#25: How to Start a Recording Studio | ToneSphere Studios

ToneSphere Studios was designed and built by Chris and Ben Threlfall during and just after the original lockdown of 2020. It was made primarily for their use for existing projects but was also geared towards branching out to the public.

The idea was to create a dynamic space to use for a wide range of projects, from recording and mixing to photography, videography, and live streaming.

To follow Toneshpere Studios on Instagram, visit: https://www.instagram.com/tonespherestudios/  

To listen to Endscape check out the Enscape website at: https://www.endscapeband.com/

To listen to Dremora check out Bandcamp at: https://dremorauk.bandcamp.com/

To listen to Engraved Disillusion check out Bandcamp at: https://engraveddisillusion.bandcamp.com/

Watch the Engraved Disillusion 'Into Oblivion' music video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQISioXpD5g

Want to join a community of artists and music enthusiasts and gain access to exclusive Inside The Mix Podcast content? Join the podcast Facebook community group here: Inside The Mix Podcast Community

Roots Music Rambler
Hear great conversations with the artists behind the music you love, new music and more!

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Transcript

0:00

You're listening to the inside the mix podcast with your host, Mark Matthews.

Marc Matthews: 0:06

Hello and welcome to the inside the mix podcast. I'm Mark Matthews, your host, musician producer, and mix and mastering engineer. You've come to the right place. If you wanna know more about your favorite synth music, artists, music engineering, and production songwriting, and the music industry. I've been writing, producing, mixing, and mastering music for over 15 years. And I wanna share what I've learned with you. So welcome to the inside the mix podcast. I'm your host Mark Matthews. And this is a, uh, this is a first for the podcast. So this is a live interview. So I'm not entirely sure how this is gonna go, but fingers crossed. It will go well. Um, we are at the mercy of technology, but we'll see how it goes. So yeah, in today's episode, I'm joined by Chris Trel of tone, fish studios, and metal bands Dror and EnCap. And, uh, in this episode, we'll be discussing Chris's current musical projects and the designing building, and opening of a recording studio during a pandemic. Hello, Chris, how are you? And thank you for joining me. Hello, mark. Yeah, I'm

Chris Threlfall: 1:04

very well, thank you. Uh, no problem at all. Uh, looking forward to chatting about music and the, uh, events that have happened over the last couple of years. Over years. Yeah. Yeah. How are you

Marc Matthews: 1:13

doing? I'm I'm alright, thank you. I'm alright. I'm um, I'm intrigued to see how this goes. I'm intrigued to see how this goes, as I say is the first live podcast episode. So I dunno how many people we're gonna have EUS. So for the listeners listening now on the, uh, podcast platforms, retrospectively, this was, is recorded live. So please do bear with us. so, um, I've got your bio here, Chris. So tones fair studios was designed and built by yourself and your brother Ben during and just after the original lockdown of 2020. Um, it was made primarily for the use, uh, for existing projects, but also geared towards branching out to the public. So we'll come circle back to that. Um, further on the idea was to create a dynamic space to use for a wide variety of projects from recording and mix into photography videoing and ironically live streaming. Um, so yeah, exciting stuff, just, um, just for our audience listening, where are you joining us from today, Chris?

Chris Threlfall: 2:08

So I am joining you from tots fair studios. Uh yeah, we are based, uh, around the Toton area. So just outside of Toton, um, in a, in an industrial unit out there. Um, but yes, making use of the live streaming part of the studio this afternoon, this evening, rather.

Marc Matthews: 2:25

Yeah. It's something we'll circle back to you later. Cause I think it's an important part of the music condition now in particular for, for live events, what with what's happened of late. So just to, um, GI give the audience a bit of background knowledge. Um, so myself and Chris, I've known Chris for a very long time. We, uh, we were in a band many, many moons ago. And if you circle back and listen to, I think it's episode 10 or 11 of the podcast, there's an interview with myself, uh, Chris and our other good friend and band mate, uh, shout out to Toby. Um, yep. And, uh, if you wanna get a bit more in depth knowledge and just a general laugh I strongly suggest going back and listening to that episode, cuz it is quite good. And you get to learn a bit about, a bit about my background as well. Mm-hmm as well as, as well as Chris's. So what I'd like to start off with Chris is just a bit of, for our audience, for you to go into your background. So your life before tone sphere. So tell us a bit about your musical life. I know it's quite extensive. Um, so I've been there for probably about a third of it. Um, yeah, so yeah, your musical background, Chris, let's start with that one.

