IAN HABGOOD: Theme Park Music

Name: Ian Habgood
Studio Premises: Bedsit Room
Report by: Sam Inglis
Main Equipment: Apple Mac 8500/180 running Steinberg Cubase VST v3.02, Studiomaster 16:4:8 mixer, Drawmer MX30 compressor, Philips CDR870 CD recorder, Yamaha NS10m monitors, Rode NT1 microphone, Cheetah master keyboard, Akai S3000XL sampler, Roland JV1080 synth, Emu Vintage Keys sound module, Alesis 3630 compressor and Microverb 3 multi‑effects, Yamaha CS1x synth, 2x Shure SM58 microphones.

Musicians, producers and recording engineers have to deal with all sorts of problems in their professional lives, but there can't be many who risk losing their work by forgetting to top up the electricity meter in their studio! This is, however, just one of the pressures that confront SOS reader and full‑time recording musician Ian Habgood. All his musical equipment is housed in one corner of the north London bedsit in which he also eats and sleeps — and, in the best tradition of rented accommodation, everything runs from the meter. "It's not ideal," admits Ian, "especially as I do all my recording on a computer. Now matter how many times I try and remember, I'll be sitting here and the power will go because I've forgotten to put a quid in the meter."

Theme Music

The advantage of having your studio in a bedsit is that everything is in easy reach... from left to right, Rode NT1 microphone and pop shield, Yamaha CS1x synth, rack containing (top to bottom) Alesis 3630 compressor, Drawmer MX30 compressor, Roland JV1080 synth, Emu Vintage Keys sound module, Akai S3000XL sampler,. Alesis Microverb 3; behind Ian, Apple Mac computer, Studiomaster desk, and Yamaha NS10m monitors. To the right are Ian's JVC hi‑fi and Philips CDR870 CD recorder.

Ian is clearly in the early stages of his career, but his music has already reached a wider audience than much that emanates from far grander studios — for the soundtracks to some of the most popular attractions at Britain's biggest theme parks were composed and recorded in this room. "I was working at Rock Circus in Picadilly," explains Ian, "and about a year and a half ago it closed down to be refurbished, and while they closed it down they sent the staff to other locations. I was sent to an office in Acton, and I just happened to be in a room where they were discussing Thorpe Park. They were saying that they needed a composer for the 4‑D cinema, and I said 'I could do that'. They didn't believe me at first, so I spent the whole night knocking out a demo for them. I did sweat getting it done. I thought it would impress them if I got it done the next day, and it did. One minute I was making the tea, the next I was in this office full of people in suits saying 'Well, this is what we want. We want this here, this here, and that there.'"

Since that first break, Ian has also produced music for a couple of the newer attractions at Alton Towers, including the stone‑age themed Ugland Park section. He's also keyboard player in a 'dark pop' band called Toxic, and has still more strings to his bow: "Originally I wanted to be a trumpet player," he confesses. "I did 'A' level music at Poole College, and then I did a degree in music at Newcastle College. At Newcastle it was jazz, pop, commercial music, but there wasn't really any recording. It was all about composing and arranging. I was basically a musician; I learned about the recording process through reading SOS!

"The first piece of MIDI gear I bought was the Emu Vintage Keys. I'd used MIDI at college before — I was into writing music, but I wasn't actually into recording it, and I had a friend who had a studio, and I used to go round to his place quite a lot. I remember the first project that I did at college, recording, we did at his house, and I didn't get involved in the technical side — he did the technical side and I did the playing. One thing I'm really trying to get to grips with at the moment is the line between the musician side of it and the engineering side. I used to write a piece of music — not knowing any technology — either in my head, or literally onto a tape recorder, writing it down, or whatever. Then I started getting all the equipment, and it's a question of setting it all up and doing it hands on, trying to record it at the same time."

One Careful Owner

The new Ugland attraction at Alton Towers, for which Ian wrote and produced his 'Stone Age' music.

The financial considerations which restrict Ian to working in his bedsit also mean that every piece of equipment he buys has to prove its worth. Both audio recording and MIDI sequencing are handled by his Apple PowerMac computer, on which he runs Steinberg's Cubase VST. The outputs from the computer (via the optional Apple A/V card, which was already fitted by the previous owner) and from his various synths and samplers are mixed using a Studiomaster mixer and mastered to CD‑R. Unsurprisingly, Ian has a keen eye for a good deal: "More or less everything here is second‑hand. It's gradually been built up through buying stuff from Loot, basially. If you've got the time to look around, you can buy some really cheap stuff. The desk — I remember getting that — was a real hassle; I had to get a suitcase and carry it on the tube! That was about £300. It's not a brilliant desk — it's quite noisy. It's 16‑channel with four groups and you can monitor eight inputs from a reel‑to‑reel.

"When I started I just had a Fostex R8 8‑track and a mixing desk, and I was just mucking around. I was going to get an Atari to do sequencing, but someone convinced me about audio recording on computers, and the Mac came up cheap. I was planning on selling it and making some more money out of it, actually, but I ended up using it, and convinced myself that it was much better than an R8, so I sold the R8 and kept it. The quality of the recordings is astounding — I can't believe I was umming and ahhing about changing it. I just did a test to convince myself, but it was brilliant. I did have 32Mb of RAM, and a few months ago I got it upgraded to 96. I've run about 28 audio tracks and it's just about coped with it, even with the MIDI as well. I wouldn't mind getting an Opcode or MOTU multi‑port interface, so I can have more MIDI channels, but then I'd have to get a bigger desk. I wouldn't be able to plug everything in at the same time with this one, but I don't need everything at the same time, though it is a bit of mucking around. Maybe a patchbay would be a good idea, but when you're on a strict budget...

