Flood (producer)

Mark Ellis (born 16 August 1960), known by his professional pseudonym Flood, is an English record producer and audio engineer known for working with a wide range of rock and synthpop musicians. and was the tape operator on Rick Wakeman's album 1984. Ellis was also a runner at Battery Studios in London and held apprenticeships at Marcus Studios and Trident Studios.

Freelance and Some Bizzare Records

Flood moved up to house engineer before becoming a freelance engineer in 1981, the same year he worked as assistant engineer on New Order's debut album Movement. The following year he engineered Ministry's debut album With Sympathy. He became associated with Stevo's Some Bizzare Records label, leading to him working with Cabaret Voltaire, Psychic TV, and Marc Almond's side project, Marc and the Mambas among others.

In 1993, Flood shifted from engineering U2's albums to being a producer along with Brian Eno and The Edge on Zooropa. In 1994, he worked again with Nine Inch Nails this time on The Downward Spiral. He also collaborated with Dave Bessell, Gary Stout, and Ed Buller to create Node; an analogue synth heavy project that produced the album Node.

In 1996 Flood teamed with U2 once again to produce Pop, released the next year.

Flood and Paul Hartnoll of Orbital co-produced the 2008 album by The Music, Strength in Numbers. He produced the 2009 album by The Hours, See the Light. He joined Steve Lillywhite again in 2008 to work with Thirty Seconds to Mars, on This Is War. And then worked with Editors on In This Light and on This Evening. He also collaborated with Nitzer Ebb again to finish up their first new release in over a decade, Industrial Complex. In 2010, he produced Belong by The Pains of Being Pure at Heart and Let England Shake by PJ Harvey.

In 2013, Flood worked again with Depeche Mode, being responsible for the mixing process of their album Delta Machine which was produced by Ben Hillier.

Studios

Flood had a studio in Kilburn called The Bedroom. He opened the Assault & Battery studio complex with longtime recording partner Alan Moulder. In 2008, Miloco Studios opened Assault & Battery 2, a tracking and mix studio in Willesden Green. Assault & Battery 1 came under the Miloco umbrella in Summer 2009, and both Flood and Moulder remain involved with the studios, which have since been renamed Battery Studios.

Production style

Billy Corgan, who worked with Flood on three albums, said:

Pseudonym

According to producer Mark Freegard, the pseudonym "Flood" was given to Ellis by producer Chris Tsangarides during Ellis' early days at Morgan Studios while The Cure was there recording. As a young studio runner Ellis was responsible for responding to numerous requests from the recording artists and staff for tea and bacon sandwiches. Ellis kept up with the numerous requests for tea while the other runner remained largely unavailable, leading to Tsangarides nicknaming them "Flood" and "Drought," respectively.

Selected engineering/production credits

Selected production credits:

