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Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bath West That's Podcast.

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Speaker 1: My guest today is artist remixer All Around That Pool

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Speaker 1: musician Stephen Wilson. Stephen, Hello, Hello, Hello, Hello. Okay, you

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Speaker 1: just put out a new album, Future Baites. What motivate

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Speaker 1: you to make new music today? Well, you know, I'm

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Speaker 1: I'm sort of one of those people that years and

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Speaker 1: years and years and years and years ago when I

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Speaker 1: was when I was a kid, when I was a teenager,

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Speaker 1: fell in love with the idea that I could make records,

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Speaker 1: and for me it was a magical thing and a

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Speaker 1: gift to be able to do that professionally. So I've

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Speaker 1: made it my business to make rather a lot of them. Actually,

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Speaker 1: I'm slowing down a bit. There was three years between

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Speaker 1: this album and the preceding one, which is almost unheard

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Speaker 1: for me. But as an excuse, I did get married

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Speaker 1: Eden and acquire a family in the meantime, so that

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Speaker 1: kind of slowed me down a little bit. Yeah, No,

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Speaker 1: I mean, I've I've just you know, I've just been

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Speaker 1: in love with the idea of making records ever since

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Speaker 1: I can remember, even before I knew what things like

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Speaker 1: producer lyrics, you know, even what those words I was

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Speaker 1: reading on record sleeves, even before I knew what they meant,

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Speaker 1: I kind of subconsciously and intuitively knew that's what I

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Speaker 1: was going to end up doing, and that's what I've

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Speaker 1: dedicated my life to doing. Okay, you have this new album,

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Speaker 1: the Future Baits. What was the inspiration for that? So

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Speaker 1: I wrote a couple of years ago, and and really

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Speaker 1: the idea of the future bias. There's a couple of

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Speaker 1: themes go on on the record. One I guess that

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Speaker 1: the dominant theme is about how sense of self and

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Speaker 1: identity have changed in the Internet era. So the idea

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Speaker 1: that we now, well, let's just say that before the Internet,

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Speaker 1: we used to look out as a species. We used

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Speaker 1: to look out at the stars. We used to look

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Speaker 1: out the world with incredible curiosity. Now we spend most

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Speaker 1: of our time gazing at a little screen to see

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Speaker 1: how many likes, how many comments, how many views, etcetera, etcetera.

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Speaker 1: So the idea that now we see ourselves pretty much

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Speaker 1: reflected back in the mirror of social media, and how

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Speaker 1: that has affected us as a species, how that has

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Speaker 1: affected the course of human evolution, because I really believe

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Speaker 1: it hasn't quite severely. So the album deals with a

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Speaker 1: lot of the kind of issues spinning off from that

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Speaker 1: new era, I guess of what I call the new

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Speaker 1: era of narcissism. Okay, you said you wrote it a

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Speaker 1: couple of years ago. Yeah, So what was the interim about. Well,

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Speaker 1: right here in the UK about two eighteen, we were

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Speaker 1: going through this hideous thing called Brexit. In fact, we're

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Speaker 1: still going through it. It was a very very depressing time. Um.

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Speaker 1: I was kind of, you know, seeing on social media

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Speaker 1: the increasing polarization of people, you know, the belligerents, what

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Speaker 1: I call the politics of hate really coming to the

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Speaker 1: fore that that whole thing brought out some of the

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Speaker 1: worst aspects of humanity, seemed to me. And we were

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Speaker 1: also in the middle of the Trump administration, so ditto

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Speaker 1: to that really, So I you know, I I think

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Speaker 1: I felt for the first time in my life, I

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Speaker 1: wasn't really looked looking forward to the future particularly, and

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Speaker 1: of course, low and behold, just as I finished the album,

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Speaker 1: along comes the pandemic and it's become even more sadly

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Speaker 1: and ironically, it's become even more relevant and even more topical. Okay,

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Speaker 1: just to be clear, you wrote it was there an

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Speaker 1: interim between writing it and recording it, or you just

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Speaker 1: held the album back because of the pandemic. Yes, so

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Speaker 1: the album is finished last January, so it's just before

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Speaker 1: the pandemic came along. It was being scheduled for release,

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Speaker 1: and then of course as soon as it kicked in,

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Speaker 1: we pulled it and and now it's just come out. Okay.

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Speaker 1: But in your particular case, because most people will hold

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Speaker 1: albums back, it's primarily because they want to associate the

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Speaker 1: release with the tour. You have a very dedicated fian base.

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Speaker 1: Do you find that the were maximize's consumption or use

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Speaker 1: some more tickets if there's everything happening at the same time,

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Speaker 1: what's the thinking there, Yeah, for sure. Ideally right now

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Speaker 1: I would be on tour, I would be doing record

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Speaker 1: store signings, I'll be doing TV appearances, whatever I can

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Speaker 1: do to to kind of bolster up the you know,

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Speaker 1: the record, But I can't do any of that, So ironically,

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Speaker 1: I'm left with the only thing I can do to

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Speaker 1: promote this record is social media and making videos and

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Speaker 1: posting that sort of stuff online so I can reach

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Speaker 1: my fan base that way. Um, I think the idea

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Speaker 1: of originally of postponing the album wasn't necessarily to do

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Speaker 1: with touring. It was more to do with I wasn't

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Speaker 1: sure when the pandemic first kicked in, and when Lockdown

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Speaker 1: first kicked in, I wasn't sure if it was the

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Speaker 1: right time to release a record that was essentially about

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Speaker 1: the dystopian world that we lived in. And I'm still

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Speaker 1: not sure that the truth is, I'm still not sure,

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Speaker 1: but I didn't want to hang onto it any longer.

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Speaker 1: I felt like a year was already more than enough,

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Speaker 1: you know, to hold it back. Well, the historically there

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Speaker 1: have been great dysturpian records. Are do you feel that

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Speaker 1: you're a pioneer of the twenty century or is anybody

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Speaker 1: else carrying the flag with you? I don't know. I

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Speaker 1: think there's lots of people. Certainly there's going to be

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Speaker 1: lots of people writing songs about, you know, what the

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Speaker 1: human race is going through right now. I've no I've

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Speaker 1: no doubt there already are many records that have been

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Speaker 1: released in the last few months that deal with that.

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Speaker 1: The difference for me, I suppose, is I have a

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Speaker 1: commitment and a dedication to the idea of the album

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Speaker 1: as a continuum, as a journey as a kind of

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Speaker 1: analogist with a film or a short story. I love that.

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Speaker 1: I love people. I love the idea of people sitting

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Speaker 1: down and listening to a record in the way in

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Speaker 1: the same way they would engage with a movie from

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Speaker 1: beginning to end. You wouldn't just watch a scene of

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Speaker 1: a movie in the middle, would you. You'd watch it

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Speaker 1: from beginning to end. So that kind of art of listening,

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Speaker 1: which I think is definitely being what has been and

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Speaker 1: is continuing to be compromised and eroded by what they

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Speaker 1: called playlist culture, um is you know, I I do

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Speaker 1: find myself kind of unusual in that respect. I'm sure

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Speaker 1: I'm not the only one, but I don't think there

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Speaker 1: are many of us left committed to that idea of

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Speaker 1: the album as a continuum. And that comes from from way,

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Speaker 1: way way back when I used to listen to my dad,

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Speaker 1: you know, playing Dark Side of the Moon and my

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Speaker 1: mom playing the classic Dona Summer Georgia Moroda records. Just

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Speaker 1: I'm sure, if you know, many of those have, like

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Speaker 1: this sidelong, what I would call disco symphonies. So I

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Speaker 1: was just completely in love with the idea that you

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Speaker 1: that music didn't have to be about the three minute

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Speaker 1: pop form. It could be something much more sophisticated, much

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Speaker 1: more in the long form in that sense. So I'm

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Speaker 1: still committed to that idea. I find it hard to

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Speaker 1: let go of that, even though I know it's kind

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Speaker 1: of an old fashioned idea in the age of Spotify,

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Speaker 1: streaming and playlist culture. But I have it. As you said,

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Speaker 1: I have a very dedicated fan base, so I know

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Speaker 1: there is still people out there that feel that way too. Okay,

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Speaker 1: de fire, what you mean by playless culture? Well, so

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Speaker 1: these days people aren't interested in albums, They're interested in songs. Okay,

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Speaker 1: So rather than somebody actually listening to a song they

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Speaker 1: really like, hearing a song they really like on the

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Speaker 1: radio or you know, on YouTube or whatever it is,

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Speaker 1: and saying, wow, I love that song, I want to

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Speaker 1: find out what else that artist has done and listened

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Speaker 1: to that too. People don't tend to do And obviously

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Speaker 1: I'm generalizing here, but I think a lot of people

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Speaker 1: now they don't have that mentality. Uh, it's the song,

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Speaker 1: that's all they're interested in. They don't care what the

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Speaker 1: what the rest of the albums like. They're not interested

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Speaker 1: in in what else that artist might have done. And

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Speaker 1: that's completely anathema to me, because I grew up being

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Speaker 1: fascinated by the cult of personality. So I would get

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Speaker 1: into an artist and immediately I fell in love with

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Speaker 1: the song. I wanted to hear the record. Not only

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Speaker 1: didn't want to hear the record, I wanted to hear

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Speaker 1: all the other records in that artist catalog. I wanted

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Speaker 1: to understand the trajectory of that artist's career, the bad stuff,

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Speaker 1: the good stuff, the amazing stuff, they're not so good

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Speaker 1: stuff that fails. I was fascinating with all of that.

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Speaker 1: And I don't think that's true a lot of perhaps

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Speaker 1: the younger generation of listeners now, they just like a song.

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Speaker 1: They're not interested in finding out much more about the artists.

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Speaker 1: They're not interested in hearing the album. They're not interesting,

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Speaker 1: certainly not interested in here, you know, in being you know,

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Speaker 1: familiarizing themselves with the whole catalog of a particular artist.

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Speaker 1: That's what I mean by playlist culture. Okay, what do

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Speaker 1: you view the general landscape of music today? Being the

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Speaker 1: way I always say, you know, I grew up in

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Speaker 1: the air sixties and seventies, where music drove the culture.

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Speaker 1: There was faltering with corporate rock and disco. At the

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Speaker 1: end of seventy nine, there was another injection as a

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Speaker 1: result of MTV. Music is still very influential. But I

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Speaker 1: don't want to answer the question for you. But today's

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Speaker 1: things have changed. How do you view the landscape of

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Speaker 1: music today? Are you optimistic pessimistic? Two things need to change?

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Speaker 1: Will there be an evolution? Yeah? All of the above. Really,

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Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I think it's true to say

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Speaker 1: there's more music coming into the world than any other

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Speaker 1: time in history right now. It's crazy. I mean the

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Speaker 1: amount of songs. I think Spotify get some like ten

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Speaker 1: thoud new songs added every day or something crazy or week,

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Speaker 1: I forget what it is. Anyway, it's a lot. Anyway,

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Speaker 1: there's a lot of new music being made. And a

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Speaker 1: part of that, of course, is the democratited eight. Democratization

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Speaker 1: of making music by the fact now that it's very

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Speaker 1: easy for anyone to buy a cheap piece of software,

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Speaker 1: put it on their laptop, and they can make music

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Speaker 1: in a reasonably high quality. You know, um plug ins,

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Speaker 1: virtual instruments. Pre preset culture enables people to sound like

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Speaker 1: their favorite artists almost instantly, just by pressing the right

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Speaker 1: button or choosing the right option on their on their

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Speaker 1: on their computer, laptop, on their laptop. So I think

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Speaker 1: that's good that people are able to make music. Unfortunately, um,

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Speaker 1: the downside of that is that most of that music

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Speaker 1: that's being made is extraordinarily generic. And that also is

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Speaker 1: a problem and a symptom of the preset culture. When

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Speaker 1: it's very easy to sound like everyone else, that's what happens.

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Speaker 1: Everyone does sound like everyone else. So you don't have

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Speaker 1: those kind of um, you don't have that kind of

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Speaker 1: situation you have perhaps in the sixties and seventies, the eighties,

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Speaker 1: even the nineties, where people had to find their own tone,

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Speaker 1: their own sound, their own personality because it wasn't easy

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Speaker 1: to sound like anybody else. Um. So I think that's

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Speaker 1: that's the downside of of the ease of accessibility of

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Speaker 1: now making music is that everyone pretty much sounds the

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Speaker 1: same as everyone else. I'm you know. But on the

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Speaker 1: other hand, I'm I'm kind of talking mainly about rock

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Speaker 1: music here and I and I acknowledge the fact that

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Speaker 1: I come from the tradition of rock and classic rock music.

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Speaker 1: That's what I grew up with. But there is a

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Speaker 1: new generation of music which does sound much more fresh

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Speaker 1: and is much more contemporary, is much more innovative, which

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Speaker 1: has come out of electronic and urban music in the

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Speaker 1: twenty one century, and I've been immersing myself up a

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Speaker 1: little bit more in that world. I don't like it all,

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Speaker 1: but I'm fascinated by it because a lot of the

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Speaker 1: people that make it are kind of doing things that

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Speaker 1: rock musicians don't do. That it's kind of like they

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Speaker 1: don't know what they don't know, they don't know the rules.

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Speaker 1: They're not kind of burdened with that kind of legacy

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Speaker 1: of the Beatles and led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd the

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Speaker 1: way I am and a lot of my musicians in

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Speaker 1: my generation are. They're not burdened by that, and they're

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Speaker 1: doing some extraordinary things. So I do feel, you know, um,

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Speaker 1: that there is some really interesting music going on. I

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Speaker 1: just don't feel it's coming from the you know, the

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Speaker 1: kind of area that I came from, the classic rock background.

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Speaker 1: It's there's nothing coming from that background that that kind

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Speaker 1: of interests me these days. What are the rules that

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Speaker 1: these young people are breaking because they don't have the

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Speaker 1: history that is burdening them. Well, one of them, for example,

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Speaker 1: is just in terms of structure. They have no interest.

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Speaker 1: I'm talking about, you know, people like Kanye West, Billie Eilish,

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Speaker 1: Kendrick Lamar, those kind of guys. They're they're the big

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Speaker 1: names that you know, you you might pick out pick

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Speaker 1: out of the current scene, but there's a lot of

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Speaker 1: other people doing it too. If you listen to the

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Speaker 1: music those guys make, there's no adherence to anything what

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Speaker 1: you might call a conventional song structure, and that fascinates

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Speaker 1: me because of course I've grown up with all of

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Speaker 1: those legacy artists understanding that the whole notion of introverse chorus,

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Speaker 1: first chorus, middle eight chorus, you know, the classic kind

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Speaker 1: of tim panale structure that are that are apparently a

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Speaker 1: great pop song has, although of course there's been exceptions

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Speaker 1: to that, but these guys don't. They don't kind of

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Speaker 1: seem to care about that at all. And I like

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Speaker 1: that because it makes the music unfolding more unpredictable ways,

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Speaker 1: and in a way that reminds me that's like going

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Speaker 1: back to what, you know, what I was talking about

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Speaker 1: the beginning, this idea the albums could take you on

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Speaker 1: a journey, and part of the the appeal of that

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Speaker 1: was you didn't know what was coming next. You didn't

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Speaker 1: know what was coming next on a concept album, you

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Speaker 1: didn't know what was coming next if a if a

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Speaker 1: song was ten minutes long. Um, So that adherence to

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Speaker 1: classic pop song structures seems to be disappearing and I

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Speaker 1: kind of I kind of like that. I kind of

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Speaker 1: applaud that that that interests me certainly. Okay, you know,

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Speaker 1: there's been a lot of documentation that you have to

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Speaker 1: put the hook up close so that people don't skip

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Speaker 1: the song. Is that something you think about when you're

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Speaker 1: making new music. No, I don't. You know, the only

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Speaker 1: thing I think about when I'm making new music is

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Speaker 1: just getting myself excited about it. That's all I think about.

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Speaker 1: And I've I've had this question come up in you know,

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Speaker 1: various different forms. Do you think about your fans when

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Speaker 1: you're making music? And I really don't. And it's an

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Speaker 1: incredibly selfish way to go about your career, But I

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Speaker 1: believe that's what an artist is, that someone who's essentially

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Speaker 1: very selfish. You know, people talk about the music industry

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Speaker 1: as if it's one thing, and of course it's never

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Speaker 1: really been one thing. It's always been at least two things.

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Speaker 1: It's been the entertainment industry and the music in industry,

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Speaker 1: and there's been a crossover. Of course, there has in

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Speaker 1: certain in the case of certain artists, but generally speaking,

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Speaker 1: I believe art is something that is made by people

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Speaker 1: who have this kind of vocation to do something which

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Speaker 1: comes from their very being, and they have to be

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Speaker 1: true to themselves. And that's where we get to these

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Speaker 1: words like integrity, you know. And then there's the other

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Speaker 1: side of the business, which is, you know, the reality

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Speaker 1: TV side of the business and the very kind of

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Speaker 1: contrived modern pop side of the business making songs that

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Speaker 1: will fit a particular demographic fit on daytime radio that

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Speaker 1: basically look at what their audience want and try to

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Speaker 1: give it to them, or worse, look at what radio

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Speaker 1: produces want and streaming services want and try to give

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Speaker 1: that to them. I'm actually incapable of doing that, and

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Speaker 1: I think anything, I think anyone that has integrity and

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Speaker 1: considers themselves to be an artist would also be largely

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Speaker 1: incapable of doing that too, because there's something about creation

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Speaker 1: and being an artist and being a musician. I think

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Speaker 1: that you means you have to kind of do what

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Speaker 1: you do in a vacuum. So you're absolutely right. I

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Speaker 1: mean that that whole thing about, you know, modern pop

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Speaker 1: music being almost a hundred percent about the lead vocal now,

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Speaker 1: no intro, no solos, no characters of the backing track

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Speaker 1: at all, just all about the lead vocal. And that

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Speaker 1: does sadden me a bit because you know, obviously I

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Speaker 1: grew up in listening to music where the music was

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Speaker 1: often as important, if not more important, than the top

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Speaker 1: line vocal melody. And what do you think about the

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Speaker 1: overuse of the elite drum sound and the lack of

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Speaker 1: melody in so much of today's current music. It's interesting,

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Speaker 1: isn't it. How how rhythm has become so fundamentally important

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Speaker 1: but more important than melody in modern pop. That's something

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Speaker 1: obviously I don't particularly I mean, my album is still

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Speaker 1: incredibly melodic, and I worked very hard to make it um,

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Speaker 1: you know, very strong melodically, as well as being hopefully

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Speaker 1: sophistication and having all the other stuff going on too.

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Speaker 1: But you're right, you listen to modern pop and it

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Speaker 1: seems that often the hooks are kind of the things

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Speaker 1: that my kids were chanting the playground. That's about the

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Speaker 1: level of banality that a lot of the hooks have

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Speaker 1: almost like you know, playground chance, but it seems to

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Speaker 1: work for them. And then the music is, as you say,

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Speaker 1: is this kind of it's all about the rhythm and

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Speaker 1: it's all about the base. There's not a lot of

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Speaker 1: what you might call harmonic movement in in modern pop

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Speaker 1: music with you know. Again, with some exceptions, Taylor Swift

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Speaker 1: writes great melodies, for example, great great harmonic shifts in

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Speaker 1: her music, but a lot a lot of the modern

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Speaker 1: urban R and B artists now are just basically creating

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Speaker 1: a rhythm track and then playground chance over the top.

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Speaker 1: It seems to me, Okay, you're blowing my mind. I

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Speaker 1: have seen Porcupine Tree, granted that you know, seventeen or

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Speaker 1: eighteen years ago, and I certainly have followed your career

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Speaker 1: and I see your picture associated with different certain works

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Speaker 1: that you've done. You always seems so serious. I'm talking

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Speaker 1: to you now. Not only can you talk fluidly, you're

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Speaker 1: so are you date? Where the hell did all this

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Speaker 1: come from? Um? Well, I'm very you know, I'm very

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Speaker 1: I'm a student of music. I've always been a nerd

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Speaker 1: um and I've always been very passionate about music. And

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Speaker 1: the history of music. And I've talked a lot about

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Speaker 1: it by b over the ears, you know. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I even have my own podcasts and you have my

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Speaker 1: own podcast where I just basically argue with my friend

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Speaker 1: about about albums. It's called the Album Years, and we

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Speaker 1: pick a year and we basically just argue about what

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Speaker 1: our favorite records are. So I've had a bit of

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Speaker 1: practice at this. Um. You know, it's not only being

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Speaker 1: able to talk fluidly. You know, there's an ability to

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Speaker 1: analyze in the society where analysis is tertiary. If it's

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Speaker 1: there and all, let's go back to the beginning. So

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Speaker 1: where did you grow up? I grew up just outside,

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Speaker 1: just outside of London, a place called Hamma Hampstead. Okay,

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Speaker 1: And what did your parents do for a living? So

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Speaker 1: my parents was an electronic engineer and my mother worked

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Speaker 1: in the local bank. So there was no there were

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Speaker 1: before you asked the question, there was no sort of

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Speaker 1: history of music in my family. How many kids in

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Speaker 1: the family. So I have one brother who's a couple

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Speaker 1: of years younger than me, who again has nothing to do,

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Speaker 1: nothing to do with music. He has a proper job.

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Speaker 1: But I I think my parents, Um, As I kind

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Speaker 1: of alluded to earlier, my parents were certainly responsible for

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Speaker 1: me falling in love with music because they kind of

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Speaker 1: brainwashed me, you know, when I was too young to

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Speaker 1: even understand in a good way. I mean, when I

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Speaker 1: was too young to even understand what I was hearing.

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Speaker 1: They were playing great records and I would hear them

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Speaker 1: on repeat. You know, the soundtrack to Saturday Night Fever,

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Speaker 1: Abbot's Greatest Hits, Dark Side of the Moon, Tubla Bells,

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Speaker 1: you know, Frank Sinatra, these great records, and I was brainwashed.

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Speaker 1: And still I feel like those records I heard as

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Speaker 1: a kid when my parents played them are still very

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Speaker 1: much the foundation of my of my musical DNA. But

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Speaker 1: ever since then, i've i think partly also because of

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Speaker 1: my parents and the kind of eclecticism of what they

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Speaker 1: listened to. I've never really recognized this idea of genre.

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Speaker 1: And I know people associate with me with with a

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Speaker 1: genre particular one. It's never one I described myself as

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Speaker 1: being a part of. I don't describe myself as being

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Speaker 1: generic in any way. I have no interest in being generic,

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Speaker 1: and I've always been very much a fan of that

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Speaker 1: idea of listening, you know, across genres, being curious about

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Speaker 1: everything that's out there. And I think again that was

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Speaker 1: because of the music my parents listened to. And how

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Speaker 1: much formal education have you had? I left school at eighteen.

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Speaker 1: I did. I did my what in England was my

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Speaker 1: O levels and then my A levels. I didn't go

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Speaker 1: to university because I already knew what I wanted to do.

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Speaker 1: Um much to my parents dismay, I I kind of

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Speaker 1: was set already on actually what I wanted to do.

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Speaker 1: I would say, probably from the age of about thirteen

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Speaker 1: or fourteen. And did you go to regular public school?

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Speaker 1: You know that these words in different meaning in the UK,

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Speaker 1: but you did not go to a private, elite school. No.

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Speaker 1: I went to a very regular grammar school. In fact,

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Speaker 1: it was a sports It was called a sports college,

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Speaker 1: which is just a fancy way of saying that they

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Speaker 1: the emphasis in the syllabus was more on sport than

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Speaker 1: it was on the arts. So I had everything stacked

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Speaker 1: against me in that respect. I didn't really have any

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Speaker 1: proper music education even at school, so everything was kind

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Speaker 1: of self taught. But it was all from listening, just

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Speaker 1: being curious and listening. It's as much music as I

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Speaker 1: could get my hands on. Okay, so you were listening.

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Speaker 1: At what point did you start playing? I think almost

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Speaker 1: as soon as as soon as I realized that I

397
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Speaker 1: was in love with this notion of making records. I

398
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Speaker 1: mean just that, just the whole thing of being able

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Speaker 1: to hold something in my hand and say that I

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Speaker 1: did it. That was my ambition, you know, just to

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Speaker 1: hold a record in my hand, and we're talking about

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Speaker 1: good old fashioned vinyl records here. To be able to

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Speaker 1: hold one of those things in my hand and say

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Speaker 1: this is my record. That was my That was my

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Speaker 1: dream and ambition from twelve thirteen. So I my parents

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Speaker 1: did send me to guitar and piano lessons, and I

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Speaker 1: hated it because I wasn't interested in being um. I

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Speaker 1: wasn't interested in learning repertoire. I still to this day,

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Speaker 1: I can't play anybody else's music. If you give me

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Speaker 1: a guitar and say play me something, I know, I

411
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Speaker 1: couldn't play anything. I could only play my music. And

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Speaker 1: so my my guitar teacher would would be furious with

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Speaker 1: me because he'd sent me away with a bunch of

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Speaker 1: homework to do, to learn I don't know, Segovia piece

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Speaker 1: or something, and I come back the next week and

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Speaker 1: he'd say, if you learned the piece, and I say no,

417
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Speaker 1: but I've written my own and and that was that.

