Andy Falconer on the making of “The Orb’s Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld”
Andy Falconer was one of the engineers on The Orb’s Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld, one of my favorite albums of all time. He recently wrote an article on his website responding to an earlier (now deleted) post by another Ultraworld alum, Kris “Thrash” Weston. My interest in these stories is not the interpersonal stuff (though it is juicy), but the glimpses into the creation of one of my greatest musical influences.
After chatting with Andy on Twitter, he took to Facebook and began posting some additional details of the Ultraworld production, which it turns out he was typing one-fingered from a hospital bed (he’s recovering from a lung infection, and thankfully was just cleared to go home!). He was generous enough to allow me to post the contents of his writing here.
Are you sitting comfortably? Then let us begin.
No HD recording. No Mac, PC or Pro-tools. This is back in the days of ATARI 1040ST running Notator Logic. This was just used to record and control MIDI data. 90% of the sampling was done using the Akai S1000 and some on my Roland S-50. There was also the odd DX7 etc involved.
We recorded just about everything to tape on a 24 track analogue OTARI 80 2inch open reel running in sync with a Mitsubishi X-850 32 track digital 1inch. These were synchronised using SMPTE but I can't remember the name of the third party control unit. The Mitsubishi had a built in Time code track so you didn't loose one for the code, but the OTARI being old school didn't have this trick, so was reduced to 23 usable tracks.
The running time of a tape on the OTARI was 30ips without any noise reduction. This gave us 15 minutes recording time till the tape ran out. The standard joke on the sessions was the question from the tape-op "how long is the track" and somebody would ask him "how long is the tape". The Mitsubishi had 1/2 hour playing time and for both machines only Ampex tape was used.
The desk was a DDA split console 32/32 with NO automation. A lot of good outboard gear with the Lexicon 480 being the main reverb running as two stereo modules and ALWAYS with my own programming. Stuff like TC delays, Rev 7, Midi verb and Ultraharmonizer also in the racks as well as a couple of 3D auto panners we'd hire in.
Some of the tracks such as Star 6, 7, 8 & 9 or Into The Fourth Dimension came with an arrangement or stucture from the persons/person who had written the track. Others not, but regardless all new musical or rhythmic parts generated in the studio were always recorded down the entire length of the tape i.e no arrangement. I would build these sampler/midi parts up on the analogue 24 track (warm sound for all those dubby beats and bass) and always leave a bunch of stereo tracks open on the Mitsubishi for whenever Alex wanted to free-form stuff straight to tape. Either from Deck, DAT, CD and sometimes live from a sampler. Kris and me both did some of this stuff as well, but Alex WAS the main man. Once we'd got everything on tape that we wanted I would get centre stage. I would build up the mix, get the effects on and get a good technical balance checking all tbe boxes as well as having fun with getting wild and creative with all the outboard. I'd then run a mix down onto DAT and make sure I always got a good start and finish.
Then it would be Kris's turn to shine. Like I mentioned, we had no automation and for half the stuff no real arrangement. When you wanted to bring things in and out you had to use the cut and solo buttons or push the faders (keeping an eye on my marks from the China Graph pencil). At that point that was the real talent of Kris. He could play the mutes and solo's like a pianist on a concert grand. Unfortunately rarely for the length of a whole track without screwing up but it didn't matter. We'd just run endless variations of sections off onto tape until he had exhausted his muse. Then Alex would normally get up and have a go, but it would be shorter and much more pedestrian. At this point there would be a couple of hours of bits if mixes on the DAT tape/tapes.
Back over to me...I'd settle down with a pair of headphones in front of a Studer 1/4" stereo open reel and cut the track together. Simply done by going through the DATS finding the bits I wanted, copying the sections over to the Studer and cutting them together with a hardback razor blade. Old school "cut and paste". That was how final arrangements for most tracks was done.
After a track was finally mixed and edited on the Studer it was copied back over to the DAT. BTW still Ampex tape all the way and the DAT was a Sony (trying to remember....DTC 1000?).
Once all tracks were completed we assembled the monster. Again, no pro-tools etc. This was done by running the DAT masters back onto the Mitsubishi as Stero pairs. Little Fluffy went onto tracks 1 & 2, Earth went onto 3 & 4 etc. Each track with a small overlap and Alex having the opportunity on further digital tracks on the Mitsubishi to lay down more effects and build up the transitions. Ta-da! Final mix balance and run off onto DAT one more time and finished.
I say finished, but I heard it was a nightmare to Master (I wasn't there) and no wonder. Because we'd already assembled the album the guy doing the job had half hour long chunks to deal with of some pretty extreme audio program and not even a fraction of the computer support you'd take for granted now. Just like how the album was made. Old School "hand work" and of a type that's just about dead.
O.K I think that's about it and more than you probably thought you'd get. But technical aside, I'll say it again. Alex brought the people together, he brought the beats, the vibe and the concept. I translated that into sound for him and Kris brought the energy for the mix. Worked.
I’d like to thank Andy for sharing this look into the production of this album, and I encourage you to follow him on Twitter or Facebook to see what he’s up to these days.
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