00 — Bootlegging, Radio Mics & a Revox B77
June 1988, a warm summer evening in the amphitheatre at Bath University and Alan, the Entertainments Officer, had constructed a rather non-conventional stage with a large sound system just in front of the lake. The structure and sound somewhat dwarfed the rather small audience of the first (and probably last) open-air concert at the University during which several student bands and some ‘professional’ outfits took to the stage in what was an end-of-exam celebration.
It wasn’t as grey as the deteriorating film makes it look!
The music sounded great with the amphitheatre providing an excellent setting both visually and acoustically, however, the University sits at the top of one of the seven hills surrounding Bath and the shape of the amphitheatre had some unforeseen consequences.
The sound booming from the surprising powerful PA system was reflected rather efficiently off of the amphitheatre and University buildings behind and thanks to what must have been some unfortunate atmospheric conditions, sent out across the city. Soon complaints were coming in from near and far with residents on the other side of the valley some eight miles away not pleased with the clarity of the sound they were receiving on a summer night.
By the following morning the Vice-Chancellor had banned any further open-air events and continued to deal with complaints for several days. Even today the ability to have outdoor music at the University is highly restricted and a sensitive subject!
As well as being part of the Ents scene I had another interest in the concert related to a weekly nighttime radio show I hosted on University Radio Bath (URB) called Green Onions. Along with Adrian my co-presenter we had taken to recording as many gigs as possible for future use on the show.
Being the mid-1980s in a student world our equipment and resources were limited, sometimes if we were lucky we would get a feed direct from the front-of-house mixing desk and run a very long cable back to the URB studios across buildings and walkways. On other occasions, it was microphones gaffer taped onto beams in the ceiling. Back in the URB studio the signal was fed through an analogue mixer with just basic EQ, as no gadgets like compressors or limiters were available to us, with the output sent to a trusty Revox B77 open reel tape recorder.
For student radio stations in the 1980s Revox open reel tape recorders were the main stay for recording. The B77, following on from the more basic A77, was seen as the pride and joy, a professional and high-quality piece of equipment. With multiple tape speeds and the ability to record and playback simultaneously it would later become a key part of our recording arsenal.
The open air concert presented a new challenge with no access to the mixer, which was in the middle of the audience, and no ceiling or structures apart from the stage itself. Our solution was a pair of radio mikes taped to the stage structure near the speaker stacks — not an ideal situation given this was basic analogue FM technology (quite advanced for 1988) with microphones designed for dialogue not high volume rock. The receivers for the microphones were placed up on a roof space in a nearby building and then cabled all the way to the studio.
The audience at the concert may have been small but the atmosphere was great and everyone partied the night away. It is fondly remembered by all, even Richard Mawditt the University Secretary & Registrar at the time, who was fuming the following day, can laugh about it today.
One of the student bands who played at the concert were Blue Powder, formed in 1987 by two Bath undergraduates, Steve Chowne and Tush Hamilton. After the concert Steve, who at the time I only knew casually from studying the same course, asked me whether I could run off some copies of the recording, which later became known as Out in the Air, the first Blue Powder album. That conversation led to a friendship of over 30 years the heart of which has been recording music simply for the pleasure of it with a band that has seen members come and go but maintains the original founders of Steve and Tush.
Even by 1988 standards, let alone modern standards, the recording was extremely limited in terms of sound quality, with the microphones saturating and distorting but it serves as a great atmospheric reminder of student days on a warm summer evening. In 2024 with modern digital audio workstation technology the old analogue recording has been cleaned up as much as possible with two extra tracks added from another live concert held in the University Hall in the spring of 1990.
Selected tracks are available on Spotify and other streaming services.
Originally published at https://bluepowder.uk.