"I've got the Arboretum Hyperprism plug‑in pack for VST. I use the reverb from it quite a lot, and some of the panning delays. I don't really use the compressors though, because the hardware ones I've got are better. I've tried using the flangers and phasers and stuff, to cover up the fact that I can't sing — but they never really docover up the fact that I can't sing!" admits Ian, with excessive modesty.

One minute I was making the tea, the next I was in this office full of people in suits saying 'Well, this is what we want. We want this here, this here, and that there.

"I mix onto the Philips CDR870; I usually master on to decent TDK discs or whatever, and do the old pulling‑the‑drawer‑out trick to use cheap CDs when I'm knocking up demo CDs for promotion and such like."

Like so many people, Ian listens to his recordings on Yamaha NS10 monitors, and he feels that they have served him well: "I listen to absolutely everything through NS10s. When I did the Thorpe Park thing, that was pirate‑themed music on the outside, and on the inside they had massive speakers. I mixed it in here, and then I had to take it down there, and they had a Spirit digital desk. They sat me down — I had to take my computer and everything — and they said 'Would you mind doing a mix in here?' When I set it up, I couldn't believe it — it was more or less there already, and I'd gone from the NS10s to these massive speakers. I listen to all my music through those speakers."

Synths & Samplers

The music that Ian records in his room is very much based around his synths and, latterly, his Akai S3000 sampler. "The Roland JV1080 already had three expansion cards in it when I bought it — that was 700 quid. It's quite new, and it's got the orchestral card, which is good, 'cos I know how to arrange for orchestras. I'm supposed to be working on a haunted house thing at the moment for Alton Towers, and I'm using orchestral stuff. It's only in the draft stage at the moment.

"I mainly got the Yamaha CS1x for the band that I'm in. The girl that was in it before me had this keyboard, and I borrowed it, and eventually I thought 'I'll get myself one, they're only 200 quid or something, they're really cheap.' The manual's a bit of a pain in the arse, though. I remember reading it and thinking 'The person who wrote this doesn't seem to know much about keyboards!

"With the synths, I mainly use the presets. The only things I tend to edit are reverb and so on; I'm not one of those people who's too into changing the actual frequencies and things like that. If I'm going to muck around with things, it's got to be my own things, my own samples and trumpet sounds."

Ian's preference for synth presets is balanced by an impressively creative attitude towards sampling: "I really like creating my own samples — like for the Ugland Park attraction, the guy who was commissioning the music told me 'It's got to have a real Stone Age feel to it, and when I hear it, I want to think Stone Age.' So I came back here and I thought 'Well, in the Stone Age they didn't have any instruments, did they?' So I literally went out into the garden and picked up rocks, leaves, twigs, and everything I could find. I came in here, set the mic up, crunched a few twigs, scrunched a few leaves, banged a few rocks, sampled it all, set it all up on different notes on the keyboard, played out rhythms on the rocks, got the crunches of the twigs and me saying 'Ug', and mixed it all together. They were really pleased with it. It was brilliant fun, and the great thing was that I'd just got my sampler then and I didn't really know how to use it properly, so it was a brilliant learning experience.

"The song I'm working on at the moment has some of my vocals in, and I'm not really a good singer, but I think if you pitch your voice up or down a couple of notes, it can sound better. Well, it does with me! I do like making my own samples.

"It's handy being a trumpet player, as well, because that's one of those instruments that's not easily replicated with samples. I tend to use it quite a lot on stuff. I'm really getting to grips with setting up the mic properly, setting up the compressor to get a really crisp sound. I'm quite into the sort of Earth, Wind & Fire‑type tight brass lines. The reason I got the Drawmer MX30 is because I didn't know too much about compression, but it's so easy to use and set up and everything that it's ideal for me.

"With the sampler I use Mesa [the Mac sample‑editing package], so I've got it all linked up in a nice SCSI chain, which every now and then you have a little problem with. I don't understand SCSI, it's a funny beast. When I've had a problem I've taken everything apart, and put it all back together exactly as it was, and then it works — and then it'll work for another two months, and then it'll do it again. I put all my samples on Zip disk — the Zip drive is just for the sampler, and the Jaz drive is where I back up all my computer stuff. You can get the disks for 40 quid, which is quite reasonable, but I've got five there, and for for that amount of money I could have probably got a computer CD writer. That'd be a good thing to get."

Indeed, Ian seems to have a very focused idea of what he wants, both in terms of studio facilities and equipment, and in terms of his ambitions for the future: "Because I've just learned as I've gone along, there are things I'd like to know more about, like how to get rid of hums. Articles will say 'Oh, it's an earthing problem' — well, what is an earthing problem?

"I've been talking about I've been talking about possibly doing something for the Millennium Wheel [the giant big wheel which will be erected by the Thames to mark the millennium], which would be good. I'm also hoping to do some work for Warwick Castle: there's some jousting festivals that go on there, so they want music for jousting! What I actually want to get into, though, is working with visuals. I did a short film — the guy had put it on to CD‑ROM and I linked it up through the Movies function in Cubase. I'd like to get into doing music for computer games, too."

Oh yes — and he's now got a continuous power supply to protect the computer in case the meter runs out...

Anyone wishing to contact Ian can do so via SOS on +44 (0)1954 789888.