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Speaker 1: That that that was basically what I was interested right

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Speaker 1: from the beginning, just being able to create and beat.

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Speaker 1: My dad, being an electronic engineer. He built me stuff,

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Speaker 1: you know, that that I had no right to have

422
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Speaker 1: access to when I was a kid, you know, like

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Speaker 1: a little multi track cassette record, which meant I could

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Speaker 1: start experimenting with overdubbing and ound on sound from a

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Speaker 1: very very early age. And but you know, and I

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Speaker 1: have to say, I was never interested in being a

427
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Speaker 1: singer a guitar player. What I was interested in was

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Speaker 1: making records. I didn't realize it at the time, but

429
00:22:14,800 --> 00:22:16,399
Speaker 1: what I'd kind of fallen in love with was the

430
00:22:16,440 --> 00:22:19,679
Speaker 1: idea of being the producer stroke or to you know,

431
00:22:20,280 --> 00:22:22,600
Speaker 1: I remember having el O Records early on and looking

432
00:22:22,640 --> 00:22:24,800
Speaker 1: jeff Lyn, this guy does everything. That's what I want

433
00:22:24,800 --> 00:22:27,840
Speaker 1: to do. He writes the songs, he produces, he plays guitar,

434
00:22:27,960 --> 00:22:31,320
Speaker 1: he sings. I'm going to be that guy. So those

435
00:22:31,480 --> 00:22:34,040
Speaker 1: those were the kind of inspirations to me. Those kind

436
00:22:34,040 --> 00:22:37,600
Speaker 1: of people like Jeff Lynn now were you alone ranger,

437
00:22:37,680 --> 00:22:40,720
Speaker 1: or did you have friends who talked about this stuff

438
00:22:40,760 --> 00:22:44,080
Speaker 1: with that helped you in your formative era. Yeah, I

439
00:22:44,080 --> 00:22:45,959
Speaker 1: had a couple of buddies at school that we formed.

440
00:22:46,160 --> 00:22:49,720
Speaker 1: We formed our first bands together with m and also

441
00:22:49,800 --> 00:22:53,159
Speaker 1: had an interest in music. I had a very very

442
00:22:53,160 --> 00:22:55,639
Speaker 1: good friend of mine who had an older brother there

443
00:22:55,680 --> 00:22:58,560
Speaker 1: was about five years older than him, and actually that's

444
00:22:58,600 --> 00:23:01,719
Speaker 1: how I really became immersed in world of early seventies

445
00:23:01,800 --> 00:23:04,760
Speaker 1: conceptual rock music, because all the music that was happening

446
00:23:04,760 --> 00:23:06,480
Speaker 1: when I was at school, when I was at secondary

447
00:23:06,520 --> 00:23:09,120
Speaker 1: school or high school as you call it in the States,

448
00:23:09,480 --> 00:23:13,560
Speaker 1: was you know, post punk, uh, sort of the early

449
00:23:13,600 --> 00:23:16,439
Speaker 1: sort of new romantic stuff, electronic early electronic stuff like

450
00:23:16,440 --> 00:23:18,359
Speaker 1: Gary Human and New Order. That was what with the

451
00:23:18,400 --> 00:23:21,000
Speaker 1: kids were listening to a school. But my best friend

452
00:23:21,040 --> 00:23:23,199
Speaker 1: Mark had this older brother, Stewart, and he had this

453
00:23:23,240 --> 00:23:27,000
Speaker 1: record collection, so he kind of he wasn't interested in anymore,

454
00:23:27,000 --> 00:23:29,080
Speaker 1: so we just kind of borrowed records from his collection,

455
00:23:29,119 --> 00:23:32,680
Speaker 1: and that's how I discovered things like Hawk, Winn, Camel,

456
00:23:33,960 --> 00:23:37,440
Speaker 1: you know, all that early seventies conceptual rock stuff. So

457
00:23:37,520 --> 00:23:40,280
Speaker 1: that was another big kind of watershed moment. I think

458
00:23:40,359 --> 00:23:42,800
Speaker 1: him in my childhood, because that's where I found I

459
00:23:42,840 --> 00:23:46,720
Speaker 1: had access to to this this form of music that

460
00:23:46,840 --> 00:23:51,320
Speaker 1: had only really happened, you know, ten years before, but

461
00:23:51,440 --> 00:23:53,399
Speaker 1: it was like it might have well has been a

462
00:23:53,480 --> 00:23:57,000
Speaker 1: hundred years before. Because we're talking about the eighties here.

463
00:23:57,240 --> 00:24:00,359
Speaker 1: No one talked about music from the early seven and teas,

464
00:24:00,400 --> 00:24:04,199
Speaker 1: at least in my in my particular area, it was

465
00:24:04,200 --> 00:24:09,520
Speaker 1: an althema, right, but not only prog rock everything, you know,

466
00:24:09,560 --> 00:24:11,760
Speaker 1: all of the musical genres that come out of the seventies,

467
00:24:11,760 --> 00:24:14,840
Speaker 1: whether it's fusion music, you know, or the whole singer

468
00:24:14,880 --> 00:24:17,760
Speaker 1: songwriter tradition or progressive or whatever it was, if it

469
00:24:17,840 --> 00:24:20,680
Speaker 1: came from the seventies, no one listened to it, no

470
00:24:20,680 --> 00:24:23,640
Speaker 1: one talked about it, no one name checked it. So

471
00:24:23,680 --> 00:24:25,760
Speaker 1: I was very lucky. I had this this friend of

472
00:24:25,800 --> 00:24:28,560
Speaker 1: mine with his big brother who had this amazing record collection,

473
00:24:28,960 --> 00:24:32,840
Speaker 1: you know, stuff by Aphrodite's Child, you know, which is

474
00:24:32,920 --> 00:24:35,720
Speaker 1: quite obscure you know at the time. I still is,

475
00:24:35,760 --> 00:24:38,560
Speaker 1: I guess, you know. Anyway, So that that was a

476
00:24:38,600 --> 00:24:40,600
Speaker 1: really important factor I think as well in my in

477
00:24:40,640 --> 00:24:44,359
Speaker 1: my youth. Yeah, Okay, the obvious question, as an American

478
00:24:44,480 --> 00:24:46,439
Speaker 1: you're eight team, you leave school, what do you do

479
00:24:46,520 --> 00:24:50,639
Speaker 1: for money, So I ended up being very poor for

480
00:24:50,680 --> 00:24:52,840
Speaker 1: a while. I did go and work for a computer

481
00:24:52,880 --> 00:24:54,560
Speaker 1: company for a couple of years, but I got out

482
00:24:54,560 --> 00:24:56,439
Speaker 1: of as soon as I could. And for about the

483
00:24:56,480 --> 00:24:58,639
Speaker 1: first ten years of my career, when when I had

484
00:24:58,680 --> 00:25:01,560
Speaker 1: Porkepontry and No Man Commentary was still a solo project.

485
00:25:02,000 --> 00:25:04,160
Speaker 1: No Man was a duo I had with another singer guy,

486
00:25:04,320 --> 00:25:08,000
Speaker 1: and I did music for TV commercials. I basically got

487
00:25:08,040 --> 00:25:11,160
Speaker 1: by by doing music for TV commercials. But but that

488
00:25:11,240 --> 00:25:14,040
Speaker 1: was that was good, and I didn't mind that, you

489
00:25:14,080 --> 00:25:17,280
Speaker 1: know why, because it meant I didn't have to even

490
00:25:17,560 --> 00:25:21,879
Speaker 1: entertain the idea of compromising the other stuff. I was

491
00:25:21,960 --> 00:25:24,640
Speaker 1: making money and I could do the other stuff without

492
00:25:24,680 --> 00:25:26,639
Speaker 1: having to think about I've got to make this work

493
00:25:26,680 --> 00:25:29,600
Speaker 1: for me financially. And it didn't. It was a disaster,

494
00:25:29,840 --> 00:25:34,359
Speaker 1: you know. Uh. Poukeuponary lost money for years. No Man likewise,

495
00:25:34,560 --> 00:25:37,600
Speaker 1: and it didn't matter because I had this kind of

496
00:25:38,080 --> 00:25:41,040
Speaker 1: safety net of being able to do music for for

497
00:25:41,080 --> 00:25:42,840
Speaker 1: these TV things. I was okay, how did you get

498
00:25:42,840 --> 00:25:46,320
Speaker 1: those gigs? Again? I was very lucky. I had a

499
00:25:46,320 --> 00:25:49,000
Speaker 1: friend of mine who happened to be um in an

500
00:25:49,040 --> 00:25:51,640
Speaker 1: advertising agency who came to me one day and said

501
00:25:51,880 --> 00:25:54,040
Speaker 1: it was really funny. It would have been about and

502
00:25:54,119 --> 00:25:55,760
Speaker 1: he came to me and said, we want we're doing

503
00:25:55,760 --> 00:25:59,840
Speaker 1: this commercial for Lego and basically the production team want

504
00:26:00,040 --> 00:26:04,240
Speaker 1: hastiche of Metallica, Master of Puppets. And I said, hey,

505
00:26:04,240 --> 00:26:06,679
Speaker 1: I'll have a go. I can do that. And I

506
00:26:06,720 --> 00:26:11,159
Speaker 1: did a really terrible, terrible version of Metallica Thrash Metal.

507
00:26:11,640 --> 00:26:15,520
Speaker 1: But luckily the production team were no wiser. They didn't

508
00:26:15,520 --> 00:26:17,720
Speaker 1: really know what they were talking about it, so they

509
00:26:17,800 --> 00:26:19,720
Speaker 1: kind of it was really lame, but it kind of

510
00:26:19,760 --> 00:26:22,000
Speaker 1: convinced them, and I got my foot in the door,

511
00:26:22,119 --> 00:26:25,119
Speaker 1: and um and and so I started to get more

512
00:26:25,160 --> 00:26:27,399
Speaker 1: and more work from agencies and and some of the

513
00:26:27,400 --> 00:26:29,920
Speaker 1: stuff I did later on was was genuinely quite good.

514
00:26:29,960 --> 00:26:33,719
Speaker 1: So I got a pretty good name for myself. Generally speaking,

515
00:26:33,880 --> 00:26:38,040
Speaker 1: musicians who are not household names are incredible networkers. So

516
00:26:38,080 --> 00:26:40,800
Speaker 1: if you look at yourself, everybody's humble. Do you work

517
00:26:40,880 --> 00:26:45,159
Speaker 1: the connections certainly back then, work on relationships, or really

518
00:26:45,359 --> 00:26:49,119
Speaker 1: somehow you blundered through when things came your way. I

519
00:26:49,160 --> 00:26:53,120
Speaker 1: think the latter. Yeah, I'm not. I'm certainly not very

520
00:26:53,119 --> 00:26:58,320
Speaker 1: good at schmoozing and networking. Um, I think, you know, largely,

521
00:26:58,359 --> 00:27:01,320
Speaker 1: I felt most of my here, I felt very much

522
00:27:01,680 --> 00:27:05,320
Speaker 1: out on a limb. I've never really been part of

523
00:27:05,359 --> 00:27:08,200
Speaker 1: a scene. I'm not sure if I would have wanted

524
00:27:08,240 --> 00:27:09,760
Speaker 1: to have been part of a scene. I mean, it's

525
00:27:09,800 --> 00:27:13,280
Speaker 1: kind of be careful what you wish for in a way. Um.

526
00:27:13,359 --> 00:27:16,800
Speaker 1: But it's also been frustrating not being part of a scene,

527
00:27:16,840 --> 00:27:18,680
Speaker 1: because being part of a scene gives you a big

528
00:27:18,760 --> 00:27:21,800
Speaker 1: leg up, you know. I feel like most of my

529
00:27:21,880 --> 00:27:23,840
Speaker 1: career has been a little bit of a war of attrition,

530
00:27:23,920 --> 00:27:27,080
Speaker 1: you know, particularly with the genre I was associated with,

531
00:27:27,880 --> 00:27:30,879
Speaker 1: being you know, persona non grat for most of the

532
00:27:30,960 --> 00:27:32,959
Speaker 1: nineties and most of the first ten years of this

533
00:27:33,080 --> 00:27:36,080
Speaker 1: of this millennium too less so now I think it's

534
00:27:36,600 --> 00:27:39,360
Speaker 1: you know, the kind of world of progressive rock, conceptual

535
00:27:39,440 --> 00:27:42,359
Speaker 1: rock is a little bit more accepted now, partly because

536
00:27:42,400 --> 00:27:44,560
Speaker 1: I think the younger generation don't care about genre as

537
00:27:44,640 --> 00:27:47,320
Speaker 1: much as my generation did, which is another good thing

538
00:27:47,359 --> 00:27:50,440
Speaker 1: about about the way people engage with music these days.

539
00:27:50,800 --> 00:27:53,199
Speaker 1: But for years, it was a struggle to get pressed,

540
00:27:53,240 --> 00:27:56,719
Speaker 1: it was a struggle to get radio play, um, and

541
00:27:56,760 --> 00:27:58,720
Speaker 1: I felt like I would have been better off perhaps

542
00:27:58,760 --> 00:28:02,240
Speaker 1: being someone who was better or at networking and associating

543
00:28:02,280 --> 00:28:04,480
Speaker 1: with me, part with myself with part of the scene.

544
00:28:04,640 --> 00:28:05,920
Speaker 1: But I think part of the reason I never did

545
00:28:05,960 --> 00:28:08,840
Speaker 1: is because I loved I love the music too much.

546
00:28:09,040 --> 00:28:13,320
Speaker 1: I loved the whole romantic notion of making music too much,

547
00:28:13,440 --> 00:28:17,159
Speaker 1: too to to kind of get into that mindset and

548
00:28:17,240 --> 00:28:19,959
Speaker 1: more cynical mindset I guess you maybe need to get into.

549
00:28:20,160 --> 00:28:22,520
Speaker 1: I've been very lucky the whole remixing things just fallen

550
00:28:22,560 --> 00:28:24,600
Speaker 1: into my lap two and I'm sure we're going to

551
00:28:24,640 --> 00:28:27,280
Speaker 1: come on, Yeah, let's see that. Because I got so

552
00:28:27,359 --> 00:28:31,920
Speaker 1: you do this podcast? What years do you tend to cover?

553
00:28:32,720 --> 00:28:36,679
Speaker 1: Were random? So so basically the idea was a very

554
00:28:36,720 --> 00:28:38,400
Speaker 1: good friend of mine, Tim Bones, so I've known for

555
00:28:38,440 --> 00:28:40,520
Speaker 1: more than thirty years, and basically whenever we get together,

556
00:28:40,520 --> 00:28:44,720
Speaker 1: we'd just nerd off and argue about music. And at

557
00:28:44,760 --> 00:28:46,600
Speaker 1: the beginning of Lockdown, I was looking for some things

558
00:28:46,640 --> 00:28:48,680
Speaker 1: to do, you know, creatively, to fill the time that

559
00:28:48,720 --> 00:28:50,000
Speaker 1: I suddenly had in my hand. And one of these

560
00:28:50,040 --> 00:28:52,520
Speaker 1: ideas was let's do a podcast. And I said to him,

561
00:28:52,560 --> 00:28:54,640
Speaker 1: why don't we just take what we do, you know,

562
00:28:54,960 --> 00:28:57,760
Speaker 1: naturally on onto a podcast and see if people love it?

563
00:28:58,560 --> 00:29:01,760
Speaker 1: And the idea is basically, we pick a year at random,

564
00:29:01,800 --> 00:29:05,280
Speaker 1: and we then go and see what albums were released

565
00:29:05,280 --> 00:29:07,959
Speaker 1: that year. And the first thing we do is we

566
00:29:08,000 --> 00:29:10,320
Speaker 1: throw out all the ones that we consider to be canon.

567
00:29:11,080 --> 00:29:14,840
Speaker 1: So we don't talk about Sergeant. If we do seven,

568
00:29:14,880 --> 00:29:18,000
Speaker 1: we don't talk about Sergeant Pepper, if we do three,

569
00:29:18,040 --> 00:29:20,240
Speaker 1: we don't talk about Dark Side of the Moon. There

570
00:29:20,440 --> 00:29:25,360
Speaker 1: is nothing left to say about these albums. Nothing, So

571
00:29:25,680 --> 00:29:29,280
Speaker 1: we deliberately pick ones that we think maybe people haven't

572
00:29:29,320 --> 00:29:32,040
Speaker 1: heard about. So give you an example. We did and

573
00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:35,360
Speaker 1: we talked about Van Morrison's Common One as our favorite

574
00:29:35,360 --> 00:29:38,040
Speaker 1: album of that year, which isn't even an album that

575
00:29:38,160 --> 00:29:41,400
Speaker 1: Van Morrison fans talk about very often, but for us

576
00:29:41,480 --> 00:29:43,880
Speaker 1: it's like one of the all time classics and a

577
00:29:43,920 --> 00:29:46,280
Speaker 1: beloved album. So that gives you a kind of example

578
00:29:46,280 --> 00:29:48,760
Speaker 1: of how we go about it. We're trying to introduce

579
00:29:49,080 --> 00:29:50,680
Speaker 1: people that listen to it, which a lot of them

580
00:29:50,680 --> 00:29:53,640
Speaker 1: are my fans and Tim's fans, trying to introduce them

581
00:29:53,640 --> 00:29:56,120
Speaker 1: perhaps two albums that are not part of the cannon,

582
00:29:56,480 --> 00:29:59,120
Speaker 1: but we think are just as good as those albums.

583
00:29:59,640 --> 00:30:02,520
Speaker 1: Would we ever picked a year from the twenty first century,

584
00:30:03,240 --> 00:30:05,600
Speaker 1: we haven't yet. We haven't yet, but we are going to.

585
00:30:05,760 --> 00:30:08,480
Speaker 1: We've only done about twelve episodes so far. We've we've

586
00:30:08,520 --> 00:30:10,600
Speaker 1: I think we've been back as far as sixty seven

587
00:30:10,720 --> 00:30:15,280
Speaker 1: and as far forward as night So we've been relatively focused,

588
00:30:16,200 --> 00:30:18,480
Speaker 1: you know, in the last thirty years or thirty thirty

589
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:21,160
Speaker 1: five years of the twentieth century. At the moment, let's

590
00:30:21,280 --> 00:30:26,280
Speaker 1: jump into today's era. We have Van Morrison along ironically

591
00:30:26,400 --> 00:30:31,360
Speaker 1: with Eric Clapton making a anti lockdown songs. Is COVID

592
00:30:31,720 --> 00:30:38,120
Speaker 1: Mutate and in you know, basically indeed the UK. How

593
00:30:38,160 --> 00:30:40,320
Speaker 1: do you feel about that, and how do you feel

594
00:30:40,360 --> 00:30:44,440
Speaker 1: about Brexit? Well, I mean, I think I think I

595
00:30:44,520 --> 00:30:47,040
Speaker 1: mentioned to you earlier on the Brexit for me was

596
00:30:47,080 --> 00:30:51,560
Speaker 1: something extremely depressing because it brought out it brought out

597
00:30:51,600 --> 00:30:58,640
Speaker 1: those extremes in in viewpoint, It made people ten times

598
00:30:58,640 --> 00:31:02,640
Speaker 1: more belligerent, ten times more polarized. It didn't seem like

599
00:31:02,680 --> 00:31:07,560
Speaker 1: there was any room for discussion or a gray area anymore.

600
00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:10,160
Speaker 1: And that was really what the future bias became about,

601
00:31:10,200 --> 00:31:12,280
Speaker 1: you know, and a lot of that I do lay

602
00:31:12,320 --> 00:31:14,360
Speaker 1: the blame a lot a lot of that social media,

603
00:31:14,400 --> 00:31:16,200
Speaker 1: but it's unfair to do that because of course the

604
00:31:16,200 --> 00:31:19,400
Speaker 1: technology itself is not to blame. It's about the way that,

605
00:31:19,720 --> 00:31:21,920
Speaker 1: you know, the human beings engaged with the technology that's

606
00:31:21,960 --> 00:31:25,040
Speaker 1: the problem. How do I feel about Eric Clatton and

607
00:31:25,600 --> 00:31:28,440
Speaker 1: Van Morrison writing anti what is it they're doing? They're

608
00:31:28,480 --> 00:31:32,920
Speaker 1: kind of writing and and they're not saying that the

609
00:31:32,960 --> 00:31:34,920
Speaker 1: COVID is a conspiracy? Are they? They're not one of

610
00:31:34,920 --> 00:31:39,000
Speaker 1: those people that they're basically saying, Well, Van Morrison is

611
00:31:39,640 --> 00:31:43,640
Speaker 1: verging into that territory. But he's basically saying you the

612
00:31:43,720 --> 00:31:46,680
Speaker 1: lockdown as BS, you should open everything up. We should

613
00:31:46,680 --> 00:31:48,080
Speaker 1: be able to tour, or we should be able to

614
00:31:48,080 --> 00:31:53,560
Speaker 1: go to restaurants, etcetera. Yeah, it's kind of pretty responsibility.

615
00:31:53,640 --> 00:31:56,080
Speaker 1: I mean, I think the thing about Van Morrison is

616
00:31:56,120 --> 00:31:59,000
Speaker 1: if you really really take a long look at him

617
00:31:59,040 --> 00:32:02,600
Speaker 1: as a person, you probably wouldn't want to listen to

618
00:32:02,640 --> 00:32:05,800
Speaker 1: his music. And I think, you know, sometimes you just

619
00:32:05,880 --> 00:32:08,239
Speaker 1: have to divorce the art from the artists, don't you,

620
00:32:08,280 --> 00:32:13,000
Speaker 1: And possibly that's the case with him. Yeah, Okay, let's

621
00:32:13,000 --> 00:32:14,840
Speaker 1: go back to the remixing things. So how did it

622
00:32:14,920 --> 00:32:18,960
Speaker 1: fall into your lap? So? I in about two thousand

623
00:32:19,000 --> 00:32:22,920
Speaker 1: and two, I and my band Pokepine Tree, signed to

624
00:32:22,960 --> 00:32:26,600
Speaker 1: an American record label. We signed to Jason Flom's label,

625
00:32:26,680 --> 00:32:29,680
Speaker 1: Lava through Atlantic, and it was a big thing for

626
00:32:29,760 --> 00:32:31,880
Speaker 1: us because it was the first time we'd signed directly

627
00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:34,280
Speaker 1: to an American label, and we thought, you know, we thought,

628
00:32:34,320 --> 00:32:38,240
Speaker 1: oh great, we're gonna We're gonna crack America. Um and

629
00:32:38,440 --> 00:32:40,680
Speaker 1: we didn't obviously crack America, but we had a couple

630
00:32:40,720 --> 00:32:43,719
Speaker 1: of let's let's stop there because I remember, you know,

631
00:32:44,560 --> 00:32:47,239
Speaker 1: trains I liked on the first Lava record. Why do

632
00:32:47,280 --> 00:32:51,640
Speaker 1: you think you did not crack America? Because what we listen,

633
00:32:51,680 --> 00:32:53,480
Speaker 1: I don't want to blow my own trumpet, and I hate,

634
00:32:53,560 --> 00:32:55,320
Speaker 1: I hate to do it, but I'm going to do

635
00:32:55,320 --> 00:32:59,120
Speaker 1: it anyway. I think what we were doing was just

636
00:32:59,200 --> 00:33:02,040
Speaker 1: a little bit too head of the curve. Basically, what

637
00:33:02,080 --> 00:33:04,479
Speaker 1: we were doing in two thousand two, which has been

638
00:33:04,560 --> 00:33:07,800
Speaker 1: much imitated since, very flatteringly, but no one had done

639
00:33:07,800 --> 00:33:12,160
Speaker 1: it at the time, was combining extremely heavy riffs with

640
00:33:12,320 --> 00:33:16,920
Speaker 1: classic singer songwriter with textual ambient music and a lot

641
00:33:16,920 --> 00:33:21,000
Speaker 1: of sound design elements that you might associate with conceptual

642
00:33:21,080 --> 00:33:24,440
Speaker 1: rock music. And I don't think anyone had really done

643
00:33:24,440 --> 00:33:26,200
Speaker 1: that before. There was a lot of you know, really

644
00:33:26,240 --> 00:33:29,440
Speaker 1: crushingly great heavy rock records around at that time, but

645
00:33:29,520 --> 00:33:32,640
Speaker 1: they didn't have the kind of layering and the sophistication

646
00:33:32,640 --> 00:33:34,680
Speaker 1: in the production that we were that we were doing,

647
00:33:35,520 --> 00:33:38,959
Speaker 1: and for whatever reason, it just it was the classic

648
00:33:39,040 --> 00:33:41,800
Speaker 1: case of the record company couldn't figure out how to market.

