RECORDING THE BBC’S ALBUM “HIGH HORSE”

“Let’s make a record,” we said to one another over an agreeable curry at our favourite, post-rehearsal restaurant. “How hard can it be?”.

Well, with the track record (pun intended) of the band members it should have been a piece of cake. Bob has been producing and playing on albums for 40 years and had just had a run of six Top 5 singles in the iTunes Rock Chart with the rock band, WELLER. Since his days in Diamond Head in the ‘80’s, Dave had been the solid bass foundation for many a fine recording and Barry has lost count of the number sessions he’s played drums for. Ben owns some records. How hard could it be?

Songs were selected, arrangements rehearsed, studio booked, release dates planned. Then – the dreaded Curse of Covid struck. Studios were closed, travel restricted and Bob, in particular, was laid low with a one-in-a-million adverse reaction to the vaccine. What should have been a 10-day project to record 12 tracks turned into an eight-month odyssey! But we got there……and very proud we are too of the end product – even though we say so ourselves. In fact, it’s not only the four members of the band who seem to enjoy the album given the huge number of radio plays it’s attracted in just the first three weeks of release. The support has been amazing and much appreciated.

A big thank you goes to all at The Hive Rooms, Gatwick where we recorded the album. It is, by any measure, an outstanding facility and the opportunity to work on a classic SSL mixing desk (something we’d first done in the 1980’s) gave the record that final polish and great sound. Check out the studio here: The Hive Rooms

As Ben said, “It looks like we got the difficult second album out of the way first!” I assume that means we can look forward to getting back into the studio again in the very near future!