Paul Hardcastle

According to this article, Paul Hardcastle had a Prophet 5, which he used extensively on "19".

A Kurzweil Micro Piano is left permanently set to preset 32, which is a nice pad, and for conventional piano sounds,

In a video by AnalogSynthMuseum, Paul Hardcastle is shown using the E-Mu Emulator II to create his iconic track "19."

In the YouTube video by AnalogSynthMuseum, Paul Hardcastle is shown using the Roland Jupiter-8 synthesizer during the creation of his track "19."

Paul Hardcastle used the NED Synclavier II for his album "40 Years." This synthesizer, known for its pristine sound quality, contrasts with the warmer, analog feel of Hardcastle's earlier work. The source photo provides evidence of his use of the Synclavier during this period.

"Yeah, I used to do that. Two tape recorders. Bung it all onto one. Play it back into the other one with a 'live overdub'. I used to get some really weird sounds doing that. Not good sounds, just weird. Things would get so hissed up and distorted they'd take on a whole new character. Eventually I thought, 'this is ridiculous, how can I have a career in music when all I've got is two cassette recorders?' So I saved up all my money and bought a Teac 144 Portastudio which in comparison was like an SSL. God knows what I'd do with one now. I've got an ACES 24 channel desk now which isn't the best desk in the world but it gets me by."

"If one record had a profound bearing at the beginning of my career then it was He's The Greatest Dancer by Sister Sledge. I bought this little Korg 700S and I used to play along to that in my room. Then I swapped that for a Korg Delta and got a couple of little chord books... C major... A min... I thought yeeahh! I'm there! This is it! A riff! Then I got involved in this band. I didn't really know that they didn't want me for my expert keyboard playing — they wanted me for my ideas."

"If one record had a profound bearing at the beginning of my career then it was He's The Greatest Dancer by Sister Sledge. I bought this little Korg 700S and I used to play along to that in my room. Then I swapped that for a Korg Delta and got a couple of little chord books... C major... A min... I thought yeeahh! I'm there! This is it! A riff! Then I got involved in this band. I didn't really know that they didn't want me for my expert keyboard playing — they wanted me for my ideas."

The fact is we're not really interested in Paul Hardcastle's tormented conscience. We want to know what gear he's got. So it's up to the spare bedroom to take in the-hardware. The first thing you trip over is a Linn LM-1, followed swiftly by a DX7, JX8P, Emulator II, Prophet 5, Mini Moog and the ACES desk along the back wall.

The fact is we're not really interested in Paul Hardcastle's tormented conscience. We want to know what gear he's got. So it's up to the spare bedroom to take in the-hardware. The first thing you trip over is a Linn LM-1, followed swiftly by a DX7, JX8P, Emulator II, Prophet 5, Mini Moog and the ACES desk along the back wall.

The fact is we're not really interested in Paul Hardcastle's tormented conscience. We want to know what gear he's got. So it's up to the spare bedroom to take in the-hardware. The first thing you trip over is a Linn LM-1, followed swiftly by a DX7, JX8P, Emulator II, Prophet 5, Mini Moog and the ACES desk along the back wall.

The fact is we're not really interested in Paul Hardcastle's tormented conscience. We want to know what gear he's got. So it's up to the spare bedroom to take in the-hardware. The first thing you trip over is a Linn LM-1, followed swiftly by a DX7, JX8P, Emulator II, Prophet 5, Mini Moog and the ACES desk along the back wall.

"I do everything in here. The only thing I don't do is mix. Actually I've just got some Roland gear, the SDD 3000 and the SRV 2000 reverb so I might even start doing a spot of mixing here. At the moment I do it all at Sound Suite in Camden with Alvin Clark who's probably the best person in the world to work with. It's not SSL but it doesn't need to be. I mean it's very nice having SSL with gates on every channel but you can get by without them. 19 was all done here."

"I do everything in here. The only thing I don't do is mix. Actually I've just got some Roland gear, the SDD 3000 and the SRV 2000 reverb so I might even start doing a spot of mixing here. At the moment I do it all at Sound Suite in Camden with Alvin Clark who's probably the best person in the world to work with. It's not SSL but it doesn't need to be. I mean it's very nice having SSL with gates on every channel but you can get by without them. 19 was all done here."

"I got out the old TR808 and set up a dance rhythm: I think the 808 is such a good machine. It's very precise and it's like the backbone of Electro. The handclaps on it are great. We gated those to reduce the length so there was space between them. Most of the samples were AMS and Emulator. The drum sound was mainly TR808. We beefed the snare up with AMS and had it triggering the snare on the Linn 2. I used very heavy delay on the bass drum. The thing is I could have programmed the beats in but they wouldn't have faded into the mix in the same way. There's this bit in the Destruction Mix where this bloke is getting his brain's blown-out — "You're 18 and you're wearing somebody's brains" — and to illustrate that we used this backward droning bell that I'd sampled on the Emulator. It seemed to go really well with the words. I mean we could have used a Major 7th or something but it didn't seem very apt."

"I got out the old TR808 and set up a dance rhythm: I think the 808 is such a good machine. It's very precise and it's like the backbone of Electro. The handclaps on it are great. We gated those to reduce the length so there was space between them. Most of the samples were AMS and Emulator. The drum sound was mainly TR808. We beefed the snare up with AMS and had it triggering the snare on the Linn 2. I used very heavy delay on the bass drum. The thing is I could have programmed the beats in but they wouldn't have faded into the mix in the same way. There's this bit in the Destruction Mix where this bloke is getting his brain's blown-out — "You're 18 and you're wearing somebody's brains" — and to illustrate that we used this backward droning bell that I'd sampled on the Emulator. It seemed to go really well with the words. I mean we could have used a Major 7th or something but it didn't seem very apt."

"Everyone tried to dive in. I could have got actors in but as I've explained to everyone it would have lost that feel it had and it wouldn't have been believable. We used a sample of this bloke from Sound Suite screaming, that we built up with Lexicon 224X — it sounded like a woman in the end. Even he was joking about suing the other day."

The studio that gives Hardcastle this freedom is located in a low building in his enormous back garden ("mind the Rottweiler", he warns our photographer as he scouts for exterior locations). The control room, dominated by an AMR24 console, looks in on a small live area (used mostly for vocals), and against its left-hand wall is the Synclavier, run in conjunction with a Mac IIex. On top of the Synclavier sits a Korg Wavestation. "I use the Wavestation for its sounds, and as another controller keyboard — the Synclavier has a weighted keyboard, which isn't right for everything."

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

Moving on, a rack of modules provides a fair range of sounds to back up the Synclavier. One of the newest additions is an Emu Procussion, below which are a Roland MKS70, MIDIMoog ("it still goes out of tune; I was told it wouldn't"), Oberheim Matrix 6R, Korg DVP1, a slot for a Yamaha G10 guitar controller unit ("great with the TX802"), Roland D110, Roland P330, Yamaha TX81Z ("great for little clavs and so on"), and a Roland Planet P ("actually, I don't think I even turn that on any more").

There's also a small selection of old analogue keyboards: a late-model Prophet V with a MIDI retrofit, a Roland SH101, and a Juno 6. "I use the SH101 for bass sounds a lot, and it's MIDI'd up via a Groove convertor."