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Glyn Thomas Johns (born 15 February 1942) is an English audio engineer and record producer. He has worked with many of the most famous rock recording acts from both the UK and abroad, such as the Rolling Stones, the Beatles, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Kinks, Eagles, Bob Dylan, the Band, Eric Clapton, the Clash, Steve Miller Band, Small Faces, the Ozark Mountain Daredevils and Joan Armatrading. Throughout his career, he has generally preferred a live, natural approach to recording in the studio, and developed a method of recording drums sometimes referred to as the "Glyn Johns method".
The years 1964–1984 marked Johns's peak era of activity in which he engineered or produced numerous hit records. In 1965 Johns became one of the first independent British recording engineers to operate Freelancer rather than under the hire of a particular record label or studio. He was involved in making some of the most influential albums of the rock era such as Beggars Banquet and Let It Bleed by the Rolling Stones, Who's Next by the Who, and Led Zeppelin's debut album. Johns was the chief engineer during the Beatles' Get Back sessions for what became the Let It Be album, as documented in the films Let It Be (1970) and (2021). Since 1984 Johns has continued to be active in the industry.
Johns is the father of Ethan Johns, and the older brother of Andy Johns (1950–2013), all three of whom shared the same career. In addition to his work as an engineer and producer, Johns has recorded as a solo musical artist. In 2012, Johns was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, receiving the Award for Musical Excellence.
Johns recounts that his next-door neighbour lent him a Guild electric guitar, which sparked his interest playing guitar. At this time Johns was attending the church's Wednesday night youth club, where for the first time he saw Jimmy Page play guitar. Johns became a fan of traditional jazz and joined a local ragtag jazz band on tea chest bass. He cites the record "Little Rock Getaway" by Les Paul and Mary Ford as an influence. Les Paul was one of the first musicians to experiment with tape multi-tracking and sound effects. Lonnie Donegan's skiffle hit version of Lead Belly's "Rock Island Line" was also influential—according to Johns, "I had heard nothing like it and rushed out to buy it the next day". He soon bought his own guitar and was introduced to blues and folk recordings by a neighbour, who lent him records by artists such as Snooks Eaglin, Brownie McGhee, Sonny Terry, Woody Guthrie, and Burl Ives. Johns began to keep company with a group of friends interested in music, whose ranks included Ian Stewart (later in the Rolling Stones). In 1959 at the age of 17, Johns left school, and with Mayhew and Golding formed the band the Presidents.
At the time IBC had a busy schedule. Coats and ties were required to be worn by recording engineers (and white lab coats for technical engineers). Most recordings were done then in monaural (except for classical music). During Johns's first year at IBC, the popularity of rock and roll increased and demand for records that sounded more American. Engineers were confronted with the challenge of capturing louder music. Younger engineers were more apt to try new approaches, and Terry Johnson, another young engineer at IBC, convinced Johns to move in this direction. Johns recounts that Jack Good, one of the UK's early successful television rock and roll producers, made regular use of IBC Studios, and did many of his recordings with Johns and Johnson engineering sessions. They engineered pre-recorded tracks for the Oh Boy! television programme, which featured leading British rock and roll performers of the day, such as Joe Brown, Marty Wilde, Billy Fury, Wee Willie Harris, and others.
Johns recounts that in the early 1960s, he was signed to Decca Records as a solo musical performing artist at the urging of Jack Good. Johns's first single, "Sioux Indian", was produced by Jack Good and the next two produced by Tony Meehan. Johns later went on to record for Pye Records and Immediate Records, but none of his solo records became hits.
During this time, Johns was playing in the Presidents, who, according to Johns, began to put the phrase "Featuring Decca Recording Star Glyn Johns" on their posters. Johns realised that he could invite musicians to IBC on Sundays, when the studio was not booking sessions—letting musicians play in the sound room whilst he honed his engineering and producing skills at the console. The makeshift sessions attracted many of the best young musicians in London, such as Jimmy Page, Ian Stewart, Alexis Korner, Brian Jones, and Nicky Hopkins. Johns recounts that his first session as chief engineer was for a recording by Joe Brown, which was produced by Tony Hatch. In 1962, Johns entered into an arrangement with George Clouston, the manager at IBC studios, to let him produce records by certain artists.
In 1965, Johns left IBC studios to further pursue his solo career as a singer and performer and promote his latest record "Mary Anne", but the record failed to chart. At the urging of Talmy, Johns began working freelance as an independent producer and engineer—one of the first independent engineers in the UK. Subsequently, he did sessions at various studios such as Decca, Pye, Marble Arch, and Olympic.
In 1971, Johns reunited with the Who for the first time since the mid-1960s, this time as a co-producer, to work on what became the album Who's Next. According to Pete Townshend in his autobiography:
Johns continued to work with the Who throughout the 1970s as an engineer on parts of Quadrophenia in 1973. He produced and engineered The Who by Numbers (1975) and produced early sessions for Who Are You (1978) with engineer John Astley, who later took over as producer. Johns returned to work with the group, producing and engineering 1982's It's Hard.
Pete Townshend recruited Johns to engineer Eric Clapton's Rainbow Concert in 1973. Johns produced and engineered Eric Clapton's 1977 album, Slowhand, which featured hits such as "Lay Down Sally", "Wonderful Tonight", and his version of J. J. Cale's "Cocaine", and Clapton's next album, Backless in 1978, which contained another hit "Promises". In his autobiography Eric Clapton wrote about Johns:
Starting with the sessions for Between the Buttons in late 1966, Johns and the Rolling Stones began to record extensively at Olympic Studios. Olympic Studios became Johns's preferred studio for many years, and it became one of the most in-demand recording facilities in England.
