My very first job after college was in a recording studio.

By night, the studios became a dance hall so every morning the studios had to be set up, and dismantled again in the evening.  Hard work.

This was in the late sixties when the showbands were in full swing.  I never liked their music but the lads in the bands were great craic. 

The odd time there would be a rush on an album and we would dismantle the studio for the dance, head off for a few pints and then come back when the dance was over.  The studio would then be reassembled and we would work through the night and on through the next day.  I suppose when you consider that the bands usually brought in a few crates of beer for the all-nighters, it would explain why their records were always crap?

There was a group of session musicians who were there almost permanently.  There was your drummer and your base guitarist and the rest.  One bloke played the slide guitar which was probably my least favourite instrument.  This bloke had a habit of bringing a pistol into work which would sit on the guitar during recording.  During coffee breaks, he would vanish out to the sheds at the back and do a bit of target practice.  I don’t know why that stuck in my mind.

I have been rifling through my old music collection lately and came across a track with a drop of slide guitar.  It brought back great memories of the recording sessions.  It is also probably the only piece of music I know of where the slide guitar sounds great.

 

And in case anyone is wondering – I cut it short as it was quite a chunky file!

And for those of you who aren’t wondering why I cut the file but are wondering how much I was paid…  £10 a week. Gross.  A king’s ransom!