Chris Threlfall: 3:28

Cool. So, I mean, music's always been quite a big part of my life to be fair, even, uh, from a very young age. Um, always used to like listen to Beatles records and mess around on a piano and stuff like that. Not with much kind of. Musical knowledge taught to me or anything like that. And it was fairly horrific, but, it did spark a kind of interest. So like ever since then, I've, I've always tried to be involved in like, uh, mixing kind of projects and stuff like that. Even from like a secondary school kind of level, and always used to be in bands, you know, like the, what youre gonna do at lunchtime, you're gonna go and play on the field. You're gonna go and play in a band and, you know, stuff like it was that kind of all our little 30 wat combos sitting up on a table in the music room, just, you know, making some noise and playing Metallica and Slayer covers and stuff like that. Yeah. so a lot of it comes from just those kind of early days. Um, and then kind of jumping forward a little bit, um, to where I kind of. Had to make a choice on what kind of instrument I wanted to play. I think so I've always been kind of split a little bit between, uh, like guitar and drums. Um, and there's just always, as I'm sure you're aware of bigger demand for drummers. Yep. Um, so that was a kind of fell into, uh, oh, do you wanna, do you wanna join a bank? So we really need a drum. I do. You just wanna give it a go and it goes from, oh, you're quite good at tapping on a table. Why can't you do that on a drum kit kind of thing. And it turns out there's quite a big difference between those two, uh, situations. But, uh, the first band I ever joined was, uh, was a queen tribute band. I did know that yeah, I did not know that as a drummer. Anyway, it was, it was a friend of mine was, uh, was a big queen fan and, uh, we possibly slightly unimaginatively called ourselves king Yeah. But, uh, yeah, so I I'd never listened to queen. Before I joined that had you not, no. So I was just there, you know, playing a four beat, just like, yeah, this is a queen song. This is great. Like years later of like, oh, I was, so that was such a wasted kind of like opportunity there to, to actually learn some queen stuff and really get into the music. Cuz I really love the band now, but yeah, back then it was just a, oh, I get to get behind a drum kit and play some stuff. That's that's really cool. And um, but yeah, from, from that, like just a myriad of, of bands with, with similar groups of friends until I met yourself and, and Toby and, and the rest of, uh, engraved from, uh, the it's original incarnation and then got very into Def metal and, and you know, the drums that, that, that go with that essentially. Um, and then, yeah, it just kind of snowballed from there and, and carried on to, to where we are today. Really. So that's, you know, we did like a, um, College course in music, which kind of, I think helped get me out of just the I'd play thrash metal and nothing else kind of mindset, which is, uh, always a good thing to do. Mm-hmm , , um, play a bit of pop and, you know, get, get all the bangers but, uh, yeah.

Marc Matthews: 6:34

Yeah, I think that's, um, circl back to a few things in there. So go back to the 30 wa I'm fairly certain. We, we, we, we jammed with 30 wat amps when we were writing a lot of our stuff. I know. Um, I distinctly remember, were they even 30?

Chris Threlfall: 6:45

I think probably not

Marc Matthews: 6:46

16. I remember playing, we play in some sort of like almost abandoned attic at the bar at the back of your, of your shared house. If I remember rightly um,

Chris Threlfall: 6:55

yes. Yeah. We wrote quite a few songs in there. Didn't we? We did.

Marc Matthews: 6:58

And we did, we also tried to, to hack a competition so we could play with, um, dark tranquility. If I remember right. Yes and

Chris Threlfall: 7:05

lost. Yeah. I think we

Marc Matthews: 7:06

got bored and ended up going to

Chris Threlfall: 7:07

the pub quite quickly as well. Cuz we had to reset the router to get a new IP address. Every time we voted. And then like after about two hours of just doing that and everyone getting really annoyed, we were like should just goes to the pub. Yep. Like, yeah, just say someone else out hacked us. That that sounds about

Marc Matthews: 7:25

right. And it's interesting, you mentioned about queen there and not actually, um, listen to queen because, uh, for those, for the audience listening now, um, after, uh, a few drinks generally, uh, Chris is quite inclined to putting on queen , um, in the early hours, much to the, uh, bereft of his neighbors. Um, but no,

