Brian Eno and Coldplay's 'cat-flap arrangement'

Brian Eno has been interviewed by Exclaim.ca in time for next month's magazine, and he talks about working in the studio with Coldplay on the recent LP5 sessions, and what he sees going on. Below are the Coldplay excerpts that are relevant... [comments/discussion]

You really are coaching them [Coldplay] quite closely to bring out their greatest potential.

Yes, well, that was the case with the first record I did with them. On this one I have a slightly more unusual relationship, which we call the cat-flap arrangement...

Which is what?

So there's a cat flap in their studio, and I occasionally crawl in and have a listen to what's going on, make a few comments and crawl out again. And you know, they occasionally will say, "Uh, got any time next week that you can make it through the cat flap?" So it's a much more distant relationship this time. They've picked up the cues from the last time and are kind of running with them this time. I think what happens after you've worked with people a few times, you start to understand which part of the process somebody is really useful for and that's when you want them there.

Right, so there's a lot less talking going on essentially.

Yes. And I think you don't want everybody there all the time. It's not very productive. If everybody's there all the time, probably 60 percent of the people are not doing anything, so they are sort of sitting around reading things or looking at things on Google, or fiddling about, or whatever they're doing. It's much better to have a smaller number of people in the room and have focused attention, then have everybody there. I always think that since somebody's reading a magazine in the studio, it's like a leak. You know, there's sort of something disappearing through that hole.

You can read the full article over at Exclaim.ca now.

It's Brian Eno...