MXR chorus, Korg stuff, a wah… all that stuff. His pedals were just an MXR chorus and things like that, right? And of course a lot of the effects came from his pedalboard, the ‘chip pan’. That smokes up the distortion, gives it a creamier edge. He had a 100-watt Marshall amp, and we dropped the voltage down to 90 or 92 volts. He’d read somewhere about using the Variac. “Yes, and it was a pretty advanced rig for the time, I suppose. But sometimes we’d print stereo tracks if we wanted to keep the ambience separate.”ĭid he use basically the same guitar rig for both Blizzard of Ozz and Diary of a Madman? Most of the time all those mics would be mixed down to one track. “Then we had a U82 sitting about eight feet in front of the stack, at the top of the steps and another U87 about 20 feet further back from that. The center of the microphone was right on the voice coil edge, on a tangent, facing right at it. We had four Shure SM57s right over the voice coils on four of the speakers – two speakers on the top and two on the bottom, catty cornered. “His amp setup was a Marshall stack, with two 4x12 cabs. What was Randy’s guitar rig for the sessions, and how did you record it? Later on, I got into much more technical means of constructing a solo.” And in those days it would be almost impossible to punch in – unless it was an easy punch, like if Randy had left a gap somewhere in the solo. So by the time we were doing solos, we didn’t have a lot of tracks to spare. We were only working with one 24-track machine we weren’t syncing up a second 24-track. He actually tripled most of them.”ĭid you do any comping of solos? Use one line from take 11, for example, and another line from take 24? Once he knew what to do, he’d slam down a good one and then we’d try to get it doubled up. He’d find something he liked, then he’d try something totally different for a while, then he’d come back to his original idea. I’d go to the pub for a couple hours, and when I got back Randy still usually wasn’t ready.” Sometimes he’d use headphones instead of the Tannoys, but it was the same basic principle. Randy would stand at the top of the steps with two big 15-inch Tannoy playback monitors on either side of him, and he’d blast solos over the backing track. “Randy’s amps were set up in a stone room underneath the control room they were facing into the stone steps that led down to the stone room. I’d record 15 or 20 passes of the solo section backing tracks, one after the other, starting maybe 15 seconds before the solo and ending 20 seconds after it. You can just go to the pub for a couple of hours.’ I’d make him a rough stereo mix of the backing track on 1/4-inch tape. To do solos, he’d say, ‘I’m going to need to listen to this a lot of times. “Randy didn’t talk a lot in the studio he just worked. What was Randy’s behavior in the studio generally like? I remember I had to mix the album very quickly.” It was all the money Ozzy had in the world, I think, for four weeks of recording. It was before he had a record deal, so we didn’t have a lot of time to hang around in the studio experimenting with stuff. “Remember that Blizzard of Ozz was being done on Ozzy’s money. We don’t need all these tracks.’ And I’d be like, ‘Well, that’s what Randy wants.’ And Ozzy would usually come around. At some points, Ozzy would come in and say, ‘It’s taking forever. What are you doing that for?’ And Randy would say, ‘It’s gonna be okay.’ He could placate Ozzy and keep doing what he wanted. We don’t need all these tracks.’ And I’d be like, ‘Well, that’s what Randy wants.’ And Ozzy would usually come around Ozzy speaks a lot about how patient Randy was with him.Īt some points, Ozzy would come in and say, ‘It’s taking forever. If Ozzy didn’t like something, Randy could turn it around pretty quickly, but there were very few things Randy did that Ozzy didn’t like.” He was the sort of guy you didn’t argue with – you just tried to keep up. I think everybody was in awe of Randy’s compositional talents. Did Randy defer to their greater experience?
Ozzy had been in Black Sabbath, Bob Daisley was in Rainbow and Lee Kerslake in Uriah Heep. Randy was the least seasoned member of the band. He wouldn’t play much if he didn’t like the sound, and if he liked what it sounded like, he’d play a lot more. I’d have to keep changing settings and looking at him for his reaction. Did Randy give you any direction as to how he wanted his guitar tracks on Blizzard of Ozz to sound?
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