Tony McPhee

McPhee used an Add-A-Sound that he personally modified, as known from the following sources:

ZigZag, March 1971, "Tony McPhee... Groundhog" by John Tobler

What about records? You’ve never thought of bringing in Moogs and what have you?

No, I’m not really a weird noise freak. I think it’s much better and cleverer to get a strange sound out of an ordinary instrument, which is why I admired Hendrix so much. He could make Moog noises with a guitar, and though I don’t consciously try to copy him, I do sometimes get similar effects.

Yes, and the wah-wah pedal often accentuates the similarity...

Well, a lot of people don’t realise about wah-wahs....I mean, every little step you bring it down is a different tone, and you can get all sorts of noises from it. I’ve also got an octave splitter which sounds great through the Laney gear — it gives you an octave above and an octave below. Hendrix uses one on ‘Machine Gun’ — it gives a sort of modulated note, where you have the note and other frequencies with it which aren’t really related, so you end up with a weird sort of dischordant sound. And I’m just discovering exactly what you can get out of this device.

Melody Maker, June 5, 1971, pg. 34, Any Questions?

I use a Laney 100-Watt stack, plus an Arbiter Add-A-Sound octave splitter, which adds higher harmonies, producing a "violin" sound and also lower octaves, which used [sic] on "Cherry Red." I modified this unit and built in a pre-amp with high-pass filter which acts as a treble boost. I also use a Shcaller [sic] wah-wah pedal. On "Thank Christ" we had completely different equipment, so the sound is different on "Split", plus the fact that I also used a Fender Stratocaster for many of the numbers on "Split," notably parts 2 and 4, using a combination of wah-wah and tremolo arm to get "whizzing" effects.

Sounds, March 18, 1972, "The Groundhogs: Tony McPhee At The Talk-In" by Jerry Gilbert

Since Thank Christ For The Bomb you've started to get into sounds and effects which you can obtain by using the studios and also by modifying your guitar and amplification.

Yeah definitely. Studios are weird things, you know you can get a sound on stage which suits you but you can't get it in a studio so you have to muck about with it quite a bit and in doing so you get a different sound. I use a wah-wah pedal which I'm using less of now – it got a bit tiresome after a while – then there's a new thing called an octave splitter and that just sort of gives you a rough octave above and below.

You can get sounds like a bass and sustained sounds with a weird quality and in effect it's like an electrical Rory Gallagher – you know this ability he's got of striking harmonics, well in actual fact that's what it does, so you can cheat quite well on those things. Also playing two notes at once it gives you the same effect as a ring modulator which is very trendy these days... notes which are the subtraction and addition of the two frequencies and this sort of thing which gives you a bubbly sort of sound. That's all I get along with really but I do feel now that I want more – not simply from gadgets because I don't use these as gadgets, I use them as separate instruments really.

The whole point is I knew I could imitate things like strings on the new album but I wanted the actual strings sound for some reason otherwise it makes it another freaky album which I didn't want to do. When the mellotron comes on stage we are going to have to re-think quite drastically – not that we do much thinking; we'll probably just slide along like we always do.

July 8, 1972 photos from Carl Dunn of The Groundhogs performing at Concert 10, posted to Facebook by McPhee on September 12, 2011 (Photo 1, Photo 2) (visible)

Hogwash liner notes

Dallas Arbiter Octave Splitter

Sounds, May 5, 1973, "Mac’s Home Cooking: The Groundhogs" by Jerry Gilbert

For having exploited the full range of guitar sounds via the various echo and wah-wah pedals and octave splitter, he turned to the electronic keyboard instruments just as a duck turns to water.

"I only want to use a synthesiser to synthesise — nothing more. I synthesised a drum kit and got an amazing brass sound. I want to use a brass sound on the new album, but brass musicians are a pain in the arse so this is ideal. You can never mistake a synthesiser for the real thing, though, because it has characteristics of its own".

Andrew Liles website, Discography, "Split-Up" (2015)

In 1971 when ‘Split’ was originally released, there were {a few} guitar pedals, mainly wah-wah, overdrive & chorus (with a bit of phasing or ‘flanging’). I had an Arbiter and a sound early octave pedal but I was keen to find ‘new’ sounds, like ring modulation. Some of the 70’s bands have re-done their most popular albums but I never thought I could improve on Split, with Martin Birch engineering at De Lane Lea studios, it had it all!

