Dedicated Recording Studios - The End Of An Era?

Not so long ago, tradition was that if you wanted to make it big in the music industry

, you had to have an album to sell to the masses. To make this album, you had to be signed to a major record label who would take your band into a large recording studio, where your band would play and a producer in a suit would direct men in white lab coats to engineer a finished product.

Now, a teen in their bedroom with their friend and a half-decent computer can knock out some tunes and, with the help of some good press and marketing, get to number one and win awards. Don't believe me? Labrinth? Ed Sheeran?

Big name studios like Olympic and Abbey Road are finding themselves in some serious financial trouble only recently Abbey Road was up for sale, despite having one of the best reputations in the world for recording, as well as some of the most high profile clients. Studio One at Abbey Road has been home to bands performing in front of a small crowd, with full orchestras and whatever instrumentation the artists could dream of. Is the money involved in this scale of production simply too much outgoing to justify the incoming?

Some would argue that the studio environment breeds creativity- bands like U2 and Muse create new soundscapes with possibilities only available in large spaces with dedicated time and silence around to pick up the slightest nuances. Many of their respective recent works have large orchestral arrangements quite impossible to make happen in a bedroom. But how true is the previous statement, now that virtual orchestras are becoming more prevalent? The latest offerings from Vienna and EastWest are used on more pop records that real orchestras over the last year the thousands of pounds spent on the virtual instruments is justified against the cost of using an orchestra once when the players may cost a hundred pounds a day each. In larger orchestras this makes the cost ludicrous for any smaller artists, or even larger ones without huge label backing.

Another advantage of large studios is the gear they may carry. Vintage guitars and amps, vintage pianos and keyboards (many of which are being rendered obsolete by virtual keyboard emulations), classic preamps and the best mixing desks can add up to make for a very authentic sound.

Banter Media are a good English example of how a balance can be struck between a large studio with all its benefits and a home studio with low overheads virtual keyboards and guitar amps mean less overheads to hire or buy the real thing whilst keeping the sound and environment of a real studio, treated live rooms provide the authenticity but without the overinflated cost that keeps budding artists in their bedrooms.

by: Peter Stevens

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