shifted to more musical

5:04

people, Swain and Jolly, you know, they

5:06

were different people entirely. They got harmony.

5:09

They offered vocal harmony up to the band for

5:11

the first time. But I guess there's a thing

5:13

of, essentially your

5:15

vision had to kind of coincide

5:18

with the producers. I'm getting the

5:21

feeling there wasn't a whole lot of argument amongst

5:23

the band. They can't, no, it has

5:25

to, yeah. I think I was probably

5:27

dominant in the studio within

5:30

the band. That's the way, I mean, it's

5:32

never ever gonna work if all four or

5:34

five members of the group sit in the

5:36

studio control room at the same time, all

5:39

with their ideas just banging against the

5:41

producer's head, you know, that's a

5:44

nightmare. So bands kind

5:46

of silently allocate their leaders,

5:48

don't they? That's normally what

5:50

happens. There's not a vote. And

5:54

where bands find, I think fall

5:56

into issues probably is when there

5:58

are two leaders. and they're

6:00

both in dispute in the room.

6:02

And that, you've got to have great sympathy

6:04

for the producer. I mean, have you experienced

6:06

that kind of stuff? No,

6:08

but I've certainly stepped in

6:10

to a situation where that was an

6:13

issue before. It's not

6:15

even a matter of a leader, it's a matter of

6:18

when you've got Alphas busting heads, you know, that's the

6:20

thing. But what about when you're... But isn't that a

6:22

lot of a producer's job is to be able to

6:24

negotiate that? Yeah, well, it

6:26

is. And I think they need to

6:29

really understand the personalities before they walk into the

6:31

room. And I do think psychology is everything. And

6:33

I think in a way, as much as we

6:35

love Trevor and I love Trevor, I

6:37

think Trevor really wasn't interested

6:39

in that side of stuff. But

6:42

what he was offering you was the most incredible

6:44

record you'll ever make. Yeah, although I must say,

6:46

because having, you know, because I've worked with Trevor

6:48

a lot over the years and I love it,

6:50

it's one of my favorite things. So basically, just

6:53

being in a room with him is a... And

6:55

all just, you know, because everything somehow sounds like

6:57

that. It's just like, what the fuck is it?

6:59

Why is it sounding like that? But

7:02

what's always amazes me is

7:04

how much more of a bad... Like I

7:07

said, I always assumed, you know, from this

7:09

record, that it was all about white coats

7:11

and recorded in a kind of in a

7:13

clean room in some incredible sort of environment

7:15

you make microchips in. But it's not. He's

7:17

very much a band guy. He's a player

7:19

guy. And it's just really

7:21

weird that a lot of it is... We

7:24

perceive his records to not be that, but

7:26

they are, you know, you go back and

7:28

listen to Slave of the Rhythm and 80%

7:31

of that is just guys in a room,

7:33

you know. Yeah, but I think,

7:35

and I remember from when we spoke to

7:37

Trevor, that I think he said

7:39

something like, what really upsets him

7:41

is when he's a better musician than any

7:44

of the guys in the band. Which Steve

7:47

took issue with, didn't he? Which

7:49

I thought was a very interesting point, because right

7:51

there, you see the difference in producers, but Steve

7:53

says it's not a matter of you being better

7:55

than them. It's a matter of those are the

7:57

guys you've got and those are the

7:59

guys who's ready. record you're making. I take

8:01

my hat off to that as well. And

8:03

I think it's important that they can go

8:05

out and, well, here's the dilemma.

8:08

Here's the thing. And

8:10

in a way, the Beatles did this for

8:12

us because the Beatles said we're not playing

8:14

live anymore. We are going to go

8:16

into a studio and make the studio a

8:19

fifth instrument in the band and we're going to make

8:21

records. It doesn't matter if you can ever play live

8:23

because we're not going to do it. And

8:27

and I think Trevor. Is

8:30

is making was not considering necessarily whether

8:32

or not the band in the room

8:34

could ever reproduce that record live now

8:38

there where someone like Hugh Pajam

8:40

working for the police, 100 percent

8:42

was making a record that could

8:44

be easily performed. Yeah, because it

8:46

was basically only three people playing on the

8:48

record with very, very few overdubs, if any

8:51

at all. Yeah, but

8:53

it's quite interesting that this is where you get

8:55

the real the dark arts like Hugh's a great

8:57

example of this, like, yes,

9:00

those those police records are incredibly

9:02

simple. They're just bass drums and

9:04

a guitar, but that bass is

9:07

like 14 tracks of electric

9:09

double bass overdubs, one on top

9:11

of the other. So it sounds

9:14

amazing. Wow. I never knew that.

9:17

So that is that is strange because

9:19

it must be diminishing returns after a while.

9:21

It just goes into fog, you'd think. Yeah.

9:24

But but but interestingly, Hugh doesn't

9:26

always stick to that brief because,

9:28

you know, later on, you know,

9:31

he's making in the

9:33

air tonight with a

9:35

drum sound that's actually impossible

9:37

to reproduce live unless it's

9:39

a sample. Yeah, I get. Yeah. So

9:42

so I think I think we,

9:44

you know, these are all different. Well, no, if

9:46

you took a lexicon on the road, you know,

9:48

I don't want to get bogged down. This is

9:51

not going to be of interest to our listeners.

9:53

No, no, no, no. But we

9:55

have, by the way, dear listeners, we

9:58

have a thing we're on tour. We'll

10:00

get to that in a second. but

10:02

we do have a thing. If anyone

10:04

veers into boring gear territory conversation, we

10:07

just say inflate the travel pillow because we

10:09

just have a thing about, you know those

10:11

pillows that people run their necks, where run

10:14

their necks when they're flying? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So

10:16

if it's really boring, you just want to fall

10:18

asleep into one of those. Yes,

10:22

that was nearly inflate the travel pillow. That

10:24

was nearly it, yeah. But the

10:27

one producer we haven't mentioned out of these

10:29

four that we're going to show some highlight

10:31

clips from. We're doing highlight clips because it's

10:33

really tricky for us to interview while we're

10:35

on tour, to make arrangements between

10:37

artists and us to fit in exactly

10:40

at the right time when we land

10:42

at a hotel or wherever

10:44

it might be. We do

10:46

have some penciled in, but it

10:49

has been a little tricky. Yeah, not for

10:51

want of trying. We'd like to make that

10:53

very clear. It is, but hopefully you're still

10:56

listening to the show and engaged in what

10:58

the guy and I have to ramble on

11:00

about. And also catching up on some really

11:02

nice clips that Ben

11:05

Jones has put together for us. The

11:07

one producer we haven't mentioned out of these four that

11:09

are coming up is Bob Ezrin. And

11:12

Bob is someone you personally have worked with. Yeah,

11:14

no, I know Bob very well. But and the thing I

11:16

love- What's his style? What's his thing? Well,

11:19

I haven't done that much studio work with him.

11:21

What's interesting was, I mean, my

11:23

first time I encountered him was he was

11:25

brought in to kind of as director, producer,

11:27

but in a director. Because it's

11:29

funny, isn't it? Because the term record producer, it's funny.

11:32

It's basically if it was a film, he'd

11:34

be the director, really. But

11:37

in France, for instance, the record producer is

11:39

the producer because he has to find the

11:41

money. So yeah,

11:44

so that which is interesting, isn't it? But

11:46

it was so Bob was brought in to

11:48

kind of direct the show because, you know,

11:50

because that was the one element that was

11:52

lacking since someone had left the band. And

11:56

he was amazing at that. But I see to me,

11:58

I, used to

12:00

think of Bob Ezrin the way I

12:03

think of Trevor. I mean his records

12:05

were the poshest sounding records. He's a

12:07

musical guy though isn't he? And the

12:09

thing that I love about him, as

12:13

well as having that fantastic fidelity, those

12:15

amazing sounding arranged records, especially the Zannes

12:17

Cooper records were incredible. And

12:20

that first Gabriel album is still just unsurpassed,

12:22

you know. But he's

12:25

got that theatrical thing.

12:27

He's looking at it as theatre and you

12:29

know. Well that's interesting isn't it?

