Background Richard "Dick" Swettenham was a British technician and engineer who was the Technical Director at
Olympic Studios in the 1960s, where he designed and custom-built the studios' innovative wraparound
mixing consoles. In 1968, when
Island Records wanted a mixing console for the company's new
Basing Street Studios,
Glyn Johns persuaded Swettenham to leave Olympic Studios and partner with
Island Records founder
Chris Blackwell to start his own mixing console manufacturing company, and Helios Electronics was established in 1969. 10 years later, in 1979, Helios Electronics ceased operations. Helios founder Swettenham died of cancer on April 9, 2000.
Console design Like their predecessors at Olympic Studios, Helios mixing consoles feature a wraparound design with console sections positioned at a much higher angle, putting controls easier for the engineer to reach than traditional console designs. Some Helios consoles also featured flattering mic preamps with Lustraphone transformers and characteristic 3-band
EQ.
Helios consoles The first Helios mixing console was commissioned by Keith Grant for Olympic Studios' new Studio Two in 1969, where the console was used to record projects by
Jimi Hendrix,
Procol Harum,
Led Zeppelin,
Traffic,
the Rolling Stones,
Eric Clapton and others. Also in 1969, Island Records commissioned a 20-input, 8-bus Helios console with 16-channel monitoring for their new
Basing Street Studios, where the console was used to record
Black Sabbath,
Jethro Tull,
Genesis,
Bob Marley & the Wailers,
Dire Straits, and the
Led Zeppelin album
Led Zeppelin IV, including "
Black Dog" and "
Stairway to Heaven". In the mid- to late-'70s,
Richard Branson commissioned Helios consoles for
Virgin Records' recording studios
The Manor,
The Manor Mobile, and
The Town House. The initial Manor Mobile Helios console outfitted the world's first purpose-designed 24-track mobile recording studio, its 24 inputs later expanded to 40 inputs with the use of additional Helios submixers. The Town House studios opened with a 40-input Helios console with Allison automation, which remained in use at the studio until 1984. A
quad-ready 32-input Helios console with Allison automation was part of Virgin's 1975 refurbishment of The Manor studios, where it remained in use through late 1981. Helios consoles were popular with artists building their own recording studios in the 1970s, including
the Beatles Apple Studios,
Eric Clapton,
Ian Anderson of
Jethro Tull's Maison Rouge Mobile, and
10cc's
Strawberry Studios.
The Who originally outfitted their
Ramport Studios with a 32-input Helios console, which was replaced by a
Neve console in 1976. In 1985, after Ramport was purchased by Virgin Records and renamed Townhouse 3, the studio received The Town House Studio 1's Helios console, which remained in use until 1988. When
the Rolling Stones designed their
Mobile Studio in the late '60s, they commissioned Swettenham's company to build a Helios console. The RSM would go on to record most of Led Zeppelin's
Led Zeppelin III (1970) and
Led Zeppelin IV (1971), much of the Rolling Stones'
Sticky Fingers (1971) and
Exile on Main St. (1972), as well as the Stones' 1969 Hyde Park concert. During the making of the sixth Deep Purple album,
Machine Head, the Mobile nearly caught fire as it stood next to the
Montreux Casino in Switzerland, which was set ablaze during a
Frank Zappa concert. This incident became the inspiration behind Deep Purple's most famous song, "
Smoke on the Water", which mentioned the Mobile in the lyrics ("We all came out to Montreux ... to make records with a mobile") and later referred to the Mobile as the "Rolling truck Stones thing". Since November, 2001, the RSM has been owned by the
National Music Centre in
Calgary, Canada. The Helios console from Town House records now resides and is utilized by Shorefire Recording Studios in Long Branch NJ.
Legacy In the 10 years that Helios Electronics was in business, fewer than 50 Helios consoles were built, and it is estimated that only 20 of these consoles remain intact, while others have been parted out, rebuilt, or cloned. The rarity of the consoles, along with their use on so many notable recordings, has made the Helios sound something sought out by recording professionals In 2004, Helios Electronics released the Type 69 mic/line/EQ module, a reissue of the input section of the rare silver Olympic Studios mixing desk. In 2011, Anamod introduced the Realios TL Compressor, a 500-series module based on the compressor modules in vintage Helios consoles. In 2020, H2 Audio introduced the Helios 2128 microphone preamp and the Helios 5011 EQ 500-series format modules.
Software emulations In 2007,
Universal Audio introduced the Type 69 EQ
signal processing plug-in, officially licensed by Helios. An updated version of the plug-in was introduced in 2018. ==References==