When Andrew Liles (regarded by some to be the funniest man) told me he’d like to re-do Split I thought he was having a laugh, but he has done what I would have IF I’d had the modern pedals.

Andrew has done me a great service by bringing my recordings into the 21st Century.

Tony (T.S.) McPhee – 2015

Listed among McPhee's gear in the liner notes of Hogwash. It is also specified among the equipment in McPhee’s home studio “T.S. Studios” on page 29 of the November 1974 issue of Beat Instrumental.

Hogwash liner notes

Astronic Graphic Equalizer

Beat Instrumental, November 1974, "Home Studios: Tony McPhee" by Del Robinson, pg. 29

[...] Astronic graphic equalisers; […]

Used live, on Solid and on Crosscut Saw. By June 1978, it was being used to boost his Guild amp.

Ca. 1973 photo of McPhee on stage (pictured), via Easy on the Eye, "Tony McPhee & The Groundhogs" (April 2013)

https://easyontheeye2.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/tony-ts-mcphee.jpg

Tony TS McPhee with The Groundhogs, photographed on stage at the Sheffield City Hall.

Solid back cover

Effects using:

A Synthi Hi-Fli, Audio Design Phaser, Vari-Pitch Revox

1974 footage of The Groundhogs performing "Light My Light" at The Marquee (visible; prominent at 2:46)

Beat, March 1976, "Tony McPhee: The Hogs Return" by Chris Simmons, pg. 25

Amps

In the amplification department, Tony is still undecided as to what he will use for the gigs. "I used to have a big Laney cabinet, and I'll probably end up using that. I have been in the studio with a Davoli amp (with a 15" speaker) which is great for straight things, but as soon as I put my Hi-Fli through it it just breaks up. Perhaps I'll end up driving the Davoli through the Laney cab, but I'll have to experiment more fully first. Actually, the real problem is not amplifying the guitar but my synthesizer.

Distort

"You need a system that won't distort the sound and still has enough poke behind it to carry. On certain gigs you will find that the set-up you have is perfect and on others you will hate it. Then, another problem is that I need a whole lot of top as I use my fingers instead of a pick. Recording is obviously a different bag; I use a pick in the studio to pick out definite notes clearly. It doesn't matter on stage but when you use your fingers some notes are a little down on others. Anyway, if one note's a bummer so what? The main thing is feel."

One might guess that with his penchant for sound experimentation, Tony supplements his guitar with various effect units, but surprisingly he sticks to his Hi-Fli and Echoplex only. He explained his feelings. "The Hi-Fli is a pretty underrated instrument — I've seen a lot for sale secondhand which means that people buy them and then get rid of them. The Echoplex I find very versatile, and that's what appeals to me particularly. What I really want is an amp to handle all the different sounds properly. Earlier on I was trying out a system using either an HH or JBL 2x15 cabinet, with Gauss speakers, and little Eagle tweeters for top. The amp was 100 watt HH. This was ideal for some things but once again it was quite difficult to get a straight sustain."

Beat Instrumental, June 1978, "Don't Mention the Gr**ndh*gs! says Tony 'T.S.' McPhee. Peter Douglas apologises" by Peter Douglas, pg. 18

In line with this begin-all-over-again approach Tony has ditched a lot of the equipment he accumulated with the old band through some remains. "I'm still using the EMS Hi-Fi, mainly because I use it as a power supply. Let me explain: when this band got together, I thought right — I still had the Laney cabinets and all that sort of stuff I used to use — you can't walk into a pub with that stuff. So I thought I'd look around for some smaller gear. I'd got a fifty watt Marshall, but I found that was too loud — I couldn't get it to scream without It deafening everybody. Anyway, I was round at a friend's house and he brought out this amplifier — it was an old Guild, circa 1960 I should think. He said it didn't seem to work, and I didn't have any tools with me at the time, so I couldn't look inside it.

He told me he'd had a bit of an accident with it — he'd plugged it in and smoke had poured out of the back. Apparently there was a fuse missing and they'd forgotten it was a 110 volt amplifier. It had never been changed from the American voltage. So I walked off with it, bought myself another transformer and a few resistors, stuck 'em all in, and it worked fine. It's the sort of amp where the inputs are marked 'organ' or 'accordian'!

