Recollection by Jules (Gale Electronics, 1974–1977)

I worked for Gale from 1974 to 1977. I was 24 when I started, having previously worked for an advertising photographer in London, but I needed a change. A friend from college knew the secretary, Lucy, at Gale’s. He’d been offered a job but didn’t have a work permit, so he told me about the vacancy instead.

I got the job after a quick interview with David Lyth (later of Volt Loudspeakers) and was put onto the production line building speakers. It was a fun time, being in the middle of Mayfair, and reputedly the only factory in the vicinity. Bruton Place was a great road, just off Berkeley Square where, as the song goes, the nightingale sang!

That’s where I first met Ian Dampney and Nigel Hobden. Donald Sinclair, a whisky-drinking Scot, was the speaker manager, and many an evening was spent in one of the Mayfair pubs after work. He taught me to drink pints of bitter with a whisky chaser.

The other guys I remember making the speakers were Mo, Dennis, and an Indian chap whose surname was Patel, though I’ve forgotten his first name. Peter Balkan was the small guy who tested each speaker we made in the anechoic chamber, fun when he was in a good mood, but with a wicked temper when he wasn’t. Ray, the salesman, had an E-Type Jaguar, I remember. There were also three African ladies upstairs who coated the speaker cones, I’ve forgotten their names, but one of them was a genuine princess.

In time I was promoted upstairs to build the GT2101 decks and their control units, which was a bit quieter work. I had a dust-free chamber to work in, and I remember building the control units and calibrating the deck speeds using an oscilloscope to tweak the crystal that controlled it.

Eventually we were joined by John Curl, who was designing the amplifier. He’d previously worked for Mark Levinson, I believe, and our amp was going to be the best. He was put up in an expensive Mayfair hotel for the duration of his stay in London, typical Ira spending! That amp ended up in bits on the worktop. I remember Ray Cooper visiting the workshop and talking to him, I think he’s still a friend of Nigel. I also remember looking out of the upstairs window when Oscar Peterson visited, and when one of the guys from Yes dropped by.

Ian and Nigel saw the end coming for Gale as Ira tried to expand, I remember he was even going to buy EMI at one point. They started a model-making business and took me with them. I worked there for 21 years, until they eventually made me redundant! I’m back in photography now. Funny thing, hi-fi and photography have always been closely linked, though don’t ask me why.

I remember when Gale went broke and we were paid out in the street in Bruton Place. Then Donald Wong bought the company, and a skeleton crew moved to Kensal Rise. That lasted a couple of years, I think, and I worked for the model-making company there. Eventually Donald took production elsewhere and, I think, dropped the large speakers in favour of smaller ones.

I once had a silver pair of stands and actually sprayed them black, I think I threw them away eventually (sorry, folks!). I still have the black-and-chrome ones, though, and they still work fine. The surrounds are probably falling apart, but I don’t thrash them. I run them from a Quad 303 and the 100-watt “dumping” amp (Quad 405).

I used to do the hi-fi shows with Ray, they were great fun, playing Oxygène by Jean-Michel Jarre, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, and Dark Side of the Moon at full volume for the hi-fi crowd.

I love the pictures you have on this site. Have you got the Playboy magazine ones? Or was it another men’s mag, I forget. I have it somewhere. There was one advert of the black-and-chrome speaker taken on a stand in a garden with a cat on it. I think they only used it once. Have you seen that one? It was my garden, my cat, and I took the picture!

— Jules