12:32

Because we were talking about producers wanting, realizing

12:35

that this band is going to have to

12:37

promote the record live, could they do it?

12:39

Well obviously Bob's records are very posh and

12:41

he does use the studio a lot. But

12:43

he is, he's thinking the bigger picture. He

12:45

was thinking of, especially certainly

12:47

with Alice and with the Floyd,

12:49

with the Wall. He was working with the

12:51

artist, how we could develop this

12:54

into a bigger show. Yeah I mean you look at

12:56

a song like The Trial, which

12:58

he's actually got writing credit on, which is

13:00

just fantastic, sort of Codd, Gilbert

13:02

and Sullivan, whatever. Yeah. What

13:07

about you as a session player back in the,

13:09

certainly back in the 80s and well 90s, but what was

13:12

it, what did you want from a

13:14

producer when you walked in? It's actually the other

13:16

way around isn't it? It's what did a producer

13:18

walk from me because that was the thing

13:21

in that most of my work is that

13:23

like I have a admittedly

13:25

very impressive list of artists that I've worked

13:27

with, but that's not because I was hard

13:29

by the zaas, most of those are producers

13:31

I had. I had producer relationships, like

13:34

our relationship with Pat Leonard, with

13:36

Trevor, with Steve Lillywhite. And

13:39

you know these, so it was the producer for a lot of

13:41

the time, I didn't know who the artist was until I got

13:43

there. And would

13:45

the producer be just saying like, well I

13:47

want you here, you're in the room because

13:49

I want you to be you, God. Yeah.

13:51

Or were they also saying, look, this is

13:53

the kind of music that we're talking about

13:55

here, this is what the band want, this

13:58

is probably what... You were probably

14:00

dealing mostly with, not with bands, were you? Because bands

14:02

would have their own bass player. You were dealing with

14:05

solo artists, mostly, weren't you? Yeah.

14:07

Although there was quite

14:09

a few times where it's actually

14:11

me on a record that is

14:13

a band. Could

14:15

this be time for the Michael

14:18

Jackson story? Oh, god, no. But

14:21

that's the interesting one, because that I was picked

14:23

by Michael Jackson because he'd heard like a prayer.

14:25

And so he wanted that. He wanted me to

14:27

play that. And I was thinking, this is going

14:29

to be brilliant, because for

14:32

anyone who knows, like a prayer, which

14:35

is part of the highlight of my career, it's

14:37

the middle section and the end section

14:39

where there's just this insane sort of

14:42

bass workout with an octave pedal full,

14:44

balls out, showing off kind of nonsense.

14:49

And so I was and they said they want that

14:51

for Michael Jackson. I was like, oh, my god, this

14:53

is going to be amazing. So hang on. You said

14:55

the beginning section and the end section. No, the middle

14:57

section and the end section. Oh,

14:59

I see. Yeah. When the choir's in and

15:02

everything, it's the middle. And

15:04

but when I turned up for the Michael

15:06

Jackson song was Earth song, which of course is this

15:08

huge ballad. And it was like, what the hell am

15:10

I supposed to do with that? Come

15:14

on. Where was Michael? Michael,

15:16

that's the funny thing. I kept going to the

15:18

studio and they go, sorry, Michael's just left. So

15:20

come back tomorrow. And Michael liked this. He didn't

15:22

like that. Didn't know what if we could try

15:24

this. All right. So they said, come back tomorrow.

15:27

I come to Hill. Michael would be here. And

15:29

I go back tomorrow. Michael had just left. And

15:31

this happened about three or four times. So

15:34

I was getting really fed up. And I said, look, Michael

15:36

could just be here. You know, tell me what he wants.

15:38

I'll do it. We can all go home. Obviously,

15:40

I didn't say that at all. But and

15:44

then so I get a call from Bill

15:46

Betrell, who is producing. That's that was the

15:48

link. He said, Guy, come in. Michael's here.

15:50

He's not leaving. So I rushed down the studio. This is

15:52

in L.A. I should point out, I

15:54

mean, this is this nuts period of my life.

15:56

I had to rush to the studio from my

15:58

session with Robbie Robertson. whose album I

16:01

was doing from the band. Yeah. Yeah.

16:03

And which is amazing. And I

16:05

get there and Michael's just left. But there

16:08

was a very, very different vibe in the

16:10

studio. And like, there

16:12

was this sort of, there

16:14

was this new engineer and you can't see

16:16

me, but I'm doing inverted commas. I

16:19

say engineer because it was this giant

16:21

Samoan bloke, someone who'd be

16:23

sort of more suited to being, or

16:25

I don't know, a bodyguard, perhaps. And

16:28

he was standing down one end of the mixing desk and I

16:30

wasn't allowed to get down there. I was trying to, you could

16:32

smoke in the studio, but I was trying to get an ashtray

16:34

or something. This guy literally wouldn't let me go down there. It's

16:36

like, all right. So I started playing

16:39

and we get to the end of the song. And

16:42

this engineer suddenly leans over behind

16:44

the desk and he's

16:46

sort of nodding his head and he comes back up

16:48

and he goes, yeah, I think

16:50

Michael would find that appropriate.

16:54

I'm like, what? So this bloke

16:56

who has the most tenuous grasp

16:58

of the English language somehow has

17:00

an absolutely intrinsic understanding of what

17:03

Michael Jackson would require from a

17:05

bass performance. Ah. I

17:08

suddenly realized, hang on, someone

17:11

is hiding behind the mixing

17:13

desk telling this guy what

17:15

to tell me. Oh

17:18

my God, Michael Jackson is hiding behind

17:20

the mixing desk. And after I couldn't

17:22

say this, I'm looking at Bill. And

17:25

Bill, his eyes are just going, don't look at me. Don't

17:27

look at me. Don't look at me. And so everyone opposite,

17:30

we all know he's there. And

17:32

we just have to go along with this thing. Yeah,

17:35

of literally me waiting for

17:38

Michael to tell his bodyguard

17:42

what he wants, what he likes and what he doesn't.

17:45

What happened at the end of the session? I

17:47

can't really remember. He never poked his head out

17:49

though. No, never. But he was hiding a lot

17:51

at the time. He was famously hiding. He had

17:54

a meat apart. This was

17:57

when he had his nose broken, something like 12 times.

18:00

at that point and apparently there was no surgeon

18:02

in LA would touch him and he was having

18:04

to go down to Costa Rica to get stuff

18:06

done and he'd had some cheekbone implants. So apparently

18:08

he had this flap of skin hanging off under

18:10

his eye and it looked dreadful. Looked

18:12

like he'd just come out of a millwall

18:14

pub. Exactly. But at

18:16

the time he was doing like he had a

18:18

meeting with Niall Rogers about him

18:20

producing his album, literally in the same week. Niall

18:24

went out to his

18:27

place in Encino and

18:31

knocked on the door of the office, they said he's

18:34

in there, knocked on the door and heard this

18:36

weird scuffling and then nothing

18:38

and then he thought, well I guess I better go in.

18:40

So he opened the door and he walked in and it's this

18:42

vast office and then he

18:44

just goes and sits down at the desk

18:46

and it becomes very

18:48

apparent that someone is just hiding under the

18:50

desk in front of him. You

18:54

can't say anything. It was

18:56

just so awkward. He

18:58

had to leave I think and then

19:00

he just saw Michael frolicking with a

19:02

deer outside or something. Mr Jackson can't

19:05

be here, he said his wardrobe. Could

19:08

you talk to the wardrobe? Exactly.

19:11

Fantastic. So

19:14

shall we get Steve Lindleywhite's

19:16

clip rolled up? Yeah, come on. Okay,

19:21

let's talk about the band then. Which

19:24

one? The Irish Boys. Oh yes,

19:26

yes. You obviously did their first three albums

19:28

and other stuff with them later on but

19:30

so I'm taking it. You mentioned you saying

19:32

that you wanted to be your own A&R

19:34

man. Did you

19:37

sort of discover them Steve? Yeah,

19:40

I remember getting sent a

19:43

cassette of their, well

19:45

it was demos but it was also their

19:47

independent release in Ireland. Produced

19:52

by Chas De Wally I think, weirdly.