Chris Threlfall: 7:44

I had it coming yeah,

Marc Matthews: 7:45

yeah, yeah, they did. I'm not, I'm sure they're not listening, but we won't go into details on them. No. Um, But, uh, yeah, so quite an extensive musical background. And just, just for just echoing what Chris said then. So we were in a band called engraved disillusion, which was a, which was a heavy metal band, uh, turned into a metal band, death metal at one point, various incarnations, probably over the course of about 10 years. Um, I will put links to that in the, in the episode show. Actually, you can go and check that out. So I'm sure for the audience listening, if you listen to my music, it's quite different to, uh, to heavy metal, but, um, I think echoing what you said there, Chris, about coming and having that sort of musicianship of, of experiencing different genres. I think I dunno about you, but I think it does make you a more creative individual and I think it opens. You're more, you're more open to, to musical stars and musical ideas. And I think it helps your songwriting. Yeah. That's

Chris Threlfall: 9:50

I think that openness is what you, if you learn nothing else, that's probably the most important thing from being exposed to like, even, you know, some of the most generic songs, you know, like the Bon Jovi's and the Europes and, and the stuff like that, that you inevitably end up playing at at college shows sometimes. And just kind of makes you delve into that world a little bit more and, and have a bit of appreciation to where some of these other, other things came from. Um, and then yeah, you can apply that later on and, and you think, wow, what, what could I get into the music that I currently play to make it sound different or sound, sound better, or take it in a different direction and stuff like that. So, yeah, that's, that's definitely like a, like a big part of it, I'd say. Yeah,

Marc Matthews: 10:29

definitely. And I think, um, just before I go onto the next point, actually, which is quite poignant one, um, I just wanna delve into the stats for this current live episode. Um, exciting times we have five viewers, um, which is, which is five more than I thought we were gonna get Um, which is amazing. I've

Chris Threlfall: 10:46

I got five screens open on different devices here. Yeah. I've got a farm going on.

Marc Matthews: 10:51

yeah. Yeah. Um, farming out IP addresses. Um, so I'm just gonna say hello to Emily, uh, Lawrence rod, and Jamie, thank you for, uh, joining us on this inaugural, um, inside the mix podcast, episode six. Um, yeah, that's a number Lawrence. Well done. Okay. Um, so my next point was gonna be heavy metal. Now I had an interview with max though, um, which is gonna come out in series two mm-hmm and I've interviewed countless other, um, synth artists. Cause I know you are, you are quite into your synth music as well. And the amount of musicians that come from a metal background, including myself is, is there seems to be this. Weird pull from the synth world godfather three esque that sort of draws you in. Yeah. Can you think of any reason why that might be, why there, why there might be a transition from metal to synth music?

Chris Threlfall: 11:46

So, I mean, as I said to you the other day, I, I did do a, an inside the mixed binge, uh, and listen to all of the episodes, uh, like in short order. yeah. And yeah, the, I did pick up that a lot. There was a lot of, of people from a metal background or at least, you know, a rock or punk or, or that kind of guitar driven music background that went into it. And I think it's probably just because they're so compatible, if you think about like, you know, the pop music and stuff like that. I mean, it's all keyboard based. Mm-hmm like a lot of the time it's written on piano and then it's transposed onto other, uh, mediums and stuff like that. And I think that it's very easy to go from. Like piano and guitar are very kind of intermingled together, like in, in the world of pop and in the world of, of metal. I mean, you think about like how symphonic music and metal paired together. So well. Yeah. And, and that's got a very big following and like, it's, it's almost like a follow on from classical music the way some of it's composed a lot of the time, I think, uh, like synth based music has done something similar. So there's lots and lots of bands already in, in like the metal genre that, that have done it for years. Yeah. And, you know, and it's becoming a lot more popular now obviously with the, how, uh, like Sy music is, is starting to come like really to the forefront of music, again, with like bands, you know, just, uh, beast in black, uh, battle beast, you know, those kinds of, you know, metal poppy amaranth, like mm-hmm And I think it's, it is just. You can take the metal aspects of it and you can put them onto different instruments. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh, we can strip back back. And that melody doesn't have to be like a big guitar harmony. It can be like, uh, a synth line. That's a lot more chilled out. And I think a lot of it's because it's so much easier to kind of do on your own as well. Yeah. And another thing that was quite prevalent throughout the podcast was a lot of people kind of started doing it over lockdown. Yep. Yeah. That is common. And I totally see why, because you you've got that collaborative kind of aspect taken away from you. That's out of your control, but being like creative people, you just want. Carry on doing it and yeah. Having access to things like Sy and, and DAW programs and stuff like that. I mean, I've been lost in Sy fly brief for days. yeah. You just, you just get stuck in and then you think, oh, that sounds good. And that sounds good. And right. Get some drum loop and put behind that and you can totally see how that would kind of naturally kind of happen in, in like a musician's mind. But yeah, again, yeah. It's, it's just down to that compatibility between the two genres, I think. When they do get married together, they, they work so well. And it's easy to kind of go in one side as a metal musician, meld it together and then come out the other side as a synth kind of musician. Yeah. It's I can totally see, see that transition. Yeah.

