RECORDING - MIXING
UB40: I had the great honour and pleasure of working with Ali, Astro, Mickey and the guys on their Acoustic Sessions album We holed up at RAK Studio 2 and recorded and mixed everything in 5 days.
We then repeated our collaboration when I got to mix the guys' new album "A Real Labour Of Love".
10.Gauge: The band's drummer Neil Felgate approached me to produce the lads' EP "Rain's Comin' ". We decamped to Monnow Valley Studio to track. Mixing and mastering was done at The Sonic Cuisine. Since then we’ve recorded more material at The Park Studios and released a live “Lockdown“ recording of the band.
Celine Dion: What an honour to record drums for a couple of songs on Celine's album "Encore Un Soir".
Patricia Kaas: Jonathan Quarmby, who produced the new 2016 album, called me into RAK studio 3 to record all the strings and brass for this gem.
Pete Tong: I got to record pretty much every percussion piece in the box on this, from shakers to tubular bells, with three of the world's best percussionists - John Blease, Joby Burgess and Oli Blake. All this for Pete Tong's Classic House album adaptation of their Albert Hall Prom show.
PLAN B - Arrow Benjamin - Craze & Hoax - Johnny McDaid: I spent 8 very creative and intense days in RAK Studio 3 and 1 with this power writing team recording a new track for Plan B's album. Amazing vocals, piano, Mellotron, guitars, bass drums and B3. I even got to perform handclaps and acoustic guitar on this one :-)
Gabrielle Aplin: Spent a great day at RAK studio 1 engineering for producer Jonathan Quarmby. We recorded drums, bass, vocals, piano and baritone guitar for a killer track on Gabrielle's album "Light Up The Dark". I got to record her again, in surround, at the Youtube Space and later that year at RAK Studio 3.
Marti Pellow: We had a blast of a time in RAK studio 2, where I got to record Ladona Harley-Peters' amazing voice for Marti's new Album "Mysterious".
Sir Tim Rice: Rak studio 1, Drums, percussion (including tubular bells), bass, 2 keyboards, piano, 2 guitarists and 6 horn players, all live recorded and mixed in a day for "From Here To Eternity". That was fun!
Elliott Randall: RAK's studio manager calls us the A-Team. I record and mix for Elliott. We filmed and recorded a few short demo movies for Electro-Harmonix. We also monopolised RAK's studio 1, 2 and 4 to record and mix a fabulous album, with Elliott producing and playing guitar. Good friends of Elliott's who joined us on the album included, Ralph Salmins, Adam Phillips, Hugh Wilkinson, Arnulf Lindner, Peter Murray, Pete Zorn and Basil Meade's LCGC. We went to SARM's studio 1 to record the horns and the strings. Elliott has recently released his brand new solo albums "Heartstrings" and “Virtual Memory”. Pure passion and very analogue, recorded at ELZ Music, British Grove and The Sonic Cuisine.
Laurence Fox: I got a call from Jonathan Quarmby to come into RAK studio 3 to record strings, drums, bass and guitars for the 'Lewis" actor's new album.
Rock Goddess: I mixed and mastered the NWOBHM's girl powerhouse come back EP "It's More Than Rock 'n Roll" and recorded the “This Time” album.
Alexandra Burke: Recorded Alexandra's amazing voice at RAK Studio 2 and you can hear the result on the "Overcome" Deluxe Edition.
The Buzzcocks: Recorded their 30th anniversary show at The Forum.
Chuggington: Those of you with smaller kids are surely familiar with The Chuggineers. NY based producer Chris McHale called me in to the Soho Sound Kitchen to recored all the vocals for the new series.
Distortion Mirrors: Luke Worle's project landed on my desk via Elliott Randall and Joe McGlohon, who were producing and performing on some of the album tracks. I ended up recording sax and guitars, re-recording some of the vocals and mixing two of the songs.
Yusuf Islam: Recorded the delightful artist formerly known as Cat Stevens at The Old Vic.
Beverly Knight: I mixed a new version of Run-DMC's Sucker MCs for the Red Rhythm production team, with Beverly duetting with Reverend Run. Done at RAK's studio 4.
The Kooks: Recorded them over two nights at The London Astoria.
Melanie C: I got to record Melanie's stunning voice several times at RAK, in studio 4.
New Model Army: The guys from NMA asked me to re-mix one of their songs for the 30th Anniversary Anthology. An honour indeed.
Ellie Goulding: I got called in via RAK studios to work with producer/songwriter Rick Nowels and Ellie Goulding on a brand new track.
Mo Foster: We spent a lovely and creative day at the Sonic Cusine, mixing the new bonus track, "Puddy's Theme", for the re-mastered "Time To Think" album. We also went into RAK's Studio 2 to record 5 songs for a new musical based on the wonderful Jean De Florette films. Mo produced and played guitar and the session A-list did the rest; Chris Lawrence, Mitch Dalton, Corrina Silvester, Greg Knowles, Julian Littman, Chris Haigh and Karen Bates. Ray Russell arranged the strings for the main theme, which we recorded at British Grove on the EMI REDD.51. Most recently I mixed “It’s All Too Soon” for Mo's latest album "Bass Themes".
Monsterjaw: I had already been mastering and mixing for Mik Davis's other bands (NYAAA & Utopian Love Revival) , so when it came to recording and mixing two new EPs for Monsterjaw, we holed up in New Model Army's studio and got to work.
Leelo Pascal: After Leelo had been through various studios and engineers in the US, Canada and Switzerland and got absolutely nowhere, he decided to build his own studio in the Swiss pre-alps. We were introduced by Terry Nelson via the AES and the plan was to do a trial mix. I ended up mixing the entire album at Studio CMI.
Samuel Purdey: I got called in to record an Elliott Randall guitar overdub for their new "Mayfair" song. The guys then asked me to mix this gorgeous Steely Dan style track. It's an honour to be following in Elliot Scheiner's footsteps as one of Samuel Purdey mix engineers.
Ørjan Vatne: David Hamilton-Smith had always been on my wish list of producers to work with. When he asked me to remix a track for one of his artists, I jumped at the chance. I teamed up with Abstract Source and we turned out a kick-ass dance floor stonker.
Pino Palladino: I first met Pino on one of The Who tours, so I was extremely pleased when I got called into RAK to record his bass for Dione Bromfield under the watchful eye of producer Paul O'Duffy.
Praying Mantis: The guys decided to re-record some of their early NWOBHM hits. So we went into SNAP studios and Phoenix studios put both Neves through their paces and then headed back to the Sonic Cuisine to mix and master.
Ann Peebles: I recorded this soul legend in a stunning performance of “I Can’t Stand the Rain”, as a duet with Deborah Bonham. I even got to play John Bonham’s gong on it.
RAIE: My journey with Raie started by mixing and mastering her EP Talking about you, which led to headinginto the Goldsmith’s Music Studio to record the This Music Thing EP. Most recently we spent a week at Galaxy Studios in Belgium to record her feature length album Red Brick Angel.
Shotgun House: This great Blues/Rock band landed on my desk via social media. What started out as one mix, ended up being a very cool EP.
Roger Waters: Since Pink Floyd is one of my favourite bands of all time, I was thrilled to do some tape transfers of The Wall and The Final Cut at Sensible Music. I also had fun recording the sound of a match striking for Roger’s Dark Side Of The Moon tour…. In star quad!