It can be seen in the eleventh photo, captioned "Some of Marius de Vries' outboard gear. From top: Digitech Vocalist II effects, Yamaha SPX900 multi‑effects, Alesis Quadraverb GT and Quadraverb multi‑effects, Mutronics Mutator compressor, Avalon input channel, Yamaha REV7 multi‑effects, Alesis 3630 compressor and Tascam DA30 DAT recorder."

Equipment used on Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up," which was recorded at Stock, Aitken & Waterman's PWL Studio, included "The Linn 9000, which most sequences and drums were done on, was run from a [Friendchip] SRC synchroniser, and a [Yamaha] DX7 was used for virtually all of the bass lines. There was also a [Roland] Juno 106; a [Yamaha] Rev 5 and Rev 7; Dbx 160 compressors; SDE 3000 delays; an Emulator; and the wonderful Publison Infernal Machine 90, which was the first sampler that could actually pitch?change without really affecting the time signature. You could time?stretch things and make them fit reasonably well — It was a little choppy, but for the time it was phenomenal. Other than that, there was an AMS delay/harmoniser, which always had a number of kick and snare samples, and that was pretty much it."

Jools Holland's equipment list, from the January 1993 issue of Music Technology:

(Helicon Mountain studios)

Instruments: Casio FZ1 Keyboard Sampler Casio FZ10M Sampler Module w/80-disk sound library Casio VZ1 Synth Hohner Clavinet Korg CX3 Organ w/Leslie 145 Cabinet Yamaha C5 Grand Piano Yamaha DX7 Synth

Recording: Atari 1040ST w/Steinberg Pro24 and C-Lab Creator sequencing software Fisher CD Player Revox PR99 two-track Saturn 824 24-track (Dolby SR on arrangement) Soundtracs Quartz 48-channel in-line desk (96 inputs on mixdown) Casio DA1 DAT Recorder Casio DA2 DAT Recorder XRI XR300 SMPTE Synchroniser

Effects: Drawmer Gate Drawmer Dual Compressor/Limiter Eventide Harmonizer Lexicon 480L Reverb Lexicon PCM70 Multi-effects Processor Roland SDE2000 Digital Delay SA PPE 240 Teac Graphic Equaliser Yamaha REV7 Reverb Yamaha R1000 Reverb Yamaha SPX90 (x2) Multi-effects Processor

Microphones: Neumann U87, AKG, Shure, PZM

Value for money is clearly a touchstone for Tom:

"I try always to stick to a Policy of 'if it costs over £100, don't buy it.' You get more music for your money that way."

The studio's effect rack bears witness to the theory, for sitting alongside the ubiquitous Drawmer noise gates and Yamaha REV7 reverb, is that same company's budget-priced multi-effects unit, the SPX 90:

"If you could only have one effect, it'd have to be that — as an all-rounder, I much prefer it to the REV7, though there are some effects you can only get on that — the 7's great for really short, ambient things, like bass drum reverb."

Roland CR78 (left) provides Chris with classic analogue drum sounds, while Yamaha REV7 (below right) offers the detailed reverb programming his music needs