Now this wasn’t
recorded in an actual studio was it?
No. No, it was at the engineer’s
private home. A Mr Leader if memory serves me rightly.
Did you see any of it
recorded?
Only a very small amount. In addition to cleaning, my work
at the studios also involved general duties. I sometimes made cups of tea, sadly wasted on Americans who didn’t appreciate them, and assisted
the studio in other small ways. On this occasion, I had to bring more tape to Mr
Leader’s house because they had used up the supply he had with him. I must say
it was a very strange arrangement.
In what way?
A number of blankets and egg cartons were attached to the
internal structure to act as baffling and soundproofing. When I arrived, I
discovered Mr Jansch sitting in a broom cupboard which had been especially
purposed for the recording of folk singers. Mr Leander evidently considered it a
satisfactory arrangement despite the scant disregard shown for the household cleaning equipment which had been simply distributed around the home, in a matter I felt was most unseemly. For a start, they were being callously mistreated and I could see the bristles of a broom
were being adversely affected thanks to some unwelcome attention they were
receiving from a playful cat. But one also feels that while brooms, mops and
dusters are the tools of one’s trade, they have no place in the home outside of
a specially designated storage facility. One doesn’t want one's evening reading distracted by a mop in one’s eye-line.
And what was Jansch
like?
He loathed me on sight, which is par for the course I
suppose.
Why is that?
Well he was Glaswegian. I’ve got nothing against the sons of
Glasgow or the Scots in general. My mother has, obviously, and once hit a
visitor on the nose with a spoon simply for suggesting Clyde was a nice place
to visit. I personally take no issue with our Northern neighbours. But they do
tend to hate the English, especially those of us who are from the upper
classes, to use a term. He was civil enough but I could tell from his somewhat
cool demeanour that he had heard my educated intonation and refined accent and
taken against me as a “posh southerner.”
Did you like the
music?
Well… it’s certainly the best thing I’ve ever heard played
by a disgruntled Glaswegian in a broom cupboard… if that’s any help.
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