649
00:33:41,840 --> 00:33:43,320
Speaker 1: And I don't blame them. I'm not one of those

650
00:33:43,320 --> 00:33:46,080
Speaker 1: people that lays the blame always at the you know,

651
00:33:46,120 --> 00:33:49,040
Speaker 1: the feet of the record company. Andy Carper was the

652
00:33:49,040 --> 00:33:51,560
Speaker 1: guys signed has worked so hard to try and get

653
00:33:51,560 --> 00:33:53,560
Speaker 1: it off the ground. But the point is that people

654
00:33:53,600 --> 00:33:56,280
Speaker 1: just didn't really know what to do with us, didn't

655
00:33:56,360 --> 00:33:58,640
Speaker 1: quite get it. It was like, well, they're kind of

656
00:33:58,680 --> 00:34:01,720
Speaker 1: like a heavy pink Floyd, aren't they. What do we

657
00:34:01,760 --> 00:34:05,680
Speaker 1: do with that? You know? Um? And I think subsequently

658
00:34:06,160 --> 00:34:10,640
Speaker 1: that sound became almost, you know, a genre in its

659
00:34:10,640 --> 00:34:12,680
Speaker 1: own right, and there's been lots of bands now have

660
00:34:12,880 --> 00:34:16,520
Speaker 1: kind of imitated those early Porcupine Tree records and what

661
00:34:16,600 --> 00:34:19,960
Speaker 1: a couple of those would be. Well, there's they're not

662
00:34:20,040 --> 00:34:22,520
Speaker 1: massively successful bands, but there are there are a lot

663
00:34:22,560 --> 00:34:24,600
Speaker 1: of bands. There's a label over here called case Scope

664
00:34:24,680 --> 00:34:29,040
Speaker 1: Music who basically that's the sound of that label, and

665
00:34:29,080 --> 00:34:30,960
Speaker 1: they have some bands that do quite good business, not

666
00:34:31,000 --> 00:34:33,440
Speaker 1: probably not in America, but that you know that it

667
00:34:33,560 --> 00:34:36,160
Speaker 1: became a kind of like a sound and a recipe

668
00:34:36,200 --> 00:34:40,960
Speaker 1: in a combination that other other bands adopted and and

669
00:34:41,000 --> 00:34:43,040
Speaker 1: it's one of those interesting things that in absentially the

670
00:34:43,040 --> 00:34:45,080
Speaker 1: album you talked about they had trains on. It sold

671
00:34:45,200 --> 00:34:48,640
Speaker 1: nothing when it came out, but it now sells year

672
00:34:48,680 --> 00:34:51,680
Speaker 1: in year out, It sells ten thou copies. Every year

673
00:34:51,680 --> 00:34:54,239
Speaker 1: it sells tenos. Okay, this begs a question. Those two

674
00:34:54,320 --> 00:34:59,000
Speaker 1: Lava albums, were you happy with them? Yeah? Yeah, yeah,

675
00:34:59,040 --> 00:35:07,640
Speaker 1: I'm really proud of Okay, so how did you fall

676
00:35:07,680 --> 00:35:11,560
Speaker 1: into the remixing? You made a deal with Lava, right, so,

677
00:35:11,560 --> 00:35:13,920
Speaker 1: so yeah, we we've we've gone slightly off topic and

678
00:35:13,960 --> 00:35:16,080
Speaker 1: we so basically we did those albums and one of

679
00:35:16,080 --> 00:35:17,759
Speaker 1: the things that the record company came to us and

680
00:35:17,760 --> 00:35:20,279
Speaker 1: said they wanted to do as part of the trying

681
00:35:20,360 --> 00:35:22,000
Speaker 1: way to break because they thought, Okay, this band that

682
00:35:22,000 --> 00:35:24,560
Speaker 1: they've got this kind of conceptual, layered production thing going on,

683
00:35:25,040 --> 00:35:26,920
Speaker 1: Let's hook them up with DTS and we'll do a

684
00:35:26,920 --> 00:35:29,480
Speaker 1: five point one mix, and we'll hire Elliott Shina, this

685
00:35:29,719 --> 00:35:32,600
Speaker 1: legendary a legendary engineer to do the five point one mix.

686
00:35:33,320 --> 00:35:36,680
Speaker 1: So cut along, story short, that's what happened. I'd never

687
00:35:36,719 --> 00:35:39,440
Speaker 1: heard music in five point one. I was completely ignorance

688
00:35:39,480 --> 00:35:41,120
Speaker 1: of it. I've never heard it, but I said, I'm

689
00:35:41,120 --> 00:35:42,960
Speaker 1: going to book a studio in London. Send me over

690
00:35:42,960 --> 00:35:44,520
Speaker 1: the mix I want to hear. I'm a control freak,

691
00:35:44,640 --> 00:35:46,000
Speaker 1: you know. I'm not going to let somebody just mix

692
00:35:46,040 --> 00:35:48,160
Speaker 1: the record put it out without me listening to it.

693
00:35:48,680 --> 00:35:51,440
Speaker 1: So I hired the studio in in in London, and

694
00:35:51,480 --> 00:35:53,359
Speaker 1: Elliott sent the mix over and I went and listened

695
00:35:53,360 --> 00:35:55,759
Speaker 1: to it, and I hated it. I hated it not

696
00:35:55,840 --> 00:35:58,799
Speaker 1: because he's done a bad job. It sounded beautiful, but

697
00:35:58,920 --> 00:36:01,360
Speaker 1: it wasn't. It wasn't why. It wasn't the way I

698
00:36:01,400 --> 00:36:03,880
Speaker 1: would have done it, and it wasn't. It didn't sound

699
00:36:03,960 --> 00:36:06,200
Speaker 1: right to me. It didn't sound like ust to me. Okay,

700
00:36:06,320 --> 00:36:10,160
Speaker 1: very very specifically, what was wrong? Do you know what?

701
00:36:10,160 --> 00:36:12,200
Speaker 1: Bob is? So long ago I can't remember. I think

702
00:36:12,320 --> 00:36:15,120
Speaker 1: I hated the way the drums sounded. There's too much

703
00:36:15,120 --> 00:36:18,719
Speaker 1: reverb on the drums or the guitars were to recess,

704
00:36:19,719 --> 00:36:21,920
Speaker 1: so literally it literally had to do with the sound

705
00:36:21,960 --> 00:36:26,560
Speaker 1: of the instrument as opposed to how they were put in.

706
00:36:26,600 --> 00:36:32,080
Speaker 1: The varying for speakers also also this also this year.

707
00:36:32,160 --> 00:36:34,480
Speaker 1: The balance and the distribution of this. You know, it

708
00:36:34,520 --> 00:36:36,080
Speaker 1: wasn't like I said, Elie, it was a you know,

709
00:36:36,160 --> 00:36:38,640
Speaker 1: master he'd done, he had done what he was doing

710
00:36:38,640 --> 00:36:40,640
Speaker 1: with it with his other acts. But for me, for

711
00:36:40,680 --> 00:36:42,880
Speaker 1: whatever reason, it didn't feel right for us. So I

712
00:36:42,880 --> 00:36:44,960
Speaker 1: said to the record label, I don't like this. I

713
00:36:45,000 --> 00:36:46,960
Speaker 1: want to go over there and sit with him and

714
00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:48,879
Speaker 1: just basically go through it, go through it with him

715
00:36:49,120 --> 00:36:50,879
Speaker 1: and you know, sort of do it as a as

716
00:36:50,880 --> 00:36:53,280
Speaker 1: a sort of co co mixing job. And that's what happened.

717
00:36:53,280 --> 00:36:54,640
Speaker 1: I went over there. I flew over there, and I

718
00:36:54,680 --> 00:36:57,040
Speaker 1: spent a week sitting there with him while he rather

719
00:36:57,120 --> 00:37:01,400
Speaker 1: begrudgingly remixed the whole album, and we got something that

720
00:37:01,440 --> 00:37:03,240
Speaker 1: we both were really happy with at the end of it. Anyway,

721
00:37:03,239 --> 00:37:04,680
Speaker 1: it's cut a long story short. While I was sitting

722
00:37:04,719 --> 00:37:07,200
Speaker 1: there listening to I was thinking, I can do this.

723
00:37:08,360 --> 00:37:10,840
Speaker 1: This is fantastic. I love this. I'm going to do

724
00:37:10,880 --> 00:37:12,840
Speaker 1: all my records in it. So I got back and

725
00:37:12,880 --> 00:37:15,200
Speaker 1: I put myself a little put a little five point

726
00:37:15,239 --> 00:37:17,839
Speaker 1: one system together in my in my own studio, and

727
00:37:17,880 --> 00:37:20,040
Speaker 1: from that point on I started to remix all the

728
00:37:20,080 --> 00:37:22,520
Speaker 1: records I was working on in five point one and

729
00:37:22,560 --> 00:37:25,279
Speaker 1: Lo and Behold. Three or four years later, Fear of

730
00:37:25,280 --> 00:37:27,680
Speaker 1: a Blank Planet, which is a couple of Porkeypine Try

731
00:37:27,719 --> 00:37:31,560
Speaker 1: albums down the line later gets a Grammy nomination for

732
00:37:31,719 --> 00:37:34,920
Speaker 1: Best five point one Mix. Where where were How did

733
00:37:34,920 --> 00:37:37,080
Speaker 1: you get that gig? What do you mean? What do

734
00:37:37,080 --> 00:37:39,120
Speaker 1: you mean? How do you have a black pianot planet?

735
00:37:39,200 --> 00:37:41,160
Speaker 1: You did not work on? No, no, no, not the

736
00:37:41,200 --> 00:37:44,120
Speaker 1: Public Enemy album. No, this is Fear of a Blank Planet.

737
00:37:44,239 --> 00:37:45,920
Speaker 1: This is a Poke Pine Try album. This is a

738
00:37:45,920 --> 00:37:47,759
Speaker 1: Poke Pone Trey album that was kind of riffing off

739
00:37:47,800 --> 00:37:49,960
Speaker 1: the Public Enemy title. Okay, I guess I was unaware

740
00:37:50,000 --> 00:37:51,840
Speaker 1: of it. Okay, yeah, yeah, it was the altist. So

741
00:37:51,880 --> 00:37:53,800
Speaker 1: two albums after an absentially the Pork Pantry album is

742
00:37:53,840 --> 00:37:55,759
Speaker 1: called Fear of a Blank Planet, So it was kind

743
00:37:55,760 --> 00:37:57,200
Speaker 1: of a riff on the Fear of a Black Planet

744
00:37:57,239 --> 00:37:59,840
Speaker 1: was a riff on the public everything. Anyway, that album

745
00:38:00,000 --> 00:38:02,680
Speaker 1: got a Grammy nomination for the Best five point one Mix,

746
00:38:03,080 --> 00:38:05,080
Speaker 1: just out of the blue, I mean, and and somebody

747
00:38:05,160 --> 00:38:06,279
Speaker 1: rung me up one day and said, do you know

748
00:38:06,320 --> 00:38:08,359
Speaker 1: you've been nominated for a Grammy for your for your

749
00:38:08,360 --> 00:38:12,239
Speaker 1: mixed of a Blame Planet? Anyway, So to cut another

750
00:38:12,400 --> 00:38:15,160
Speaker 1: long story short. My manager at that point started to

751
00:38:15,200 --> 00:38:17,359
Speaker 1: put out some feelers and say, I've got a guy.

752
00:38:17,560 --> 00:38:20,279
Speaker 1: He's just been nominated for five point one mix. Do

753
00:38:20,360 --> 00:38:23,319
Speaker 1: you are you interested in having it? And one of

754
00:38:23,360 --> 00:38:26,200
Speaker 1: the people that responded in a positive way was Robert

755
00:38:26,200 --> 00:38:30,319
Speaker 1: Fripp and King Crimson, who I was a lifelong fan of. Anyway,

756
00:38:30,600 --> 00:38:33,160
Speaker 1: he wasn't completely sure, but he was interested, So I

757
00:38:33,200 --> 00:38:35,040
Speaker 1: did a couple of tracks on spect for him. He

758
00:38:35,080 --> 00:38:38,760
Speaker 1: came up, we played the two tracks to him and

759
00:38:38,920 --> 00:38:40,920
Speaker 1: by the end of the first track he was jumping

760
00:38:40,960 --> 00:38:42,200
Speaker 1: up and down his chair and saying, We're going to

761
00:38:42,239 --> 00:38:44,120
Speaker 1: do the whole King Crimson catalog in five point one.

762
00:38:45,080 --> 00:38:48,040
Speaker 1: So I started with the King Crimson Catalog. It was

763
00:38:48,200 --> 00:38:52,080
Speaker 1: very well received. One door led to another a little

764
00:38:52,120 --> 00:38:54,520
Speaker 1: bit slower, a little bit slower. So what year was

765
00:38:54,560 --> 00:38:59,080
Speaker 1: the King Crimson remixes? Was two thousand nine. This was

766
00:38:59,120 --> 00:39:02,520
Speaker 1: the story of in the Court of the Crimson King. Okay, now,

767
00:39:02,560 --> 00:39:06,560
Speaker 1: a couple of things. Most people would say five point

768
00:39:06,600 --> 00:39:09,560
Speaker 1: one is a field format, not so much as S

769
00:39:09,600 --> 00:39:12,640
Speaker 1: a c D. But it's really for a very small

770
00:39:12,680 --> 00:39:17,480
Speaker 1: percentage of people who have high level home theaters. So

771
00:39:17,560 --> 00:39:22,040
Speaker 1: I didn't the market appears to be small and dwindling.

772
00:39:22,160 --> 00:39:24,960
Speaker 1: From being inside the beast, what do you see are

773
00:39:25,000 --> 00:39:27,040
Speaker 1: you talking about at that time? Are you talking about

774
00:39:27,120 --> 00:39:29,720
Speaker 1: right now? Because right now it's growing. Right now, it's growing.

775
00:39:29,960 --> 00:39:31,840
Speaker 1: But you're absolutely right. In two thousand and nine, it

776
00:39:31,880 --> 00:39:34,880
Speaker 1: was dwindling, and part of the reason it was dwindling

777
00:39:35,320 --> 00:39:37,920
Speaker 1: was because the record companies had given up putting out

778
00:39:37,960 --> 00:39:41,560
Speaker 1: stuff from five point one. Now, what actually happened was

779
00:39:41,600 --> 00:39:44,200
Speaker 1: that they put enormous in two thousand. In the early

780
00:39:44,280 --> 00:39:47,480
Speaker 1: two thousand's, they put an enormous amount of money into

781
00:39:47,560 --> 00:39:49,880
Speaker 1: getting stuff remixed into five point one. They were paying

782
00:39:49,920 --> 00:39:53,239
Speaker 1: like a hundred thousand dollars to get pet sounds mixed

783
00:39:53,280 --> 00:39:56,160
Speaker 1: into five point one, you know, and a hundred and

784
00:39:56,200 --> 00:39:58,359
Speaker 1: fifty thousand dollars to get room as mixed into five

785
00:39:58,680 --> 00:40:00,680
Speaker 1: And then when and then with surprised when they only

786
00:40:00,680 --> 00:40:03,959
Speaker 1: sold ten thousand units and they didn't make their money back. Now,

787
00:40:04,640 --> 00:40:07,000
Speaker 1: fast forward to two thousand seven and eight. There's not

788
00:40:07,040 --> 00:40:09,360
Speaker 1: a lot of people putting our catalog in five point one.

789
00:40:09,400 --> 00:40:11,360
Speaker 1: But the people that are doing it are making no

790
00:40:11,400 --> 00:40:13,279
Speaker 1: money from it. They're doing it as a labor of love.

791
00:40:13,320 --> 00:40:17,759
Speaker 1: And there is a small dedicated audience four five point

792
00:40:17,800 --> 00:40:21,120
Speaker 1: one that have been starved of catalog since the record

793
00:40:21,120 --> 00:40:24,280
Speaker 1: companies had spent so much money doing the early records

794
00:40:24,280 --> 00:40:27,160
Speaker 1: that they basically completely pulled out. But I was a

795
00:40:27,239 --> 00:40:29,840
Speaker 1: champion for it, and I started remixing King Crimson, and

796
00:40:29,840 --> 00:40:32,800
Speaker 1: there weren't many other records coming out at five point one,

797
00:40:32,840 --> 00:40:36,400
Speaker 1: but the ones that we were ravenously received by the

798
00:40:36,440 --> 00:40:39,319
Speaker 1: people that listened to it. And there was still a

799
00:40:39,360 --> 00:40:42,960
Speaker 1: category in the Grammys for multi channels surround sound mixing,

800
00:40:43,600 --> 00:40:47,239
Speaker 1: so it was actually relatively easy for me to get

801
00:40:47,239 --> 00:40:49,920
Speaker 1: the nod the nomination because there wasn't a lot of competition.

802
00:40:50,320 --> 00:40:53,680
Speaker 1: But people notice things. People notice things like Grammy nominations.

803
00:40:54,600 --> 00:40:58,440
Speaker 1: So I started with Crimson and then I got invited

804
00:40:58,480 --> 00:41:02,480
Speaker 1: to do Jethrow Tells Aqual Lung War. You're working with Fripp.

805
00:41:03,280 --> 00:41:06,680
Speaker 1: You know. The first album's results of having Gregg League

806
00:41:07,000 --> 00:41:10,400
Speaker 1: did pretty well commercially, then it became more of a

807
00:41:10,400 --> 00:41:14,000
Speaker 1: cult item. The obvious question is was that a labor

808
00:41:14,120 --> 00:41:17,480
Speaker 1: of love? Did you make any money? How many copies

809
00:41:17,520 --> 00:41:19,960
Speaker 1: of these how many copies of one of these albums

810
00:41:19,960 --> 00:41:24,680
Speaker 1: would sell? Um, Well, that's a difficult thing to quantify

811
00:41:24,800 --> 00:41:29,120
Speaker 1: because the fourti anniversary editions were CD DVD A combos,

812
00:41:29,840 --> 00:41:33,160
Speaker 1: so so that that's the trick. And that's another thing

813
00:41:33,200 --> 00:41:35,480
Speaker 1: that's changed from those early years when record comans were

814
00:41:35,520 --> 00:41:39,640
Speaker 1: doing surround mixes. They're very rarely now released to stand alone.

815
00:41:39,680 --> 00:41:42,879
Speaker 1: They are considered to be extra value content. And I'm

816
00:41:42,920 --> 00:41:46,080
Speaker 1: sure we'll come onto this, but nowadays surround mixes are

817
00:41:46,080 --> 00:41:49,840
Speaker 1: almost always added as a kind of extra to a

818
00:41:49,920 --> 00:41:54,800
Speaker 1: box set or a deluxe edition. Um. But in those days,

819
00:41:54,800 --> 00:41:59,120
Speaker 1: two tend the Crimson fourtieth anniversary editions were put out

820
00:41:59,120 --> 00:42:02,879
Speaker 1: as CD, DVD A combos and they did extremely well,

821
00:42:03,320 --> 00:42:06,920
Speaker 1: extremely well, partly because I think it was coincided with

822
00:42:06,960 --> 00:42:10,000
Speaker 1: the time when bands like King Crimson were being completely

823
00:42:10,040 --> 00:42:14,680
Speaker 1: rediscovered and reevaluated, particularly by mainstream media. And Robert will

824
00:42:14,719 --> 00:42:17,720
Speaker 1: tell you that because he put out thirtieth anniversary editions

825
00:42:17,760 --> 00:42:21,960
Speaker 1: of those albums around too about and they got no press,

826
00:42:21,960 --> 00:42:24,920
Speaker 1: and the little press they did get was quite derogatory.

827
00:42:25,000 --> 00:42:29,000
Speaker 1: When the forty anniversary editions came out, five star reviews

828
00:42:29,560 --> 00:42:33,319
Speaker 1: right across the board, it was extraordinary. It was absolutely

829
00:42:33,360 --> 00:42:35,839
Speaker 1: even for albums that had never been part of the

830
00:42:35,960 --> 00:42:39,680
Speaker 1: you know, the core favorites of that band we're getting

831
00:42:39,719 --> 00:42:44,200
Speaker 1: the most extraordinary reviews, and that band started to really

832
00:42:44,239 --> 00:42:45,920
Speaker 1: start to sell again, and of course that led to

833
00:42:46,000 --> 00:42:49,000
Speaker 1: him reforming King Crimson around that time too. Okay, let's

834
00:42:49,000 --> 00:42:52,160
Speaker 1: just talk at that particular time. You said, at first

835
00:42:52,320 --> 00:42:56,280
Speaker 1: you did the five point one mixes at your home,

836
00:42:56,560 --> 00:42:58,440
Speaker 1: and then when you were working with Fripp, did you

837
00:42:58,480 --> 00:43:02,080
Speaker 1: also do them, and what kind of equipment were you using,

838
00:43:02,080 --> 00:43:04,240
Speaker 1: and what was the studio experience as you went further

839
00:43:04,680 --> 00:43:07,840
Speaker 1: into the project. So it was all done in the

840
00:43:07,880 --> 00:43:10,880
Speaker 1: digital domain. Basically, what would happen is the multi track tapes.

841
00:43:11,160 --> 00:43:13,440
Speaker 1: I mean this is true. Pretty much every project have done,

842
00:43:13,480 --> 00:43:17,680
Speaker 1: the multi track tapes gets sent to a professional tape

843
00:43:17,680 --> 00:43:20,480
Speaker 1: transfer facility where they baked the tapes and then they

844
00:43:20,480 --> 00:43:23,439
Speaker 1: transfer them to high resolution digital files. I get sent

845
00:43:23,480 --> 00:43:27,040
Speaker 1: those files, so I get raw multi track tapes, but

846
00:43:27,280 --> 00:43:30,880
Speaker 1: as digitized files. So then part of it for me

847
00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:33,360
Speaker 1: is just kind of detective work seeing what's on the tapes,

848
00:43:33,440 --> 00:43:37,920
Speaker 1: making sure everything's there, and then essentially recreating the stereo

849
00:43:38,080 --> 00:43:41,839
Speaker 1: as closely as possible before breaking out to five point one.

850
00:43:41,840 --> 00:43:44,200
Speaker 1: And I do all that in Logic, the software called

851
00:43:44,239 --> 00:43:48,560
Speaker 1: Logic Audio, and it's a very simple set up logic

852
00:43:48,600 --> 00:43:52,480
Speaker 1: audio basically going out to six self powered speakers, the

853
00:43:52,520 --> 00:43:53,799
Speaker 1: two at the front, the two at the back, the

854
00:43:53,800 --> 00:43:57,719
Speaker 1: one in the middle, and the sub the low frequency speaker.

855
00:43:58,719 --> 00:44:01,600
Speaker 1: And that was based atally set up in my little

856
00:44:01,600 --> 00:44:03,839
Speaker 1: home studio. I have a proper studio now, but for

857
00:44:03,960 --> 00:44:06,040
Speaker 1: years because there's no money in it. No, they weren't

858
00:44:06,040 --> 00:44:07,319
Speaker 1: paying a lot of money to do any of this.

859
00:44:07,920 --> 00:44:09,439
Speaker 1: I'm not kidding when I say it was a labor

860
00:44:09,560 --> 00:44:14,719
Speaker 1: love um and I was just having fun doing it,

861
00:44:15,080 --> 00:44:18,560
Speaker 1: and you know, and learning a lot, learning a lot

862
00:44:18,600 --> 00:44:21,279
Speaker 1: by how those guys made those records. It was an education.

863
00:44:21,400 --> 00:44:24,239
Speaker 1: So making the album of the old days, yes, there

864
00:44:24,280 --> 00:44:27,480
Speaker 1: might even be multiple twenty four track machines. Then you

865
00:44:27,560 --> 00:44:30,360
Speaker 1: have twenty four track, then you mix it down to

866
00:44:30,440 --> 00:44:34,200
Speaker 1: two track, So we're in the process. Were your teeps

867
00:44:34,200 --> 00:44:36,600
Speaker 1: coming from all of the also send you the two track?

