Studio earned its stripes
QUESTION Was Abbey Road Studios named after The Beatles album?
THE Beatles’ Abbey Road album was released in 1969. At the time, 3, Abbey Road, St John’s Wood, London NW8 was called the EMI Recording Studios.
It was renamed Abbey Road Studios in honour of The Beatles in 1976. It is where the Fab Four recorded almost all of their music between 1962 and 1970. The studios opened on November 12, 1931, with a performance of Land Of Hope And Glory in studio one, conducted by Edward Elgar.
During The Beatles’ first recording in studio two on June 6, 1962, the band cut four tracks: Besame Mucho, Love Me Do, PS I Love You, and Ask Me Why.
The sound engineer was Ken Townsend. He had begun his career at the studios in 1954 as a recording engineer and would witness The Beatles years. It was Townsend who created artificial double tracking (ADT), which enabled The Beatles to avoid having to re-record vocals to create multi-layered effects. John Lennon dubbed it Ken’s Flanger and it was widely used on the Revolver and Sgt Pepper albums.
The album Abbey Road was originally set to be called Everest, after sound engineer Geoff Emerick’s favourite brand of cigarettes. The Beatles reputedly changed the title because no one wanted to go to Nepal for a photo session. Paul McCartney came up with the alternative idea of photographing the band on the zebra crossing a few yards from Abbey Road Studios. The road was created in 1829 from a farm track called Abbey Lane. Its name was ultimately derived from Kilburn Priory, which once stood there.
Townsend was promoted to general manager in 1974 and rebranded the studios. Up until then, only EMI artists could record there, so once it was renamed Abbey Road it could welcome stars from other labels.
The albums Be Here Now by Oasis (Creation Records), Blue Lines by Massive Attack (Virgin Records) and Ceremonials by Florence + The Machine (Island Records) were recorded there.
Olivia Smith, London.
QUESTION Before computers, how were large banking transactions made?
BEFORE computers, if two banks were about to set up banking transfers, there’d be an exchange of code books called test keys.
These had code numbers for the days of the week, date, each of the world’s currencies and amounts from €1,000 to many millions. There was a PIN for use between the two banks and a sequence number for send and receive.
If a request was being sent from Pimlico Bank in London to the Coral Sea Bank in Australia for 65,000 US dollars to be paid to a third party, a telex would be exchanged with the instructions.
Added to the telex would be a number compiled by the sending bank’s code department.
On receipt of the telex, the number would be decoded and if the correct answer was arrived at using the test keys exchanged with the sender, the payment would be made.
The bank I worked for had hundreds of keys to be exchanged between the world’s banks. They were kept under lock and key in the coding department.
This method was used for many years until it was replaced by the Swift (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications) system, a memberowned co-operative that provides secure financial transactions.
QUESTION Has anyone ever been on a real wild goose chase?
SURPRISINGLY, a wild goose chase actually has nothing to do with geese.
It is a game related to horses. A rider sets off and carries out a series of random acts. His pursuers have to mimic the tasks while attempting to catch the rider.
His actions are difficult to predict, making it harder for him to be caught — hence the modern meaning of chasing after an unachievable goal.
The comparison to a wild goose is apt because these birds act unpredictably.
The other similarity is the V formation the pursuing horsemen adopt to pre-empt the twists and turns of the rider being chased. This resembles the shape of a skein of wild geese in flight.
The game was first described in 1593’s A Discourse Of Horsemanshippe by the poet Gervase Markham. The 1602 poem The Mother’s Blessing by Nicholas Breton references the racing term, but is suggestive of the idiom:
‘Esteeme a horse, according to his pace But loose no wagers on a wilde goose chase.’
Shakespeare used the phrase in Romeo And Juliet, when Mercutio asks about chasing wild geese. He may have been accusing Romeo of being an evasive leader, but it could have been a less salubrious reference because a goose was a slang term for a prostitute.
Over two centuries, the Flight of the Wild Geese referred to the exodus of Irish men to fight abroad. These included the Nine Years’ War, which started in 1593 against the English conquest of Ireland. Irish soldiers had backed the exiled James II.
Following the defeat of James’s forces at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, they fled to Europe to escape William of Orange (William III). They later fought in religious wars on the side of Roman Catholic countries such as France and Spain.
Today, wild goose chases can refer to a type of cross-country running race.
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