General Music Chat

Hello everyone,

Thanks for the look...We are in the developmental stages of opening a recording studio and I want to make sure that we will offer what is highest in demand. We intend to cater to you the artists. And so I thought why not just ask...?

Is there a big call for affordable rehearsal space? How about mobile recording capabilities?

Any thing else hard to come by ... looking forward to your local input…also interested in the general consensus:)
• Location: fort worth

Most of the musicians / bands I am aquainted with find it hard to find other musicians that fill their need. Rehersal space is in demand but flexable availability is crucial. A recording studio who will work within the time and financial burdins facing musicians in todays economy would soon get a good name in an industry where the by word is NOT trust.

I would think that the most important aspect of any studio (yes, portable-willing to travel to the bands/artists locale would be a +) would be the engineer(s) and the quality of sound produced. This is like an artform. They would have to be equally as creative or maybe even more than the musicians themselves in order to achieve 'that sound' (it would be different for every band/musician) to be a player in the music industry today, imho.

Glad ya'll stopped by and thanks again for the response; if your curious about the sound that has been produced by one of the engineers ... go check out the sounds @ www.myspace.com/richardellis

My personal favorite is River of Love

I think its listed #4 on Rich Ellises page

Anymore thoughts anyone?

I've never been in a band that had problems with rehearsal space.

Finding someone willing to take the time & do a good mix after all that hard work in the studio, however...

Last idjit actually used the wrong vocal track, you know, the worst of 6 takes, on the "final master." I was so disgusted I coulda shot the mofo. It was a quid pro quo thing, however, & there was no way to convince the twit that it was anything other than "no big deal," evidently. I wasn't dealing with him directly or there woulda been some sort of trouble, I was so PO'd.

I've actually never been satisfied with any of my studio experiences. Perhaps it's a local thing. Most of them were pretty bad, although I had high hopes for the azzwipe above.

It seems with today's technology and the availabilty of home studio equipment a recording studio might be a tough buisness to make a living at. Studios down here in Houston are having a rough time with the economic downturn and all, however if you are able to find the right niche, with good marketing and you are in a large city you might just make it. I have a writers studio BR1180 I use to record my originals, don't laugh, I am able to get a pretty good recording, mostly I use it to write, arrange and for copyrite purposes.
The last time our band went to record a demo I set it up at a recording studio, I also found it difficult getting the guy's together to do this, geeze its tough enough to rehearse, but a live recording at a gig this would be a nice alternative to consider with the conveniance, especially if it didn't cost thousands. Our last Demo cost $400.00 and took us 4 hours we were able to get a real nice demo of covers for club booking perposes, and there are a lot better deals out there now, if you could be competitive with this you might have something. Also there is a lot of practice spaces for rent here in H-town a friend of mine owns some and he doesn't have any problem renting them or collecting rent. He say's they allways pay because their afraid I will lock up their sh*t if they don't. he runs it just like one of those mini storage places.

Yeah, a mobile recording unit, complete with vid recording capabilites, would probably fill our needs more than the standard studio stuff. Some good vids actually tie the 2 together, using the studio recording with both studio & live vids.

I imagine that gets rather expensive for you, though.

Simple good quality live recordings are hard to come by, though, & I would say that that is needed more than rehearsal space, at least in these parts. Dunno what things are like in Tx.

Down here in H-town there are a lot of apartments (I mean a lot of them)
mostly the young whippersnappers getting their bands together if they are not practicing at their parents they usually split rent on a nice air conditioned and secure practice space depending on the size they can range from $300.00 to $1000.00 a month.
Some of them even live there but they are not supposed to.
Guy's our age usually have they're priorities a little more in order and have houses we can practice in. I am not dissing the younguns I used to be one of you 30 years ago.

What is a rehearsal space?

I would think mobile recording would be something cool. If you could record bands live at their gigs. That might be a niche you could fill.

I dont know. My group kinda has that DIY ethic. Im not big on paying someone else for something that I can do myself or internally in the band.

Ive never rented rehearsal space, but I can see a need for that service. In the Memphis area where I live I see lots of adds for rehearsal space. One outfit has a large common room with stage lights and sound for the groups to do showcases. Most of these groups tend to be original acts. Sadly the couple of showcases I went too, were boring to me. It was obvious the bands hadnt played out much cause they just didnt come off slick.

Anyway good luck with your service, just dont promise anything you cant deliver, and deliver more than you promise and you will do fine.

Hey jw. here in Houston there are that I know of about 10 buisnesses that had the idea of taking a building they were haveing problems renting space out to the public, so they divided the space up into 10'x10', 20'x20', 20'x40' spaces insulating the walls for soundproofing providing restrooms, adequate elec. and a.c. and have someone work there kind of keeping an eye on people and they're spaces. One of them 10 years ago close to downtown Houston was an old converted parking garage.
Pretty soon other buisnesses that could help musicians started to show up and the whole thing kind of snowballs. It is great for the local music scene and for the building owner. Recording studios, you can take lessons, get your instruments and gear repaired, it turned out to be kind of a place where your neighbor is jammin and you can hear them a little, kind of like walking into a music store, all the sudden your around like minded people. It in the old days was a place for musicians to network before the internet. Similar to a buisness park just for musicians and supporting biz.

Cool!

I will take all this input ya'll have given us and put it to good use. Thanks again We really appreciate all the feedback!!

Cheers!!