How Andy Jackson used SADiE to cut 'The Division Bell' together from miles of tape

Back in the mid-90s, digital editing was still a luxury. When Pink Floyd were making The Division Bell, engineer Andy Jackson brought in a prototype SADiE system—basically a rackmount computer with hard drives and a clunky interface that let you slice and rearrange audio non-destructively. Before that, editing meant physically cutting magnetic tape with a razor blade and splicing block, a painstaking process that discouraged endless experimentation.

With SADiE, Jackson could assemble solos, vocal takes, and even whole song sections from dozens of separate performances. David Gilmour would record multiple guitar passes, then Jackson would comp the best phrases together, adjusting timing and feel without ever touching tape. It meant the band could be more exploratory in the studio—try thirty versions of a part, then let the machine stitch the perfect Frankenstein take. The workflow shifted from “get it right in one pass” to “collect everything and sort it later,” which was liberating but also risked over-polish. The album has a clean, seamless sound partly because SADiE let them remove every tiny imperfection.