1981: The Associates – Fourth Drawer Down
1981: New Order – Movement (assistant engineer)
1982: The Sound – All Fall Down (engineer)
1982: Stephen Emmer – Vogue Estate (producer)
1982: Marc and the Mambas – Untitled (engineer)
1983: Ministry – With Sympathy (engineer)
1983: Cabaret Voltaire – The Crackdown (co-producer)
1984: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – From Her to Eternity (engineer)
1985: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – The Firstborn Is Dead (producer, engineer)
1985: Depeche Mode – Shake the Disease (engineer)
1985: Frank Tovey – Snakes & Ladders (engineer)
1986: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Kicking Against the Pricks (mixing)
1986: Crime and the City Solution – Room of Lights (co-producer)
1986: Erasure – Wonderland (producer)
1986: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Your Funeral... My Trial (mixing, assistant producer, engineer)
1987: U2 – The Joshua Tree (engineer)
1987: Erasure – The Circus (producer)
1988: The Silencers – A Blues For Buddha (producer)
1988: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Tender Prey (engineer)
1988: Book of Love – Lullaby (producer)
1989: Nitzer Ebb – Belief (producer)
1989: Nine Inch Nails – Pretty Hate Machine (engineer, programming, producer)
1989: Renegade Soundwave – Soundclash (producer)
1989: Pop Will Eat Itself – This Is the Day...This Is the Hour...This Is This! (producer, mixing)
1990: The Charlatans – Some Friendly (remixing)
1990: Nitzer Ebb – Showtime (producer, engineer)
1990: Depeche Mode – Violator (producer, mixer)
1990: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – The Good Son (mixing)
1990: Pop Will Eat Itself – Cure For Sanity (producer, mixing)
1991: Nitzer Ebb – As Is (mixing)
1991: U2 – Achtung Baby (mixing, engineer)
1991: Nitzer Ebb – Ebbhead (producer)
1992: Curve – Doppelgänger (producer, engineer)
1992: The Jesus and Mary Chain – Honey's Dead (engineer)
1992: The Charlatans – Between 10th and 11th (producer)
1992: Nine Inch Nails – Broken (producer)
1993: Depeche Mode – Songs of Faith and Devotion (producer)
1993: U2 – Zooropa (mixing, loops, engineer, producer)
1993: Curve – Cuckoo (producer)
1994: Tom Jones – The Lead and How to Swing It (producer)
1994: Nine Inch Nails – The Downward Spiral (producer, hi-hat, synthesizer)
1994: Cranes – Loved (mixing)
1995: PJ Harvey – To Bring You My Love (producer, engineer, mixing)
1995: Nitzer Ebb – Big Hit (engineer, programming, mixing, producer, guitar)
1995: The Smashing Pumpkins – Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (producer)
1997: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – The Boatman's Call (mixing, producer, composer)
1997: U2 – Pop (producer, keyboards, mixing)
1998: The Smashing Pumpkins – Adore (mixing, producer)
1998: Barry Adamson – As Above, So Below (producer, mixing, instrumentation, theremin)
1998: PJ Harvey – Is This Desire? (producer)
2000: The Smashing Pumpkins – Machina/The Machines of God (mixing, producer)
2000: Erasure – Loveboat (mixing)
2001: New Order – Get Ready (mixing, producer)
2002: Echoboy – Giraffe (producer)
2004: U2 – How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (producer, mixing)
2005: Soulwax – Any Minute Now (mixing, producer)
2005: a-ha – Analogue (mixing)
2005: Yourcodenameis:milo – Ignoto (producer)
2006: Placebo – Meds (mixing)
2006: The Killers – Sam's Town (producer, mixing, audio production, engineer)
2007: PJ Harvey – White Chalk (producer, engineer, mixing)
2008: Goldfrapp – Seventh Tree (audio production, keyboards)
2008: Sigur Rós – Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust (engineer, producer, mixing)
2009: State of Play (score co-producer with Alex Heffes and additional music)
2009: PJ Harvey and John Parish – A Woman A Man Walked By (mixing)
2009: Thirty Seconds to Mars – This Is War (producer)
2010: The Hours – It's Not How You Start, It's How You Finish (mixing, producer)
2011: PJ Harvey – Let England Shake (mixing, engineer)
2011: The Pains of Being Pure at Heart – Belong (producer)
2011: Glasvegas – Euphoric Heartbreak (producer)
2012: Karima Francis – The Remedy (producer and mixing)
2012: Compact Space – Who Says It's Real (mixing)
2012: Goldfrapp – "Yellow Halo" and "Melancholy Sky" (co-producer and mixing)
2012: Orbital – Wonky (producer)
2013: Foals – Holy Fire (co-producer and co-mixing)
2013: Depeche Mode – Delta Machine (mixing)
2014: Warpaint – Warpaint (producer and mixing)
2014: U2 – Songs of Innocence (producer)
2015: 8:58 – 8:58 (producer)
2016: PJ Harvey – The Hope Six Demolition Project (co-producer and co-mixing)
2016: Ed Harcourt – Furnaces (producer and mixing)
2017: Fink – Resurgam (producer)
2019: White Lies – Five (co-producer and co-mixing)
2019: The Murder Capital – When I Have Fears (producer)
2019: Fink – Bloom Innocent (producer)
2020: EOB – Earth (producer)
2020: Jehnny Beth – To Love Is to Live (producer, 4 tracks)
2022: Interpol – The Other Side of Make-Believe (producer)
2023: Shame – Food For Worms (producer and mixing)
2023: PJ Harvey – I Inside the Old Year Dying (co-producer and co-mixing)

References

External links

Flood biography on artistdirect.com
1997 interview with Flood by Paul Tingen in Sound on Sound magazine