868
00:44:36,960 --> 00:44:39,520
Speaker 1: They send you the last version of the track, would

869
00:44:39,520 --> 00:44:42,239
Speaker 1: you actually get So I'm not interested in I'm not

870
00:44:42,280 --> 00:44:44,880
Speaker 1: interested in the two track bounced down master. I'm interested

871
00:44:44,920 --> 00:44:48,359
Speaker 1: in the raw multi track tapes. So the tapes where

872
00:44:48,400 --> 00:44:51,040
Speaker 1: the guitar is isolated, the bass drum is isolated, the

873
00:44:51,120 --> 00:44:54,359
Speaker 1: vocals are isolated, the back in, etcetera, etcetera, and there's

874
00:44:54,400 --> 00:44:57,200
Speaker 1: no there's no usually no processing at it, so things

875
00:44:57,239 --> 00:45:02,000
Speaker 1: like reverbs, compression EQ or any phaser of anything like

876
00:45:02,080 --> 00:45:06,640
Speaker 1: that has to be reapplied to the mix um. So

877
00:45:06,680 --> 00:45:09,920
Speaker 1: I'm pretty much I'm very much working from from the

878
00:45:10,120 --> 00:45:15,560
Speaker 1: very raw source recordings upwards. Yeah, okay, Well this is

879
00:45:15,640 --> 00:45:19,239
Speaker 1: fascinating to me because prior to your work, I was

880
00:45:19,280 --> 00:45:24,800
Speaker 1: a hundred percent against remixing the most egregious examples. Although

881
00:45:24,800 --> 00:45:26,840
Speaker 1: he's a nice guy and a friend of mine, Jiles Martin,

882
00:45:26,920 --> 00:45:30,560
Speaker 1: what they've done with the Beatles I just find horrific. Okay,

883
00:45:30,640 --> 00:45:33,920
Speaker 1: it has changed the music, and I'm very fearful that

884
00:45:33,960 --> 00:45:38,000
Speaker 1: those will become the default products going forward. But when

885
00:45:38,040 --> 00:45:43,920
Speaker 1: I first listened to your tall mixes, it sounded just

886
00:45:44,239 --> 00:45:47,360
Speaker 1: like the original, just like with a lot of steel

887
00:45:47,400 --> 00:45:50,600
Speaker 1: wool scrubbed off, and you were closer. How could you

888
00:45:50,680 --> 00:45:53,720
Speaker 1: do that without did you just know the material? Without

889
00:45:53,800 --> 00:45:56,920
Speaker 1: having the two tracks? How did you get so close

890
00:45:57,000 --> 00:46:00,640
Speaker 1: to the finished product that had previously been released? Well,

891
00:46:00,680 --> 00:46:02,960
Speaker 1: I mean I do, obviously I do have the two tracks.

892
00:46:02,960 --> 00:46:05,040
Speaker 1: I have the CD, I have the vinyl. So what

893
00:46:05,080 --> 00:46:08,360
Speaker 1: I'm what I'm doing? So my work process is basically

894
00:46:08,360 --> 00:46:11,120
Speaker 1: to load up the multi track tapes, and then alongside

895
00:46:11,160 --> 00:46:14,080
Speaker 1: the multi track tapes is to load up the original

896
00:46:14,480 --> 00:46:17,160
Speaker 1: stereo mix. And then I'm literally on a pair of

897
00:46:17,200 --> 00:46:21,839
Speaker 1: headphones listening in little five second chunks to the stereo mix,

898
00:46:22,000 --> 00:46:24,000
Speaker 1: to the original stereo mix, and then my new mix,

899
00:46:24,120 --> 00:46:27,359
Speaker 1: and then I'm hearing are okay, they've pushed the lead

900
00:46:27,360 --> 00:46:29,480
Speaker 1: guitar up a couple of dB there, so I'll do

901
00:46:29,520 --> 00:46:33,400
Speaker 1: that now. My whole philosophy with this is the people

902
00:46:33,719 --> 00:46:36,719
Speaker 1: that these mixes are aimed at, the people that these

903
00:46:36,719 --> 00:46:38,719
Speaker 1: reissues are aimed at, whether it's part of a box

904
00:46:38,760 --> 00:46:40,440
Speaker 1: set or it's part of a CD combo, as a

905
00:46:40,520 --> 00:46:42,960
Speaker 1: stand alone blue ray, whatever it is. The people that

906
00:46:43,000 --> 00:46:45,120
Speaker 1: are going to listen to these products and buy these

907
00:46:45,160 --> 00:46:48,600
Speaker 1: products are people that probably have bought these albums at

908
00:46:48,680 --> 00:46:52,239
Speaker 1: least three times before. They bought the original vinyl when

909
00:46:52,239 --> 00:46:55,000
Speaker 1: it came out, they bought the first CD edition, and

910
00:46:55,000 --> 00:46:57,840
Speaker 1: they probably bought the deluxe CD with the extra disc

911
00:46:57,960 --> 00:47:00,719
Speaker 1: or the bonus tracks. Now you're a expecting them to

912
00:47:00,719 --> 00:47:04,279
Speaker 1: buy the deluxe hundred dollar plus box set with a

913
00:47:04,320 --> 00:47:05,880
Speaker 1: blue ray in it or a DVD in it with

914
00:47:05,920 --> 00:47:08,799
Speaker 1: a five point one mix. So the point is that

915
00:47:08,840 --> 00:47:11,760
Speaker 1: these people know the music probably better than the artist.

916
00:47:12,680 --> 00:47:15,920
Speaker 1: And I say that advisedly because most of these artists

917
00:47:15,960 --> 00:47:18,560
Speaker 1: haven't listened to their records for years, and I'm the same,

918
00:47:18,800 --> 00:47:21,760
Speaker 1: I don't listen to my music. So Ian and Robert,

919
00:47:21,800 --> 00:47:23,680
Speaker 1: for example, the two people we've talked about so far,

920
00:47:23,760 --> 00:47:27,160
Speaker 1: King Crimson and told they haven't listened to their records

921
00:47:27,160 --> 00:47:30,799
Speaker 1: for years, and I find quite often I'm fighting them

922
00:47:30,840 --> 00:47:33,759
Speaker 1: to not change the music. So Robert will come in

923
00:47:33,760 --> 00:47:36,600
Speaker 1: and say I never liked that bit, let's you raise it,

924
00:47:36,640 --> 00:47:39,240
Speaker 1: and I'm saying, you can't do that, Robert, you can't

925
00:47:39,280 --> 00:47:41,920
Speaker 1: do that because the people that listen have been listening

926
00:47:41,920 --> 00:47:44,960
Speaker 1: to this record for sometimes for fifty years or forty

927
00:47:45,040 --> 00:47:47,759
Speaker 1: years or fifty years. It's like a bible to them.

928
00:47:47,800 --> 00:47:50,840
Speaker 1: It's like a sacred text. So we can't change. And

929
00:47:50,880 --> 00:47:52,920
Speaker 1: I've had these kind of fights with with some of them.

930
00:47:53,040 --> 00:47:55,360
Speaker 1: I mean not fights, but it's a heated discussions with

931
00:47:55,400 --> 00:47:58,120
Speaker 1: some of these guys. The worst was Greg Lake when

932
00:47:58,120 --> 00:48:00,160
Speaker 1: I did an e LP album, Greg Lake come mean

933
00:48:00,200 --> 00:48:02,400
Speaker 1: and saying bless him, you know, rest in peace and

934
00:48:02,400 --> 00:48:05,280
Speaker 1: all that, but coming in and saying we always played

935
00:48:05,280 --> 00:48:07,799
Speaker 1: that too, fast. Can you slow it down? I said,

936
00:48:07,840 --> 00:48:10,719
Speaker 1: well I can, but I'm not going to because I

937
00:48:10,719 --> 00:48:14,000
Speaker 1: think you're missing the point. You know, this this was Tarkas.

938
00:48:14,080 --> 00:48:16,040
Speaker 1: You know. I think you're missing the point Greg that

939
00:48:16,120 --> 00:48:18,480
Speaker 1: this is not for you to to, you know, fix

940
00:48:18,560 --> 00:48:20,239
Speaker 1: things that you didn't like the way you played it

941
00:48:20,280 --> 00:48:23,719
Speaker 1: forty years ago. This is about creating a more immersive,

942
00:48:24,400 --> 00:48:30,040
Speaker 1: three dimensional version that's essentially doesn't sound in a way,

943
00:48:30,120 --> 00:48:33,839
Speaker 1: doesn't sound different. But I can't remember what analogy you use.

944
00:48:34,000 --> 00:48:35,640
Speaker 1: You use, Bob, the steel wool one, but I mean,

945
00:48:35,640 --> 00:48:38,320
Speaker 1: I always use the analogy. It's like cleaning the Sistine Chapel.

946
00:48:38,880 --> 00:48:42,360
Speaker 1: It's like just taking off a layer of grime off

947
00:48:42,400 --> 00:48:45,080
Speaker 1: off of the Michael Angelo beneath, but you're not changing

948
00:48:45,120 --> 00:48:49,880
Speaker 1: anything about the art itself. So I'm very committed to

949
00:48:49,920 --> 00:48:53,680
Speaker 1: this idea of recreating that stereum, all of those mixed

950
00:48:53,719 --> 00:48:57,080
Speaker 1: decisions that they made in nine or whenever it was

951
00:48:59,239 --> 00:49:03,000
Speaker 1: figuring out all of those mixed decisions and recreating them

952
00:49:03,040 --> 00:49:06,840
Speaker 1: because fans don't want to hear any other way. Um,

953
00:49:07,120 --> 00:49:09,600
Speaker 1: there's kind of a there's kind of a contradiction to

954
00:49:09,680 --> 00:49:11,880
Speaker 1: work here, which obviously the fact you're remixing in the

955
00:49:11,960 --> 00:49:16,080
Speaker 1: first place. It's going to sound a bit different. But

956
00:49:16,600 --> 00:49:18,360
Speaker 1: I think there's a way to do it that it

957
00:49:18,400 --> 00:49:21,520
Speaker 1: doesn't jar. It doesn't sound like someone has tried to

958
00:49:21,640 --> 00:49:27,880
Speaker 1: reimagine the music, and I'm very, very against that. Okay,

959
00:49:28,840 --> 00:49:32,759
Speaker 1: Is it just technology? How do you achieve a clearer

960
00:49:32,880 --> 00:49:36,280
Speaker 1: version than the original? A lot of it is technology.

961
00:49:36,440 --> 00:49:38,080
Speaker 1: I would love to take the credit. You know, I'm

962
00:49:38,120 --> 00:49:41,800
Speaker 1: doing some incredible act of necromancy to make it sound better.

963
00:49:42,000 --> 00:49:46,520
Speaker 1: Not really, um, it is the technology working with digital files,

964
00:49:46,640 --> 00:49:50,440
Speaker 1: not having to work with multiple generations of analog tape.

965
00:49:50,880 --> 00:49:53,320
Speaker 1: I'll give you an example. In the Court of the

966
00:49:53,360 --> 00:49:56,360
Speaker 1: Crimson King was actually recording on eight track, but it

967
00:49:56,440 --> 00:49:58,759
Speaker 1: was done in the old fashioned way of they would

968
00:49:58,800 --> 00:50:01,600
Speaker 1: record the band on eight tracks. They would bounce those

969
00:50:01,640 --> 00:50:04,400
Speaker 1: eight tracks down to two tracks on a second eight track.

970
00:50:04,920 --> 00:50:06,880
Speaker 1: Then they would fill up the other six tracks on

971
00:50:06,880 --> 00:50:09,959
Speaker 1: that tape with malotron. They would then bounce that down

972
00:50:10,000 --> 00:50:13,000
Speaker 1: to two tracks on a third tape and fill up

973
00:50:13,040 --> 00:50:15,960
Speaker 1: the rest of the six tracks with a vocal. They

974
00:50:15,960 --> 00:50:18,080
Speaker 1: don't have to be Einstein to work out that. That

975
00:50:18,160 --> 00:50:21,920
Speaker 1: means that by that time the drums, guitar, and bass

976
00:50:21,960 --> 00:50:24,640
Speaker 1: that were on the original reel our third generation analog

977
00:50:24,680 --> 00:50:28,440
Speaker 1: tape copies with all the attendant hiss and degradation of

978
00:50:28,520 --> 00:50:31,800
Speaker 1: sound that that entails. So when I get those tapes,

979
00:50:31,880 --> 00:50:34,080
Speaker 1: I go back to the original source reels and I

980
00:50:34,200 --> 00:50:37,680
Speaker 1: resynchronize all of what they call those slave reels. So

981
00:50:37,760 --> 00:50:41,000
Speaker 1: I'm dealing for the very first time, the very first

982
00:50:41,000 --> 00:50:44,000
Speaker 1: time anyone has been able to mix that album from

983
00:50:44,200 --> 00:50:49,080
Speaker 1: first generation copies of the drums, bass and guitar, and that,

984
00:50:49,120 --> 00:50:52,959
Speaker 1: by definition, gives you more clarity. Less tape is less

985
00:50:53,000 --> 00:50:56,000
Speaker 1: harmonic distortion. Now, I say that with the caveat that

986
00:50:56,080 --> 00:50:59,560
Speaker 1: some people like all that ship and one of the

987
00:50:59,560 --> 00:51:03,400
Speaker 1: complaint it's I have had, and I completely acknowledge it,

988
00:51:03,480 --> 00:51:05,759
Speaker 1: is that some people don't like the fact that the

989
00:51:05,880 --> 00:51:10,120
Speaker 1: music sounds clearer. The part of the sort of sludge

990
00:51:10,719 --> 00:51:14,400
Speaker 1: and cross talk and tapeist is all part of the

991
00:51:14,400 --> 00:51:16,680
Speaker 1: experience for them. And all I would say is that

992
00:51:16,719 --> 00:51:19,600
Speaker 1: what I do probably isn't for those people. And you know,

993
00:51:19,640 --> 00:51:21,840
Speaker 1: I think there are a minority anywhere, but those purists.

994
00:51:21,880 --> 00:51:24,160
Speaker 1: It's not for those people. But does that sort explain

995
00:51:24,160 --> 00:51:25,960
Speaker 1: to you, you know how some of that clarity is

996
00:51:26,400 --> 00:51:28,600
Speaker 1: kind of coming back in in that respect, and you know,

997
00:51:28,640 --> 00:51:31,600
Speaker 1: being able to clean. Yes, and what about in terms

998
00:51:31,680 --> 00:51:34,040
Speaker 1: of effects, you say, you start with raw and then

999
00:51:34,080 --> 00:51:38,279
Speaker 1: you add reverb delay whatever is. The modern technology also

1000
00:51:38,360 --> 00:51:42,279
Speaker 1: helped there. The modern technology is amazing. One of the

1001
00:51:42,320 --> 00:51:45,840
Speaker 1: things I hear a lot is that digital can't replicate analog.

1002
00:51:46,719 --> 00:51:49,200
Speaker 1: I think that was true for years. I think it's

1003
00:51:49,239 --> 00:51:51,760
Speaker 1: becoming less and less and less true, and it's becoming

1004
00:51:51,800 --> 00:51:56,320
Speaker 1: more and more redundant as an argument against digital technology

1005
00:51:56,440 --> 00:51:59,520
Speaker 1: is so good now the plugins what we call the

1006
00:51:59,560 --> 00:52:01,120
Speaker 1: plugins that we use, which are the kind of pro

1007
00:52:01,280 --> 00:52:03,640
Speaker 1: you know, equivalence of what used to be like old outboards,

1008
00:52:03,640 --> 00:52:07,359
Speaker 1: effects units, compressors, delays, a reverbs. The plugins now are

1009
00:52:07,400 --> 00:52:11,279
Speaker 1: so good, and the emulations of the vintage plug in

1010
00:52:11,400 --> 00:52:14,520
Speaker 1: specifically are phenomenal, to the point that some of the

1011
00:52:14,520 --> 00:52:16,120
Speaker 1: guys that used to use them in the sixties and

1012
00:52:16,160 --> 00:52:18,920
Speaker 1: seventies can't tell the difference between the emulations now. But

1013
00:52:19,040 --> 00:52:22,640
Speaker 1: that's really been happening, particularly the last five six years.

1014
00:52:22,640 --> 00:52:25,600
Speaker 1: They've just becoming There's a company called Universal Audio that

1015
00:52:25,800 --> 00:52:28,560
Speaker 1: make plug ins that are such a high quality, and

1016
00:52:28,640 --> 00:52:31,759
Speaker 1: they are emulations. So I'm using, you know, when I'm

1017
00:52:31,760 --> 00:52:35,520
Speaker 1: going and remixing aqualung for example, I'm using an emulation

1018
00:52:35,520 --> 00:52:39,040
Speaker 1: of the old e MT one forty rever plug chamber,

1019
00:52:39,320 --> 00:52:42,560
Speaker 1: which is exactly the same reverb that they used on aqualung.

1020
00:52:42,800 --> 00:52:44,960
Speaker 1: It just happens to be a digital emulation of it,

1021
00:52:45,400 --> 00:52:49,200
Speaker 1: which is phenomenal. So that's been also kind of one

1022
00:52:49,200 --> 00:52:51,120
Speaker 1: of the things that's really helped me is these kind

1023
00:52:51,120 --> 00:52:55,240
Speaker 1: of emulations, modern digital emulations of all of the original

1024
00:52:55,280 --> 00:53:02,320
Speaker 1: analog outboard gear. Okay, we'red you stand on raw source

1025
00:53:03,120 --> 00:53:06,799
Speaker 1: forget remixing, are you someone? You know? There are people

1026
00:53:06,840 --> 00:53:09,680
Speaker 1: who cut on the ANALYG transfer the digital. There are

1027
00:53:09,680 --> 00:53:12,040
Speaker 1: people who talk about digital. They talk about sampling rate

1028
00:53:12,520 --> 00:53:15,800
Speaker 1: c D versus violent, analyged versus digital. If we're starting

1029
00:53:15,800 --> 00:53:18,759
Speaker 1: from ground zero, where do you stand? Let's just say

1030
00:53:18,760 --> 00:53:21,279
Speaker 1: that all these days, everything I do, and I think

1031
00:53:21,320 --> 00:53:24,680
Speaker 1: everything almost everyone I do in the digital domain is

1032
00:53:24,719 --> 00:53:28,000
Speaker 1: done at a very high resolution. So the days when

1033
00:53:28,040 --> 00:53:32,080
Speaker 1: we were working on digital at c D resolution, you know,

1034
00:53:32,160 --> 00:53:35,520
Speaker 1: sixteen bitty four point one, I mean I'm now doing

1035
00:53:35,560 --> 00:53:39,160
Speaker 1: stuff at K twenty four bits, sometimes even K twenty

1036
00:53:39,200 --> 00:53:43,520
Speaker 1: four bit. The resolution is just off the scale. Um,

1037
00:53:43,640 --> 00:53:46,319
Speaker 1: So I don't think there's any compromise in terms of

1038
00:53:46,360 --> 00:53:50,880
Speaker 1: the quality of digital. But there is something missing from digital,

1039
00:53:51,600 --> 00:53:54,040
Speaker 1: and what it is missing is that it doesn't have

1040
00:53:54,360 --> 00:53:58,239
Speaker 1: a kind of signature sound the way analog does. Analog

1041
00:53:58,400 --> 00:54:03,600
Speaker 1: does have um It imprints its personality and its signature

1042
00:54:03,680 --> 00:54:07,120
Speaker 1: on the music, and some people like that. I like that,

1043
00:54:07,239 --> 00:54:09,760
Speaker 1: you know, I like I like old records that recording

1044
00:54:09,800 --> 00:54:12,240
Speaker 1: sixties and seventies. Part of what I like about them

1045
00:54:12,440 --> 00:54:15,279
Speaker 1: is that kind of golden glow, that kind of gradual

1046
00:54:16,000 --> 00:54:19,759
Speaker 1: top end roll off that you get with analog. It's

1047
00:54:19,800 --> 00:54:22,120
Speaker 1: a very sweet kind of roll off at the top end.

1048
00:54:22,160 --> 00:54:25,440
Speaker 1: And I don't understand these things. The truth, I'm kind

1049
00:54:25,440 --> 00:54:27,560
Speaker 1: of bluffing here a little bit. I don't understand this

1050
00:54:27,600 --> 00:54:30,239
Speaker 1: stuff that there are people that really do. But all

1051
00:54:30,280 --> 00:54:32,560
Speaker 1: I'll say is that I grew up in the age

1052
00:54:32,560 --> 00:54:35,840
Speaker 1: of digital recording. I started in the industry when digital

1053
00:54:35,880 --> 00:54:38,720
Speaker 1: recording was very young and it didn't sound very good.

1054
00:54:39,520 --> 00:54:43,920
Speaker 1: These days, it sounds fantastic. And you can cut analog

1055
00:54:44,480 --> 00:54:49,160
Speaker 1: from a digital, a digital recording uh K twenty four bit,

1056
00:54:49,640 --> 00:54:54,040
Speaker 1: it should sound amazing. It should sound amazing. Okay, I

1057
00:54:54,080 --> 00:54:58,600
Speaker 1: completely understand releasing vinyl records of things that we originally

1058
00:54:58,680 --> 00:55:02,799
Speaker 1: quite ano be al never made any sense to me

1059
00:55:03,440 --> 00:55:07,800
Speaker 1: to have something that we recorded digitally trim through the vinyl.

1060
00:55:08,400 --> 00:55:12,279
Speaker 1: What is your take on that? Well, I think I

1061
00:55:12,360 --> 00:55:14,719
Speaker 1: understand completely where you're coming from. But I think the

1062
00:55:14,760 --> 00:55:17,200
Speaker 1: one thing you're discounting there is the whole romance and

1063
00:55:17,239 --> 00:55:19,680
Speaker 1: the kind of tactile experience of vinyl, aren't you You

1064
00:55:19,760 --> 00:55:22,640
Speaker 1: know so, I think a lot of the time it's

1065
00:55:22,760 --> 00:55:26,680
Speaker 1: not about the source audio. It's it's you know, a

1066
00:55:26,800 --> 00:55:30,360
Speaker 1: c D made from the same master as a vinyl.

1067
00:55:30,440 --> 00:55:32,719
Speaker 1: You're absolutely right, what's the point? What's the point where

1068
00:55:32,760 --> 00:55:34,719
Speaker 1: you can get a CD for five bucks and you

1069
00:55:34,800 --> 00:55:37,520
Speaker 1: have to pay thirty bucks with the vinyl and you've

1070
00:55:37,520 --> 00:55:40,959
Speaker 1: got all that surface noise and potential crackle involved too,

1071
00:55:41,000 --> 00:55:43,840
Speaker 1: you know, to contend with I feel that way sometimes,

1072
00:55:43,880 --> 00:55:46,920
Speaker 1: but I also like vinyl and I like to have

1073
00:55:47,000 --> 00:55:49,520
Speaker 1: certain things on vinyl because I love the ritual of

1074
00:55:49,640 --> 00:55:53,080
Speaker 1: final I love the kind of tactile, tangible experience of

1075
00:55:53,200 --> 00:55:57,320
Speaker 1: taking a record off the shelf, taking out of the sleeve,

1076
00:55:57,400 --> 00:55:59,960
Speaker 1: putting it on the turntable. Honestly, I think a lot

1077
00:56:00,080 --> 00:56:04,399
Speaker 1: of it is that for people. And I also think

1078
00:56:04,440 --> 00:56:07,560
Speaker 1: a lot of people hear things that they want to hear,

1079
00:56:08,200 --> 00:56:10,960
Speaker 1: so when they listen to vinyl. Oh, it sounds so

1080
00:56:11,040 --> 00:56:14,160
Speaker 1: much better than the digital files. I think what they're

1081
00:56:14,200 --> 00:56:17,120
Speaker 1: hearing is the kind of compromises they're inherent in vinyl,

1082
00:56:17,160 --> 00:56:20,480
Speaker 1: the fact you can't cut very high top end to vinyl.

1083
00:56:20,840 --> 00:56:23,080
Speaker 1: There is a natural roll off. So people hear that

1084
00:56:23,120 --> 00:56:24,960
Speaker 1: and they say, oh, it sounds so much warmer than

1085
00:56:25,000 --> 00:56:28,120
Speaker 1: the CD or the digital file. Yeah, it sounds warmer

1086
00:56:28,160 --> 00:56:31,080
Speaker 1: because they couldn't cut the trouble to the vinyl. So

1087
00:56:31,160 --> 00:56:32,840
Speaker 1: there's a lot. I think there's a lot of that

1088
00:56:32,920 --> 00:56:35,319
Speaker 1: mythology that goes into vinyl. But I have to say

1089
00:56:35,360 --> 00:56:37,799
Speaker 1: I love Final because I love the ritual of it

1090
00:56:38,160 --> 00:56:40,640
Speaker 1: and I have a nostalgic attachment to it as obviously

1091
00:56:40,640 --> 00:56:46,120
Speaker 1: growing up with vinyl. Okay, forget the rituals purely talking

1092
00:56:46,160 --> 00:56:50,120
Speaker 1: about the sound. Is there any reason to take something

1093
00:56:50,160 --> 00:56:54,239
Speaker 1: that was cut digitally creator the vinyl such that you

1094
00:56:54,320 --> 00:56:58,880
Speaker 1: either have a comparable but different sound or a better sound,

1095
00:56:59,000 --> 00:57:01,440
Speaker 1: or inherently or you're going to get a word sound

1096
00:57:01,880 --> 00:57:05,560
Speaker 1: because of the compromises of vinyl itself. Okay, with the

1097
00:57:05,600 --> 00:57:08,120
Speaker 1: caveat that, it does depend on what the sources. Okay,

1098
00:57:08,239 --> 00:57:10,720
Speaker 1: you know, if you've got if you've got a source file,

1099
00:57:11,640 --> 00:57:14,040
Speaker 1: that is a very high resolution, then it would make

1100
00:57:14,080 --> 00:57:16,880
Speaker 1: sense to cut its vinyl. If it's a digital file

1101
00:57:17,040 --> 00:57:20,640
Speaker 1: that's CD resolution already in the sense that the artist

1102
00:57:20,720 --> 00:57:24,760
Speaker 1: recorded it as CD resolution is probably pointless. But even

1103
00:57:24,800 --> 00:57:26,520
Speaker 1: then there is the caveat that you may have a

1104
00:57:26,520 --> 00:57:30,240
Speaker 1: fantastic vinyl cutting engineer who will get something out of

1105
00:57:30,280 --> 00:57:33,160
Speaker 1: the audio that the guy cutting the CD didn't get.