19:57

Who was an A&R man at CBS. I think

19:59

I'm right. saying that. He could be part of

20:01

your, he could now join your songwriting

20:04

duo. Wally Pratt and Wally. And

20:10

I remember thinking it was a little, and

20:13

I liked it, but you

20:15

know in those days, and still now if I

20:17

was to produce again, I would

20:20

like to see them live. Because for

20:22

me when an artist plays live, they're

20:24

not thinking about what they're doing. And

20:26

part of my job in a studio is

20:29

to enable them to be creative and

20:31

not having to think really what they're

20:33

doing. You know, I mean it's a

20:36

weird thing, but if they're analyzing too

20:38

much, stays remember, recording

20:40

studios was Star Trek. People

20:42

didn't have anything at home. So it was like,

20:45

it's a studio, oh my god. And I'd

20:48

been king of the studio

20:50

since I, well I'd been in studio

20:52

since I was 17. So even when

20:54

I, well you're locked in a room

20:56

at the back. Yeah, but I'm exactly,

20:58

but still I was part, I got

21:00

it by osmosis. And so

21:02

when I was 24

21:06

on the first U2 album, Bono was 19, Adam was

21:08

19, and Larry was 17. So even though we were

21:10

close in

21:14

age, there's a big gap, you

21:17

know, five years at that age.

21:19

Oh it's huge. It's huge in

21:21

those days. So I was, and

21:23

I'm very proud actually that I

21:25

was the first person ever to

21:28

make a successful rock album

21:30

in Ireland because Thin Lizzy,

21:33

Rory Gallagher, Boomtown Rats, they

21:35

all came over to London.

21:38

Where did you do it? At Windmill? Was

21:41

it Windmill? At Windmill Lane, yeah. And of

21:43

course, you know, I walked into Windmill Lane

21:45

and it was a studio made for recording

21:47

folk music. Well you worked right because you

21:49

lived there for a while. Walking through the

21:52

reception of Windmill Lane, it

21:54

was like this nice stone place

21:57

and that was where the girls sat, you know, because

21:59

there were mobile phones. So if you

22:01

needed to speak to someone, you call the

22:03

main number and the receptionist would put it

22:05

through to the different studios, you

22:07

know, and there was also the video editing

22:10

at Wimmel Lane upstairs, right? You remember that?

22:13

So I wanted to

22:16

record the drums in the hallway, just said, but

22:18

that's where the girl sits. I go, well, what

22:20

time does she go home? She goes home at

22:22

six o'clock. I said, okay,

22:24

we'll record the drums after six o'clock.

22:27

At which point Larry had

22:30

a problem because his dad said he had

22:32

to be home because he was only 17

22:34

and his dad was worried about him. So

22:40

on the boy album, it

22:42

was very much a, you

22:45

know, but even then, you know,

22:47

Bono hadn't finished all his lyrics. I

22:51

think I work best with those

22:53

sorts of people who aren't craftsmen

22:55

as songwriters. And I do believe

22:57

in that, in making

22:59

something in the studio, that setting

23:01

up a scene that can make

23:04

a unique situation. You

23:06

sense that the edge had a

23:08

sound that could stand unique? Well,

23:11

yes, he was definitely the metronome

23:13

of the band. You know, he would play

23:16

through the echo. So that

23:18

was the sort of tempo of

23:21

how they worked. It's

23:24

funny because those echoes, like the Memory Man

23:26

and stuff that he used to use. Because

23:28

what's interesting is that, yes, everything's set to

23:30

that time, but you couldn't precisely set those

23:33

times, could you? No, no, no. I didn't

23:35

use a click with them until

23:37

the third album. Using a click, I don't

23:39

know about you. Did you ever make your

23:41

records without a click track, Gary? No,

23:44

we used clicks. So

23:48

it was Click-A-Wake and Ed Fones while he

23:50

was playing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

23:52

On the first two U2 albums, I

23:55

didn't really start doing clicks until 1983.

23:58

And it was a fantastic thing, but it was a great thing. It was also,

24:00

it was sometimes, if the

24:02

musicians couldn't play well to the click,

24:04

it just felt like it was slowing

24:06

down. You know, when there was a drum

24:09

fill, it felt like it was so... Wow.

24:12

So it was... We all know from computer music that

24:14

we make, you know, now it's so

24:16

rigid, isn't it? There's no movement. Double

24:18

time is not double time. And half

24:20

time is not half time. When you look

24:22

at a drummer like... He's really got a click of his, you know.

24:24

Yeah. I mean, Stuart Copeland, you

24:26

know, he is... This whole tempo and

24:29

rhythm is so at the front of

24:31

the beat. It's fantastic. You know,

24:33

and it's like pushing, pushing, pushing at the

24:35

front. But then you've got like, say, Jerry

24:37

Marotta or his brother Rick Marotta, those big,

24:39

those like American or the band, you know,

24:41

those sort of people who write on the

24:43

back end of the beat. You

24:45

know... Nick Mason. Nick Mason, absolutely,

24:48

you know. And it's

24:50

wonderful, the nuance

24:52

between all the different

24:54

styles. And that's what

24:56

is slightly missing in musicians now,

24:58

because drummers are fantastic now playing

25:00

to clicks, you know, because they

25:02

can give and they take and

25:05

they... It's almost like they

25:07

don't have to be completely in with the click

25:09

for it to work. They just like to hear

25:11

it for something. So

25:14

yeah, so we were talking about Bob Ezra, weren't we?

25:16

So now we're going to... Alice Cooper. Now,

25:19

he tried everything, didn't he, to sort of get

25:21

broken early on. Yeah. Well,

25:23

first of all, I think he went to the West

25:25

Coast, didn't he? I mean, where were they from? Detroit?

25:27

They're from Detroit. And then he went to the West

25:30

Coast to try and hang out with the mamas and

25:32

the puppets and try and... Yeah, and it was all

25:34

wrong. You know, ride on that wave completely wrong. It's

25:36

a bloke who sort of, you know, kills animals

25:38

virtually on stage or gets

25:41

executed. But

25:43

I think, you know, we spoke

25:45

earlier about Bob trying, you know,

25:47

really engaging with Alice's theatricality and

25:50

trying to break him that way.

25:53

Here's the thing, we still... Because what's interesting

25:55

is that back then... I've got to

25:57

remember, they were thinking of Alice

25:59

Cooper. was this band. It

26:02

was. You know, and it's a really funny thing.

26:04

It's one of those things where... I

26:07

think, you know, it was so personified as

26:09

Alice that eventually he gave up and just

26:11

went, all right, I'm Alice. Because the

26:13

point was, he wasn't, was he? He was

26:15

Vince. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I love

26:17

those records, by the way. Oh,

26:20

you know, for me. They're incredible. Again,

26:23

you know, and welcome to my nightmare. The

26:26

production is woof. It's getting

26:28

on. Bob Bessman. Bob, I'm going to steer your

26:30

brain back into I'm 18. Because

26:32

I'm 18 broke Alice. And

26:35

it's still, you know, it's one of his great pieces. He

26:37

still does it. How do you get to love that,

26:39

Woody? It's like singing... ...My

26:42

Generation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You

26:44

know, I mean, you know, the great thing

26:47

about the Alice Cooper songs is that they

26:49

are, they're all little pieces of theater, too.

26:52

So it's almost as though he's doing his,

26:54

you know, he's doing a show

26:57

like many, you know, and

26:59

Gary, you would know this better

27:01

than any of us, you know, like you go and

27:03

you do a show and you play it every night

27:05

for some period of time, one

27:07

stage. And every night you

27:09

find a little something different. You find,

27:12

you know,

27:14

there's something in it that you

27:16

notice or something in it that you do

27:18

slightly differently that keeps it alive for you

27:20

and keeps it interesting. In

27:22

his case, you know, every

27:24

night it's a different audience. And

27:27

every night the audience reacts in a

27:29

slightly different way. And that

27:32

fuels him. Like he loves, you

27:34

know, Alice is a true showman,

27:37

obviously, and loves the applause

27:39

and loves the interchange with the audience.

27:41

And so he's been playing a lot

27:43

of these songs for 50 years, longer.