"I took the speaker out, 'cause I blew it. Anyway, it was obviously quite low sensitivity, so I knew I'd have to have to put something in front of it to wind it up. Now for some time I'd been using a transmitter/receiver, and that boosts the signal up a bit, but with the receiver it was always awkward to know exactly where to stick it. So I stuck the receiver on the pole of the Hi-Fli and plugged it into the Hi-Fli using the power supply. And the Hi-Fli boosted the signal up a bit more so I can get a raw sound at quite a low volume. I just plug it in, turn it right up, and away it goes."

Paul Freestone, January 25, 2014 comment on Easy on the Eye, "Tony McPhee & The Groundhogs"

I think this was taken on 30th Nov 1973, during the band’s ‘Soldier’ tour. The effects unit behind TS is the EMS Hi-Fli, which he was using for the first time at these gigs. All details of line-ups, equipment, gigs, etc, are included in my book about Tony McPhee – ‘Eccentric Man: A Biography & Discography of Tony (TS) McPhee’.

Part of McPhee’s home studio “T.S. Studios”, as specified on page 29 of the November 1974 issue of Beat Instrumental. It is also listed on the back cover of Solid.

Solid back cover

Effects using:

A Synthi Hi-Fli, Audio Design Phaser, Vari-Pitch Revox

Beat Instrumental, November 1974, "Home Studios: Tony McPhee" by Del Robinson, pg. 29

[...] an Audio Design F400RS phasing unit and F700RS compressors from the same source; […]

The first Cadac console ever made, which was designed for Morgan Studios before heading to Majestic Studios, was purchased by McPhee in 1973 after the recording of Hogwash. It was used for Solid, Crosscut Saw and Black Diamond.

Solid back cover

Recorded on 3M 8 track with Cadac desk and Ampex stereo machine.

Beat Instrumental, November 1974, "Home Studios: Tony McPhee" by Del Robinson, pgs. 28-29 (pictured)

Tony certainly has plenty of opportunity to develop his engineering now. For a start, the centrepiece of the crowded control room is the Cadac 8-track desk, which he bought second-hand from Majestic Studios in Clapham. 'It can be converted very easily to 16.' This is the second desk Tony's installed in his home studio. 'I did a deal with De Lane Lea, before they became Kingsway Recorders, and bought about £5,500 worth of gear, which was the basis of a complete studio.

'I used the original desk to do my solo album, but it didn't have the advantage of pan pots, so when this one came up I decided to take it. I've ordered an Ampex 16-track recording machine which I should be getting very soon.'

Beat, March 1976, "Tony McPhee: The Hogs Return" by Chris Simmons, pg. 24 (pictured)

Rock's Backpages audio, "AUDIO: The Groundhogs' Tony McPhee (1997)" by John Tobler (@ 53:38)

Tony "T.S." McPhee: So, by that time, I'd got equipment, 'cause my idea was it's cheaper to buy the equipment. Then you can, from that point, you can have as many albums as you'd like. Yeah.

John Tobler: Yeah. You mean recording it?

McPhee: Recording from it, yeah.

Tobler: Okay.

McPhee: So I actually bought out De Lane Lea... a eight-track,

Tobler: Yeah.

McPhee: which is what we did Thank Christ and Split on.

Tobler: Oh.

McPhee: And other assorted bits and pieces. And so, from that point on, I did my own albums. We did— I did Solid out there. [...] and built out to a sixteen-track. So, Solid was eight-track and then, uh... yeah, Crosscut Saw and Black Diamond were both on sixteen.

www.philsbook.com, "Majestic Recording Studios"

[https://static.wixstatic.com/media/41e8ac_bc71b010caef475ba413acd7bb9c1831~mv2.jpg/v1/fill/w_626,h_445,al_c,q_80,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_auto/74-cadac-col_edited.jpg]

There were some differences of opinion about Newells acoustic design and choice of equipment so engineer David Hadfield from Maximum Sound studios was brought in as a consultant. He convinced Collier to abandon Philip Newell's ides and that he should basically start again with the studio. Eddie Veale was commissioned to sort out the acoustics; Hadfield contacted Clive Green who had just set up the Cadac company about the possibility of supplying a console. Clive Green was about to deliver a new console to Morgan Studios to replace their original Cadac, one of the very first desks built by Clive Green.

