Howard Gray

Music Producer and founder member of Apollo 440.
Born July 15th, 1962, Sydney, Australia.
Howard Gray grew up in Liverpool, England. During his final year at school his interest in music and sound recording landed him a job as 'Tape Op' at Richard Branson's residential country estate, The Manor Studio. His progression to assistant sound engineer, and then engineer, both at The Manor and Branson's newly completed Townhouse Studio in London's Hammersmith, saw him working with Public Image Limited, Simple Minds, XTC, Heaven 17, Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark, Dub Syndicate, Phil Collins, Japan, UB40, The Armoury Show, Kate Bush, Van Morrison and many more. One of the producers Gray engineered for most frequently was Steve Lillywhite, who encouraged him to go freelance.
In 1983 UB40 asked him to help produce "Labour Of Love", their best-selling album of Reggae covers. Scritti Politti, The Pale Fountains, The Cure, Yazz, Terence Trent D'Arby, The Screaming Blue Messiahs, Danny Wilson, Belly, The Wolfgang Press, Kirsty MacColl and Blue Pearl are some of the artists he worked with over the next decade.
Always keen to explore available technology Gray was an early fan of the Sequential Circuits Studio 440 (opens in a new tab), considered by many to be the grandfather of sequencing/sampling/drum and music making machines. With Age Of Chance, in 1987, Gray was one of the first to use the machine to create an entire album.
In 1990, together with his brother Trevor Gray and old school friends Noko and James Gardner, Howard Gray formed Apollo 440, with whom he has released five albums, three UK Top 10 singles, and a further eight Top 40 singles. As in-demand remixers Apollo 440 and their alter ego Stealth Sonic Orchestra have worked their magic over 60 times for artists such as U2, Manic Street Preachers, Deep Forest, Puretone and Ennio Morricone. With Apollo 440, Gray has collaborated with Jean-Michel Jarre, Jeff Beck and Tomoyasu Hotei, recorded various film soundtracks, and worked on a number of Sony Playstation games.
In addition to his role with Apollo 440, the 21st century has seen Gray add more outside production credits to his extensive CV, working with the likes of Art Brut, The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster, Gareth Sager and Drive-By Argument. He has recently completed production of the debut album by Josh Bray, and looks forward to collaborating on his fourth F.A. Cup single for Liverpool F.C.