27:47

I mean, I'm 18. They

27:49

already had that when I went to see them at

27:51

Maxis Kansas City on September 8th in 1970. They

27:55

had already been playing it for a year.

27:58

I thought it was I'm Edgy. when

28:00

I saw the show because I'm edgy and

28:03

I don't know what I want. I'm

28:05

edgy. And I'm going,

28:07

I'm edgy. That's hip. So

28:10

I told them, I thought that would be a

28:13

big song. I love that I'm edgy song. And

28:15

they're looking at each other like, what? Oh,

28:17

I'm 18. Yes, even

28:20

better. And of course it went on

28:22

to be that was the song that John Lydon

28:24

sang in, along to the jukebox

28:26

in Malcolm Vivian's shop that got him the

28:28

gig with the Sex Pistols. That's

28:30

right. Bookends the 70s. Yeah,

28:34

it does. And it's a good song. But where did

28:36

you, yeah, I mean,

28:38

but that album and Killer, you know, I mean, they

28:40

are more just a, they're rock straight up glam

28:43

rock and roll. But then something

28:45

begins to happen with him with schools out, I guess.

28:47

And of course, you know, the school's out. What a

28:49

record. I mean, I remember that, you know, and that

28:52

album covered. Right, Guy, did you have that album? Of

28:54

course I had that album. Yeah, yeah, it was not,

28:56

but I was still at primary school. But I remember

28:59

it was those records that made me first

29:01

aware of the idea of record production, you

29:03

know, because they sounded magnificent, which I mean,

29:05

going on to, I mean, welcome to

29:07

my nightmare was the one that that's when you said, I

29:09

think, oh my God, what is going on here? Just in

29:11

terms of sound. But Guy, can I say I hid those,

29:13

I hid those. You're gonna show them to us now, aren't

29:15

you? You're gonna show them to us now, aren't you? No,

29:18

I don't have them with me. I don't, he's

29:20

wearing them. Why don't they stop putting them on

29:22

the cover because they were a fire hazard. They

29:24

were a fire hazard. They were so hot. That

29:27

was true. It is, they were a fire

29:29

hazard and, and

29:31

technically, basically for people who don't know, it was

29:33

a school desk. Similar times, you could give away

29:36

panties, they could be a fire hazard. The school

29:38

desk, when you, you know. Yeah, yeah, and when

29:40

you lifted up the desk inside was

29:42

the record with panties wrapped, paper panties

29:44

wrapped around it. Yeah. Even

29:47

the word makes me feel odd. Sorry. It's

29:49

okay, but I'll tell you what it does.

29:51

The word panties and paper panties in particular,

29:53

is it really points out that you need

29:55

a pop filter. Just

29:58

saying. I do. Thank

30:00

you, Professor. Have you

30:02

done that before? Have you done that before, Bobby?

30:05

Is that a thing? Because that was way too

30:07

smooth. Just keep them up. Hey,

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31:49

Alice's theatrical sound with those boys. There

31:53

was a moment when you said, you know what, we don't need to

31:55

just make all this music with you, with

31:57

the band. We can start orchestrating this. We can

31:59

add some. stuff. Well, well,

32:02

you know, let's

32:04

back up a little bit because there

32:06

was theatricality in there was black

32:09

juju on love it to death, which

32:11

was which was a remarkable piece

32:13

for it was a little bit

32:16

like walk on gilded splinters.

32:18

You know, Dr. John, it was

32:21

creepy and weird and you know, and

32:24

there were he stopped and he yelled

32:26

and he did all kinds of strange

32:28

things. And so

32:32

that was a sort of foray into it.

32:34

And then and of course, they had babies

32:37

later, you know, had

32:40

a great deal of theater, but I've been on

32:42

killer. You know, we had the

32:45

whole long, you know, Halo of Flies

32:47

long, theatrical

32:49

piece there, you know, so we were starting

32:51

to experiment, then we get to schools out.

32:53

The interesting thing about schools out was we

32:56

had changed studios up

32:58

until schools out.

33:00

I was Jack Jr. I was

33:03

working in Jack's favorite studio, which

33:05

Jack's favorite engineer in Jack's

33:08

way with Jack's kind of sounds sort of

33:11

I was, you know, I mean,

33:14

only Jack was Jack, but I but I

33:16

had learned drum sounds from Jack Richardson. I

33:18

was using the mics he preferred and all

33:20

that sort of stuff. Then I

33:23

get to New York at the record point, which is

33:25

this incredible

33:29

crucible of creativity, just

33:32

a bunch of wacko young men

33:35

playing with toys, you know, suddenly all this

33:37

new technology and there were a few of

33:39

them that were inventing the technology at the

33:42

time. So we

33:44

get there and suddenly, whoo, the sounds are

33:47

different. You can do all kinds of things

33:49

that I couldn't do at RCA

33:52

Mid America Studios in Chicago at number

33:54

one North Wacker. But

33:58

also there were

34:00

people on the staff at the record plant

34:03

who played instruments. So I could like me,

34:05

right? So suddenly I could

34:07

add a piano, me, and I could add

34:09

a dulcimer, and that would be Paul Prestipino.

34:11

And he would come in and play. He

34:13

was one of the maintenance guys, but he

34:15

played a great,

34:18

he sort of mandolin, dulcimer, whatever it was that we

34:20

had him do. Also

34:22

in New York, you could rent

34:24

anything. So I could

34:26

rent a calliope, which I used on

34:29

the Kiss album for Flamin' You. Do,

34:31

do, do, do, you know. They died.

34:34

But I was like, wait, you wait. People

34:37

will talk about this forever. So Kiss, this

34:39

is So Kiss. So

34:41

Hugh Padgett. Hugh, who I

34:43

see quite a lot, seeing as he

34:45

actually only lives three doors down from us in

34:47

London. Did he come to our show

34:49

the other night? He did. He

34:51

came to Westall. No, you couldn't stay. So

34:54

we couldn't get the Rock on Ter's picture.

34:56

But did you chat with him? I did

34:58

chat, yeah. And he loved it. It was

35:00

really, what's so nice is, yeah,

35:03

and what's, of course, what's so great, the

35:05

thing, there's the Pink Floyd thing that everyone

35:07

has in their heads until

35:10

they come and see us. And

35:12

Hugh was an absolute brilliant example

35:14

of that. It's like, oh my God, to hear

35:16

those songs again. And just, you

35:18

know, talk about, and everyone's got the kind of,

35:21

you know, sort of upset the controls in my

35:23

bedroom, in the dark, you know, and

35:25

all that. And it was really, really nice because

35:29

it's, I think what is great about

35:31

this band, Gary, is people, we

35:33

don't realize just how fixed Imperial

35:37

period Pink Floyd is in people's heads. That's

35:39

right. And they've almost forgotten about those early

35:41

days. But, you know, because we never remind

35:43

people at the beginning who have listened, who

35:45

are listening to this for the first time.

35:48

Guy and I play with Nick Mason in

35:50

Nick Mason's Song of the Secrets. And we

35:52

are currently out on the road doing

35:54

the first five Floyd albums.

35:57

But, you know, interestingly, you talk to most of the

35:59

people. of our age and certainly

36:01

a little bit older. And those

36:04

early Floyd things were very, very

36:07

influential. I would have thought

36:09

for a producer, you know, what the Floyd were

36:12

doing was, you know, the psychedelic stuff and the,

36:14

you know, the more abstract type of

36:16

music and things like set the controls

36:19

suddenly allowing songs to be a lot

36:21

longer and a lot more visual in

36:23

a way, must have been inspiring for

36:26

many producers. Steve Liddie White said the same.

36:28

Because even, I mean, if you

36:30

just to how kind of out there, like

36:32

Source Full of Secrets is, and

36:34

because they didn't really, I mean, other than stuff

36:37

like Stockhausen, they

36:39

didn't really have anything to refer back to

36:41

in terms of people making records like that,

36:43

did they? And

36:46

their psychedelic freakout thing was based on a

36:48

jazz model. Wasn't it? That thing

36:50

of you play the riff and then you all go

36:52

off and express yourself and then you come back to

36:54

the riff. I don't like you expressing yourself too much.

