Andy Jackson: Signal To Noise

The Pink Floyd engineer takes his own walk on the dark side.

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Since the early 80s, Andy Jackson has worked as a sound engineer and co-producer for Pink Floyd and its members.

Signal To Noise is his own sombre and subdued musical journey, focusing on atmosphere and mood more than hooks and virtuosity. Ambient underpinnings and a downbeat space-rock vibe pervade the album, with few tracks getting above a crawl, tempo-wise. While it doesn’t sound like Floyd, the band’s influence looms in tracks like Invisible Colours with its semi-tribal feel, and in the oft-used, simple and effective two-part vocal harmonies, as in Brownian Motion. Less obvious points of reference might be Robbie Robertson and Chris Rea – the tone and texture of the guitar sounds and the low-register, borderline mumble of much of the lead vocals bring to mind songs like Somewhere Down The Crazy River and The Road To Hell (check out One More Push especially). The result is a collection of hypnotic, taut compositions with an intensity that often feels claustrophobic, with all manner of sonic effects and manipulated sounds going on in the background. This is late-night, headphones-on music.

Gary Mackenzie

Gary has contributed reviews and news features for Prog Magazine for over a decade now. A fan of prog and heavy rock since childhood, his main areas of interest are classic and symphonic prog, prog-metal and modern acts bringing in fresh influences to the genre. He has a professional background in youth and community work, he teaches drum kit in schools and is a working musician. Gary was the drummer in semi-legendary NWOBHM band Praying Mantis for a couple of years and has been a member of indie-prog-pop-art-rock combo The Mighty Handful for more than twenty years. He loves cats and skiing, and has a Blue Peter badge.