So when the studio finally opened commercially it was equipped with the Cadac 16:8 (with 3 built in Pye compressors) and an 8-track Ampex tape machine.

[...]

[https://static.wixstatic.com/media/41e8ac_a72ec147abcb434ea1b697f65be2e921~mv2.png/v1/fill/w_928,h_440,al_c,q_90,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_auto/73-may-majestic.png]

Trident B

In April 1973 Majestic went 16 track installing a Trident B desk.

"Majestic studios in Clapham had a Trident B Range desk. It was one of the earliest B Ranges ( John Kongos had the first one in his studio in Mortlake, Saturn Sound in Worthing had the second one ( clad in blue formica..) My friend Dougal and I wired the console frame (for Majestic). When I went down there to do some sort of mod shortly after it was installed, the engineer was Roger Wilkinson - and he played me the 2-track of Jimmy Helms "I'm Gonna Make You an Offer You Can't Refuse" which had recently been recorded there, so that would make it 1973". Gwyn Mathias.

The Morgan Cadac desk was put up for sale and bought by Tony McPhee of The Groundhogs for his home studio.

Acquired by McPhee sometime after the recording of Hogwash and used for The Two Sides of Tony (T.S.) McPhee, as stated in this May 5, 1973 Sounds interview, a November 1974 Beat Instrumental interview and in a 1997 interview with John Tobler.

Sounds, May 5, 1973, "Mac’s Home Cooking: The Groundhogs" by Jerry Gilbert

Tony started building the studio in January, the centrepiece being an eight track console which he’d procured from the De Lane Lea studios in Kingsway. As a technician for whom nothing less than the right sound is sufficient, he made up his mind that Hogwash would be the last album the Groundhogs would record in London.

[...]

"Studios really piss me off so I wanted to get my own studio done because it was necessary", McPhee blandly pointed out. "It started off as a four-track and then became eight when I got this equipment."

[...]

"The eight track I have is obsolescent, which means that I have to go and stick jacks in round the back but that doesn’t matter — I mean how much more can you get from a modern machine?"

Beat Instrumental, November 1974, "Home Studios: Tony McPhee" by Del Robinson, pgs. 28

Tony certainly has plenty of opportunity to develop his engineering now. For a start, the centrepiece of the crowded control room is the Cadac 8-track desk, which he bought second-hand from Majestic Studios in Clapham. 'It can be converted very easily to 16.' This is the second desk Tony's installed in his home studio. 'I did a deal with De Lane Lea, before they became Kingsway Recorders, and bought about £5,500 worth of gear, which was the basis of a complete studio.

'I used the original desk to do my solo album, but it didn't have the advantage of pan pots, so when this one came up I decided to take it. I've ordered an Ampex 16-track recording machine which I should be getting very soon.'

Rock's Backpages audio, "AUDIO: The Groundhogs' Tony McPhee (1997)" by John Tobler (@ 53:38)

Tony "T.S." McPhee: So, by that time, I'd got equipment, 'cause my idea was it's cheaper to buy the equipment. Then you can, from that point, you can have as many albums as you'd like. Yeah.

John Tobler: Yeah. You mean recording it?

McPhee: Recording from it, yeah.

Tobler: Okay.

McPhee: So I actually bought out De Lane Lea... a eight-track,

Tobler: Yeah.

McPhee: which is what we did Thank Christ and Split on.

Tobler: Oh.

McPhee: And other assorted bits and pieces. And so, from that point on, I did my own albums.

The following information further corroborates that the A-Range built for De Lane Lea Kingsway was sold to McPhee:

1. The March 1970 issue of Beat Instrumental reports on page 23: "Equipment at Kingsway includes an 18-channel 8-track console, custom-built by Sound Techniques, which was also responsible for the electronics of the 8-track tape machine, which has a 3M deck. In addition, there are Ampex four-track, two-track and mono machines and an EMI mono."
2. The May 1970 issue of Beat Instrumental reports on page 12: "At De Lane Lea's Kingsway studios, the Groundhogs were putting finishing touches to their album".
3. On the "Recording Consoles" page of Sound Techniques' website, there are only pictures of the A-Range consoles built for De Lane Lea Wembley and De Lane Lea Soho. Yet, the site's "History" page lists a total of three De Lane Lea consoles: Soho, Kingsway and Wembley.