36:56

No, I know. You've made that very clear. Hugh

36:59

Padget is someone, you know, we

37:01

talk about people coming up from,

37:04

towards producing via being engineers. But I

37:06

remember when he was, you

37:09

know, he was an engineer, but he was, I think

37:11

he embarrassingly

37:13

either got called assistant engineer or

37:16

even maybe tape op on our

37:18

first album because Richard

37:20

was considered himself the engineer, which

37:22

is James Burgess on the first

37:24

Bandai Ballet albums. But

37:27

on that first, we went to the townhouse

37:29

a few times and it was Hugh.

37:31

Was he in house? He was in

37:33

house and the course is a funny thing, which I

37:35

think a lot of people might not know, but it was

37:37

until about, until the end of

37:39

the 70s, till the 80s, when you

37:41

made an album, you booked a studio

37:44

and it came with an engineer. You

37:46

had the house engineer and then it

37:48

became, which is why Alan

37:50

Parsons, you know, engineered Dark Side of

37:52

the Moon, not because they asked for him, because he was

37:54

the guy on who that was

37:56

his shift at Abbey Road. And

37:59

so, and Hugh just happened to be, I

38:01

mean he did such fantastic interesting stuff because the

38:03

townhouse which is the studio where he worked which

38:05

is where I ended up, I ended up having

38:07

my own studio which is one of the absolute,

38:09

certainly for the 80s definitive studios. It was on

38:11

Uxbridge Road. No, Goldhaut

38:13

Road. Goldhaut Road which is parallel

38:15

to Uxbridge Road. Yeah, it used

38:18

to be a film studio and

38:20

now of course is luxury flats

38:22

obviously. But yeah,

38:24

he did things like he was the engineer on

38:26

the Derrik and Clive album and yeah,

38:29

all sorts of stuff like that because he just

38:31

happened to be the guy and he happened to

38:33

be the guy when the drummer from Genesis decided

38:36

to try and do a solo record and

38:38

I think he ended up with the production credit for

38:40

that you know and the rest is geography. It

38:43

is. So here's Hugh Pageant talking about producing

38:45

Sting. Ghost in the Machine was the first

38:47

one. Yeah. I remember it coming out and

38:49

it was again, it had so

38:51

much of your flavor on it. It

38:54

wasn't just the three-piece anymore. You know,

38:56

there was keyboards on there, there were

38:58

sequences, there was depth to the production.

39:00

Was that something that you were inputting?

39:03

Well, yes to an extent. I

39:05

mean, I got the gig basically

39:08

through XTC and they

39:10

used to tour quite a lot

39:12

in those days together and

39:15

one day Sting and Andy

39:17

Partridge were on a bus together and

39:20

Sting said, do you know what? We're

39:22

looking for a new producer because

39:24

we just want to change and also

39:27

the whole thing with the police in

39:29

those days, Miles Copeland was the manager

39:31

and everything was done

39:34

as cheaply as possible and then they

39:36

were amazing those first three albums. I

39:38

think they just wanted a change and

39:41

also it was around that time

39:43

in the late 70s, early 80s

39:46

that synthesizers and particularly polyphonic synthesizers

39:48

were just coming out. So there

39:50

was a load of

39:52

new gear, drum machines,

39:55

sequencers, synthesizers and

39:58

when you're a big band, you always just get out of it. given

40:00

stuff don't you? Yeah when you can afford it

40:02

you get given it for free what a joke.

40:04

I know Phil Collins always used to say that

40:06

he said I could never afford a drum kit

40:09

when I was young now I've made some money

40:11

I'm just being given drum kits all the time

40:13

and he never used to accept them for that

40:15

reason as well it's a rather

40:17

ironical isn't it? So I had

40:20

met Sting on a session at

40:22

the townhouse before as well so

40:24

I just got the phone call

40:26

and said will you turn up

40:28

in Montserrat and work with the

40:30

police. I'd never met

40:32

Andy before I met Stuart

40:35

because he lived just down the road in

40:37

Shepherd's Bush but basically I

40:39

arrived in Montserrat

40:41

with just a whole bunch

40:44

of Sting's sort of rough

40:46

demos the band and

40:48

all this new gear it was

40:50

all overheim mostly overheims that

40:53

we had do you remember? And this

40:55

is George Martin's air studio in Montserrat

40:57

into air studios. Did you watch Under

41:00

the Volcano that documentary did he? Yeah

41:02

absolutely it's brilliant yeah I was

41:04

in it for a few seconds. Ah

41:07

okay there's a little bass player rumor that

41:09

I'd like to get sorted out which is

41:11

that apparently Sting had this thing certainly on

41:13

Every Breath You Take but that's which wasn't

41:15

on this album though. That wasn't on this

41:17

album but I think it might have been

41:19

on many songs anyway which is the reason

41:21

for his bass sound was that he would

41:23

play a bass but then there would be

41:25

loads of electric or just double basses bowing

41:27

underneath it. No it wasn't it

41:29

wasn't bowed it

41:31

was double bass but he would just

41:33

play you know minims

41:35

or root notes just

41:37

to sort of flesh it out. And the tour

41:40

was like about eight tracks of it or something?

41:42

No there

41:45

you go bass players of the world. This is

41:47

the horse's mouth. The one thing

41:49

I do remember a lot about

41:52

is bass really partly because

41:54

Sting's an amazing bass player

41:56

and also he always used

41:58

to play in the country. control room with

42:00

me. Generally on that first goes

42:02

to the Machine album. He had one of

42:05

those which I don't

42:07

really like Steinberg basses. Steinberger,

42:10

yeah. Steinberger, sorry. Very

42:12

odd looking carbon fiber thing which

42:14

didn't have very much bass on

42:16

it and I think it might

42:18

have been my idea to overdub

42:20

this double bass that he had

42:22

which was nicknamed, all their instruments

42:24

were generally nicknamed something and this

42:26

double bass was called Brian and

42:29

it was an electric double bass that had

42:31

a sort of metal

42:34

pipe as the outside bit.

42:37

You see what I mean? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. He

42:39

also had a really nice old Fender

42:42

jazz bait. Oh okay because he's got

42:44

his precision, his 1951 precision

42:46

which he still uses a lot. Yeah,

42:48

that's the one that looks like a

42:51

telecaster. That's right, yeah. The original bass

42:53

he had was a very old jazz

42:55

bass but he seemed to like, I

42:58

don't know, he liked the look of the Steinberger.

43:00

We all did, that's what I played, we all

43:03

did. I said what was great about the Steinberger

43:05

because it was a tiny little stick thing and

43:07

you carried it in like a little gun bag and

43:10

what was brilliant was that it never left your

43:12

side. It went in the overhead locker on planes and

43:14

it was indestructible. You could put it between two chairs

43:16

and jump up and down on it. I didn't but

43:18

if you've noticed I've not spoken for a while. In

43:20

fact I think I'm sorry. I'm sorry, off at one

43:23

point. Poor old Gary. I'm

43:25

sorry. I'll just say one

43:27

last thing on the bass tech for any bass

43:30

freaks who are looking. I'm certainly not

43:32

going to say no. Well everything used

43:34

to go through a little boss

43:37

chorus pedal. Oh

43:39

no, I thought no, the Dimension D.

43:41

No, no, no, it was a boss

43:43

light blue chorus

43:46

pedal. CE2, the CE2. And the

43:48

knobs were set at 10 to

43:50

2. Also

43:53

he didn't have a bass amp, never

43:55

ever went through a bass amp, it was always

43:57

just de-eyed. But I think Gary, I think everything

43:59

you ever did went through a boss chorus as

44:01

well. Come on, you're in. I

44:03

was just can only apologize. You're

44:06

part of the problem, mate. What they

44:08

really want to know about is was Stewart

44:10

and Sting beating the shit out of each

44:13

other? Yeah, exactly. Because I think

44:15

that probably happened on the next album, didn't it?

44:17

It did. It happened more on the second album.

44:20

Yeah, I mean, they had

44:22

had physical confrontations. There was

44:24

a famous physical confrontation at

44:27

a gig in the south of France

44:29

where Sting and

44:31

Stewart got into a real rough

44:34

and tumble and Sting actually cracked

44:36

one of Stewart's ribs and he couldn't play.