1106
00:57:33,560 --> 00:57:36,360
Speaker 1: But these are caveats. Basically your question, The answer is no.

1107
00:57:37,440 --> 00:57:40,320
Speaker 1: The answer is no. Just so I understand you're saying

1108
00:57:40,400 --> 00:57:43,040
Speaker 1: it would be you get a higher chance of getting

1109
00:57:43,080 --> 00:57:46,800
Speaker 1: good quality if you had a higher resolution digital recording. Yeah,

1110
00:57:46,960 --> 00:57:49,960
Speaker 1: if you've got digital recording that's done at four bit,

1111
00:57:50,800 --> 00:57:53,160
Speaker 1: putting that on a CD, you're naturally having to dial

1112
00:57:53,160 --> 00:57:55,439
Speaker 1: it that down to forty four point one sixteen. You're

1113
00:57:55,480 --> 00:57:57,600
Speaker 1: losing a lot of the information. A lot of the

1114
00:57:57,600 --> 00:58:01,280
Speaker 1: digital information is being thrown away because c D has

1115
00:58:01,360 --> 00:58:04,880
Speaker 1: to be a lower resolution, lower bit rate going to vinyl.

1116
00:58:04,920 --> 00:58:07,720
Speaker 1: That's not true. You have a pure analog wave, which

1117
00:58:07,760 --> 00:58:10,640
Speaker 1: is a continuous thing. There's no information being thrown away.

1118
00:58:11,640 --> 00:58:15,640
Speaker 1: But if your digital file is already CED resolution, there

1119
00:58:15,720 --> 00:58:18,280
Speaker 1: is nothing to be gained by cutting it to vinyl.

1120
00:58:18,360 --> 00:58:27,280
Speaker 1: Does does that make sense, okay, So tell us how

1121
00:58:27,320 --> 00:58:29,960
Speaker 1: you got the Toll gig. So it came from the

1122
00:58:30,040 --> 00:58:31,800
Speaker 1: King Crimson, you know, the King. It was like I

1123
00:58:31,800 --> 00:58:33,960
Speaker 1: was saying to you earlier, one door led to another.

1124
00:58:34,240 --> 00:58:37,400
Speaker 1: The King Crimson series was very successful, very well received,

1125
00:58:37,480 --> 00:58:39,880
Speaker 1: very well reviewed. Next thing I know, I get a

1126
00:58:39,920 --> 00:58:42,240
Speaker 1: call from Tim, Tim Shacksfield at e M. I as

1127
00:58:42,320 --> 00:58:45,320
Speaker 1: was then this would have been two thousand eleven. We're

1128
00:58:45,320 --> 00:58:47,560
Speaker 1: doing Aqualung fourth anniversary. We'd like to get a five

1129
00:58:47,600 --> 00:58:49,280
Speaker 1: point one mixed done? Would you like to do it?

1130
00:58:50,200 --> 00:58:53,240
Speaker 1: So that started me off on the whole Toll catalog again.

1131
00:58:53,440 --> 00:58:58,120
Speaker 1: That Aqualu and came out. It was extremely successful because

1132
00:58:58,120 --> 00:59:00,840
Speaker 1: it basically sounded the same as the original all but

1133
00:59:01,640 --> 00:59:04,720
Speaker 1: so much better. And I'm paraphrasing what a lot of

1134
00:59:04,720 --> 00:59:06,320
Speaker 1: people said about it. You know, I'm not That's not

1135
00:59:06,360 --> 00:59:08,240
Speaker 1: what I think. That's what most people said about it.

1136
00:59:08,520 --> 00:59:11,480
Speaker 1: And again I don't take credit for that. That album

1137
00:59:11,800 --> 00:59:15,720
Speaker 1: was originally mixed onto a faulty quarter inch tape machine.

1138
00:59:16,320 --> 00:59:19,320
Speaker 1: There was out of alignment. So every single version of

1139
00:59:19,360 --> 00:59:21,680
Speaker 1: the album that came out before we remixed it had

1140
00:59:21,760 --> 00:59:24,400
Speaker 1: been from a master that was was mixed onto a

1141
00:59:24,520 --> 00:59:27,600
Speaker 1: faulty machine. So it used to make me laugh when

1142
00:59:27,600 --> 00:59:29,640
Speaker 1: he used to see some of these people on forum saying,

1143
00:59:30,080 --> 00:59:33,280
Speaker 1: how dare Stephen Wilson remixed this album? The original mix

1144
00:59:33,360 --> 00:59:36,960
Speaker 1: will never be bettered. When Ian himself said, we mixed

1145
00:59:36,960 --> 00:59:39,520
Speaker 1: that onto a machine that wasn't working properly. I've been

1146
00:59:39,560 --> 00:59:44,000
Speaker 1: waiting forty years to fix it. So we fixed it.

1147
00:59:44,040 --> 00:59:46,280
Speaker 1: And it wasn't hard to fix it because the original

1148
00:59:46,400 --> 00:59:50,600
Speaker 1: session tapes sounded beautiful. It was the quarter inch master

1149
00:59:51,240 --> 00:59:54,320
Speaker 1: that was where the problems had come in. So we

1150
00:59:54,360 --> 00:59:56,600
Speaker 1: did a mix of that. It came out beautiful. It

1151
00:59:56,720 --> 01:00:00,520
Speaker 1: sounded much more alive and vibrant and three dimensional insert

1152
01:00:00,560 --> 01:00:04,240
Speaker 1: your own cliche. And it was very well succeeds, very

1153
01:00:04,240 --> 01:00:06,760
Speaker 1: well received, and I've gone on now and done I

1154
01:00:06,760 --> 01:00:11,080
Speaker 1: think something like ten toll records now we've we've basically also,

1155
01:00:11,560 --> 01:00:14,760
Speaker 1: you know, at what point did you shift from doing

1156
01:00:14,800 --> 01:00:18,640
Speaker 1: in addition to five point one two tracks and how

1157
01:00:18,680 --> 01:00:21,760
Speaker 1: did that come down? That's a very good question. Um, yeah,

1158
01:00:21,800 --> 01:00:25,200
Speaker 1: we haven't touched on that have weak So what happened

1159
01:00:25,320 --> 01:00:28,240
Speaker 1: was essentially I was hired to do the five point ones,

1160
01:00:28,840 --> 01:00:32,920
Speaker 1: but my first the first part of my process always

1161
01:00:33,800 --> 01:00:37,800
Speaker 1: was to recreate the Sarah stereo mix to the point

1162
01:00:37,840 --> 01:00:41,600
Speaker 1: that I could hardly tell the difference when I beat them.

1163
01:00:41,640 --> 01:00:43,360
Speaker 1: When I would go from the original mix to my

1164
01:00:43,400 --> 01:00:45,280
Speaker 1: new mix. The only thing I wanted to hear that

1165
01:00:45,360 --> 01:00:47,800
Speaker 1: was different was perhaps a little bit more clarity. I

1166
01:00:47,800 --> 01:00:49,960
Speaker 1: didn't want to hear any difference in the levels. I

1167
01:00:49,960 --> 01:00:52,400
Speaker 1: didn't want to hear any any difference in the reverb treatments,

1168
01:00:52,440 --> 01:00:57,360
Speaker 1: the EQ, the compression, stereo placement I matched exactly to

1169
01:00:58,160 --> 01:01:00,880
Speaker 1: any moves and he rides in the volume, and he

1170
01:01:01,200 --> 01:01:04,120
Speaker 1: moves in the stereo field, something panning from left to right,

1171
01:01:04,240 --> 01:01:09,320
Speaker 1: or I recreated everything meticulously because I wanted the five

1172
01:01:09,360 --> 01:01:12,200
Speaker 1: point one mixed to reflect as closely as possible what

1173
01:01:12,240 --> 01:01:14,600
Speaker 1: the stereo mix that people have been as as you know,

1174
01:01:14,680 --> 01:01:17,960
Speaker 1: as much as it's possible within thein the surround field,

1175
01:01:17,960 --> 01:01:21,720
Speaker 1: to reflect what was happening in the stereo mix. And basically,

1176
01:01:21,720 --> 01:01:24,200
Speaker 1: to cut a long story short again, while we were

1177
01:01:24,240 --> 01:01:28,040
Speaker 1: doing this, people like Robert and Ian and myself, we're

1178
01:01:28,080 --> 01:01:30,840
Speaker 1: listening to the stereo mix and saying, this sounds better

1179
01:01:30,880 --> 01:01:33,600
Speaker 1: than the original mix. We should include this in the package,

1180
01:01:33,600 --> 01:01:37,160
Speaker 1: you know, as a bonus for people. You know, we won't.

1181
01:01:37,200 --> 01:01:39,680
Speaker 1: We won't take the original mix out include the original

1182
01:01:39,680 --> 01:01:42,400
Speaker 1: mix two, which is almost always what happens. The original

1183
01:01:42,440 --> 01:01:45,480
Speaker 1: mixes included too. But let's throw in this new stereo

1184
01:01:45,560 --> 01:01:47,800
Speaker 1: mix too, because even though it was a byproduct of

1185
01:01:47,880 --> 01:01:51,680
Speaker 1: doing the five point one, it is it does sound different.

1186
01:01:51,880 --> 01:01:56,080
Speaker 1: It sounds arguably better, clearer. Maybe a little bit of

1187
01:01:56,080 --> 01:01:58,720
Speaker 1: that analog magic has been compromised, but you know what,

1188
01:01:58,800 --> 01:02:01,080
Speaker 1: it's a different perspective. So that was the kind of

1189
01:02:01,120 --> 01:02:03,320
Speaker 1: mindset originally, let's throw it in. Let's throw it in

1190
01:02:03,320 --> 01:02:06,400
Speaker 1: as a bonus um and a lot of people started

1191
01:02:06,440 --> 01:02:10,560
Speaker 1: responding very very well to the stereo remix, to to

1192
01:02:10,600 --> 01:02:12,920
Speaker 1: the point that some of my jobs have been like

1193
01:02:13,000 --> 01:02:16,640
Speaker 1: for example, the Chicago Chicago second album I just got

1194
01:02:16,720 --> 01:02:18,520
Speaker 1: hired to do a stereo mix of that wasn't even

1195
01:02:18,520 --> 01:02:20,920
Speaker 1: a five And the Sabbath albums I've just done stereo

1196
01:02:21,040 --> 01:02:23,520
Speaker 1: only not that the record company didn't even ask me

1197
01:02:23,560 --> 01:02:26,400
Speaker 1: to do surround mixes. So that was kind of how

1198
01:02:26,480 --> 01:02:30,920
Speaker 1: that came about. Yeah, okay, just in terms of process,

1199
01:02:31,360 --> 01:02:33,840
Speaker 1: what do you do after you make the stereo mix

1200
01:02:33,960 --> 01:02:37,880
Speaker 1: to make at five point one? You know, in technical terms,

1201
01:02:37,920 --> 01:02:41,520
Speaker 1: on the workstation, I flip, I just flip on each fader.

1202
01:02:41,600 --> 01:02:45,480
Speaker 1: I go from stereo out to surround out. And when

1203
01:02:45,560 --> 01:02:50,480
Speaker 1: you do that, your stereo pan pot becomes a surround

1204
01:02:50,560 --> 01:02:52,920
Speaker 1: pan pot. So instead of just something where you go

1205
01:02:52,960 --> 01:02:55,000
Speaker 1: from left to right, it becomes a little sort of

1206
01:02:55,040 --> 01:02:57,720
Speaker 1: diagram which is like essentially like a little picture of

1207
01:02:57,760 --> 01:03:01,760
Speaker 1: your room, and it has a dot in each corner

1208
01:03:02,000 --> 01:03:04,560
Speaker 1: where each speaker is, and you just start to break

1209
01:03:04,600 --> 01:03:07,040
Speaker 1: things out into the room. So I might say to myself,

1210
01:03:07,400 --> 01:03:09,200
Speaker 1: you know, and I really approached it like an idiot,

1211
01:03:09,200 --> 01:03:11,960
Speaker 1: because apart from those mixes i'd seen Elliott do, I

1212
01:03:11,960 --> 01:03:14,840
Speaker 1: hadn't listened to anyone else's mixes, and I just kind

1213
01:03:14,840 --> 01:03:16,760
Speaker 1: of did it like a bit of a you know,

1214
01:03:17,120 --> 01:03:19,920
Speaker 1: kind of intuitive way, like an idiot. So, well, this

1215
01:03:20,040 --> 01:03:22,080
Speaker 1: might sound good, and let's try to put in the

1216
01:03:22,080 --> 01:03:24,520
Speaker 1: backing vocals in the back and and if it sounded

1217
01:03:24,560 --> 01:03:27,080
Speaker 1: good to me, that's what I went with. And when

1218
01:03:27,160 --> 01:03:29,600
Speaker 1: the mixes came out, I started to realize I was

1219
01:03:29,640 --> 01:03:31,760
Speaker 1: doing it in a way that not many people have

1220
01:03:31,880 --> 01:03:35,280
Speaker 1: done it before. I was doing it quite aggressively. A

1221
01:03:35,360 --> 01:03:38,960
Speaker 1: lot of surround mixes had tended to be quite conservative

1222
01:03:39,600 --> 01:03:42,360
Speaker 1: in that they kept pretty much the whole stereo image

1223
01:03:42,360 --> 01:03:44,840
Speaker 1: in the front and they would just occasionally put a

1224
01:03:44,840 --> 01:03:47,800
Speaker 1: bit of reverb or sound effect in the back speakers.

1225
01:03:48,160 --> 01:03:50,200
Speaker 1: And I didn't know this because I had seen Elliott

1226
01:03:50,240 --> 01:03:52,480
Speaker 1: doing and Elliott was quite aggresive with his surround mixing.

1227
01:03:52,960 --> 01:03:55,680
Speaker 1: But apparently he's one of the one of the exceptions too.

1228
01:03:56,000 --> 01:03:57,840
Speaker 1: And I was putting all sorts of things in the back,

1229
01:03:57,920 --> 01:04:00,000
Speaker 1: you know, and in the center speaker and moving things

1230
01:04:00,040 --> 01:04:01,720
Speaker 1: around the room, and it just sounded good to me.

1231
01:04:01,800 --> 01:04:05,200
Speaker 1: This is fun, you know. So they answer your question is,

1232
01:04:05,200 --> 01:04:07,440
Speaker 1: technically speaking, you just get presented with a little sort

1233
01:04:07,440 --> 01:04:11,160
Speaker 1: of pan, a surround pan pot which has a little

1234
01:04:11,200 --> 01:04:13,240
Speaker 1: dot where each of your speakers is, and you just

1235
01:04:13,400 --> 01:04:16,520
Speaker 1: move using the mouse. You just move things where you

1236
01:04:16,560 --> 01:04:19,160
Speaker 1: want them to be in the surround field. It's easy. Okay,

1237
01:04:19,200 --> 01:04:22,040
Speaker 1: Obviously there's been a learning curve and you're much better now.

1238
01:04:22,960 --> 01:04:24,720
Speaker 1: How long did it take you to do in the past?

1239
01:04:24,800 --> 01:04:27,600
Speaker 1: But more importantly, someone called you today. I just wanted

1240
01:04:27,640 --> 01:04:31,480
Speaker 1: to track and forget the preparatory, you know, baking it.

1241
01:04:31,640 --> 01:04:34,280
Speaker 1: You know that's not done in your studio. Once you

1242
01:04:34,360 --> 01:04:38,520
Speaker 1: get the files. How long from start to finish? Well,

1243
01:04:38,560 --> 01:04:41,120
Speaker 1: that really depends, like for example, I'm doing a project

1244
01:04:41,120 --> 01:04:44,840
Speaker 1: now which unfortunately has to remain nameless, but it's it's

1245
01:04:44,840 --> 01:04:48,040
Speaker 1: a big American record from from the nineties that sold

1246
01:04:48,080 --> 01:04:51,160
Speaker 1: a lot of copies, and the tapes came to me

1247
01:04:51,680 --> 01:04:55,200
Speaker 1: and they recorded. Some of the tracks were recorded on

1248
01:04:55,520 --> 01:05:01,480
Speaker 1: four twenty four track tapes running in SYNCHRONI station. So

1249
01:05:01,560 --> 01:05:04,320
Speaker 1: I'm loading up these sessions and it's just insane. There's

1250
01:05:04,360 --> 01:05:08,360
Speaker 1: like a hundred channels of information. And the thing is

1251
01:05:08,640 --> 01:05:10,760
Speaker 1: the track sheets that come along, which the track sheets

1252
01:05:10,760 --> 01:05:13,160
Speaker 1: being the original documentation that's like on the tape boxes.

1253
01:05:13,400 --> 01:05:16,040
Speaker 1: They're usually not very helpful because these guys that recorded

1254
01:05:16,040 --> 01:05:19,920
Speaker 1: these albums never really anticipated there's someone like me twenty

1255
01:05:20,000 --> 01:05:22,320
Speaker 1: years later I was going to have to figure out

1256
01:05:22,360 --> 01:05:25,480
Speaker 1: what's on these tapes ever again. So I'm literally then

1257
01:05:25,520 --> 01:05:28,760
Speaker 1: going through all of these tracks, listening to say, okay,

1258
01:05:28,840 --> 01:05:32,920
Speaker 1: that sounds like a backing vocal label as such, that

1259
01:05:33,120 --> 01:05:37,800
Speaker 1: sounds like it could be a you know, as our

1260
01:05:37,880 --> 01:05:40,880
Speaker 1: sitar whenever it is. I'm listening through and I'm kind

1261
01:05:40,880 --> 01:05:43,320
Speaker 1: of labeling labeling each of those tracks. And this is

1262
01:05:43,320 --> 01:05:46,120
Speaker 1: before I've done any mixing at all. I'm literally just

1263
01:05:46,680 --> 01:05:50,160
Speaker 1: identifying what is on each track of the multi track,

1264
01:05:50,880 --> 01:05:53,080
Speaker 1: and then I can start to have an idea about

1265
01:05:53,080 --> 01:05:55,560
Speaker 1: what sort of what sort of time is involved this

1266
01:05:55,600 --> 01:05:58,400
Speaker 1: project I'm doing right now, I've been working on since

1267
01:05:58,440 --> 01:05:59,880
Speaker 1: the beginning of the year, off and on, you know,

1268
01:06:00,200 --> 01:06:02,480
Speaker 1: because I have got my other, my other consideration of

1269
01:06:02,520 --> 01:06:05,480
Speaker 1: my record coming out, but I've been promoting that. But

1270
01:06:05,520 --> 01:06:07,440
Speaker 1: I've been working on it on and off since the

1271
01:06:07,480 --> 01:06:09,680
Speaker 1: beginning of the year. It's probably gonna be the best

1272
01:06:09,680 --> 01:06:11,400
Speaker 1: part of four to six weeks by the time I

1273
01:06:11,480 --> 01:06:14,440
Speaker 1: finished the surround mix of this particular album. But then

1274
01:06:14,480 --> 01:06:16,560
Speaker 1: I've had other records where it's just record on eight track,

1275
01:06:17,160 --> 01:06:19,920
Speaker 1: like when I did I think it was Benefit or

1276
01:06:20,000 --> 01:06:23,040
Speaker 1: stand up for Jethrow Toll. No, this was the first

1277
01:06:23,040 --> 01:06:25,840
Speaker 1: albums record on four track, so I had there was

1278
01:06:26,000 --> 01:06:28,200
Speaker 1: very little, you know, to sort of figure out and

1279
01:06:28,200 --> 01:06:31,160
Speaker 1: do with that. Um so that I mean, obviously that

1280
01:06:31,240 --> 01:06:34,280
Speaker 1: was a much quicker process. Someone comes in with twenty

1281
01:06:34,320 --> 01:06:36,640
Speaker 1: four tracks, how long do you think it'll do. I'll

1282
01:06:36,640 --> 01:06:38,560
Speaker 1: take me about a week. Take me about a week

1283
01:06:38,600 --> 01:06:43,160
Speaker 1: to recreate stereo mix from a well recorded twenty four track,

1284
01:06:43,360 --> 01:06:46,600
Speaker 1: forty minute album. You'll tell me about a week. And

1285
01:06:47,040 --> 01:06:50,480
Speaker 1: how do you establish a fee? I don't I don't.

1286
01:06:50,760 --> 01:06:53,880
Speaker 1: I don't really care about the money. I mean, I'm

1287
01:06:53,920 --> 01:06:55,920
Speaker 1: in a very privileged position to be able to say that.

1288
01:06:56,040 --> 01:07:00,640
Speaker 1: I always say to the people that asked me, um,

1289
01:07:00,680 --> 01:07:03,920
Speaker 1: what have you got, it's fine. And the other the

1290
01:07:03,960 --> 01:07:06,800
Speaker 1: other sort of consideration for me is I must genuinely

1291
01:07:06,920 --> 01:07:12,880
Speaker 1: like the album uh and have some um pre knowledge

1292
01:07:12,880 --> 01:07:14,760
Speaker 1: of the album. I must know that. I mean, I'm

1293
01:07:14,760 --> 01:07:16,160
Speaker 1: not going to take on a record that I've never

1294
01:07:16,160 --> 01:07:18,800
Speaker 1: heard before, I don't know, I have no affinity with.

1295
01:07:19,000 --> 01:07:20,680
Speaker 1: And part of that is simply because I you know,

1296
01:07:20,880 --> 01:07:24,960
Speaker 1: I do acknowledge to myself that the people I'm doing

1297
01:07:25,000 --> 01:07:27,360
Speaker 1: this for are the people that have bought the album

1298
01:07:27,400 --> 01:07:29,960
Speaker 1: over and over again and their fans, and I think

1299
01:07:30,000 --> 01:07:31,439
Speaker 1: I'd have to be able to do a good job.

1300
01:07:31,480 --> 01:07:33,520
Speaker 1: I have to be a fan too, so I have

1301
01:07:33,600 --> 01:07:35,640
Speaker 1: to genuinely be a fan of the record. And at

1302
01:07:35,640 --> 01:07:37,840
Speaker 1: that point I just say to the label or the

1303
01:07:37,880 --> 01:07:39,960
Speaker 1: management or the artist, whoever it is, it's asked me,

1304
01:07:40,240 --> 01:07:43,040
Speaker 1: what have you got? What's comfortable for you budget wise?

1305
01:07:44,040 --> 01:07:46,600
Speaker 1: And usually it's fine. I've never turned down a job

1306
01:07:46,640 --> 01:07:50,760
Speaker 1: that I wanted to do because of the money. And

1307
01:07:51,000 --> 01:07:55,080
Speaker 1: you get an override or royalty sales, no I would

1308
01:07:55,240 --> 01:07:58,720
Speaker 1: never accept that. Never, it's not my work. It's not

1309
01:07:58,800 --> 01:08:01,800
Speaker 1: my work, it's not my career activity. Even my mix,

1310
01:08:01,840 --> 01:08:03,840
Speaker 1: I'm kind of copying the original guy that mixed it,

1311
01:08:03,920 --> 01:08:06,920
Speaker 1: you know, I'm kind of recreating his mix in a way.

1312
01:08:07,000 --> 01:08:08,840
Speaker 1: So the only part of the process that I'm really

1313
01:08:08,840 --> 01:08:11,800
Speaker 1: being creative is in breaking out into the room. You

1314
01:08:11,800 --> 01:08:15,440
Speaker 1: know that the surround field. No, I would never on principle,

1315
01:08:15,480 --> 01:08:18,400
Speaker 1: I would never take an override a royalty. Okay, the

1316
01:08:18,479 --> 01:08:22,320
Speaker 1: five month stepard is very important and can change record mastering.

