DAY FIVE.....MONTSERRAT....Walking On The Moon....cont...

Air Studios Montserrat, opened by George Martin in the seventies and host to some of the World's  well known recording artists and their subsequent albums. Studios, state of the art but more importantly, away from it all in a tropical paradise, where the creative juices and no doubt the locally grown Mary Jane, could flow through the veins of renowned stars such as The Police, The Rolling Stones, Luther Vandross, Paul MC.Cartney, Midge Ure, Michael Jackson, America and local celebrity Arrow, remember him? Hot, Hot, Hot. Not now.

Like small children who have just discovered the world around is made from chocolate, we entered the premises through the side gate, thinking to a man, of those who had entered before us. Trish was also with us of course and like a mother looking after three wayward trespassing sons, was making sure we didn't tread carelessly or excitedly fail to heed the warning of the sign outside.

Firstly we came upon a hot courtyard into which was sunken a swimming pool. The pool was now filled with fetid green rainwater to a level where not even the bravest would trust a dive from the rotting, rust edged board. In the middle of the slime a frog or toad, giant, as if from living long in the toxic mix, baked in the shallows. Around the pool, cracked tiles gave way to our footfall, weed and fronded foliage swayed in the hot breeze on the sides where once was a lawn, green and fertile, but now presenting a realistic challenge to Alan Titchmarsh and his team of garden do gooders.

The building itself, the studio complex, edged the pool on one side. Massive windows looked out onto the pool area, now opaque with dust and dirt, not revealing what lay in wait beyond. A door to the left swung loosely open in the breeze and as I watched, Merlin disappeared through it, followed by Jim, camera clicking like some long abandoned, out of time metronome. Soon I joined them. The bright light outside immediately gave way to an inner gloom and smell of dusty decay. Some sunlight managed to find passage through the windows in thin shards no wider than the thickest string of a bass guitar or a conductor's baton.

The room in which we all now stood was recognisable to me. It had been the main recording studio. The control room was to my left where producers had filtered and mixed and musicians had negotiated and fiddled. Incredibly, the glass that separated it from the main room was still intact, but the speakers, once embedded in the wall above were now long gone. Wires hung down everywhere, and some even were bursting up from the floor in tangled confusion. We realised of course that much looting here had taken place and although the fabric of the building remained it had been depleted of its innards. Every step we took (!) kicked up ash which joined the beams of light.

We crept around like post apocalyptic survivors, recently up from a nuclear bunker, silently and with a strange respect, turning over switches and plugs as if hoping to find some rock heirloom, a discarded plectrum, a musical score, a sliver of recording tape buried in the debris. But no. All was gone, long gone, either rotten to the years, or taken by others such as we. Another door led to a huge area, the size of a small aircraft hanger. It was empty and with no windows, dark, even more gloomy that the rest of the studios. What it had been, we could only guess, but some of the flooring gave as we trod upon it, and like skaters on the first frozen lakes of winter, we decided not to venture further and turned back.

After some time and with great reluctance we realised that it was time to leave. Trish had long since returned to keep Shirley company in the car and we were mindful of the heat outside in the courtyard. Back outside I looked up, for the first time. The upper floor, accessed by a wrought iron spiral staircase, clearly had housed accommodation and living space. The way up was, however, barred. The roof looked none too safe and it was clear that the floor had given way in parts with floorboarding hanging through the ceiling below.

Soon these once great studios will be gone, reclaimed, like many of the ravaged areas of the island, by the magnificent nature, swallowed up and often reborn. But if the buildings would never come back could the spirit of the music made here live on? I think so. For as we explored in our reverential hush this day, there were tunes running through our minds. I talked to the other two after, they agreed. As I struggled to breathe in the claustrophobic ash and dust, an appropriate Police tune had played along. They too had their own personal experiences of a similar nature. To me this was a tiny triumph against the double disaster that destroyed Air Studios. As we drove away, on to our next adventure, my tune played on, and on..........