Abbey Road Studios

Abbey Road Studios

Article from Wikipedia

Abbey Road Studios is a recording studio located at 3 Abbey Road, St John's Wood, City of Westminster, London, England. It was established in November 1931 by the Gramophone Company, a predecessor of British music company EMI, its present owner. Abbey Road Studios is most notable as being the venue in the 1960s for innovative recording techniques adopted by The Beatles, Pink Floyd, The Hollies, Badfinger and others.
Towards the end of 2009, the studio came under threat of sale to property developers. However, the British Government protected the site, granting it English Heritage Grade II listed status in 2010, thereby preventing the building from any major alterations

Abbey Road Studios is most closely associated with the Beatles, who recorded almost all of their albums and singles there between 1962 and 1970. The Beatles named their 1969 album, Abbey Road, after the street where the studio is located (the recording studio would only be named Abbey Road after the Beatles record in 1970). The cover photo for that album was taken by Iain Macmillan outside Abbey Road Studios with the result that the pedestrian zebra crossing outside the studio has become a place of pilgrimage for Beatles fans from all over the world. It has been a long-standing tradition for visitors to pay homage to the band by writing on the wall in front of the building, although it is painted over monthly. In December 2010 the zebra crossing at Abbey Road was given a Grade II listed status.

Notable producers and sound engineers who have worked at Abbey Road include Sir George Martin, Geoff Emerick, Norman "Hurricane" Smith, Ken Scott, Mike Stone, Alan Parsons, Peter Vince, Malcolm Addey, Peter Brown, Richard Langham, Phil McDonald, John Kurlander, Richard Lush and Ken Townsend, who invented the groundbreaking studio effect known as automatic double tracking (ADT). The chief mastering engineer at Abbey Road was Chris "Vinyl" Blair, who started his career early on as a tape deck operator.

Abbey Road Studios is a five-to-ten minute walk away from St John's Wood tube station. From central London, it is accessible using the Jubilee line. When exiting the station, the visitor faces south at the intersection of A41 (Finchley Rd./Wellington Rd.) and Acacia Road (to the left)/Grove End Road (to the right). The studio is along Grove End Road, passing Waverley Place and Loudon St. on the right; addresses decrease in number along the way. As Grove End Road veers sharply to the left, Abbey Road is to the immediate right. The first pedestrian crossing is the crossing featured on the album. The studio, at 3 Abbey Road, is the unaddressed white building across the street between Hill Road and Garden Road.

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