1317
01:08:22,479 --> 01:08:26,439
Speaker 1: So how are these projects mastered? Wow? Wow, you've You've

1318
01:08:26,520 --> 01:08:30,240
Speaker 1: hit on one of my favorite subjects there. Early on,

1319
01:08:31,160 --> 01:08:33,400
Speaker 1: these five point one mixes were being and and the

1320
01:08:33,439 --> 01:08:37,080
Speaker 1: stereo mixes were being sent off to be mastered in

1321
01:08:37,439 --> 01:08:41,360
Speaker 1: various They will remain nameless for some very reputible master

1322
01:08:41,479 --> 01:08:45,599
Speaker 1: ing rooms. And I had sent the mixes off being

1323
01:08:45,640 --> 01:08:48,360
Speaker 1: really happy with the way they sounded, and they kept

1324
01:08:48,439 --> 01:08:51,280
Speaker 1: coming back and they sounded worse to me. And I

1325
01:08:51,640 --> 01:08:54,439
Speaker 1: remember having conversations some of the guys that commissioned them

1326
01:08:54,439 --> 01:08:57,479
Speaker 1: from me, and I would say to them, you thought

1327
01:08:57,560 --> 01:08:59,360
Speaker 1: that makes it sounding great, didn't you to start with?

1328
01:08:59,560 --> 01:09:01,640
Speaker 1: And they'd say, yeah, they sound it amazing. Why are

1329
01:09:01,680 --> 01:09:05,000
Speaker 1: you having the master because they're coming back basically compressed

1330
01:09:05,000 --> 01:09:08,559
Speaker 1: with big smiley eques, which is what you would do

1331
01:09:08,800 --> 01:09:11,240
Speaker 1: with a new You might arguably do that with a

1332
01:09:11,240 --> 01:09:14,519
Speaker 1: new record that you wanted to get on radio or

1333
01:09:14,560 --> 01:09:16,880
Speaker 1: you wanted to part when it's on Spotify and the playlist.

1334
01:09:17,320 --> 01:09:19,680
Speaker 1: But the point is that these records were doing are

1335
01:09:19,760 --> 01:09:23,160
Speaker 1: selling to the fans who are listening to them at home,

1336
01:09:23,960 --> 01:09:27,160
Speaker 1: generally on pretty good high fives. Why are we crushing

1337
01:09:27,160 --> 01:09:29,360
Speaker 1: the dynamics out of them? And this is one of

1338
01:09:29,400 --> 01:09:34,439
Speaker 1: my big bug best crushing dynamics. Um So, I actually

1339
01:09:34,439 --> 01:09:37,400
Speaker 1: managed to persuade almost in every almost every case since

1340
01:09:37,479 --> 01:09:39,360
Speaker 1: say the early days, the first two or three years,

1341
01:09:40,120 --> 01:09:44,760
Speaker 1: these mixes get released by passing the mastering stage completely.

1342
01:09:44,840 --> 01:09:47,360
Speaker 1: So the mixes come out of my studio, they go

1343
01:09:47,400 --> 01:09:50,519
Speaker 1: on the disc exactly as they are, and the labels

1344
01:09:50,560 --> 01:09:54,360
Speaker 1: love that because they say five dollars not to have

1345
01:09:54,439 --> 01:09:57,640
Speaker 1: it masters. You know. Okay, let's be talking about the

1346
01:09:57,720 --> 01:10:02,680
Speaker 1: very specific equipment, because do an equipment has difference? First hardware,

1347
01:10:02,960 --> 01:10:06,280
Speaker 1: what are you using for a computer? So I'm I'm

1348
01:10:06,320 --> 01:10:08,760
Speaker 1: a I'm a Mac user. I've been a MacUser ever

1349
01:10:08,760 --> 01:10:11,840
Speaker 1: since the beginning. Um so I just bought myself. I

1350
01:10:11,920 --> 01:10:15,920
Speaker 1: love one of the brand new towers, you know, very expensive,

1351
01:10:15,960 --> 01:10:18,240
Speaker 1: but for Dolby atmost particularly which is what I've now

1352
01:10:19,200 --> 01:10:21,400
Speaker 1: transition to, which is the next step out from five

1353
01:10:21,439 --> 01:10:23,439
Speaker 1: per one, which maybe you want to talk about that too,

1354
01:10:23,439 --> 01:10:26,360
Speaker 1: But anyway, Dolby Atmosses is obviously, as you can imagine,

1355
01:10:26,439 --> 01:10:29,040
Speaker 1: quite process or intensive. So I've got a very very

1356
01:10:29,040 --> 01:10:33,160
Speaker 1: powerful Uh those machines you can buy for five thousand

1357
01:10:33,200 --> 01:10:36,200
Speaker 1: or ninety thousand dollars. How much rem did you put it?

1358
01:10:36,240 --> 01:10:39,160
Speaker 1: What do you do for chips? I spent about ten

1359
01:10:39,280 --> 01:10:42,880
Speaker 1: thousand pounds, So what's that about thirteen thousand that I

1360
01:10:42,920 --> 01:10:46,400
Speaker 1: forget exactly? I threw quite a lot of ram at it. Yeah,

1361
01:10:46,439 --> 01:10:49,880
Speaker 1: because surround mixing is quite particularly this project i'm doing now,

1362
01:10:49,920 --> 01:10:54,439
Speaker 1: where as I've got a hundred channels of audio and

1363
01:10:54,479 --> 01:10:57,599
Speaker 1: I'm breaking out into Dolby at mooss it's quite it's

1364
01:10:57,640 --> 01:11:02,000
Speaker 1: quite CPU intensive, it's quite memory intensive. And what do

1365
01:11:02,080 --> 01:11:06,080
Speaker 1: you use? How many screens and what screens? I just

1366
01:11:06,160 --> 01:11:09,000
Speaker 1: have one screen, but it's a big screen. It's a

1367
01:11:09,000 --> 01:11:11,360
Speaker 1: big screen. I can't I can't be doing with the

1368
01:11:11,400 --> 01:11:14,360
Speaker 1: two screens thing. So I have a big screen, one

1369
01:11:14,400 --> 01:11:16,599
Speaker 1: of those ones that kind of curves around you. It's

1370
01:11:16,640 --> 01:11:19,200
Speaker 1: like a wraparound thing, so I can see the whole

1371
01:11:19,240 --> 01:11:27,920
Speaker 1: mix all the time. Basically, Okay, what headphones do you use? Um?

1372
01:11:27,960 --> 01:11:31,479
Speaker 1: I am using? Hold on, I'll tell you audio audio technical?

1373
01:11:31,640 --> 01:11:36,479
Speaker 1: Headphones audio technical? And did you make a specific choice

1374
01:11:36,520 --> 01:11:40,080
Speaker 1: on those? And how expensive are those? Do you know what?

1375
01:11:40,120 --> 01:11:42,639
Speaker 1: They're not that expensive? They're not. I think they're good.

1376
01:11:42,960 --> 01:11:45,960
Speaker 1: They're good. Um, I did make a choice. They're you know,

1377
01:11:46,000 --> 01:11:48,080
Speaker 1: they're like a three quid pair of headphones. I mean,

1378
01:11:48,120 --> 01:11:51,439
Speaker 1: you can spend three thousand. But the question would become

1379
01:11:51,520 --> 01:11:53,759
Speaker 1: this was like the old days of mixing Tora tones

1380
01:11:53,960 --> 01:11:57,519
Speaker 1: or exactly Yamaha and as ten. You know, you don't

1381
01:11:57,520 --> 01:12:00,160
Speaker 1: want to get too far from the average listener. So

1382
01:12:00,200 --> 01:12:02,680
Speaker 1: a lot of people use these Sony as a standard.

1383
01:12:02,880 --> 01:12:06,400
Speaker 1: How did you discover these audio technicals? I can't remember.

1384
01:12:06,439 --> 01:12:09,280
Speaker 1: I probably just went to my local music equipment supply

1385
01:12:09,400 --> 01:12:12,200
Speaker 1: and said, you know, I think I bought these headphones

1386
01:12:12,240 --> 01:12:14,519
Speaker 1: not for mixing on. I bought them for probably tracking

1387
01:12:14,560 --> 01:12:16,439
Speaker 1: with you know, I wanted a good pair of headphones

1388
01:12:16,479 --> 01:12:18,360
Speaker 1: to work with when I was tracking vocals and stuff

1389
01:12:18,400 --> 01:12:21,000
Speaker 1: for my own stuff, and I just started mixing on them.

1390
01:12:21,040 --> 01:12:23,759
Speaker 1: I know how they sound, I understand what I'm hearing

1391
01:12:23,800 --> 01:12:25,920
Speaker 1: through them, and of course that's the most important, which

1392
01:12:25,960 --> 01:12:27,800
Speaker 1: is kind of what you're alluding to. You know. The

1393
01:12:27,840 --> 01:12:29,840
Speaker 1: point is if you know what you're hearing, if you

1394
01:12:30,000 --> 01:12:32,400
Speaker 1: understand what you're speakers or your headphones are giving you,

1395
01:12:32,600 --> 01:12:34,600
Speaker 1: that is a hundred times more important than having the

1396
01:12:34,640 --> 01:12:40,640
Speaker 1: fancy you know, amazing expensive speakers are amazing expensive headphones.

1397
01:12:41,280 --> 01:12:44,639
Speaker 1: And then what speakers do you use? So for mixing

1398
01:12:44,960 --> 01:12:48,240
Speaker 1: in stereo, I use Vocals, a company to I think

1399
01:12:48,240 --> 01:12:51,800
Speaker 1: the Italian company called Focal French. Actually I know, because

1400
01:12:51,800 --> 01:12:54,120
Speaker 1: I haven't in my car. I beg your pardon, French

1401
01:12:54,120 --> 01:12:57,640
Speaker 1: company called Focal, Yeah, yeah, so I have to. I

1402
01:12:57,680 --> 01:13:01,400
Speaker 1: think they called Triads, the Triads Stery Monitors. And for

1403
01:13:01,439 --> 01:13:05,439
Speaker 1: the mixing instaurround, I use General Lex Jenny Lex speakers,

1404
01:13:05,439 --> 01:13:09,080
Speaker 1: self powered speakers. And why did you choose those specific

1405
01:13:09,120 --> 01:13:13,360
Speaker 1: brands because Elliott used them. So I used basically my

1406
01:13:13,400 --> 01:13:16,040
Speaker 1: original five point one setup was based on his because

1407
01:13:16,040 --> 01:13:18,760
Speaker 1: he's the only one i'd seen and he was using

1408
01:13:18,840 --> 01:13:20,799
Speaker 1: General X. So I just went out and bought myself

1409
01:13:20,880 --> 01:13:23,800
Speaker 1: five or six General X speakers and now I have

1410
01:13:23,840 --> 01:13:25,840
Speaker 1: Dolby atmos, so i have another seven or eight in

1411
01:13:25,840 --> 01:13:29,000
Speaker 1: the room, but I've just stuck with them. Again. I

1412
01:13:29,080 --> 01:13:31,120
Speaker 1: understand what I'm hearing when I hear general X, I've

1413
01:13:31,120 --> 01:13:34,200
Speaker 1: I've grown up, you know, hearing them. Okay, for people

1414
01:13:34,240 --> 01:13:38,480
Speaker 1: who at this point still don't understand, explain Dolby atmos.

1415
01:13:39,520 --> 01:13:42,880
Speaker 1: So Dolby, you know, I don't completely understand all of

1416
01:13:42,880 --> 01:13:46,720
Speaker 1: it myself, because it's it's a much more complex thing

1417
01:13:46,720 --> 01:13:49,160
Speaker 1: that five point five one is very straightforward. You've got

1418
01:13:49,200 --> 01:13:51,240
Speaker 1: five speakers, you can put sound in any of the

1419
01:13:51,240 --> 01:13:53,439
Speaker 1: five speakers, and you've got the sub which is the

1420
01:13:53,479 --> 01:13:57,120
Speaker 1: dot one, which is for the low end frequencies. Dolby

1421
01:13:57,160 --> 01:13:59,840
Speaker 1: ATMOS is more complicated because it's it's it's to do

1422
01:14:00,040 --> 01:14:03,040
Speaker 1: with it's more to do with object orientation, which means

1423
01:14:03,080 --> 01:14:07,040
Speaker 1: you can basically place the sound anywhere in the room.

1424
01:14:07,200 --> 01:14:09,599
Speaker 1: It will sound like it's coming of a particular spot

1425
01:14:09,680 --> 01:14:11,680
Speaker 1: in the room, in the air. I don't know how

1426
01:14:11,680 --> 01:14:14,200
Speaker 1: they do it, but they do. But the bottom line

1427
01:14:14,240 --> 01:14:17,840
Speaker 1: is that the most standard configuration of Dolby atmost, which

1428
01:14:17,840 --> 01:14:21,200
Speaker 1: is the one I've got, is seven point one point four,

1429
01:14:21,760 --> 01:14:24,439
Speaker 1: which means that you still have the five speakers you

1430
01:14:24,479 --> 01:14:26,880
Speaker 1: have in five point one, the two in front, two behind,

1431
01:14:26,880 --> 01:14:29,120
Speaker 1: the one in the center, and the sub but you

1432
01:14:29,160 --> 01:14:32,040
Speaker 1: have two additional speakers in the horizontal plane which are

1433
01:14:32,080 --> 01:14:35,360
Speaker 1: at the sides, so they fill in between the front

1434
01:14:35,400 --> 01:14:38,280
Speaker 1: and the back pair, so you can discreetly put something

1435
01:14:38,280 --> 01:14:41,639
Speaker 1: that feels like it's coming specifically right from beside you

1436
01:14:42,120 --> 01:14:44,000
Speaker 1: rather than from behind you or in front of you.

1437
01:14:44,720 --> 01:14:48,880
Speaker 1: And the point four are two sets of speakers above you,

1438
01:14:49,360 --> 01:14:52,160
Speaker 1: two at the front, two behind you, which means you

1439
01:14:52,160 --> 01:14:55,200
Speaker 1: can now move sound not just in the horizontal plane

1440
01:14:55,479 --> 01:14:58,640
Speaker 1: but also in the vertical plane. And it's incredible, and

1441
01:14:58,680 --> 01:15:01,320
Speaker 1: it does mean you can give the impression of literally

1442
01:15:01,360 --> 01:15:03,760
Speaker 1: you can put point something in the air and say

1443
01:15:03,840 --> 01:15:07,760
Speaker 1: that sound is coming from there and point at it.

1444
01:15:08,160 --> 01:15:10,760
Speaker 1: And that's the incredible thing about Almoss. It's I mean

1445
01:15:10,920 --> 01:15:13,240
Speaker 1: to say it's immersive is an understatement. It's the next

1446
01:15:13,320 --> 01:15:16,840
Speaker 1: level up from from immersive. Okay, you know, Dolby, always

1447
01:15:16,840 --> 01:15:20,720
Speaker 1: start theatrically. How many people you're mixing these records, you're

1448
01:15:20,760 --> 01:15:24,240
Speaker 1: mixing them for home use, How many people have these systems?

1449
01:15:25,160 --> 01:15:29,040
Speaker 1: I've no idea. Um that's never really been a motivating

1450
01:15:29,040 --> 01:15:30,920
Speaker 1: fact for me, and I've always been of the philosophy

1451
01:15:30,960 --> 01:15:34,160
Speaker 1: that if there's there's catalog out there is more likely

1452
01:15:34,160 --> 01:15:36,720
Speaker 1: people will go out and buy systems. Now, when the

1453
01:15:36,720 --> 01:15:40,599
Speaker 1: Beatles are doing Dolby Atmos, that's a big help. That's

1454
01:15:40,600 --> 01:15:41,760
Speaker 1: a big help. I know you're not a fan of

1455
01:15:41,840 --> 01:15:44,960
Speaker 1: Giles Is mixes necessarily, but the fact that he's done

1456
01:15:45,000 --> 01:15:48,839
Speaker 1: Delby Atmos mixes, the Beatles have done Delby Atmos mixes

1457
01:15:49,160 --> 01:15:51,760
Speaker 1: probably has sent a lot of people out to look

1458
01:15:51,800 --> 01:15:54,280
Speaker 1: at the possibility of putting Dolby Atmos in their rooms.

1459
01:15:54,439 --> 01:15:56,479
Speaker 1: And I think that was always the problem. When I started.

1460
01:15:56,520 --> 01:16:00,439
Speaker 1: There wasn't catalog like that out there. Um, And when

1461
01:16:00,479 --> 01:16:03,639
Speaker 1: you get people putting out albums like the Beatles catalog

1462
01:16:03,800 --> 01:16:07,360
Speaker 1: in in at moss, then that's such a great kick

1463
01:16:07,439 --> 01:16:09,920
Speaker 1: start to the whole industry. The other thing I think

1464
01:16:09,920 --> 01:16:11,880
Speaker 1: Altmos has got in his favor is that there there

1465
01:16:11,880 --> 01:16:14,360
Speaker 1: are now Again, I don't understand the technology, but there

1466
01:16:14,360 --> 01:16:17,920
Speaker 1: are there are soundbars, and there are headphones that are

1467
01:16:17,960 --> 01:16:21,519
Speaker 1: able to They are able to decode Dolby Atmos mixes

1468
01:16:21,680 --> 01:16:24,240
Speaker 1: and give you a kind of pseudo I think. I mean,

1469
01:16:24,280 --> 01:16:26,280
Speaker 1: I've heard it. It It was amazing. I heard I listened

1470
01:16:26,280 --> 01:16:28,000
Speaker 1: to one of my mixes on a pair of headphones

1471
01:16:28,560 --> 01:16:31,320
Speaker 1: and it wasn't completely discreet, but you know what it

1472
01:16:31,360 --> 01:16:34,639
Speaker 1: was se of it was there. I don't know how

1473
01:16:34,680 --> 01:16:37,120
Speaker 1: they do it, but that's that's again I think a

1474
01:16:37,160 --> 01:16:39,960
Speaker 1: big advantage is going to have over the previous attempts

1475
01:16:40,000 --> 01:16:44,200
Speaker 1: at creating multi channel sound in the domestic market. Tell

1476
01:16:44,240 --> 01:16:49,559
Speaker 1: me two albums that you've remixed that you're like the

1477
01:16:49,600 --> 01:16:54,320
Speaker 1: most or you're proud of stuff. M Well, there's different criteria.

1478
01:16:54,360 --> 01:16:55,920
Speaker 1: Then there were some that I'm proud of because I

1479
01:16:55,960 --> 01:17:01,200
Speaker 1: feel we made the most improvement in the sound, and

1480
01:17:01,760 --> 01:17:05,240
Speaker 1: Aqua Lung would be pretty near the top of the list,

1481
01:17:05,240 --> 01:17:07,559
Speaker 1: if not the top of the list, because that was

1482
01:17:07,680 --> 01:17:09,880
Speaker 1: not as as I mentioned before, to that had a

1483
01:17:09,880 --> 01:17:15,519
Speaker 1: problematic original mixdown phase. So being able to really clean

1484
01:17:15,560 --> 01:17:17,280
Speaker 1: that up and make it shine and sound like it

1485
01:17:17,479 --> 01:17:20,519
Speaker 1: never sounded before, I had a mensum out of proud

1486
01:17:20,800 --> 01:17:23,960
Speaker 1: pride of doing that in terms of actual creatively, the

1487
01:17:24,439 --> 01:17:28,800
Speaker 1: most challenging but probably the most rewarding, Seeds of Love

1488
01:17:28,880 --> 01:17:35,560
Speaker 1: by Tears for Fears was a nightmare to do, uh,

1489
01:17:35,600 --> 01:17:37,679
Speaker 1: but it's one of my favorite records of all time,

1490
01:17:38,280 --> 01:17:42,480
Speaker 1: and the final result was incredibly rewarding just a beautifully

1491
01:17:42,479 --> 01:17:47,160
Speaker 1: recorded album with great playing, great songs, great performances, but

1492
01:17:47,439 --> 01:17:50,479
Speaker 1: an early generation of digital recording. And another album that

1493
01:17:50,520 --> 01:17:53,760
Speaker 1: took three years to make was recorded multiple times in

1494
01:17:53,800 --> 01:17:57,479
Speaker 1: different studios with different lineups, different arrangements, and then the

1495
01:17:57,520 --> 01:18:00,360
Speaker 1: final versions of the songs would be one version of

1496
01:18:00,400 --> 01:18:03,519
Speaker 1: the song recorded in this year with this band stitched

1497
01:18:03,520 --> 01:18:05,960
Speaker 1: onto another version of the song done two years later

1498
01:18:06,000 --> 01:18:08,080
Speaker 1: in a different studio with a different engineer and a

1499
01:18:08,080 --> 01:18:10,600
Speaker 1: different band. I mean, it was just a nightmare to

1500
01:18:10,640 --> 01:18:14,080
Speaker 1: piece it together, but I'm very proud that I did

1501
01:18:14,280 --> 01:18:16,600
Speaker 1: and persevered and we got through to the other end,

1502
01:18:16,640 --> 01:18:20,240
Speaker 1: and it sounds terrific. Okay, that was an album that

1503
01:18:20,320 --> 01:18:25,360
Speaker 1: was recorded digitally from source, yes, yeah, And what machine

1504
01:18:25,400 --> 01:18:27,640
Speaker 1: did they use? Do they do use the Mitsubishi or

1505
01:18:27,640 --> 01:18:30,040
Speaker 1: do you know? I think I think it was the Mitsubishi. Yes,

1506
01:18:30,080 --> 01:18:32,880
Speaker 1: And it was recorded forty eight forty eight K, which

1507
01:18:32,920 --> 01:18:34,800
Speaker 1: was you know, that was all the digital machines were

1508
01:18:34,840 --> 01:18:37,200
Speaker 1: capable of then. But you know what, when digital is

1509
01:18:37,200 --> 01:18:39,840
Speaker 1: recorded well, it can still sound amazing. I'll tell you

1510
01:18:39,880 --> 01:18:43,160
Speaker 1: another example, Skylarking by EXTC another out my remix, which

1511
01:18:43,160 --> 01:18:45,240
Speaker 1: is a beautiful you know, recorded by Todd of course

1512
01:18:46,160 --> 01:18:52,240
Speaker 1: up in Woodstock, and that was recorded. I think, no,

1513
01:18:52,360 --> 01:18:53,920
Speaker 1: maybe I'm thinking the wrong album. No, it's not that

1514
01:18:53,920 --> 01:18:56,360
Speaker 1: album's Oranges and Lemons, the follow up to Skylarking, not

1515
01:18:56,439 --> 01:18:59,439
Speaker 1: the Todd one. Oranges and Lemons was recorded at forty

1516
01:18:59,520 --> 01:19:03,720
Speaker 1: eight A sixteen bit, which is like CD resolution. But

1517
01:19:03,760 --> 01:19:06,720
Speaker 1: you know what, it sounds amazing. It sounds amazing, And

1518
01:19:06,760 --> 01:19:09,920
Speaker 1: I think sometimes people forget that a great producer and

1519
01:19:09,960 --> 01:19:12,559
Speaker 1: a great engineer is a lot more important than the

1520
01:19:12,600 --> 01:19:17,080
Speaker 1: resolution of the recording. Um, those things are, obviously, they

1521
01:19:17,120 --> 01:19:20,160
Speaker 1: are important. I'm not saying they're not. But the fact

1522
01:19:20,240 --> 01:19:22,040
Speaker 1: that the album sounds as good as it done when

1523
01:19:22,040 --> 01:19:24,479
Speaker 1: it was a relatively low you know, in terms of

1524
01:19:24,479 --> 01:19:29,880
Speaker 1: digital terms, quite primitive forty eight K sixteen bit sounds phenomenal.

1525
01:19:30,200 --> 01:19:32,400
Speaker 1: Let's talk about that Tard albums. I discussed this with

1526
01:19:32,439 --> 01:19:37,080
Speaker 1: Tard himself. I find there's a signature kind of high

1527
01:19:37,200 --> 01:19:41,719
Speaker 1: end compressed sound that his records have in the final mix.

1528
01:19:42,680 --> 01:19:46,240
Speaker 1: Did you find his mixes like that different from other mixes?

1529
01:19:46,280 --> 01:19:49,360
Speaker 1: Did you have a take on that? Yeah, his mixes

1530
01:19:49,400 --> 01:19:51,880
Speaker 1: are quite eccentric, in a in a in a in

1531
01:19:51,880 --> 01:19:55,000
Speaker 1: a good way. Um, And of course wasn't particularly a

1532
01:19:55,040 --> 01:19:57,240
Speaker 1: fan of the original mix. Andy Partrish wasn't a fan

1533
01:19:57,280 --> 01:20:03,840
Speaker 1: of the original mix. Um Todd's mixes are quite um.

