“The notion that this would be The Beatles’ last album had not occurred to me at the time. On reflection, the fact is that they clearly did not want to be in each other’s company. They tended to come in and work on their own as individuals.

“Paul would come in and sing Oh! Darling until his voice was suitably hoarse to get the right take. John, too, would work on his vocals by himself. George, of course, was very involved with his own songs, doing things without help from the others. Abbey Road was largely the work of individuals and not that of a band.

“Geoff Emerick was the engineer – I was still an assistant, very much in training. My relationship with Geoff was very good. He was a great teacher, always ready to answer my technical questions, provided that I waited for the right moment to ask. He’s a great ‘ideas’ guy, always looking for a new way to record something. That was a lot of fun to watch.

“The album was the second one that was done on eight-track – Let It Be was the first, although there might have been one or two songs on The White Album that were done on eight-track. The machine was under Abbey Road’s extravagant scrutiny – they wouldn’t buy anything that they didn’t think they would totally use.

“George Martin was always the middle ground between everybody, and they all, without exception, had a great deal of respect for him. He was, in many ways, the guiding light of this period. He was the glue that cemented everything together.”