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Abbey Road recording console sells for $1.8 million
By Andy Malt | Published on Wednesday 29 March 2017
A recording console originally housed at EMI’s Abbey Road Studios has sold for just over $1.8 million at auction in New York. The equipment was used to record albums by Paul McCartney and Wings, George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Kate Bush, The Cure, and Pink Floyd’s ‘Dark Side Of The Moon’, among others.
The EMI TG12345 MK IV recording console was one of only two made for Abbey Road Studios, used there between 1971 and 1983. The other is now in Prime Studios in Austria, while the one just sold was acquired by its seller – producer Mike Hedges – when Abbey Road upgraded its equipment in 1983. It had been expected to sell for around £700,000.
“The world record price of this important item of music engineering only confirms the military precision of EMI craftsmanship and the powerhouse persona of Abbey Road Studio”, says auction house Bonhams’ Katherine Schofield. “The intense bidding seen in the room and on the phone speaks to its association with one of the UK’s most relevant and successful bands, Pink Floyd, and highlights the fact that this is far from being any ordinary console”.
It’s not known who the new owner is, or their plans for the bit of studio kit they now own.