1534
01:20:03,880 --> 01:20:09,360
Speaker 1: They're quite sort of murky in a nice way. Um

1535
01:20:10,840 --> 01:20:13,400
Speaker 1: quite homogenized. There's not a lot of clarity, and there's

1536
01:20:13,439 --> 01:20:15,160
Speaker 1: not a lot of detail. There is that kind of

1537
01:20:15,600 --> 01:20:18,920
Speaker 1: slightly muddy top end, which I think is what you're

1538
01:20:18,960 --> 01:20:21,000
Speaker 1: kind of alluding to. This very much a signature to

1539
01:20:21,040 --> 01:20:23,559
Speaker 1: the way the top end on his record sound, which

1540
01:20:23,720 --> 01:20:28,520
Speaker 1: doesn't doesn't allow the instruments to really have clarity or separation,

1541
01:20:29,320 --> 01:20:31,840
Speaker 1: and I wonder if that's something he likes. He likes

1542
01:20:31,880 --> 01:20:34,679
Speaker 1: the fact that mused the all instruments in a sense

1543
01:20:35,360 --> 01:20:39,200
Speaker 1: combine into this kind of cohesive sound rather than sounding

1544
01:20:39,240 --> 01:20:42,800
Speaker 1: like different instruments in a in a mix. If you,

1545
01:20:42,840 --> 01:20:44,680
Speaker 1: if you, if you see what I'm getting at. So

1546
01:20:44,760 --> 01:20:46,960
Speaker 1: what we were doing with the remix was trying to

1547
01:20:47,000 --> 01:20:49,160
Speaker 1: get into the mix and put some air around the

1548
01:20:49,200 --> 01:20:52,320
Speaker 1: different instruments, which was definitely what Andy wanted. I mean,

1549
01:20:52,360 --> 01:20:53,920
Speaker 1: that's what he wanted at the time, and he didn't

1550
01:20:53,960 --> 01:20:56,519
Speaker 1: get it. So we were kind of trying to reetro

1551
01:20:56,800 --> 01:21:00,320
Speaker 1: retroactively put some of that separation and clarity back into

1552
01:21:00,320 --> 01:21:02,240
Speaker 1: the album. You know, again, one of my favorite albums

1553
01:21:02,280 --> 01:21:04,439
Speaker 1: of all times. So that that was that was one

1554
01:21:04,479 --> 01:21:06,720
Speaker 1: of my favorite projects I've done year for sure. One

1555
01:21:06,720 --> 01:21:08,519
Speaker 1: would say at the end you ended up with a

1556
01:21:08,560 --> 01:21:11,639
Speaker 1: product that was somewhat different from the one the fans

1557
01:21:11,640 --> 01:21:16,240
Speaker 1: were used to. In that case, we did. Yeah, I

1558
01:21:16,280 --> 01:21:18,400
Speaker 1: have no idea how he made it sound like he did.

1559
01:21:18,520 --> 01:21:21,760
Speaker 1: There is there are occasions where I simply, you know,

1560
01:21:21,840 --> 01:21:24,520
Speaker 1: for all, for all my ambitions to try and replicate

1561
01:21:24,560 --> 01:21:27,760
Speaker 1: the stereo as closely as possible, there are times when

1562
01:21:27,800 --> 01:21:31,040
Speaker 1: I just cannot get close to I cannot figure out

1563
01:21:31,360 --> 01:21:34,840
Speaker 1: why it sounds the way it does. So in that sense,

1564
01:21:34,880 --> 01:21:36,599
Speaker 1: I just have to get as close. And it could

1565
01:21:36,640 --> 01:21:39,400
Speaker 1: be as simple as they were using some piece of

1566
01:21:39,479 --> 01:21:43,479
Speaker 1: outboard gear that was specially made for them. It was

1567
01:21:43,520 --> 01:21:46,519
Speaker 1: kind of, you know, a a piece of equipment that

1568
01:21:46,560 --> 01:21:49,240
Speaker 1: had been made by some boffin that Todd knew that

1569
01:21:49,280 --> 01:21:51,120
Speaker 1: he was putting through all his mixes through and it

1570
01:21:51,479 --> 01:21:53,920
Speaker 1: did something weird to the mix, and nobody quite knew

1571
01:21:53,920 --> 01:21:55,880
Speaker 1: what it was. I mean, they're all those stories about

1572
01:21:55,880 --> 01:21:57,519
Speaker 1: those things that come out of Abbey Road, you know,

1573
01:21:57,640 --> 01:22:01,960
Speaker 1: the special Perry combobulator that they put all the tracks

1574
01:22:01,960 --> 01:22:04,080
Speaker 1: through that made it sound like an Abbey Road mix,

1575
01:22:04,160 --> 01:22:06,559
Speaker 1: you know, and all those things are very coveted by

1576
01:22:06,600 --> 01:22:10,879
Speaker 1: collectors of analog outboard equipment. I don't know, so sometimes

1577
01:22:10,920 --> 01:22:13,519
Speaker 1: I cannot get close and I do feel like, you know,

1578
01:22:13,560 --> 01:22:17,000
Speaker 1: I just have to do the best I can. Had

1579
01:22:17,040 --> 01:22:19,200
Speaker 1: you end up working with Chicago, that's the one act

1580
01:22:19,240 --> 01:22:23,080
Speaker 1: that sticks out your catalog. So that was Steve. Would

1581
01:22:23,080 --> 01:22:26,719
Speaker 1: you know Steve Willard over over Rhino in l a step.

1582
01:22:27,000 --> 01:22:28,760
Speaker 1: I know the guys we started Rynod with Steve. I

1583
01:22:28,800 --> 01:22:32,720
Speaker 1: do not now, Okay, so Steve, Steve the Ready way.

1584
01:22:32,760 --> 01:22:35,160
Speaker 1: He's not the red hair guy, is he? Do you know?

1585
01:22:35,200 --> 01:22:36,680
Speaker 1: I've only met him in person I think once, and

1586
01:22:36,720 --> 01:22:38,320
Speaker 1: it was a few years ago because over in l

1587
01:22:38,360 --> 01:22:40,559
Speaker 1: a hem, not really important. I'm thinking now I think

1588
01:22:40,600 --> 01:22:42,360
Speaker 1: I do not, but keep going. I think he's a

1589
01:22:42,400 --> 01:22:44,960
Speaker 1: lovely guy. Anyway, he asked me, He asked me, and

1590
01:22:45,240 --> 01:22:49,240
Speaker 1: that was that was a That was a slightly interesting

1591
01:22:49,280 --> 01:22:51,840
Speaker 1: project because the band didn't really know who I was,

1592
01:22:52,120 --> 01:22:55,240
Speaker 1: and they weren't right. It kind of involved in the project,

1593
01:22:55,240 --> 01:22:58,800
Speaker 1: which is unusual for me because usually one of my

1594
01:22:59,800 --> 01:23:02,360
Speaker 1: I wouldn't say it's one of my stipulations, but it's

1595
01:23:02,400 --> 01:23:06,040
Speaker 1: certainly one of my requests, strong requests, is that I

1596
01:23:06,080 --> 01:23:08,919
Speaker 1: would like the band to be on board and approving everything,

1597
01:23:09,840 --> 01:23:14,160
Speaker 1: um and with Chicago. For whatever reason, Steve was like, no, no,

1598
01:23:14,240 --> 01:23:16,000
Speaker 1: the band are interested, but they're happy for me, you know,

1599
01:23:16,320 --> 01:23:18,559
Speaker 1: you know, do it. And when it came out, the

1600
01:23:18,640 --> 01:23:21,559
Speaker 1: fans really liked it. And then there was a couple

1601
01:23:21,600 --> 01:23:24,480
Speaker 1: of comments from the band that were a bit snotty

1602
01:23:24,520 --> 01:23:27,680
Speaker 1: about it. This kind of English geeks done this mix,

1603
01:23:27,760 --> 01:23:31,800
Speaker 1: we don't know, and then um, you know. And then

1604
01:23:32,080 --> 01:23:34,240
Speaker 1: the next one they got there they got the Chicago

1605
01:23:34,240 --> 01:23:35,920
Speaker 1: Transit Authority in the the first time, they got it done

1606
01:23:35,920 --> 01:23:38,240
Speaker 1: by their own guy, and I don't know what happened there,

1607
01:23:38,240 --> 01:23:41,000
Speaker 1: but obviously they decided after that they didn't want me

1608
01:23:41,040 --> 01:23:44,160
Speaker 1: to do anymore. But no, So that one was, you know,

1609
01:23:44,200 --> 01:23:46,880
Speaker 1: these projects can come from management, they can come from

1610
01:23:46,920 --> 01:23:49,200
Speaker 1: record label, and they can come from artists. In that case,

1611
01:23:49,240 --> 01:23:52,840
Speaker 1: it definitely came from from Steve at the record label. Yeah,

1612
01:23:52,840 --> 01:23:54,320
Speaker 1: he wanted me to do it, and I was very

1613
01:23:54,320 --> 01:23:57,600
Speaker 1: happy to do it. Okay, Traditionally the actors not the engineer.

1614
01:23:58,000 --> 01:24:00,479
Speaker 1: Do you ever talk to the mixer or the engineer

1615
01:24:00,520 --> 01:24:02,360
Speaker 1: on some of these projects to find out where they

1616
01:24:02,360 --> 01:24:05,880
Speaker 1: were coming from, what they did very occasionally. Most of them,

1617
01:24:05,880 --> 01:24:10,120
Speaker 1: to be fair, are either dead or retired, so you know,

1618
01:24:10,400 --> 01:24:12,400
Speaker 1: I can't talk to Eddie offered about doing the Yes

1619
01:24:12,439 --> 01:24:14,880
Speaker 1: mixes because he's retired. He's not interested. But I did

1620
01:24:14,880 --> 01:24:17,160
Speaker 1: speak to Hugh Pagem, I spoke about one of the

1621
01:24:17,240 --> 01:24:20,200
Speaker 1: XTC mixes I did. I spoke to Dave Bascombe, who

1622
01:24:20,240 --> 01:24:23,440
Speaker 1: recorded Seeds of Love for Tears for Fears, for example.

1623
01:24:24,200 --> 01:24:27,200
Speaker 1: So yeah, I've occasionally sort sought their kind of input,

1624
01:24:27,280 --> 01:24:33,479
Speaker 1: no doubt, to dream projects you haven't yet done. Oh wow.

1625
01:24:34,360 --> 01:24:37,080
Speaker 1: Kate Bush has always been top of my list. Um.

1626
01:24:37,800 --> 01:24:41,600
Speaker 1: I just think her albums would be so perfect for

1627
01:24:41,920 --> 01:24:46,519
Speaker 1: surround um that it's frustrating to me, not even that

1628
01:24:46,640 --> 01:24:48,160
Speaker 1: I would do it, but just that no one is

1629
01:24:48,200 --> 01:24:51,280
Speaker 1: doing it. But apparently she's she's not she's not interested.

1630
01:24:51,360 --> 01:24:55,000
Speaker 1: She's not if she's just not heard surround, or she

1631
01:24:55,080 --> 01:24:57,559
Speaker 1: has and she just didn't particularly care for it as

1632
01:24:57,600 --> 01:25:01,880
Speaker 1: an idea. So yeah, Kate, Kate would be And and

1633
01:25:02,000 --> 01:25:05,519
Speaker 1: the Prince Catalog. The Prince Catalog. Prince was my when

1634
01:25:05,520 --> 01:25:07,479
Speaker 1: I was growing up in the eighties. Prince was was

1635
01:25:07,560 --> 01:25:09,599
Speaker 1: my hero. He was the guy that had posters on

1636
01:25:09,600 --> 01:25:11,840
Speaker 1: my wall, and to be able to get my hands

1637
01:25:11,880 --> 01:25:15,559
Speaker 1: on on Parade or Purple Rain or any of those

1638
01:25:15,600 --> 01:25:18,519
Speaker 1: seminar eighties records would would be a dream. I mean,

1639
01:25:18,520 --> 01:25:20,200
Speaker 1: just to be able to go into his world. I mean,

1640
01:25:20,240 --> 01:25:23,640
Speaker 1: for me, the single most gifted musician the world of

1641
01:25:23,680 --> 01:25:26,639
Speaker 1: pop has ever produced, to be able to go into

1642
01:25:26,680 --> 01:25:30,280
Speaker 1: his world and deconstruct and reconstruct the music would just

1643
01:25:30,360 --> 01:25:33,599
Speaker 1: be mind blowing for me to be able to do that. Okay,

1644
01:25:33,680 --> 01:25:37,800
Speaker 1: so this lead deep. Are you a musician or a remixer?

1645
01:25:38,200 --> 01:25:40,599
Speaker 1: And how do you split up the time into what degree?

1646
01:25:40,640 --> 01:25:43,680
Speaker 1: Are you frustrated by one or the other? Oh? I

1647
01:25:43,720 --> 01:25:46,400
Speaker 1: mean my job is to make my own records, and

1648
01:25:46,400 --> 01:25:49,000
Speaker 1: and that would allay. That is always my priority to

1649
01:25:49,040 --> 01:25:50,920
Speaker 1: make my own records. That's what That's what I feel

1650
01:25:50,920 --> 01:25:52,400
Speaker 1: I was put on this earth to do, not to

1651
01:25:53,520 --> 01:25:56,840
Speaker 1: not to tart up other people's records, you know, the

1652
01:25:56,920 --> 01:25:58,920
Speaker 1: tarting up of the old other people? Sorry, is that

1653
01:25:58,920 --> 01:26:01,240
Speaker 1: an amerrit Do you have that express in America times? No?

1654
01:26:01,320 --> 01:26:05,200
Speaker 1: We don't. Just watching a Last Night and you know

1655
01:26:05,280 --> 01:26:07,479
Speaker 1: they had someone using an expression they don't use and

1656
01:26:07,560 --> 01:26:10,160
Speaker 1: ran and everybody got freed out. So it's kind of funny.

1657
01:26:10,160 --> 01:26:12,400
Speaker 1: It sounds bad, but I don't know what you're talking

1658
01:26:12,400 --> 01:26:14,800
Speaker 1: about it, but they don't. There's certain things that don't

1659
01:26:14,840 --> 01:26:18,040
Speaker 1: mean such a negative things in the UK. It's not rude.

1660
01:26:18,080 --> 01:26:20,040
Speaker 1: Don't worry, it's not rude. It just means to basically,

1661
01:26:20,040 --> 01:26:22,400
Speaker 1: you know, give give something a sort of clean you know,

1662
01:26:22,560 --> 01:26:24,439
Speaker 1: clean up a bit, or make it look better than

1663
01:26:24,439 --> 01:26:26,599
Speaker 1: it deserves to, or or make it look as good

1664
01:26:26,600 --> 01:26:28,439
Speaker 1: as it deserves too in the case of these albums.

1665
01:26:28,800 --> 01:26:31,680
Speaker 1: So you know, that's not my job. My job is

1666
01:26:31,680 --> 01:26:34,559
Speaker 1: not to but it's become a sideline and you know what,

1667
01:26:34,560 --> 01:26:37,360
Speaker 1: it's one I love to do. And you know, I

1668
01:26:37,760 --> 01:26:40,000
Speaker 1: keep saying to myself, I'm going to try and try

1669
01:26:40,000 --> 01:26:42,080
Speaker 1: and you know, back off doing as much as I've

1670
01:26:42,120 --> 01:26:44,680
Speaker 1: been doing. But then people keep approaching me with these

1671
01:26:44,720 --> 01:26:47,360
Speaker 1: amazing albums. You know, I'm not going to say no

1672
01:26:48,400 --> 01:26:51,160
Speaker 1: when you know, if principal cap Bush ever did come on,

1673
01:26:51,160 --> 01:26:52,720
Speaker 1: I'm not going to say no. I'm not going to

1674
01:26:52,800 --> 01:26:55,360
Speaker 1: say no when I get asked to do XTC Skylarking

1675
01:26:55,479 --> 01:26:59,360
Speaker 1: or songs from the Big Chair. Of course I'm not so.

1676
01:27:00,120 --> 01:27:01,880
Speaker 1: And as I say, I think there's also an element

1677
01:27:01,920 --> 01:27:05,360
Speaker 1: that it is feeding back into what I do as

1678
01:27:05,360 --> 01:27:09,720
Speaker 1: an artist. Anyway, I've learned so much from from from

1679
01:27:09,760 --> 01:27:12,160
Speaker 1: being able to go inside this music. I mean, what

1680
01:27:12,320 --> 01:27:16,880
Speaker 1: better education could there be for someone who likes who

1681
01:27:16,880 --> 01:27:21,040
Speaker 1: believes in sonic excellent excellence and it's fascinated with production

1682
01:27:21,800 --> 01:27:24,280
Speaker 1: um and the techniques of the past and present. What

1683
01:27:24,439 --> 01:27:26,800
Speaker 1: better education could there be than to be able to

1684
01:27:26,840 --> 01:27:30,280
Speaker 1: go inside these classic records and actually have to figure

1685
01:27:30,280 --> 01:27:33,559
Speaker 1: out for yourself because nobody's apart from those engineers that

1686
01:27:33,560 --> 01:27:36,160
Speaker 1: gave me a little help, they don't remember, they don't

1687
01:27:36,160 --> 01:27:37,840
Speaker 1: remember how they did, They don't remember a lot of

1688
01:27:37,880 --> 01:27:39,800
Speaker 1: the time how they got those sounds. So I have

1689
01:27:39,840 --> 01:27:42,519
Speaker 1: to figure out for myself, and in doing so, those

1690
01:27:42,560 --> 01:27:45,240
Speaker 1: things become part of my own tool kit. So the

1691
01:27:45,320 --> 01:27:47,400
Speaker 1: answer your question, Bob, it's definitely. You know, my day

1692
01:27:47,520 --> 01:27:50,519
Speaker 1: job is doing what I do as as a musician

1693
01:27:50,520 --> 01:27:53,040
Speaker 1: as a songwriter. But I'm very very happy to do

1694
01:27:53,080 --> 01:27:55,240
Speaker 1: this too. I know every year is different, but what

1695
01:27:55,360 --> 01:27:58,160
Speaker 1: percentage of your time has spent on your music as

1696
01:27:58,200 --> 01:28:03,160
Speaker 1: opposed to working on someone else's. I think it's eight twenty.

1697
01:28:03,439 --> 01:28:05,599
Speaker 1: I mean, as I say, if I get a well

1698
01:28:05,640 --> 01:28:08,800
Speaker 1: recorded album record on twenty four tracks, I can turn

1699
01:28:08,880 --> 01:28:11,760
Speaker 1: it around probably in a week without feeling like I'm

1700
01:28:11,840 --> 01:28:14,639
Speaker 1: rushing it turn around in a week, and I'm doing

1701
01:28:14,800 --> 01:28:18,240
Speaker 1: maybe seven eight albums a year, So you can figure

1702
01:28:18,280 --> 01:28:19,800
Speaker 1: out from that that may be spending a couple of

1703
01:28:19,880 --> 01:28:24,640
Speaker 1: months a year working on the back catalog remixing projects.

1704
01:28:25,600 --> 01:28:29,040
Speaker 1: The next question would be where are you making your money?

1705
01:28:29,040 --> 01:28:33,920
Speaker 1: Are you making your money primarily from those projects? From

1706
01:28:33,960 --> 01:28:37,720
Speaker 1: going on the road? Music itself doesn't generate as much

1707
01:28:37,800 --> 01:28:40,639
Speaker 1: revenue as used to unless you're drink. I think I've

1708
01:28:40,680 --> 01:28:44,280
Speaker 1: been quite fortunate. I have a I have a substantial

1709
01:28:44,640 --> 01:28:49,240
Speaker 1: back catalog. Some would say there's too many records I've made,

1710
01:28:49,280 --> 01:28:50,519
Speaker 1: and I would be one of those people. I've made

1711
01:28:50,560 --> 01:28:53,439
Speaker 1: too many records over the years. But because I've made

1712
01:28:53,439 --> 01:28:55,240
Speaker 1: a lot of records, and I have a very very

1713
01:28:55,280 --> 01:28:59,639
Speaker 1: loyal fan base which continues to grow incrementally continues to grow,

1714
01:29:00,720 --> 01:29:03,840
Speaker 1: my back catalog generate is pretty good income for me.

1715
01:29:04,320 --> 01:29:06,880
Speaker 1: I'm never going to be, you know, multimillion or anything

1716
01:29:06,960 --> 01:29:08,280
Speaker 1: like that, but I don't want to be. I don't

1717
01:29:08,280 --> 01:29:11,439
Speaker 1: need to be. I'm very comfortable. I've managed to make

1718
01:29:11,439 --> 01:29:15,000
Speaker 1: a career by basically doing what the hell I want

1719
01:29:15,760 --> 01:29:18,760
Speaker 1: and not many people can say that, And I continue

1720
01:29:19,160 --> 01:29:21,320
Speaker 1: to make it, continue to make a career by doing

1721
01:29:21,680 --> 01:29:26,120
Speaker 1: what the hell I want musically speaking, uh and creatively speaking,

1722
01:29:26,160 --> 01:29:28,920
Speaker 1: I'm completely fulfilled. So my I'm make enough money from

1723
01:29:28,920 --> 01:29:30,519
Speaker 1: my back castalk and I get paid a little bit

1724
01:29:30,560 --> 01:29:34,599
Speaker 1: to do these remix projects too. It's it's um, it's um.

1725
01:29:34,640 --> 01:29:36,840
Speaker 1: It's not why I do them, and it doesn't matter

1726
01:29:36,920 --> 01:29:39,000
Speaker 1: to me, but it's always appreciated when there is a

1727
01:29:39,040 --> 01:29:42,200
Speaker 1: budget from the label or the artist or whatever. You said.

1728
01:29:42,240 --> 01:29:45,760
Speaker 1: You recently got married. Is this your first marriage? It is?

1729
01:29:46,320 --> 01:29:48,360
Speaker 1: And what was the motivation of this lead deep to

1730
01:29:48,400 --> 01:29:52,360
Speaker 1: get married? I fell in love. I fell in love, Bob,

1731
01:29:52,800 --> 01:29:54,280
Speaker 1: I fell in love. You know. I always thought that

1732
01:29:54,280 --> 01:29:55,720
Speaker 1: I wasn't the sort of person who would ever get

1733
01:29:55,760 --> 01:30:00,400
Speaker 1: married and have kids. But then I met my wife, Hydrometer. Well,

1734
01:30:00,439 --> 01:30:03,639
Speaker 1: I actually met her. I met her twenty years ago,

1735
01:30:03,640 --> 01:30:06,160
Speaker 1: although we only we really got together properly about four

1736
01:30:06,240 --> 01:30:08,920
Speaker 1: years ago. I originally met her twenty years ago. She's Israeli.

1737
01:30:08,960 --> 01:30:11,599
Speaker 1: She's from Israel. I met her twenty years ago when

1738
01:30:11,640 --> 01:30:14,639
Speaker 1: she's a very young young lady. She was only eighteen

1739
01:30:14,720 --> 01:30:17,360
Speaker 1: years old at the time I met her backstage at

1740
01:30:17,400 --> 01:30:20,040
Speaker 1: a gig in Israel where she was working for the promoter.

1741
01:30:20,600 --> 01:30:22,280
Speaker 1: She wasn't a fan, she didn't know who I was.

1742
01:30:23,240 --> 01:30:27,599
Speaker 1: But we we kept in touch for many, many years,

1743
01:30:27,640 --> 01:30:30,800
Speaker 1: and about four years ago, um, and she did in

1744
01:30:30,840 --> 01:30:34,559
Speaker 1: the meantime had two kids and I hadn't, so we

1745
01:30:34,560 --> 01:30:36,720
Speaker 1: we got together about four years ago and the rest

1746
01:30:36,840 --> 01:30:38,600
Speaker 1: is history, as they say. So I'm now a stepfather

1747
01:30:38,640 --> 01:30:40,960
Speaker 1: as well as as well as her husband. Now four

1748
01:30:41,040 --> 01:30:43,160
Speaker 1: years ago when she still living in Israel, or she

1749
01:30:43,240 --> 01:30:45,320
Speaker 1: moved to the UK. Now she moved to the UK

1750
01:30:45,439 --> 01:30:47,280
Speaker 1: a long, long time, many years ago. In fact, her

1751
01:30:47,280 --> 01:30:50,760
Speaker 1: first marriage had also been in England. So we've kind

1752
01:30:50,760 --> 01:30:53,120
Speaker 1: of been in touch all this time. Yeah, Well, it's

1753
01:30:53,120 --> 01:30:55,439
Speaker 1: always tough when you're an artist and you're living in

1754
01:30:55,479 --> 01:30:59,040
Speaker 1: your own head so much to balance home life in

1755
01:30:59,080 --> 01:31:03,800
Speaker 1: work life. And sometimes they're significant others who accept less

1756
01:31:03,840 --> 01:31:05,960
Speaker 1: time and other people don't. So what's it like now

1757
01:31:06,000 --> 01:31:08,719
Speaker 1: that you're married. It's really been four years you said

1758
01:31:09,439 --> 01:31:11,400
Speaker 1: it's been two years. No, it's been eighteen months since

1759
01:31:11,439 --> 01:31:13,960
Speaker 1: we got married and kind of bought a house together,

1760
01:31:14,040 --> 01:31:15,960
Speaker 1: and most of that time I haven't been on the road,

1761
01:31:16,200 --> 01:31:17,920
Speaker 1: if at all of that time I have been on

1762
01:31:17,960 --> 01:31:20,240
Speaker 1: the road for you know, and during the last year

1763
01:31:20,280 --> 01:31:22,840
Speaker 1: for obvious reasons. But the last time I actually played

1764
01:31:22,840 --> 01:31:25,439
Speaker 1: a show was towards the beginning of two thousand nineteen.

