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We lost another member of the Beatles’ A-team this week (2018 time): engineer Geoff Emerick, who shuffled off the coil at the tender age of 72. For the math-challenged among us, that means that back in 1968, when Emerick tendered his resignation to Beatle Inc. — having already worked on Revolver, Sgt. Pepper, and Magical Mystery Tour — he was a mere lad of 22. (He would return for Abbey Road.)
And while one tends to think of engineers as button-pushers and dial-twirlers, Emerick was also an idea man who offered innovative suggestions right from his first days at EMI Studios, when he was a stripling of 19. It was he who stuffed a sweater into Ringo’s drum, he who created the massive bass sound of “Rain,” he who overloaded two preamps to create the fuzztone for “Revolution.”
Time is short here at the Institute, but this appreciation by Rob Sheffield hits all the high points.