44:39

And the great thing with the police is their

44:41

roadies could all substitute for their

44:44

bosses' instruments. Oh, for the sound checks.

44:46

Oh, they're all understudies. They were all

44:48

understudied. And Swings, Stewart's roadie, was a

44:50

guy called Jeff, who was a fantastic

44:53

drummer. And so he ended up playing

44:55

the gig because it was like happened

44:57

at sound check, this punch up. And

44:59

so they couldn't not do

45:02

the gig. So they got Jeff dressed up

45:04

like Stewart and made sure the lighting guy

45:06

didn't put any follow spots on him and

45:08

did the whole gig and nobody noticed. But

45:12

when you did synchronously, was it tough for

45:14

you in the studio with the sort of

45:16

atmosphere? To be honest, it's so weird because

45:18

it's it really is one of, you know,

45:20

one of my favorite records and a great

45:22

record. I'm not blowing my own. Well, every

45:24

breath you take is. And very

45:26

successful. And it was a classic album, Hugh.

45:28

You can blow away, mate. OK, well, thank

45:31

you. But it was unbelievably painful

45:33

to make at times. I mean,

45:35

really, really, I remember ringing up

45:37

my manager at one point and

45:39

sort of almost crying down the

45:41

phone saying, I can't take this

45:43

anymore, because every time I tried

45:46

to sort of stop

45:48

their barneys, they would just

45:50

turn around to me and say, fuck off. You don't

45:52

know us at all. You know, I'd

45:54

only work with them for like probably

45:57

six or seven weeks on the first

45:59

album. And then they'd

46:01

gone off on tour and come

46:03

back and we started the second

46:05

album. And after two weeks in

46:07

the studio in Montserrat, we literally

46:09

didn't have anything to play

46:12

at all. And there was a

46:14

crisis meeting where Miles

46:16

Copeland, the manager, was flown over. He

46:18

hated Montserrat, he just, you know, he

46:21

hated sort of any place that wasn't

46:23

London or New York, basically. So he

46:25

was never around. He flew over and

46:27

we had a crisis meeting about

46:30

whether we were gonna carry on or

46:32

split up the band there and then. And

46:35

luckily the decision was made

46:38

to carry on, but I

46:40

mean, it was really horrible

46:42

to start with. And then we sort of got

46:44

down to it. But I mean, even things like

46:46

every breath you take, if

46:48

you listen to it, it's all made up

46:50

of overdubs on drums. The bass drum is

46:52

from the Oberheim DMX, I

46:55

think it was called. You know, every

46:57

time Stuart played, he wanted to play

47:00

something to show off because

47:02

he's a fantastic drummer, you know? I

47:04

mean, you know, the band is one

47:06

of the best three-piece bands ever. And

47:09

he's a virtuoso, but he

47:12

didn't like to sort of not

47:14

be virtuoso. And as with everyone

47:18

and every band, you've got to

47:20

come to compromises sometimes. It was

47:22

terribly difficult just to get him

47:24

to sort of overdub because

47:27

that's what it was, the stuff that ended up

47:29

on the song. And then we

47:31

moved to Canada after a bit and did

47:33

some overdubbing and mixed there. And

47:35

Stuart and Sting didn't like to be

47:37

in the same room together. So in

47:39

the morning, Sting would go off skiing

47:42

because this studio was just by a

47:44

ski resort. Stuart would come in

47:46

in the morning and want to sort of

47:48

try overdubbing things. And then lunch

47:50

would happen and then Sting would come in

47:52

and Stuart would go out skiing. And

47:55

so one day Sting came in and he said,

47:57

what the fuck's that? And we're listening

47:59

to everybody. and Stuart had put on

48:01

what I call one of those sewing machine

48:03

high hats. And so Sting went,

48:06

what the fuck's that? And

48:09

I go, well, that's... Stuart

48:11

made me record. Made me

48:14

do it. Bigger

48:16

boys came. He made me do it, he made

48:18

me do it. And Sting said, well,

48:20

I hate it. Get rid of it. And

48:22

I said, well, don't you think we should

48:24

sort of, you know, being the jolly sort

48:26

of diplomat, don't you think

48:28

we should talk about it with Stuart

48:30

first? No, don't. I want you to

48:32

wipe it now. And

48:34

so I said, well, okay. And

48:37

of course we're on analogue machines

48:39

then. So when you wipe

48:41

something, it literally disappeared

48:44

forever. Whereas nowadays you

48:46

would just take the high hat off

48:48

the playlist or whatever if you're doing

48:50

Pro Tools. And so

48:52

he literally came over and

48:55

stood by the tape machine while he

48:57

made me put that track into record

48:59

and wipe it. So

49:02

then the next day Stuart comes in, where's

49:05

my high hat gone? So

49:07

there would be a big Barney then. And I said,

49:09

well, look, you know, I am sort of the producer

49:12

and it is Sting's song. He

49:15

wrote this song and I happen to

49:17

agree with him that I

49:20

don't think it needs that high hat. And

49:23

so that was sort of

49:26

made a tension between me and

49:28

Stuart then as well. So,

49:31

you know, it just went from difficulty

49:33

to difficulty and I just remember being

49:35

so relieved when we all left. So

49:38

finally we're on to Trevor Horn, who's been on

49:40

the show twice now, hasn't he? He

49:42

was one of our early... He was an

49:44

early adopter and we always said we were going

49:46

to have to get him on because what was

49:48

fantastic was that, A, he's

49:51

just such a great storyteller. He's just a

49:53

joy to be in the room with, isn't

49:55

he? But what's amazing is that we

49:57

didn't get any of the Trevor Horn stuff in that first

49:59

one. All we got... But it was a fantastic, it's fantastic

50:01

for anyone who doesn't, you know, who's

50:03

interested in him, because he basically took us through

50:05

that whole period of his life before he was

50:07

Trevor Horn. I certainly

50:09

learned an immense amount. Yeah,

50:12

yeah, you know, I think it's been a really

50:14

good show this, actually. So we've had three producers

50:16

who really determine the sound of the 80s. No

50:19

doubt. Steve Lillie, White Hugh Paz, Trevor

50:21

Horn. And Bob, obviously, before then, you

50:24

know, determining quite a lot of the

50:26

sound of rock in the 70s. But

50:29

I would make a, I would make quite a

50:31

bold statement here, I think. And I think it's

50:33

very interesting that I think the 80s were

50:36

far more producer-led than

50:38

subsequent, like, I think,

50:40

than when you think of the 90s, you think

50:43

of artists much more than producers. Oh.

50:45

Or is that a contentious... Well, no, you might be

50:47

right. Do I want to die on this hill, is

50:49

the question. Well,

50:51

no, because you're right. Because if I immediately

50:53

say who produced Oasis, what would you say?

50:56

I don't know. Well,

50:59

you don't know, do you? Yeah. I can't

51:01

remember either. Look, oh, Stephen, Stephen Street is

51:03

kind of the most, you know. But then

51:05

again, Stephen Street is an 80s boy, really.

51:08

You know, the Smiths, Stephen Duffy, all that, you know.

51:10

So you're right, because what happened then in the 90s

51:12

is there was, especially with

51:15

Britpop, because we got a

51:17

massive attack, for instance. There's a definitive

51:19

90s act. Their

51:21

massive attack is not anyone else. Yeah.

51:23

Yeah. Because there was this really awful

51:25

period that came in the early 90s

51:28

when it was A&R man led. Yes, absolutely.

51:31

And talking about boy bands, right? You

51:33

know, and that

51:35

kind of thing where, you

51:38

know, they were very producer led. The

51:42

artists invariably would be on their own

51:44

records. Manager led, I'd say. Manager

51:47

led. Yeah, exactly. But

51:50

the indie sound, the kind of raw indie sound,

51:53

in a way, in the 90s was... Steve

51:56

Albini. Yeah, but what, well, in

51:58

America, yeah. Yeah. But it

52:00

was in a way, it was a revolt

52:03

against the poshness of the 80s. Yeah, absolutely.