Part of McPhee’s home studio “T.S. Studios”, as specified on pg. 29 of the November 1974 issue of Beat Instrumental.

[...] an Audio Design F400RS phasing unit and F700RS compressors from the same source; […]

In the November 1974 issue of Beat Instrumental, a Sequencer 256 is pictured among the gear in Tony McPhee's home studio on page 28; it is discussed briefly on page 29. An "EMS Sequencer" had been listed a few months prior in McPhee's profile for the WWA press kit for Solid. It also appears on page 24 of the March 1976 issue of Beast Instrumental.

WWA press kit for Solid (1974), profile for McPhee

INSTRUMENTS: Gibson SG, Fender Stratocaster, Zemaitis, Yamaha, Harmony Acoustics, H/H Amplification, ARP 2600 synthesizer and EMS Sequencer

Beat Instrumental, November 1974, "Home Studios: Tony McPhee" by Del Robinson, pg. 28-29 (pictured)

Tony's also very interested in electronic music: 'I want to build an electronic music studio', and he enthusiastically demonstrated some gear in his present set-up. It includes a couple of ARP2600 synthesisers, a rhythm sequencer ('I found this unit invaluable'), and frequency shifter, a Compact piano and a Mellotron.

'I'm a guitarist, not a keyboards player,' commented Tony modestly. 'Though I find I'm really beginning to get into synthesisers now. They're very creative instruments and it's very much up to the individual musician what he gets out of them. I prefer the ARPs - not everyone can get along with EMS units. I know people have criticised the ARP because you have to patch across it, but I don't find this a problem.'

Beat Instrumental, March 1976, "Tony McPhee: The Hogs Return" by Chris Simmons, pg. 24 (pictured)

Acquired by McPhee sometime after the recording of Hogwash and used for The Two Sides of Tony (T.S.) McPhee and Solid. It is specified in a November 1974 Beat Instrumental interview and is corroborated by the following:

Sounds, May 5, 1973, "Mac’s Home Cooking: The Groundhogs" by Jerry Gilbert

Tony started building the studio in January, the centrepiece being an eight track console which he’d procured from the De Lane Lea studios in Kingsway. As a technician for whom nothing less than the right sound is sufficient, he made up his mind that Hogwash would be the last album the Groundhogs would record in London.

[...]

"Studios really piss me off so I wanted to get my own studio done because it was necessary", McPhee blandly pointed out. "It started off as a four-track and then became eight when I got this equipment."

Beat Instrumental, November 1974, "Home Studios: Tony McPhee" by Del Robinson, pgs. 28

Tony certainly has plenty of opportunity to develop his engineering now. For a start, the centrepiece of the crowded control room is the Cadac 8-track desk, which he bought second-hand from Majestic Studios in Clapham. 'It can be converted very easily to 16.' This is the second desk Tony's installed in his home studio. 'I did a deal with De Lane Lea, before they became Kingsway Recorders, and bought about £5,500 worth of gear, which was the basis of a complete studio.

'I used the original desk to do my solo album, but it didn't have the advantage of pan pots, so when this one came up I decided to take it. I've ordered an Ampex 16-track recording machine which I should be getting very soon.'

At the moment Tony's using the 3M eight-track machine he acquired from De Lane Lea, linked up to the 'garage' by remote control. He also has a Revox which he uses mostly as an effects machine — 'I've got a Varipitch as well and I can use them for automatic double tracking and phasing. I can take a signal out from the guide head of the eight-track machine, pass it through the Revox and mix it in with the playback head. I can then use it for phasing, editing, or playing echo — it's a very handy thing, especially on an eight-track machine, when you can't afford to use just one track for double tracking.'

Rock's Backpages audio, "AUDIO: The Groundhogs' Tony McPhee (1997)" by John Tobler (@ 53:38)

Tony "T.S." McPhee: So, by that time, I'd got equipment, 'cause my idea was it's cheaper to buy the equipment. Then you can, from that point, you can have as many albums as you'd like. Yeah.