1765
01:31:25,680 --> 01:31:27,920
Speaker 1: So you know, I've been enjoying I've I've since we

1766
01:31:28,000 --> 01:31:29,920
Speaker 1: moved into the new house. I've built my new studio.

1767
01:31:29,960 --> 01:31:34,320
Speaker 1: It's actually the first time I've really had a proper studio.

1768
01:31:34,360 --> 01:31:37,800
Speaker 1: I mean every time, every every studio I've had before

1769
01:31:37,840 --> 01:31:39,839
Speaker 1: that has really been whichever room I put my computer

1770
01:31:39,920 --> 01:31:43,719
Speaker 1: into my guitars, and that's been quote unquote the studio.

1771
01:31:44,240 --> 01:31:46,719
Speaker 1: And I actually this time, we bought a new house together,

1772
01:31:46,920 --> 01:31:49,880
Speaker 1: we built a proper studio, a proper room on the

1773
01:31:49,920 --> 01:31:53,320
Speaker 1: side of the house, proper acoustically treated, and it's the

1774
01:31:53,360 --> 01:31:55,479
Speaker 1: first time I've had a really special room. And of

1775
01:31:55,520 --> 01:31:57,960
Speaker 1: course it's all been made dogby atmost compatible, which is

1776
01:31:58,000 --> 01:32:00,360
Speaker 1: great to be able to do that. So I've been

1777
01:32:00,479 --> 01:32:04,000
Speaker 1: enjoying eighteen months being home, being married, being with the kids,

1778
01:32:04,360 --> 01:32:08,040
Speaker 1: um doing a lot of work in the studio, and

1779
01:32:08,080 --> 01:32:11,439
Speaker 1: not having to worry about motivating myself to go out

1780
01:32:11,439 --> 01:32:13,679
Speaker 1: on the road, although I'm beginning to miss that obviously,

1781
01:32:13,720 --> 01:32:15,160
Speaker 1: I am, and that's a big part of what I

1782
01:32:15,240 --> 01:32:17,679
Speaker 1: love to do well. Are you the type of person

1783
01:32:18,120 --> 01:32:20,880
Speaker 1: who works strict hours or you're getting to run and

1784
01:32:20,920 --> 01:32:23,240
Speaker 1: you might work till two in the morning, or you

1785
01:32:23,360 --> 01:32:26,600
Speaker 1: start for dinner at a specific time. I have a

1786
01:32:26,600 --> 01:32:29,519
Speaker 1: pretty good work ethic, you know. So the answer is

1787
01:32:29,720 --> 01:32:31,439
Speaker 1: the answer to your question is the latter. I do

1788
01:32:31,520 --> 01:32:34,280
Speaker 1: have a kind of time. I kind of go to

1789
01:32:34,320 --> 01:32:36,559
Speaker 1: the studio around midday and I will work to about

1790
01:32:36,560 --> 01:32:37,960
Speaker 1: seven or eight in the evening, and then I'll stop

1791
01:32:38,000 --> 01:32:40,519
Speaker 1: to have dinner with my family, and then after that

1792
01:32:40,560 --> 01:32:42,840
Speaker 1: I'll spend the evening with my wife, watching TV, watching

1793
01:32:42,880 --> 01:32:46,639
Speaker 1: a movie, listening to records. So the days of me

1794
01:32:46,680 --> 01:32:48,280
Speaker 1: I used to I think I used to do that

1795
01:32:48,280 --> 01:32:49,760
Speaker 1: thing of going through till two in the morning. But

1796
01:32:49,800 --> 01:32:51,559
Speaker 1: those days, you know a lot of people say that,

1797
01:32:51,600 --> 01:32:53,559
Speaker 1: don't they As they get older, I think they stopped

1798
01:32:53,560 --> 01:32:56,400
Speaker 1: doing that burning the midnight all thing and getting some

1799
01:32:56,439 --> 01:32:59,360
Speaker 1: more of a a routine. And I'm in that stage. Now.

1800
01:33:00,080 --> 01:33:02,840
Speaker 1: Let's go back to the new album. You have an

1801
01:33:02,840 --> 01:33:07,960
Speaker 1: incredible marketing plan with people. Can see the air quote

1802
01:33:08,120 --> 01:33:12,719
Speaker 1: your merchandise tell us about the generation of a thought

1803
01:33:12,760 --> 01:33:17,439
Speaker 1: behind that. So the idea with the album was I've

1804
01:33:17,439 --> 01:33:19,720
Speaker 1: always been fascinated by by this idea part, you know,

1805
01:33:19,800 --> 01:33:22,320
Speaker 1: part of the what we've been talking about during this conversation.

1806
01:33:22,360 --> 01:33:25,599
Speaker 1: This idea of trying to reconcile the idea of being

1807
01:33:25,640 --> 01:33:29,200
Speaker 1: a professional musician by also being completely true to yourself

1808
01:33:29,200 --> 01:33:31,680
Speaker 1: and having integrity, all that stuff. Blah blah blah. It's

1809
01:33:31,680 --> 01:33:35,160
Speaker 1: a very hard, you know, tight rope to walk, and

1810
01:33:35,240 --> 01:33:37,799
Speaker 1: it's always fascinating me. This idea of music is commerce.

1811
01:33:37,960 --> 01:33:41,080
Speaker 1: How do you sell music? What is involved in selling music?

1812
01:33:41,240 --> 01:33:44,280
Speaker 1: How do you how do you if you're a creative person,

1813
01:33:44,320 --> 01:33:46,400
Speaker 1: how do you also get your brain to be involved

1814
01:33:46,840 --> 01:33:50,800
Speaker 1: in the commercial side of things, selling yourself, schmoozing and

1815
01:33:50,840 --> 01:33:53,320
Speaker 1: all that stuff we talked about. And I've been fascinated

1816
01:33:53,360 --> 01:33:54,639
Speaker 1: by that. And one of the things I've been really

1817
01:33:54,640 --> 01:33:56,760
Speaker 1: interested about is how what would it be like to

1818
01:33:56,840 --> 01:33:59,519
Speaker 1: sell a piece of music in the same way that

1819
01:33:59,560 --> 01:34:03,479
Speaker 1: apples are one of their products for example, um, and

1820
01:34:03,479 --> 01:34:05,920
Speaker 1: what would it be like to almost remind the listener

1821
01:34:06,000 --> 01:34:10,040
Speaker 1: relentlessly or the purchaser that they are involved in a

1822
01:34:10,080 --> 01:34:14,120
Speaker 1: financial transaction when theyre buy a record. So kind of

1823
01:34:14,200 --> 01:34:16,040
Speaker 1: riffing on that, I got together with the design and

1824
01:34:16,080 --> 01:34:17,799
Speaker 1: we came up with this idea, why don't we parody

1825
01:34:17,840 --> 01:34:20,800
Speaker 1: the world of high concept high design. This These companies

1826
01:34:20,800 --> 01:34:23,880
Speaker 1: that buy a fifty cent T shirt put their logo

1827
01:34:23,920 --> 01:34:26,320
Speaker 1: on it and then charge five dollars for it, like

1828
01:34:26,360 --> 01:34:30,439
Speaker 1: a company like Supreme, for example, and people love that.

1829
01:34:30,640 --> 01:34:33,360
Speaker 1: They love that, And what interests me about that is

1830
01:34:33,400 --> 01:34:37,040
Speaker 1: how it means that the purchasing of a lot of

1831
01:34:37,040 --> 01:34:39,719
Speaker 1: these items is no longer about the utility. It's about

1832
01:34:39,760 --> 01:34:43,639
Speaker 1: the ownership. It's about the status of owning the item

1833
01:34:44,080 --> 01:34:47,599
Speaker 1: rather than its utility. And I believe that applies very

1834
01:34:47,680 --> 01:34:50,400
Speaker 1: much to my world. You thought we talk about these

1835
01:34:50,439 --> 01:34:52,400
Speaker 1: deluxe edition box sets that are coming out of left,

1836
01:34:52,479 --> 01:34:54,360
Speaker 1: right and center these days, and this seems like barely

1837
01:34:54,360 --> 01:34:56,360
Speaker 1: a week goes past now and there's not ten more

1838
01:34:56,680 --> 01:35:00,320
Speaker 1: deluxe edition box sets being announced. These are absolute utely,

1839
01:35:00,720 --> 01:35:04,560
Speaker 1: I think, for most people about ownership rather than utility.

1840
01:35:04,760 --> 01:35:06,880
Speaker 1: Most of the contents of these box sets you will

1841
01:35:06,920 --> 01:35:10,160
Speaker 1: never listen to more than once. But it's nice to

1842
01:35:10,200 --> 01:35:12,800
Speaker 1: have them. It's fun to have them. It's fun to

1843
01:35:12,840 --> 01:35:15,559
Speaker 1: have the coffee table book. It's fun to have the

1844
01:35:15,560 --> 01:35:18,240
Speaker 1: CD of Demos, it's fun to have the CD of

1845
01:35:18,240 --> 01:35:20,960
Speaker 1: the Cleaned up board tape. It's fun to have the

1846
01:35:21,000 --> 01:35:23,080
Speaker 1: CD of the alternate mix, where the only difference is

1847
01:35:23,120 --> 01:35:25,320
Speaker 1: the backing vocals a bit further over to the left

1848
01:35:25,360 --> 01:35:28,000
Speaker 1: hand side of the stereo spectrum. Jimmy Page, I'm looking

1849
01:35:28,040 --> 01:35:30,559
Speaker 1: at you here with your led Zeppelin deluxe editions. It's

1850
01:35:30,600 --> 01:35:33,479
Speaker 1: kind of fun to have those things, but actually what

1851
01:35:33,520 --> 01:35:35,479
Speaker 1: you really need is the original album. That's all you

1852
01:35:35,560 --> 01:35:37,800
Speaker 1: really need. Maybe a five point one makes if you're

1853
01:35:37,800 --> 01:35:41,800
Speaker 1: into that thing too. So it's fascinating to me this

1854
01:35:41,920 --> 01:35:45,240
Speaker 1: world where things have moved towards ownership rather than use,

1855
01:35:45,800 --> 01:35:47,920
Speaker 1: and so we're kind of riffing off that with the

1856
01:35:48,080 --> 01:35:50,240
Speaker 1: with these kind of what I call high concept, high

1857
01:35:50,280 --> 01:35:53,240
Speaker 1: designer products. A can of air for two hundred dollars,

1858
01:35:53,280 --> 01:35:55,280
Speaker 1: by the way, doesn't really exist. It's it's not what

1859
01:35:55,320 --> 01:35:57,799
Speaker 1: I'm trying to say. You know, when you casual lookwards

1860
01:35:57,800 --> 01:36:00,559
Speaker 1: say it's sold out, but in it should when you

1861
01:36:00,600 --> 01:36:04,160
Speaker 1: click on there, there's like a laptop bag. Everything is

1862
01:36:04,200 --> 01:36:08,000
Speaker 1: exorbitantly praised, and that's when you realize it's a joke.

1863
01:36:08,720 --> 01:36:11,120
Speaker 1: It's a conceptual joke here, it's a conceptual gang. But

1864
01:36:11,200 --> 01:36:12,400
Speaker 1: you know, but the point is that a lot of

1865
01:36:12,439 --> 01:36:15,840
Speaker 1: these things are not completely ridiculous because there are I mean,

1866
01:36:15,880 --> 01:36:17,760
Speaker 1: they are ridiculous, But what I mean is they're not

1867
01:36:18,080 --> 01:36:20,840
Speaker 1: ridiculous in the sense there are companies out there that

1868
01:36:21,040 --> 01:36:23,519
Speaker 1: really are marketing things that are not a million miles

1869
01:36:23,520 --> 01:36:27,040
Speaker 1: away from these things. You know, paying a thousand bucks

1870
01:36:27,080 --> 01:36:29,800
Speaker 1: for a pair of sneakers just because it's got a

1871
01:36:29,800 --> 01:36:32,240
Speaker 1: particular logo on it. This is the kind of world

1872
01:36:32,240 --> 01:36:34,240
Speaker 1: I'm talking about. And also the other thing that kind

1873
01:36:34,240 --> 01:36:36,560
Speaker 1: of span off from this was this idea of the

1874
01:36:36,600 --> 01:36:40,000
Speaker 1: sort of elitism of limited editions. So we did one

1875
01:36:40,160 --> 01:36:42,200
Speaker 1: edition of the album, which is a limited edition of

1876
01:36:42,400 --> 01:36:45,240
Speaker 1: one copy, and we put it on so and by

1877
01:36:45,240 --> 01:36:46,960
Speaker 1: the way, this is real. This is not something we

1878
01:36:47,120 --> 01:36:49,760
Speaker 1: was a gag. This was real. We created myself and

1879
01:36:49,840 --> 01:36:54,599
Speaker 1: my designer created one a one edition, one sorry, one

1880
01:36:54,680 --> 01:36:58,080
Speaker 1: copy edition of one version of the album. That version

1881
01:36:58,080 --> 01:37:00,200
Speaker 1: of the album came in a big box which had

1882
01:37:00,200 --> 01:37:02,840
Speaker 1: a seven inch single with the song of which only

1883
01:37:03,040 --> 01:37:06,200
Speaker 1: one copy was pressed. It had it had my Grammy

1884
01:37:06,240 --> 01:37:10,400
Speaker 1: certificate and Grammy Medal nomination, It had handwritten lyrics, basically

1885
01:37:10,400 --> 01:37:13,120
Speaker 1: had a load of really exclusive stuff of which there

1886
01:37:13,160 --> 01:37:16,160
Speaker 1: was only one thing, you know, one version of that,

1887
01:37:16,720 --> 01:37:18,839
Speaker 1: and we put it on self a ten thousand pounds

1888
01:37:19,160 --> 01:37:21,160
Speaker 1: with all the money going to the Music Venue Trust,

1889
01:37:22,080 --> 01:37:24,599
Speaker 1: and it's sold out within five minutes, sold up within

1890
01:37:24,640 --> 01:37:27,680
Speaker 1: five minutes. And I love that because it played it

1891
01:37:27,800 --> 01:37:29,920
Speaker 1: kind of. Also, it's also playing on the idea of

1892
01:37:30,000 --> 01:37:33,920
Speaker 1: music selling music in the same way that art sells

1893
01:37:33,960 --> 01:37:36,680
Speaker 1: what it produces. So this idea that a painting or

1894
01:37:36,840 --> 01:37:41,559
Speaker 1: sculpture is produced in an addition of one and that

1895
01:37:41,680 --> 01:37:46,439
Speaker 1: one sells at a premium price. That's that's what basis

1896
01:37:46,520 --> 01:37:49,120
Speaker 1: that the whole world of art is predicated on. You know,

1897
01:37:49,160 --> 01:37:51,840
Speaker 1: you create one original piece, you sell it for an

1898
01:37:51,840 --> 01:37:54,599
Speaker 1: exorbitant price, and then the person that buys it has

1899
01:37:54,640 --> 01:37:56,880
Speaker 1: the choice to either share it by putting in an

1900
01:37:56,920 --> 01:37:59,160
Speaker 1: art gallery, or they can hang it over their front

1901
01:37:59,240 --> 01:38:00,920
Speaker 1: room and Frank hang it over their fireplace in the

1902
01:38:00,920 --> 01:38:02,559
Speaker 1: front room, and no one ever else gets to see it.

1903
01:38:02,600 --> 01:38:05,599
Speaker 1: That's their prerogative. And I was fascinated by what would

1904
01:38:05,640 --> 01:38:07,240
Speaker 1: be And I know I'm not the only person to

1905
01:38:07,280 --> 01:38:09,519
Speaker 1: do this. Woutan Clang did an album of one I

1906
01:38:09,560 --> 01:38:11,599
Speaker 1: think one copy a few years ago, which I think

1907
01:38:11,600 --> 01:38:15,120
Speaker 1: they sold from a million dollars. Uh, So I know

1908
01:38:15,200 --> 01:38:17,720
Speaker 1: this is not a completely original notion, but but it

1909
01:38:17,800 --> 01:38:20,640
Speaker 1: all kind of was riffing on this idea of elitism

1910
01:38:20,720 --> 01:38:25,960
Speaker 1: and snobbery and the idea of ownership rather than utility. Okay,

1911
01:38:26,400 --> 01:38:29,760
Speaker 1: a lot of people might be listening to this primarily

1912
01:38:29,840 --> 01:38:33,760
Speaker 1: for your remixes. Obviously we've talked about the new album,

1913
01:38:33,800 --> 01:38:35,639
Speaker 1: and you also said you have a lot of work.

1914
01:38:36,120 --> 01:38:40,080
Speaker 1: If you wanted them to further explore your work, where

1915
01:38:40,080 --> 01:38:42,879
Speaker 1: else should they look? I mean in terms of your catalog,

1916
01:38:44,080 --> 01:38:46,040
Speaker 1: It's very hard to question to us, I've done so

1917
01:38:46,080 --> 01:38:49,360
Speaker 1: many different kinds of records, So I mean, without knowing

1918
01:38:50,240 --> 01:38:52,200
Speaker 1: what the sort of agenda, what the agenda of the

1919
01:38:52,200 --> 01:38:54,840
Speaker 1: person you know that you'd be asking on behalf of

1920
01:38:55,040 --> 01:38:56,920
Speaker 1: is in terms of what their tastes are, I couldn't say.

1921
01:38:57,160 --> 01:39:00,479
Speaker 1: I think The Future Bites is probably my face record

1922
01:39:00,479 --> 01:39:02,479
Speaker 1: of all the records have ever made. Now. I know

1923
01:39:02,720 --> 01:39:04,880
Speaker 1: I say that every time I make a record, because

1924
01:39:04,920 --> 01:39:06,360
Speaker 1: I do say that every time I make a record.

1925
01:39:06,640 --> 01:39:09,240
Speaker 1: But there's something special about this record to me because

1926
01:39:09,240 --> 01:39:13,360
Speaker 1: it sounds completely like me, but it's completely a record

1927
01:39:13,400 --> 01:39:16,080
Speaker 1: of the now. It sounds like a record that could

1928
01:39:16,080 --> 01:39:19,120
Speaker 1: only have been made now. It's very contemporary sounding record.

1929
01:39:19,360 --> 01:39:20,880
Speaker 1: And I say that because I think a lot of

1930
01:39:20,880 --> 01:39:24,120
Speaker 1: my previous records have got more of a nostalgic element

1931
01:39:24,320 --> 01:39:27,559
Speaker 1: to them. If people are really into progressive rock, they

1932
01:39:27,640 --> 01:39:30,360
Speaker 1: probably like my album Hand Cannot Erase, for example. If

1933
01:39:30,400 --> 01:39:32,599
Speaker 1: people are really into metal, they probably like those early

1934
01:39:32,640 --> 01:39:36,360
Speaker 1: Porcupine Tree Lava Atlantic records like Fear of a Blank Planet.

1935
01:39:36,400 --> 01:39:40,000
Speaker 1: And in absentia, if people like more eighties pop stylings,

1936
01:39:40,000 --> 01:39:43,360
Speaker 1: they might like my record to the Bone. So it's

1937
01:39:43,360 --> 01:39:46,840
Speaker 1: a hard question to answer without knowing the taste of

1938
01:39:46,880 --> 01:39:49,920
Speaker 1: the post involved, but I would say definitely. The current record,

1939
01:39:49,920 --> 01:39:54,080
Speaker 1: The Future Bites, is a real landmark record for me,

1940
01:39:54,320 --> 01:39:58,439
Speaker 1: and it's a very accessible but no less sophisticated because

1941
01:39:58,479 --> 01:40:02,000
Speaker 1: of it record for him, A lot record, Okay, And

1942
01:40:02,040 --> 01:40:05,200
Speaker 1: since we live in this playlist world, one track where

1943
01:40:05,240 --> 01:40:10,160
Speaker 1: someone should start on the new album, Um, I really

1944
01:40:10,200 --> 01:40:12,200
Speaker 1: like this song called Man of the People, which I

1945
01:40:12,200 --> 01:40:13,720
Speaker 1: think is a beauty. It was in my head it

1946
01:40:13,760 --> 01:40:16,320
Speaker 1: was going to be Marvin Gay collaborating with Pink Floyd.

1947
01:40:16,360 --> 01:40:20,400
Speaker 1: And I know that sounds rather lofty aspirations to have

1948
01:40:20,800 --> 01:40:24,080
Speaker 1: for someone like me who can't really sing anywhere near

1949
01:40:24,120 --> 01:40:26,240
Speaker 1: like Marvin Gay, but that was it was kind of

1950
01:40:26,280 --> 01:40:27,479
Speaker 1: in my head. I had this idea. I wanted to

1951
01:40:27,479 --> 01:40:29,760
Speaker 1: do it almost like this kind of soul ballad, but

1952
01:40:29,880 --> 01:40:34,280
Speaker 1: with the kind of production aesthetic of classic Floyd And

1953
01:40:34,320 --> 01:40:36,160
Speaker 1: when you listen to it, that's kind of what it

1954
01:40:36,200 --> 01:40:39,000
Speaker 1: sounds like, I think. And I'm really proud of that song.

1955
01:40:39,080 --> 01:40:41,960
Speaker 1: Man of the People is beautiful song. I would go

1956
01:40:42,040 --> 01:40:46,519
Speaker 1: with Personal Shopper, but that's okay. You're the person who

1957
01:40:46,520 --> 01:40:49,120
Speaker 1: made the record, you know. I love the whole record.

1958
01:40:49,280 --> 01:40:51,479
Speaker 1: I'm so proud of everything. It's like trying to choose

1959
01:40:51,479 --> 01:40:53,880
Speaker 1: one of your you know, your favorite child. I love

1960
01:40:53,920 --> 01:40:56,560
Speaker 1: them all. I love Personal shop is great to Yeah,

1961
01:40:56,800 --> 01:40:59,080
Speaker 1: and I've loved talking to you. Know. It's funny until

1962
01:40:59,120 --> 01:41:02,040
Speaker 1: you actually connect someone, you have no idea what they're like.

1963
01:41:02,479 --> 01:41:04,280
Speaker 1: I had no idea. As I say, you were so

1964
01:41:04,520 --> 01:41:07,600
Speaker 1: erudite and articulate. There are many people who are musicians

1965
01:41:07,920 --> 01:41:11,120
Speaker 1: who really can make it but not really talk about it.

1966
01:41:11,720 --> 01:41:14,840
Speaker 1: And I can see why you have this podcast, and

1967
01:41:14,920 --> 01:41:16,920
Speaker 1: I would love to argue with you about some of

1968
01:41:16,960 --> 01:41:19,479
Speaker 1: these records, but I think we've come to the end

1969
01:41:19,520 --> 01:41:22,360
Speaker 1: of the feeling we've known for today, so Steve and

1970
01:41:22,400 --> 01:41:25,080
Speaker 1: I want to thank you so much for doing this pleasure.

1971
01:41:25,120 --> 01:41:26,640
Speaker 1: I had a lot of fun Bob is great to

1972
01:41:26,640 --> 01:41:28,200
Speaker 1: talk about a lot of stuff that I don't normally

1973
01:41:28,200 --> 01:41:29,800
Speaker 1: get to talk about because I've been I'm on the

1974
01:41:29,800 --> 01:41:33,000
Speaker 1: intervilled interview treadmill right now for the future. BIS and

1975
01:41:34,000 --> 01:41:36,160
Speaker 1: questions are always the same, so it's been great to

1976
01:41:36,200 --> 01:41:38,360
Speaker 1: have some different things to talk about. Thank you for that.

1977
01:41:38,520 --> 01:41:41,040
Speaker 1: It was great. I'll leave it at that until next time.

1978
01:41:41,160 --> 01:41:42,479
Speaker 1: This is Bob left sets