In 1968 the Rolling Stones expressed the desire to work with an American producer and Johns recommended Jimmy Miller, who he had seen working with Traffic. Johns stayed on as engineer, and with this team the group recorded Beggars Banquet (1968) and Let It Bleed (1969). Glyn Johns engineered some of the tracks on Sticky Fingers (1971), and Exile on Main St. (1972), both produced by Jimmy Miller. On these two albums his brother, Andy Johns, also worked as an engineer. His brother engineered Goat's Head Soup, the last Rolling Stones album produced by Jimmy Miller. Glyn Johns contributed to certain tracks on It's Only Rock 'n Roll, and returned as chief recording engineer during the earlier sessions for Black and Blue, but became frustrated with delays in progress and left following a bitter disagreement with Keith Richards.
After the group's breakup, guitarist and lead vocalist Steve Marriot formed Humble Pie, whose membership included Peter Frampton—Johns produced and engineered their third and fourth albums, Humble Pie and Rock On. The other former Small Faces, Ronnie Lane, Ian McLagan, and Kenney Jones, joined with Rod Stewart and Ronnie Wood, both from Jeff Beck Group to form the Faces, and Johns engineered and co-produced (with the band) the albums A Nod Is as Good as a Wink... to a Blind Horse and Ooh La La. During the 1970s, after leaving the Faces, Ronnie Lane worked on several projects including the Rough Mix album with Pete Townshend, which was produced by Glyn Johns. Lane began to experience health problems and was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. In 1983, Eric Clapton and Johns helped organize the ARMS Charity Concerts to raise money for Lane's medical bills and research for the disease, and assembled a cast of musicians for the show, which included Clapton, Jimmy Page, Bill Wyman, Charlie Watts, Steve Winwood and others.
Johns says it was he who suggested the band play live on the rooftop of their Apple Studio building in Savile Row, London; setting up the recording equipment for their last live performance. He also recommended that the album be structured as an "audio documentary" with talk and banter included between each track. Johns helped the band compile several versions of the album, all of which got shelved before the project was turned over to producer Phil Spector in 1970, who reworked it and released it as the album Let It Be. Johns was critical of Spector's re-produced version, calling it "a syrupy load of bullshit".
Johns engineered early recorded parts of the song "I Want You (She's So Heavy)" at Trident Studios on 23 February 1969, that in later finished form appeared on the Abbey Road album. For Abbey Road remaining tracks, the group returned to EMI Studios and re-united with producer George Martin and a team of engineers including Geoff Emerick, Phil McDonald, and Alan Parsons.
Johns assisted with early sessions of Paul McCartney and Wings' Red Rose Speedway. Johns quit the project due to what he described as his lack of satisfaction with the material.
At the request of producer Bob Johnston, Johns engineered the live recordings of Bob Dylan's performance backed by the Band at the Isle of Wight Festival in 1969, some of which appeared on his 1970 Self Portrait album. He later produced and engineered Dylan's 1984 live album, Real Live. Johns also did one of the mixes for the Band's Stage Fright in 1970.
Johns engineered and produced the Eagles' first three albums, bringing them to Olympic Studios in London to record their self-titled debut, followed by Desperado, and the early sessions for On the Border. During these years they achieved success, recording hits such as "Witchy Woman", "Tequila Sunrise", and "Best of My Love", which became their first number one hit single. Increasingly the group began to develop internal friction and with Johns. They also objected to Johns' ban on use of drugs in the studio. By 1974, singer/guitarist Glenn Frey and drummer/vocalist Don Henley gained control of the band, and sought a more hard-rocking approach. Johns, who preferred their early country rock orientation, fell out of favour with the group and left during the making of On the Border, so they moved the sessions to California and brought in producer/engineer Bill Szymczyk to finish the album. Eventually, Randy Meisner and Bernie Leadon departed, and the band recruited Don Felder, Timothy B Schmit, and former James Gang guitarist Joe Walsh.
In 2011, after a number of years spent largely away from production, Johns worked with Ryan Adams on his album, Ashes & Fire. In February 2012, Johns began work on the Band of Horses album, Mirage Rock. Johns and Clapton collaborated once again for Clapton's 2016 release I Still Do.
Johns developed an approach for recording drums in stereo, sometimes referred to as the "Glyn Johns Method", that aims to achieve a natural perspective of the whole kit, rarely employing more than three or four microphones. His method consists of using two overhead microphones, with one placed over the snare drum and the other slightly over and to the right of the floor tom (both pointed towards and equidistant from the snare drum), as well as a third microphone set in front of the bass drum. He sometimes uses an additional close mic for the snare drum.
With Glyn Johns's first wife Sylvia, Johns had two children, including a son Ethan Johns, (a producer and engineer who has worked with artists such as Paul McCartney, Kings of Leon, and, like his father, Ryan Adams,) as well as a daughter Abigail Johns.
Glyn Johns is the uncle of the blues musician Will Johns (son of Andy Johns).
Johns has written an autobiography titled Sound Man, published by Blue Rider Press on 13 November 2014, in which he recounts his experiences working with the Rolling Stones, the Beatles, the Who, the Eagles, Crosby, Stills and Nash, and others.
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