John Tobler: Yeah. You mean recording it?

McPhee: Recording from it, yeah.

Tobler: Okay.

McPhee: So I actually bought out De Lane Lea... a eight-track,

Tobler: Yeah.

McPhee: which is what we did Thank Christ and Split on.

Tobler: Oh.

McPhee: And other assorted bits and pieces. And so, from that point on, I did my own albums. We did— I did Solid out there. [...] and built out to a sixteen-track. So, Solid was eight-track and then, uh... yeah, Crosscut Saw and Black Diamond were both on sixteen.

Although the model is unspecified, it can be deduced from the following:

1. The M23 was released in 1966.
2. In the November 1967 issue of Beat Instrumental, it is reported on page 14 that "DE LANE LEA have an eight track machine on order and hope to have it in operation before January."
3. The sixteen-track prototype of the eight-track-capable M56 was not unveiled until the 35th Audio Engineering Society (AES) Convention in October 1968, as attested by engineer C. Dale Manquen's paper for the event.
4. The June 1969 issue of Beat Instrumental quotes De Lane Lea's chief engineer, Barry Ainsworth, on page 24 saying "The equipment we have here consists of an 8-track machine, made by the 3-M company, and a new type of amplifier, our own design, half the size of the normal. We also have 4- and 2-track Ampex machines as well as mono."
5. The March 1970 issue of Beat Instrumental reports on page 23: "Equipment at Kingsway includes an 18-channel 8-track console, custom-built by Sound Techniques, which was also responsible for the electronics of the 8-track tape machine, which has a 3M deck. In addition, there are Ampex four-track, two-track and mono machines and an EMI mono."
6. The May 1970 issue of Beat Instrumental reports on page 12: "At De Lane Lea's Kingsway studios, the Groundhogs were putting finishing touches to their album".
7. In its preview of the 1972 Association of Professional Recording Studios (APRS) exhibition, it is reported on page 49 of the July 1972 issue of Studio Sound that "3M will feature a 16 track version of the new M79 designed by their Mincom division." This shows that the eight-track-capable M79 was still new at this time, thus postdating De Lane Lea’s 1967 order.
8. On page 328 of Recording the Beatles: The Studio Equipment and Techniques Used to Create Their Classic Albums (2006) by Kevin Ryan & Brian Kehew, while discussing the recording of "It's All Too Much" at De Lane Lea in late May 1967, it is stated parenthetically that "DeLane Lea would later acquire a 3M 8-track , the same model chosen by EMI". According to Brian Gibson (here, here and here) and Ken Scott, the eight-track 3M tape machine at EMI was an M23.

An M67 appears atop McPhee's ARP 2600 in three photos from The Groundhogs' August 26, 1973 performance at the Kendal Pop Festival: this one by Derek Copeland and two by John Dennis (here and here).

McPhee's EMS Pitch to Voltage Converter is known from two Beat Instrumental articles: an interview in the November 1974 issue and his review of the ARP Avatar in the May 1978 issue. McPhee expresses dissatisfaction with the unit in the latter.

Beat Instrumental, November 1974, "Home Studios: Tony McPhee" by Del Robinson, pg. 29

JBL 4310s are used for playback – 'they seemed to be the best small-sized speaker I could use, and I'm limited by space'; an Ampex stereo machine for mix-down, fitted with Dolby noise reduction units; Astronic graphic equalisers; two HH 50-watt amps; an Audio Design F400RS phasing unit and F700RS compressors from the same source; an AKG echo unit; and a pitch to voltage converter, all of which makes for a pretty crowded 'spare room'!

Beat Instrumental, May 1978, "Instrument Review 6: ARP Avatar Guitar Synthesizer" by Tony McPhee, pg. 31

At the time there was a machine made by EMS called a pitch -to -voltage converter which should have done the trick; you just plugged an instrument into it, it scanned the pitch of the note you were playing, and it gave out the correct voltages to operate the synth. Unfortunately the guitar note is so rich in harmonics and transients that the converter flew about all over the place trying to find something steady to latch on to. So, somewhat disillusioned by what I thought would be the answer, I looked for another way.