The Big Box is dead, long live the Big Box!

My good friend Niki of "Snowdonnas" fame IMed me today with a link to this Wired article. Here we are building a full production studio and you read an article like this and you think to yourself "Oh shit... there goes the planet."

From one perspective this article is totally dead on. The music studio that we all know and love is a dying breed. There are a handful left (relatively speaking) and they are closing down like there is no tomorrow. "The end is near!" studio owners are screaming. I have seen multiple articles recently talking about the same issue. There was a three piece article in the Chronicle focusing on the Bay Area and how Fantasy Studios, one of the most famous studios out there, is having a problem maintaining business.

With today's home computing power, the very affordable Digital to Analog converters (DACs), and the innovation of desktop production software like Reason and Digital Performer you can easily create very professional sounding music at home. More and more musicians are moving this way and with our on the go lifestyle it totally fits in. This is where I think the article is dead on.

What the article didn't really hit on was what Mike Caffery was hinting at. The studio facility is no longer the main focus. It is the people behind the studio that are what people are willing to pay for. I was ranting on a little bit yesterday about the producers and their up and coming fame. The people know how to get a sound, know how to work with others and help polish some of the rough edges of a band or an artist. These people are needed to make the difference between a truly professional sounding album and a decent one produced on a lap top.

Sure these producers can use a laptop to do this, but they tend to want more options. They want the tactile experience of a large control surface. To feel the slider or the knob, versus turning a digital representation of it with a mouse. This is why the big studio will not go away. Only there can you get this kind of experience, find the kind of inviting environment to create music. There is something magical about stepping into a studio that your bedroom will never be. You think to yourself "this place was made for music".

But I think there is more to it then just the people or the space. In the Wired print addition (Vol. 11 issue 10) Dan the Automater is quoted as saying "I used to sample old records. Now I sample old gear." There is a sound that computers can't get yet. They are too clean, too precise and that is not what the artist is always looking for. Analog has a warmth that at this time cannot be created in the digital realm. The reason is that computers are always the same, analog circuits are not.

As the Analog circuits and tubes warm up they expand, they change the sounds, the precision slips, they do strange things and this is what makes them great. This means you have to own the hardware or have access to it. Yeah, digital synths are going away because computers can simulate them. But what happens if you want to record a guitar? A Sure mic sounds good on a guitar, but have you ever plugged in a Neumann U87i and run it into MS-Stereo on an acoustic guitar? If you have not, you should try it if you can. Lord what a difference. Vocals should be isolated and not done in a large room unless you are looking for that sound. Can you really record a full drum kit off a laptop easily? No... not really. You can rig it but that doesn't make it right.

When I read these articles I think about what happened a few years back with printing and desktop publishing. My father has been working in the print industry for 30+ years, he studied it in High School back when typesetting was done by hand, not in Quark. Once computers started being able to handle typesetting, print layout, color separation the printing industry had a shit fit. The printers thought it was over, no more, finito. But today there are still print shops. Today people still get paid to do layout.

I think this is the same with music and studios. Sure you can make an album at home. Go for it! If you can make a truly professional sounding album on a laptop, more power to you and you will probably be able to make a killing in the industry, but how are you mixing it down? Do you have the nice monitors or are you trying to do it in your headphones? I know that I sure didn't have a good monitor setup at my home studio. Sure I have nice ones, but not what you can find in a big box. Also the studio rooms are tuned, designed so you have the clearest, cleanest sound. There is a time and a place for everything and I think the production studio is changing. Away from the only place to make an album to a place to fine tune your production.