Excerpts from the Philip Newell interview
Written by Paul Harris

Philip Newell, pictured recently

How did you first come to work with Mike?

I was chief engineer at the Manor at the time. Richard Newman's book "The Making of Tubular Bells" is a good starting point for finding out more details I was not interviewed for the book since I was out of the country at the time, but Tom Newman and Simon Heyworth were quite flattering about my involvement, I did not realise quite how much they were relying on me. I had more technical knowledge, so when there were different or strange things that needed doing often I would be called in to help. I was a general advisor I suppose in an informal way. 

There is a rumour that you lent Mike some guitars for the Tubular Bells recordings?

I did lend Mike some instruments. I had some quite nice bass guitars and an unusual Fender Precision with a maple neck and slab sided body, which was cream in colour like a Telecaster from around 1967. Mike was penniless at the time.

Did you hear the original demo? What was it like?

Philip inside the Manor Mobile

I did, but it did not really impress me to be honest, though Tom clearly saw something in it. It was done on a Bang and Olufsen tape recorder, ¼ inch 4 track. It was fragments and pieces of ideas, but I didn't see its full potential.

How did Mike put the climax at the end of Part 1 of Ommadawn together?

The Beacon  - The birthplace of Ommadawn

Mike had been trying for ages to get a guitar solo on the end of side one. I was staying upstairs at The Beacon, and I remember waking up one morning and hearing this phenomenal guitar playing. I was half asleep, thinking "What is this? This sounds fantastic." I got up and dressed and there was Mike playing with a music stand in front of him and a copy of Mayfair magazine open, looking at the girls. I thought well if that's what it takes… anyhow, when we were mixing the stereo version when we came to the end of side one we had the whole mixing desk covered in girlie magazines, we could not even see the levels on the meters, only the fader and a few switches we knew we would need were visible. The last 6 or 7 minutes were mixed to these rather than the levels on the meters!! I was telling Mike that we needed to see the meters, but he did not want to know about the meters. He just wanted to do the whole thing by feel. I felt like Scotty in Star Trek, saying "But the crystals will never take the strain Captain". To which Captain Kirk (Mike) would reply "Full power, Mr Scott, that is an order"!!

There is a myth that Mike kept a lion at Througham Slad?

Its true, he was called Clyde. He was born in captivity at Edinburgh zoo, and was about one year old when they were going to release him to the wild in Africa. Between the zoo and his trip to Africa he stayed at Mike's house. Sometimes he was in the house when there was a keeper with him; otherwise he was in the enclosed courtyard.

Clyde the lion in the courtyard at Througham Slad

On one occasion, I was in the kitchen, Clyde was across the other side of the courtyard and I opened the kitchen window. Before I knew it he was across the courtyard and through the window and top of me. There was no one to help me, but the keeper had previously said the best way to handle this situation was to punch the lion on the nose and scream at it. That is easier said than done, but somehow I managed to keep my presence of mind, and luckily he backed off a little, and then some people came in including the keeper. For about 5 years I had big scratches across my shoulder and chest. 

How were you involved in the recording of Incantations?

Mike kept re-recording pieces of it. My biggest involvement was when he came down with the four tracks tapes to listen to it in quad at the Townhouse. The monitoring in the Townhouse did not match the monitors in his studio, so we did some readjustment of the levels and equalisation in the mix-down from the 4-track to the stereo re-mastering. I'm not credited on Incantations, because the sleeves had once again been printed by the time I got involved in the four-track mix down. 

So a quadraphonic version of Incantations exists?

Yes!!

Short excerpts from part two of the interview, which will be printed in issue 25 of Dark Star...

(About the Exposed album)
It was taken from about 9 concerts.  Each country where something was used is listed on the album cover.   There were some concerts in 1 or 2 countries from which no actual music was used, but there might have been a fantastic sound from the audience.  I wanted to do it that way to give it wider appeal, so that all the people could feel that they were part of it.


...One of the most perfect recordings, from my point of view that I have ever heard anywhere is Tubular Bells 2.  Despite its enormous superiority, in terms of tuning and timing, and technically in terms of recording and playing techniques it is light years ahead of Tubular Bells 1, but I doubt that it will ever reach the classic status of its predecessor.

This is the famous Space Movie soundtrack  acetate! Yes, it exists. Its virtually impossible to see, so please take our word for it...

All photos are © Philip Newell