52:05

Yeah. So there was this idea of,

52:07

you know, if we're going to get a producer,

52:09

he really needs to be the guy who just

52:11

sticks a microphone up in the room that we're

52:13

playing in and tries to stop us from fighting.

52:16

Yeah, yeah, it's true. But then I guess

52:19

this is also the rise of Rick Rubin,

52:21

isn't it? Again, which is that strip of

52:23

him re-imagining sort of classic artists. Someone, I

52:25

mean, there was a great article about this,

52:27

someone talking about the different ways of

52:30

that people record, not

52:33

in terms of making records, just straightforward recording. Like,

52:35

for instance, if you listen to Tonight's the Night,

52:37

the Neil Young Live album, it

52:39

sounds like you'd expect someone to sound

52:41

standing on a hall in a theatre

52:44

playing their songs. Whereas if you listen

52:46

to Rick Rubin's Johnny Cash albums,

52:49

you are literally sitting in his lap and he

52:51

is singing in your ear. Now

52:54

we're in the age of producers being

52:56

songwriters as well, because it's

52:58

the producer is the guy who gets

53:00

the beats up, who puts the chords down

53:02

and they can play those

53:05

grooves to the artist who then comes

53:07

up with a top line and some lyrics. So

53:11

I think that's, there's the producer

53:13

stepping back from the publishing. That's

53:17

gone. The producer now wants to be part

53:19

of the songwriting. But from where you were saying it, I

53:21

think it's quite interesting. It's almost like

53:23

there's a comparison here with the director. I

53:25

remember when Christopher Nolan was

53:27

asked what it's like to direct a

53:30

Batman film, where it's something where it's

53:32

just a huge studio, Behemoth, you know,

53:35

and how much of a director are you? And

53:37

he said, you're basically a traffic cop. And

53:40

I think for a modern pop producer, that's

53:43

probably quite a good analogy, isn't it? Yeah,

53:45

yeah, you're right. You talk about

53:47

the sort of the, you know, Mark Ronson or someone

53:49

like that, you know, you're just organizing the people coming

53:51

in. You're just facilitating all the stuff coming and going,

53:53

like you said, there's the beats guy, there's this guy,

53:56

there's the bloke. You know, like Phil

53:58

Mantoneira was telling us about the bloke. whose job is to

54:00

listen to albums from 1975 to 1979 and find samples. You

54:02

know, there's... Yeah.

54:07

Well, it's from 1980. No good. So

54:13

let's play a clip of when we had Trevor

54:15

Horn. This is one of our live shows, by

54:17

the way. So there might be a little hubbub

54:19

of happy audience. Yeah. Yeah. Which is live at

54:21

Cambridge Audio. Yes, it might be

54:24

you who's listening now. You were there.

54:26

Trevor, this all sort of begs the

54:28

question about who do you prefer to

54:30

produce, a band or a singer? Do

54:32

you... I mean, I don't want

54:35

to preempt your answer. Well,

54:38

I mean, it's obviously depends

54:40

on the band. The

54:43

problem I have found with bands is

54:46

it's quite hard to work with people

54:48

when you can play a lot better than them. Do

54:51

you know what I mean? And this

54:53

particularly applies when I've tried working with

54:55

young bands. You know,

54:57

I've I've I remember working with I

55:00

tried it a few years back, you know,

55:02

a young bass player playing and me and

55:05

my engineer both around him deadening the strings

55:07

in between ways playing because he hasn't got

55:10

any technique. He just plays in the whole

55:12

bass rings, you know, that kind

55:14

of stuff. Bands can be a pain. And

55:16

obviously by the, you know, Murphy's Law, the

55:19

guy that gives you the most trouble is the

55:21

least talented generally. Whereas,

55:25

you know, when you're working with a

55:27

singer or just

55:29

like a vocal group or something, you can hire

55:31

all the musicians. And when you hire

55:33

the musicians, everything's fabulous and the birds are singing and

55:35

everything is nice. Well, I know because having worked with

55:38

you quite a lot and it's something I always thought

55:40

and I never know what I'm going to be doing

55:42

whenever I've come into work with you. Sometimes it's playing

55:44

bass. Sometimes it was used to

55:46

get me to play acoustic guitar quite a

55:48

lot. And then you had this great maxim,

55:51

which I think is probably because you had

55:53

this thing of like basically get anyone, literally

55:56

anyone to play the

55:58

acoustic guitar except the

56:00

guitarist because

56:03

you know I know you once said I'll

56:05

have the guy delivering the pizza do the

56:07

acoustic guitar because the guitarist will go I

56:09

can give you this or

56:11

I could do this or I bought a buy to this where someone

56:13

like me is gonna go to see yeah

56:16

yeah which is why you yeah

56:18

most of the time yeah yeah

56:20

talking of single artists I suppose

56:22

seal is just you know your

56:25

kind of relationship with seal has

56:27

been probably the longest out of everyone

56:29

you've ever worked with isn't it Trevor yeah he's put

56:31

up with me longer than anybody but do you think

56:33

is it something to do with I mean he's got

56:35

the most credible voice but sonically his

56:37

voice sits it I've got into

56:39

a bit in your studios when

56:41

you've been working on some of

56:43

those seal songs and listen to it

56:46

and you can just feel how his voice places

56:48

within this arrangement that you create around him so

56:50

beautifully yeah he's got a great he's got a

56:52

lovely voice he's one of those guys that that

56:55

whoever is singing such and such a song

56:58

he'll probably be able to sing it better you

57:00

know what I mean you can sing anything he

57:03

does a great Sinatra he's a great mimic you

57:06

know it's it's I suppose he he and

57:09

I have the same sense of humor like

57:11

very sort of double entendre sense of humor

57:13

and sometimes if

57:16

people are talking they'll say something in

57:18

there look at each other did they

57:20

just really say I can take it

57:22

up the octave it's a seals really

57:27

funny and and back

57:29

in you know when I first started to work with him I said

57:32

to him look silly you know really

57:34

I don't mind how many girlfriends you have

57:37

in the studio but I don't want any

57:39

male friends if you don't mind he said

57:41

no mates only birds and

57:44

he said why and I said well it's

57:46

always a male friends

57:48

can really disrupt things they say stuff

57:50

like do you think

57:52

this is good or this sounds

57:54

a bit lush or something like

57:57

that and ruin the session my

58:00

demo. Yeah, something like that.

58:03

They're always a bit jealous whereas

58:05

girlfriends are generally

58:07

not jealous unless... There's

58:10

a there's a I mean it's an awful

58:12

thing to admit but it's in any studio

58:14

situation it's like you could almost

58:16

just tell from the tape when a girl walks

58:18

in the room. Yeah. Because everyone's showing off immediately

58:20

aren't they? I mean it's why you know it's

58:24

it's why you became a musician let's face

58:26

it. Serious to

58:28

have some amazing looking girls like he

58:31

had one girlfriend now in LA

58:34

who was about six foot three and she was in

58:36

a cop show and she was gorgeous and

58:38

you know the night that he sang Show

58:40

Me on the first album she was

58:43

sitting at his feet when he was singing it

58:45

you know and I was working with

58:47

an American engineer called Steve McMillan

58:49

who was a very conservative guy who was one

58:51

of those sort of guys who

58:53

always says stuff like you know I do

58:55

favor the LA 76 from 1973 because of

58:58

the different tubes that they use

59:01

in here. It's one of those kind

59:03

of guys and this girl was

59:05

there and

59:08

I said I said to him god she's a

59:10

good looking girl and he says it

59:12

has always been a fantasy of mine to be

59:14

gang raped by a group of female police officers.

59:19

She could definitely be one of them. He's

59:26

gonna be happy with that going out on this. You

59:35

actually named him there's been a lot of people you haven't named.

59:39

I don't think Steve would be bothered

59:41

by that. Trevor when you're working with

59:43

Seal how quickly is it

59:45

before you want the master vocal on there

59:47

is it something that's that it's going to tell

59:50

you where everything else goes? Well

59:52

with him it's always persuading him to actually sing

59:54

on the track you know you get the track

59:56

hey see we've got the track He's

1:00:00

nervous. It's okay.

