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.
