He presented the definitive BBC rock music program Whistle Test and anchored the BBC's coverage of Live Aid in 1985. I welcomed these sidebars and found it only appropriate to "hear" the inside story of Abbey Road in Hepworth's very British voice. Magnetic tape, developed by the Germans and only discovered by Britain and America after the Second World War, finally made editing possible, as the poor parts of a performance could literally be cut away, and a more pleasing version inserted in their place. The 18th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Poll: The State of Our Union Could Be Better Major record labels were once notorious for trying to e. Engineer turned studio manager Ken Townsend rechristened the place “Abbey Road” in the mid-’70s as a way to highlight the building’s relationship with its most famous client and their swansong album of the same name.

What lies behind the modest front door of the white building at No 3 Abbey Road in London's residential St John's Wood has been a source of wonder and excitement since the day it was first transformed and opened by Sir Edward Elgar in 1931. When John Lennon said in 1966 that he wanted his voice to sound like the Dali Lama chanting on a hillside, George Martin sent his vocal through a Leslie speaker.In keeping with EMI's air of formality and British aplomb, studio personnel sported white laboratory coats. My only minor complaint was that was very little context provided as to what other studios where doing, particularly in the 30s and 40s. Lastly, a large part of the charm of reading Abbey Road is that it's clearly written for an English audience. David Hepworth skriver som vanlig med stort hjerte for musikken og menneskene, med gripende formuleringer og mange tiår med innsikt i populærmusikkens vesen. As Hepworth points out, the studio was making history in nearly the same instant in which the facility first opened its doors.

The author’s thesis is similarly nuts and bolts: More than just Fab Four headquarters, the studio is where the British record industry, and recording technology, evolved over a century. Excellent and interesting history of Abbey Road and the recording of artists well before the Beatles in the 60s. During EMI Studios' early years, the facility developed a reputation for classical recordings from the likes of Yehudi Menuhin and Pablo Casals.As an Anglophile, audiophile and unapologetic Beatles nerd, there was slim chance David Hepworth's book would be anything less than a hit with me - and it certainly delivered.