1:00:04

Maybe tomorrow, you know. And I

1:00:07

used to stay in the same house as him and I used

1:00:09

to catch him in his suit going out for dinner. So

1:00:12

he'd just come in, come in and sing a couple

1:00:14

of songs, you know. I

1:00:16

tried never to organise an actual session

1:00:18

unless it was an emergency, you know.

1:00:21

But I'd just catch him on the fly. It was always

1:00:23

better. And then he'd come back with a girl maybe at

1:00:25

three o'clock in the morning and he'd be in the mood.

1:00:27

And he'd come on and sing these two songs again, you

1:00:29

know. And he'd sing them

1:00:31

and, you know, I'd always keep

1:00:33

all of them and keep going through them, you

1:00:36

know. You once described, I don't know if we can use

1:00:38

it, I don't want to upset anyone, because it's one of

1:00:40

the most brilliant descriptions I've ever heard and

1:00:43

which I've used often. You described him as having

1:00:45

a whim of iron. Whim

1:00:47

of iron. I

1:00:51

think we were all a lot younger then, you know.

1:00:55

Maybe a few of us had whims of iron, maybe I was

1:00:58

just as bad. Your latest album, which

1:01:00

is supposed to talk about your latest project, because we've

1:01:02

jumped a few decades, sorry. Well, we haven't really, but

1:01:05

it's looking back as well, isn't it? And

1:01:08

I've heard the few tracks that have

1:01:10

been made available and they sound absolutely

1:01:12

amazing. How do you get

1:01:14

about approaching a song that's already been established as

1:01:16

a massive hit and everyone knows it inside out?

1:01:19

It's not easy because as you work on the

1:01:21

song sometimes you find yourself thinking, I

1:01:23

wish I could do it the way it is on the

1:01:26

record, because that's obviously the way you do it. And

1:01:28

you can't because you're trying to bring something fresh to

1:01:30

it. But I

1:01:33

mean they're all songs, you know what songs are like,

1:01:35

you know, you can do all kinds of things with

1:01:37

them. Imagine you dragged up the Joe Jackson song, because

1:01:39

that's been a favourite one for years. Yeah, it's a

1:01:41

lovely song, yeah. I

1:01:43

was just looking for songs with good lyrics, you

1:01:45

know, lyrics that I liked, that meant

1:01:48

something, you know, that weren't just idiotic. All

1:01:53

the songs are really chosen from that point of view. You

1:01:57

know, a song's a song you can do back in

1:01:59

the day. You know a

1:02:01

song would become famous and everybody would

1:02:03

cut you to Sinatra Dean Martin They

1:02:06

everyone would do their versions and different

1:02:08

arrangers would change the chords. It's the

1:02:10

same kind of thing, isn't it? Really? I

1:02:13

mean if anything I the Nelson riddle was

1:02:15

always very There was always

1:02:17

lots going on in his records. You know I

1:02:19

mean in between each of the lines something happened

1:02:22

You know yeah, and you still working with and

1:02:24

ugly on it. No. I have

1:02:26

a world down for a long time That

1:02:28

was an amazing relationship. No we

1:02:30

we we had a I

1:02:32

did a lot funny enough in the end I did some

1:02:34

big shows with that and you know where

1:02:36

we'd we play on You

1:02:40

know that you know we did

1:02:42

a big thing with Robbie at the you

1:02:44

know when he had his anniversary We played

1:02:47

in 13 minute medley in In

1:02:51

those court And

1:02:53

so I was funny cuz I mean I remember we were

1:02:55

all at the bar at the end of that show And

1:02:58

people were talking about who have you got in your in ears? And

1:03:01

I said I've always got the drums And

1:03:05

I've got you you're generally in the right

1:03:07

place And

1:03:11

you've paid me a compliment I can't believe it

1:03:13

I Know

1:03:18

that you've been asked this a million times I

1:03:20

want to ask if my own self interest in

1:03:22

that who do you regret not producing who

1:03:24

would you have loved to have done ah I

1:03:29

Mean I mean I could you know I

1:03:32

know he sounds absurd But I

1:03:34

wouldn't have mine having a go at Bob Dylan at

1:03:36

one point. Yeah, that would have been interesting Wow Did

1:03:39

just because it's so different from what

1:03:41

from what you know? and

1:03:43

I I Friend

1:03:46

of mine who's a property

1:03:48

developer? wrote a song Based

1:03:51

on you know a desolation row

1:03:54

called desolation you row and

1:03:56

as a favor for him I

1:04:00

Did a recording of it. I had a band for

1:04:02

another session and at the end of it I said

1:04:04

to them we're going to do

1:04:06

a version of demolition desolation row You

1:04:10

guys know it right? And

1:04:12

we did it in one take with me

1:04:14

singing a guy vocal because I know it's so

1:04:16

wise be a Bob Dylan Yeah,

1:04:18

you do a great doctor than you do a great

1:04:20

Brian Ferry in fact Don't you when you did your

1:04:22

top of the box albums do yeah I used to

1:04:24

sing on the toilet and We had such

1:04:26

fun because it was verse after verse after verse and

1:04:28

you knew all the lyrics I knew all the lyrics

1:04:31

yet, and you know what it's like when you got

1:04:33

something like that You have to find something different than

1:04:35

each verse. I thought God I

1:04:37

would like to have done this so that was good

1:04:39

I enjoyed I enjoyed this episode. Yeah, and I'm sorry.

1:04:41

I thought you were actually talking to me carrying Of

1:04:43

course you weren't you were actually I thought you you

1:04:46

actually talking thing that's a real life

1:04:49

and in podcast life As

1:04:51

well, we are one in the same we are No

1:04:55

Fourth no, so let me just we're just getting

1:04:57

this straight in here. This is going out Sunday

1:04:59

in two days time We are flying

1:05:02

into Europe for Four

1:05:04

to five weeks of with

1:05:06

Nick Mason in Europe. We're doing I think

1:05:08

we start in Holland We start in Holland

1:05:10

and you trekt yeah, and yeah, we might

1:05:12

be delaying our start time might move because

1:05:14

of the Holland game But

1:05:17

yeah, and we will be doing everything we can

1:05:20

to try and squeeze in More

1:05:22

interviews like we did last time we've done it before

1:05:24

we do you know what just just

1:05:26

pretty feelers out there Because if we can't find

1:05:28

someone to interview as we haven't today and sometimes

1:05:31

we can't even do the the edit thing of

1:05:33

greatest hits We might just have a chat while

1:05:35

we're on the road and put that up as

1:05:37

our pod I think that that that would be

1:05:39

that should be okay. Would you like that? Let

1:05:42

us know? Do

1:05:44

we want to know that the arts is on a postcard

1:05:46

they're going to be beastly Yeah,

1:05:49

they only want me they said yes By

1:05:54

the way there was even a sorry it's

1:05:56

now however many days later, but we're quite

1:05:58

a lovely landmark last like we played Brighton, which

1:06:01

is always quite special, playing the Brighton Dome, which of

1:06:03

course because it's the hallowed stage

1:06:06

where Pink Floyd first performed what was

1:06:08

then called Eclipse, a Piece for Assorted

1:06:10

Lunatics, but we know is Dark Side

1:06:12

of the Moon back in November 72.

1:06:16

And Nick got up and pointed out that

1:06:18

it was actually him and my 500th

1:06:22

gig playing together. I know,

1:06:24

that was, well of course

1:06:26

it was our wonderful guitarist Professor Lee Harris

1:06:28

who came up with that number, he worked

1:06:30

it out, calculated it, or

1:06:32

just made it up frankly, because none of us are

1:06:34

going to... But how

1:06:37

amazing, 500 shows with Nick Mason,

1:06:39

I think that's got to be more shows than Roger

1:06:41

played. It's got to be. On

1:06:43

that note, thank you very much

1:06:45

for listening, thank you to Ben Jones for

1:06:47

putting this show together for us for Gimme

1:06:49

Sugar, and we are the

1:06:51

Rock On tours and we will continue doing

1:06:54

it throughout this tour. And it's a good night from

1:06:56

me? That's good night from Ben. Rock

1:06:59

On tours is produced by Gimme Sugar

1:07:02

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