On my return to Liverpool in Feb of 1987, I had to make a big decision whether to put my energy into my career, or find a new place to house the studio. I spoke to Will Sergeant from Echo & The Bunnymen who lived above me with Les, Jake, and Pete. They were all motorbike fanatics and had visited a place in Lark Lane that most other people didn’t know existed. It was the Lark Lane Motor Museum that had been built by Jim and Jane Baxter, but unfortunately because of its location away from the city centre, it was struggling to get people through the doors, and was about to close. I proposed the idea of a recording studio to them and they initially seemed keen. It took nearly a year to put the plan together, but just before the work began Jim and Jane dropped out. I was forced to go it alone with help from the Merseyside Enterprise Board, the DTI, and the bank. I also got some unexpected help from my former solicitors who I sued for negligence because of the loss of my lease. It turns out the person handling my case had suffered a nervous breakdown, and had failed to respond to the papers served on us. They eventually settled for £20k, which was immediately sucked up by the studio.

Phil Newell the former Virgin Director who had built Virgins Manor and Townhouse studios and the original Pink was contacted to build the new studio. Phil was responsible for creating those big sounding drum rooms that Phil Collins made famous on In the Air Tonight. Phil was also very eccentric and just the person to work with me on this rather crazy project. I say this because anyone who wanted to build a recording studio at this time had to be a little crazy. Amazon also moved into town a year later but was bankrupt within twelve months, eventually becoming Parr St studios.

The Pink Museum was finally opened in May 1988 and with its opening came the end of my recording career. Aswad were the first customers followed by Liverpool FC who recorded the Anfield Rap, the first hit from the new studio. The rest of the year was a little patchy booking wise because suddenly people were writing hits in their bedrooms on computers of all things. This revolutionised the music industry much in the same way as Punk had done in the seventies. It was during this time that I was approached by Lloyd Masset to come and see a band he had put together called Raw Unltd, which featured Stuart Kershaw amongst others. The band broke up but Lloyd and Stuart stuck together forming a three piece with Nathalie Loates writing Pop R&B Rap songs.

In January of 1989 the Las came into the studio for three months and things began to look up. Then we had a call in July that OMD wanted to book the studio for a month. Although I had bumped into Andy McCluskey and Paul Humphreys on numerous occasions at Din Disc on the Portobello road in 1982, it was at one of Richard Branson’s parties at The Manor in Oxford that we first met socially. After this our paths rarely crossed because I guess they were always successfully recording and touring. I remember the first time Andy walked into the studio I could see the look of bewilderment on his face as he looked around at this beautiful yet strange building.

"I tried to encourage Andy to work with younger writers"Unfortunately the session did not go well because whilst Andy was working in the Pink, Paul, Mal, and Martin had booked Amazon to write their own songs. At the end of the month it had become clear that Andy and the rest of the band had split. This was a distressing time for Andy whom I had become close to during his time in the studio. During the months that followed, I tried to encourage Andy to work with younger writers especially Stuart and Lloyd but it wasn’t until six months later when he heard Romeo and Juliet, a track they had recently recorded, that he agreed to have a jam with them. Well the rest is history. They wrote six of the songs for Sugar Tax in two or three days of jamming, and spent the rest of the year recording Sugar Tax in the studio. The high point of all of this was sitting in the car at Port Merrion in Wales, listening to the Radio 1 chart rundown, when Sailing On The Seven Seas entered the charts at number three. Towards the end of the session while Andy was busy mixing the album, a tour was looming so I introduced him to Abe Jukes, Phil Coxon and Nigel Ipinson, who were to become the new live members of OMD. Except for Abe who was replaced by Stuart on drums, this relationship continued until OMD stopped recording and touring, when Andy was told that Radio 1 would no longer play his records.

A lot of bands and artists have recorded at the Motor Museum. There must be lots of stories and anecdotes. Do any in particular stand out?

Bands like The Christians, Its Immaterial, Dead or Alive, The Farm and Frankie Goes to Hollywood, amongst many others, used the Pink Studio in Ullet Rd over the coming years mainly for demos and B-sides. P J Proby recorded Love Will Tear Us Apart, on one of their many marathon sessions with Gary Wilkinson engineering.

It was Black who recorded the first big hit in The Pink Studio in 1984 recording Wonderful Life and Sweetest Smile with Dave Dix over a weekend. I had met Colin Verncombe in Lark Lane looking rather depressed at having been dropped by Warner Bros. Black had toured supporting Hambi & The Dance as had Frankie Goes to Hollywood, with Paul Rutherford singing backing vocals for me before joining Holly, so I invited Colin to come and use the studio. My intention was for free, but he rang me a week later saying he had £200 to spend. The session was arranged for the weekend that I would be away in Italy, meeting the new label I was signing to called Durrium.

On my return from Italy I heard Wonderful Life, and Sweetest Smile, and remember the excitement from Dave Dix knowing they had done something special. Colin’s school friend then set up a label to release Wonderful Life, which suddenly began getting played on Radio 1, eventually selling over twenty thousand copies. The band where then signed to A&M and recorded an album attempting to re record the two tracks about three times. They eventually released the Pink versions of Wonderful Life and Sweetest Smile adding a little percussion to the original masters, both songs going top ten.

After moving to the Pink Museum in Lark Lane the other significant event was the arrival of a young band called Oasis. The Real People had been telling me about them for the last six months. I had decided to manage The Real People one of the many bands who without any money or management were encouraged to develop through the studio, and they kept telling me about their mates from Manchester.

Oasis had been signed by Creation, and were supporting The Real People at the Crazy House. After the gig I took them to the studio to drop off their equipment. They had booked in for four days to record some b-sides, before beginning their album. On the third evening The Griffiths brothers Tony and Chris, who were the Real People, turned up to listen to what their mates had done, but were unimpressed by what they heard. Noel tried to justify the songs saying they were only B- sides. Tony then explained that there are no B- sides any more, because all the tracks are on the same side of the CD. Tony then asked what the track was that they had been jamming earlier. It was decided to finish this song and the lyrics were written that night in the control room. The engineer for the session was Dave Scott who was the proud owner of a rather large rotweiller called Elsa, who was prone to flatulence, and would often spend her time in the control room on her back The drinks in the studio were always taken into the control room on a large silver tray, and on this occasion there was a half eaten packet of Alka Seltzers on the tray. These images contributed to the immortal lines,

I know this girl called Elsa
She’s into Alka Seltzer
She sniffs it with a cane
From a supersonic tray (changed to train)

This was around the same time that Karl Bartos came to visit Andy at the studio. I think they were collaborating on some music, so Andy arranged to take him out on Saturday night to the State, which had become a famous dance/rave venue in town. Unfortunately the bouncers would not allow them in because they both had white jeans on. How ironic that one of the founders of dance music should be discriminated against by the ignorance of some Liverpool doormen.