How did you end up in the old Producer's Workshop space?
I'm from North Carolina. I worked in studios there. There was a studio called Altamont Recording. I worked there with David McConnell. Sparklehorse [Mark Linkous] did his last record there. I worked there for a few years, and it shut down. I started making friends with people in Asheville and doing work at Echo Mountain. That's a gorgeous studio there.
I always hear that. Everyone says it's great to work out of.
I love it. While I was doing that, I met this guy named Gary Jules who did [Tears for Fears'] "Mad World" in Donnie Darko. He did pretty well in the '90s. I ended up working for him in his home studio. We worked on a film score and a record that's still not released, and that's been six years! He basically said, "Look, you need to go to L.A. You're young, and I've got great friends to introduce you to." He brought me out here, and I made friends quick. I was looking for a mix room; something small. I was just doing a lot of mix work, but I wasn't tracking a whole lot at the time. I came across this Craigslist ad. It said, "Recording Studio." There was only a picture of the building outside.
Not too appealing.
No, it wasn't. The rent was friendly, it was in Hollywood and had parking, and so I called the guy. He came down here and walked me through with the lights off. He didn't know what it was, and I didn't know really what it was, but I knew that it was a classic studio. It had the smell and the look. There was no doubt in my mind. I said that I wanted to sign a lease that day.
How many years ago was that?
That was in November of 2010. It turns out that the friendly rent was because this place was a dump. It was in really bad shape. We had to put a lot of money into it to make it functional. We re-did the control room. The place was never ever grounded. It was done with residential two-ended electronics. I had that fixed, and we treated this room again. It was so dead, and all the carpet was mildewed. They had commercial-grade carpet from floor to ceiling in here. It was nice for like '90s punk. If you're wondering why a lot of those Epitaph records sound a little harsh, it's probably because they were mixing in this room!
You're cranking up the 3 kHz.
