Massey reels in the years
Grammy-winning audio engineer Guy Massey shares his memories of working in the famous Abbey Road studios. By
Shaun Bamber.
‘One-two, one-two, one-two. Two-two-two!’’ Guy Massey is used to sound checks – except he’s normally more used to asking someone else for them rather than reeling one off himself.
Recently in New Zealand for the inaugural New Zealand Music Producer Masterclass – where he helped tutor a group of up-andcoming Kiwi music producers – Massey is a Grammy-winning audio engineer, mixer and producer who got his start at Abbey Road, the London recording studio most famous for its association with the Beatles.
Massey himself is probably also best known for his connection to the Beatles, being part of the team that won the 2010 Best Historical Album Grammy for their work on The Beatles In Mono, a re-mastered compilation of the iconic band’s entire back catalogue.
In fact, just hearing Massey’s voice is enough to bring the Beatles to mind – like them, the 50-year-old was born and bred in Liverpool, moving to London in his mid-20s after a sound engineering diploma from the University of Surrey landed him a three-month work placement at Abbey Road.
‘‘They guaranteed that at the end you would get work experience in a studio in London,’’ he remembers. ‘‘So I worked hard, and they gave me a choice of two studios. I can’t remember what the other one was, but the first one was Abbey Road, so I said, ’Yes, I want to go there please’.’’
‘‘I made the move from Liverpool to London and worked for nothing for three months, sleeping on friends’ floors – then stayed there for 10 years!’’
Given the long list of musical luminaries that have walked the corridors of Abbey Road, it naturally wasn’t long before the young Massey was rubbing shoulders with some fairly famous people – and not all of them musicians either.
‘‘I remember my very first day there I made the tea for Anthony Hopkins – you know, the actor?’’ (Yes, the name vaguely rings a bell.)
‘‘He was in, they were doing the score for – I think it was a film called Shadowlands? And Collette, my boss at the time pushed me into the control room with this tray of tea. I was sort of shaking, cos it was literally my first day. But you would bump into people like that in the corridor on a constant basis.’’
After hanging out with Hopkins, Massey moved on to assisting for Adam Ant, working on a solo album for the post-punk rocker.
Later years would see him working with everyone from Radiohead and Oasis – assisting on seminal albums The Bends and Be Here Now respectively – to Paul McCartney, Van Morrison, Paul Simon and Ed Sheeran.
Talking to him now though, Massey is most enthusiastic about his work with smaller, unsigned bands – whom he often connects with just after seeing them at a gig.
‘‘It’s brilliant, because you do your sort of high-profile jobs that pay the mortgage and put food on the table and that sort of stuff – and obviously that’s what I do it for – but the smaller things, where there’s no deal on the table, you do it purely because you like the music and you want to help somebody out,’’ he says.
‘‘I’ve got three of those going at the minute. I’m making an album with a young lad who’s a doctor, but he’s an amazing singer. So when he’s not working – when he’s not on A&E, stitching people up – we get a few days together and we’re making a record. Which I’m really proud of, you know?
‘‘It’s funny sometimes when you’re doing stuff just for the love of it, it feels better somehow.’’
Although he’s not too used to doing interviews, Massey says he’s often asked about his work – with most people wanting to know just what it’s like inside the hallowed halls of Abbey Road Studios.
‘‘A lot of people do ask me that. I remember walking over the zebra crossing [pictured on the cover of the Beatles’ Abbey Road album] to go to my first day at work – s ...... my pants basically. When you walk in there it’s like the Tardis. Cos on the outside it just looks like a double-fronted house sort of thing – but it goes back, and it goes back, and it goes back.’’
‘‘There’s essentially four studios in there. You walk down the main corridor, on the left is Studio Three, where most of Revolver was recorded, and I think The Dark Side Of The Moon too, so you feel the history as you walk down.
‘‘My favourite studio is on the ground floor – you go down and do a right into Studio Two, which is where I’ve spent many years. It’s not fancy in any way at all. Sort of like a school gym in some ways – smells like a school gym. But it’s got an amazing acoustic – beautiful, beautiful studio.
‘‘Then you turn into the corridor at the bottom of Studio Two, which is where the main orchestral recording room is, Studio One – which is about four times the size of Studio Two. It’s huge. You can fit an orchestra of 80 people in there, with a choir of a hundred, if you so desire.’’