About John Pennington
I’m John Pennington. I started in 1985 as an assistant engineer at Strawberry Studios in Stockport, learning from Martin Hannett. Since then I’ve mixed front of house for Moby, New Order, Run The Jewels, Robyn and Röyksopp, recorded and mixed albums, and mixed live shows for broadcast. I split my time between Los Angeles, USA and the UK.
These are the stories behind the credits.
1985...
Strawberry Studios
I started at Strawberry Studios in Stockport in 1985 as an assistant engineer, sitting in with producers on projects for The Smiths and Echo & the Bunnymen. I studied electronics at Salford University one day a week, but I really learned the job in the control room, from the studio's engineers Martin Lawrence and Richard Scott and co-founder Peter Tattersall. Within six months I was engineering overnight sessions for local bands: The Milltown Brothers, The Mock Turtles and World of Twist, who signed to a major label soon after our demos. By the late 1980s I was working with Sisters of Mercy, The Housemartins and A Certain Ratio. The big one was Happy Mondays' "Bummed", with Martin "Zero" Hannett producing. Martin changed the way I record: unusual microphone techniques, tape tricks, and capturing a band as they really sound. He found bands in small clubs around the North West, and together we made The High's debut album, "Somewhere Soon". The High then offered me a full-time job on the road. Strawberry was about to close and the money was twenty times what I was earning, so it was an easy decision. That's how I moved into live sound, and I've never lost the hunger for it.
1993...
Moby
In 1993 I was mixing Manchester's Eskimos & Egypt on a European tour, with Moby as their support act, and I ended up looking after him too: setting up his gear (a MiniDisc player, a keyboard and an Octopad) and mixing his shows. That turned into six months touring the world. After his next album sessions he went out again with a drummer, percussionist and backing singer, and we toured Europe and the US. Then came "Animal Rights", his guitar record, and tours alongside Soundgarden and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Watching their engineers, especially Dave Rat, taught me a huge amount. It wasn't always easy. Fans expecting techno got punk guitars, and some nights people walked out; by the end of one tour there were more people on stage than in the room. We played every show as hard as the first, and I learned how much an audience's expectations matter. After that tour I moved on, with no idea I'd be back behind the desk for him a few years later.
1991...
The Mock Turtles
In 1991 I recorded "Can You Dig It?" with The Mock Turtles at Strawberry. Nobody saw it coming: it started life as a throwaway B-side, while the band were focused on another song, "Lay Me Down". Their guitarist, Martin Glynn Murray, liked a long solo, and with drums, vocals and everything else filling our 24 tracks, we ran out of time and patience. Martin Coogan, the frontman, and I were amazed at how far off the beat it wandered, so we went to the Waterloo pub for a pint. When we came back I found a few bars of the solo that really worked. I sampled them into the Akai S1000 we'd been using for drum triggers and looped them to replace the parts that didn't. It's the only time I've ever had to rebuild a solo with a sampler, and the song became a hit. That studio thinking shaped my live mixing too. Dave Rat, who mixed the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Pearl Jam, showed me how far you can go with separation and stereo imaging: give every part its own place, and the whole mix opens up.
1996 - 1999
Fluke
Fluke’s Risotto was a monumental record, and I mixed their live show across North America. It was a gift for a front of house engineer: dense, carefully built electronic music that let me push the PA as far as it would go. We picked remarkable venues, so every show felt like an event. It’s still one of the most fun runs of my life.
1999...
Moby "Play" and more...
In 1999 Moby called me back. "Play" was becoming a worldwide hit, and I rejoined his team for years of touring, from New York to Bali. I rebuilt the backing tracks for the live show, worked with the band to make every night sound like the record, and moved us from analogue consoles to digital along the way. I've mixed Moby on and off ever since, most recently at Coachella 2026.
2007-2012
Robyn
After Moby, his manager Eric Harle asked me to work with two more of his artists. The first was Robyn. I mixed her shows through her self-titled album and the Body Talk records, touring America and Europe, and her talent and energy on stage never stopped amazing me. The highlight was supporting Madonna on the Sticky & Sweet Tour across Europe. Live Nation ran three identical stages: one in use, one being built and one on its way to the next city. When a fire closed the Channel Tunnel, the production manager chartered two cargo 747s to fly the key equipment from London to Paris, brought in fresh drivers, and sent the 40-plus trucks over on the Dover to Calais ferry. The show went on. Madonna's hour-long rehearsals with her 60-plus dancers often ate into Robyn's soundcheck, but I learned more about professionalism on that tour than almost anywhere.
2007-2015
Röyksopp
Eric Harle's other band was Röyksopp, the Norwegian duo. Their mix of electronica, pop and ambient music kept pushing what a live show could sound like, and some nights were as close to perfect as I've heard. Mixing them taught me how much is possible when the sounds coming off the stage are that good to start with.
Moving to America
I moved to Baltimore and made Maryland home for ten years. From there I worked all over the world: electronic shows for Avicii and Alesso, then, in 2014, a change of pace with Crowded House and a band of live musicians. The travel was relentless and the distance from home was hard, but those years built the career I have now.
2016-2023
X Ambassadors
In 2016 the manager of Ra Ra Riot, who also looked after X Ambassadors, put me forward to mix their shows, and I stayed with them until 2023. I already loved "Renegades" and "Unsteady", and live they had real raw power. Over those seven years they took me from small clubs to arenas, and being the one shaping how they sounded every night was a privilege. We were a family on the road, and I'm proud of the shows we made together.
2016-now
New Order
In 2016 New Order asked me to join them, and it felt like coming home. They'd been part of my working life for decades: I'd spent hours at Strawberry editing their album "Technique", and later ran Hooky's studio while he worked with Dave Potts on the Monaco project. Before any of that, I'd spent plenty of nights at the Haçienda. Mixing them live is a joy. Their electronic sound is built with real care, and the crowds sing every word. Being trusted with the sound of a band that shaped my own story is one of the proudest parts of my career.
2023-2025
Run The Jewels
In 2023, I got a call from Run The Jewels asking if I was available to mix front of house for their shows celebrating the 10th anniversary of their first album. I was about to start a tour with another band, but I love RTJ so much that I couldn't let El-P and Killer Mike down. I found someone to take my place on the other tour and set off on one of the most enjoyable tours of my life. If you've never heard Run The Jewels, you're missing out on something unique and rewarding: lyrically, sonically and spiritually. I mixed 16 shows across four cities - Terminal 5 in New York, The Salt Shed in Chicago, The Eastern in Atlanta and the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles - with the band performing a different album each night: night one was Run The Jewels, night two was Run The Jewels 2, and so on. The encore was all the hits they hadn't already played. It was a privilege to mix for them, and the RTJ production team gave rave reviews for the clarity and purity of the sound. In over 40 years of doing this, I've found that kind of praise is rare. In 2025, RTJ were asked to support Wu-Tang Clan on their Wu-Tang Forever: The Final Chamber North American tour, and we didn't disappoint. I'm sure many Wu-Tang fans were surprised by the power and confidence of RTJ's sonic onslaught. Clair Global supplied a large Cohesion system, which survived the whole tour despite the never-ending beats we pushed through it. I can't wait for RTJ5.
