Months of continuous work from November 1975 now peaked during February 1976, when I found myself working on two albums at once. During the day, from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., I was mixing Rock Follies, while at night, from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m., I was recording Stomu Yamash'ta and the GO project.
Rock Follies was a TV drama and album based on the music business, co-written and produced by Andy Mackay and Howard Schulman. For me it had started in late January, after back-to-back sessions with Blondel and Jim Capaldi. The Rock Follies recording sessions were long and manic, as there was a total of only 15 days available to record and mix all the music - not only for the TV show, but for the album as well.
There were about fifteen people on the sessions, mainly from the TV company - producers, directors, writers and those in charge of the script. We worked so fast that the whole project was plagued by musical and technical mistakes. However, the sessions were made easier by the humor of Ray Russell, who was the guitarist and arranger. Andy's laid-back attitude also helped, as did the "game" of matching up the TV story with real life studio events. Charlotte Cornwall appeared nervous and neurotic and took a daily Valium to help her deal with the stress, while Rula Lenska seemed to be out of her depth, very detached and had difficulty singing in tune. Julie Covington, unlike her TV character, was totally professional and, I thought, the only real singer. The sessions were constantly interrupted by emotional outbursts, musical mistakes and demands "to be taken seriously.". There were many occasions when Andy, Ray and I would hide behind the desk, laughing hysterically, trying not to be seen by the singers and musicians.
On the 4th of February we finished recording and moved into Studio 2 to mix. The crowd of people was now reduced to six. Up to this point I had been working an average of 14 hours a day with no real breaks, trying to finish each day's workload before driving home to Sussex at night. However, things were about to get even worse.
Stomu's album was very different in content and approach and included a band of "name" musicians. It was labeled a "rock/classical concept album", but turned out much better than this description might suggest. I had worked with Stomu the year before, on the album Raindog. This had been recorded and mixed in Studio 1 in just two weeks, during which I had struck up a good relationship with Stomu. That was the first time I had had any working experience with a Japanese artist. He seemed straight and honest in his dealings with people. Eighteen years later, while working with Fusasonuke Kondou on an album in London and touring in Japan, I discovered that such straightforwardness and honesty is perfectly normal behavior in Japan.
Stomu had built up a reputation in both the classical and jazz fields as being a genuinely experimental percussionist. With justification, he was described in his own publicity material as "an artist who really does succeed in breaking down barriers." Stomu was now in his late 20s, with long straight black hair, thin face and sinewy body. He appeared very centered and through patience, stamina and determination usually achieved what he set out to do. He could be very single-minded in his working approach and at times gave off a feeling of intransigence. He had released two previous "rock" albums on Island Records, The Man from the East in 1972 and the aforementioned Raindog in 1975, in which many western musicians had been involved, including Morris Pert, Peter Robinson, Gary Boyle and Maxine Nightingale. Both albums had received excellent reviews. His music had been used in the films The Devils and The Man Who Fell to Earth and he had worked with the British Royal Ballet on the more classical Shukumei. His beautiful wife, Hisako - a leading classical violinist and very successful in her own right - was also a guest on these albums. On Raindog, Stomu had welcomed my comments and suggestions and I had brought in my old friend Murray Head to help write lyrics and perform the lead vocals. Stomu had been impressed. The sessions had gone smoothly and partly because of this he was back at Basing Street wanting me to record with him again.
To fit in with the schedule of some of Stomu's musicians, the album had to start on the 6th of February and be finished by the 27th in order to allow enough time to record all the backing tracks with this particular band. Meanwhile Andy was due to finish the Rock Follies project on the 11th, and as we had built up a good friendship over the previous three years I did not want to let him down by pulling out. I decided that, rather than lose either album, I would work on both sessions at once during the five days that they clashed. At this time I did not realize how vast the scale of Stomu's project was.
Stomu's band consisted of Steve Winwood - keyboards, Michael Shrieve - drums, Klaus Schulze - synthesizers, Al DiMeola - guitar, Rosko Gee - bass, Pat Thrall and Junior Marvin - guitars, Brother James and Stomu - percussion, and Paul Buckmaster - string and brass arrangements. Among the instruments that Klaus Schulze was using was an original Moog synthesizer. Subsequent models were made more compact, but at that time the Moog was an enormous device consisting of four or five separate units bristling with oscillators and dials. Each sound had to be individually patched before being played, and a number of patch bays were provided for this purpose. I set up Klaus in the 8' x 6' vocal booth where he occupied the entire space. The rest of the musicians were set up in a large circle in Studio 1. I felt that this was the best way to achieve optimum visual contact between the musicians while allowing a certain amount of acoustic separation, plus I liked the idea of recording them with an "orchestral" or "classical" approach. This was a topic that had come up in conversation with Paul Buckmaster, Stomu and myself on their arrival, when they had briefed me as to what they were trying to do. During this 15 minute discussion I had formulated a possible plan and placed percussion in front of the control room window, with (anti-clockwise) booths for drums, bass, guitars, additional percussion, piano and organ.
