Paul upgrades his home studio

After spending a month in Scotland, Paul McCartney and his family — Linda, Heather, and Mary — returned to London on November 17, 1969, and made a few changes to their home at Cavendish Avenue. Paul also took the opportunity to upgrade his home recording setup.

Since 1966, Paul had been using Brenell tape decks at home — equipment he had used to record demos, to create the tape loops heard on “Tomorrow Never Knows” from the “Revolver” album, and, more recently, the tape loops used to segue from “You Never Give Me Your Money” into “Sun King” on “Abbey Road.”

Before heading to Scotland, Paul had discussed the idea of enhancing his home studio with Eddie Klein, a sound engineer who had joined EMI Studios in 1967 (Eddie would later become Paul’s personal engineer after he left Abbey Road Studios in the late 1970s.)

Eddie Klein suggested borrowing one of EMI’s Studio J37 four-track tape machines. The Beatles had recorded much of their mid-1960s output — from “Help!” through to “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” — on the J37 before transitioning to eight-track machines. Although outdated by 1969, the J37 was still occasionally used during the White Album and “Abbey Road” sessions. As such, EMI had little issue lending one of those now-obsolete machines to Paul.

According to Allan Kozinn and Adrian Sinclair in “The McCartney Legacy: Volume 1: 1969 – 73,” an EMI team installed the Studer J37 upon Paul’s return from Scotland — possibly even while he was on holiday in Antigua. This account contrasts with Kenneth Womack’s version in “Living the Beatles Legend: The untold story of Mal Evans,” which states that Beatles assistant Mal Evans helped to install the Studer on December 26.

A few essential components he had requested from EMI service engineers Ron Pender and Dick Sweetenham never arrived, which would complexity his recording tasks. For instance, Paul didn’t receive a mixing console (this may have been a conscious decision though), which requires him to plug instruments and his microphone directly into the machine.

Paul would start recording using the Studio J37 in late December.

Upon their return to London, in November 1969, Paul and Linda set about giving the Cavendish Avenue house a long overdue remodeling, from bachelor pad to family home.* During their final days in Scotland, Linda had bid by proxy at a Sotheby’s auction, acquiring a Tiffany lamp, with a dome in Tiffany’s characteristic colored glass, sitting atop a stalklike stem in gilt bronze, for £700 ($1,680). The lamp joined several others illuminating the ground floor of the Regency town house. Paul, meanwhile, initiated discussions with Arthur Bailey, a designer, about a new fireplace enclosure featuring a Louis XV marble mantelpiece they bought in September.

More importantly, Paul was reconsidering the technology in the modest home studio he had assembled in 1966.

From “The McCartney Legacy: Volume 1: 1969 – 73” by Allan Kozinn and Adrian Sinclair, 2022

Before he left for Scotland, Paul wrote to EMI service and design engineers Ron Pender and Dick Sweetenham, requesting extra outboard units, but the additional equipment never arrived.

When he returned from Scotland, Paul had an EMI team in to get the J37 set up, tested and ready for use. His presence was not required; the McCartneys’ housekeeper, Rose Martin, could show the EMI engineers where he planned to use the deck.

From “The McCartney Legacy: Volume 1: 1969 – 73” by Allan Kozinn and Adrian Sinclair, 2022

Why did you decide to make a solo album?

Because I got a Studer 4-track recording machine at home – practised on it (playing all instruments) – like the results and decided to make it into an album.

What is your home equipment (in some detail)?

Studer 4-track machine. I only had, however, one mike, and, as Mr Pender, Mr Sweatham and others only managed to take six months or so (slight delay), I worked without VU meters or a mixer, which meant that everything had to be listened to first (for distortion, etc…) then recorded. So the answer – Studer, one mike and nerve.

Paul McCartney – From the “McCartney” press release Q&A, April 1970

It was around this time that Mal began working for Paul in a clandestine fashion, cloaking his movements so as not to arouse the attention of any other Beatle and to stay under the radar with the folks at Apple. He even kept his activities on Paul’s behalf from Neil. On December 26—the two-year anniversary of the Magical Mystery Tour television debacle—Mal unloaded a Studer four-track recorder at 7 Cavendish Avenue. Outside of him and a few folks at Apple and EMI, nobody knew that Paul was going it alone musically with Linda, which was exactly how the Beatle wanted things—at least for the time being.

Recording an album in this fashion proved to be the perfect balm for Paul’s depression. With periodic visits from his loyal manservant Mal, who would ferry instruments and fresh four-track tape over to 7 Cavendish Avenue, Paul began to enjoy the homespun nature of his post-Beatles life.

From “Living the Beatles Legend: The untold story of Mal Evans” by Kenneth Womack, 2023

Not-so-antique sale

The interest in “antiques” is coming so close to the present day that many works of art will soon not have time to go out of fashion before they are reinstated. This was demonstrated yesterday by a sale of decorative arts between 1870 and 1930 at Sotheby’s which drew dealers from America, Germany and France as well as from many parts of England.

One of the most modern “antiques” was a pâte-de-verre bowl by François-Émile Décorchemont, one of the greatest craftsman-glassmakers of this century. This bowl, in green and mauve moulded with scrolls and tendrils, dated from his best period, around 1925, and made £310. A Tiffany studio lamp with a domed shade in coloured glass and gilt-bronze, stalk-like stem went for £700 to Mrs. Linda McCartney, wife of Paul McCartney, the Beatle.

Among the cheaper but amusing pieces were a Hammersmith rug and a pair of double-woven wool curtains made by William Morris and Co. which came from the home of Sir Edward Burne-Jones and sold for £80 and £120 respectively. The sale brought £18,546.

A sale of watercolours and drawings at Christie’s, which made £22,991, contained an unusual number of eighteenth-century drawings. There were two designs for ceiling paintings by Sir James Thornhill at 700gns. and 550gns., a drawing of outstanding quality by the sculptor Michael Rysbrack at 850gns., and a tiny woodland scene by Jonathan Skelton, one of the earliest of all English watercolourists, at 700gns.

From The Times – November 12, 1969

BEATLE Paul McCartney’s American wife Linda is the new owner of a £700 Tiffany studio lamp with a domed shade in coloured glass and a gilt-bronze stem, which she bought at a sale of decorative arts at Sotheby’s, London.

From Liverpool Echo, November 13, 1969

Going further

The Beatles Diary Volume 1: The Beatles Years

"With greatly expanded text, this is the most revealing and frank personal 30-year chronicle of the group ever written. Insider Barry Miles covers the Beatles story from childhood to the break-up of the group."

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