Marc Matthews: 14:53

I totally echo what you said there and it makes perfect sense. And I think specifically from my own perspective, as well, when you mentioned there about like being the master of your own destiny, so you're no longer in that there's pros and cons to each approach. I mean, you, you're working in a solitary environment working on your own music, which is great, cuz you can do it at your own leisure unless you've got deadlines from a label, et cetera. Well, I suppose on the flip side you don't have that input from four other members, but then again, you're not having to appease for other people. So mm-hmm, , it's quite nice and it is, it is, um, a product of the pandemic as well and the accessibility of technology. But I also think as well, when you come to like Sonic texture, it's textures as well. Cuz I remember being in the banded stuff and we're always like, oh man, this, this track's gonna be really heavy when I'm at as heavy as possible. Alright. Um, And I think the great thing about synth music is, and in particular is you can take your Sonic palette and make it wherever you want it to be. And you can emulate those really heavy sounds and those heavy, heavy textures using synths. And the technology is just so accessible. I mean, I've got one keyboard, uh, mini extended mini keyboard, and the rest of it is just total digital. And that is the beauty of technology. Um, mm-hmm and it's exciting cuz I like every week I'm finding more and more Sy artists just appear and they're putting out some, so the music they're putting out is amazing and a lot of the time they're just starting from the ground up mm-hmm and it's, it's really interesting. And like you say, when you go back through the podcast and you listen to the influences and the way people are moving over to synth music, and I think it's just cuz, cuz of its accessibility and also the community that exists within it as well. It's uh, it's an amazing thing. So once again, uh, thanks for that, Chris. I'm just gonna dive over to the live. Um, no nothing's happened that, um, but there you go. It's one of those things. For the audience listening retrospectively once again on the podcast, um, this is live if you've just joined at this point, and it is a, it is a new part of the podcast that we're gonna be doing every now and again. And at the moment we've got four viewers, hopefully that will, uh, that will improve. So what we're gonna do now, Chris, is I gonna give you the opportunity just to plug, uh, your two bands that you're part of. Um, you can start with either one, I don't mind, in fact, I'll make that decision for you. It makes it nice and easy that way you're not showing bias. Yeah. Um, so we'll start with, Theora give our, give our audience a bit of a description of that particular band.

Chris Threlfall: 17:34

So Dr. Is band that I joined in 2018, I think four years. yeah. So it's been, it's been a little while we've, we've had our, um, ups and downs, just the pandemic kind of knocked us out a little bit, but we're just kind of coming back again now with, with stuff. But essentially that, that was a kind of like I was saying earlier about the symphonic side of things. That was a very much. Geared towards being like a kind of symphonic, but melodic metal band. Um, we wanted to get as much kind of strings and symphonic backgrounds and stuff like that in there as, as possible. But interestingly tying it in more recently more and more synth has started to appear in the music. More bad thing. Yeah. So we we're definitely towing the line between symphonic and synthesizers and yeah, it, it, it's definitely something that just popped into our heads as well. Like yeah, naturally, like there wasn't even much kind of outside influence in that necessarily, but it was just like, Oh, let's, let's make this sound like blade runner and then the sips come out. definitely. So, yeah, that that's a local band to, to this area. So they, they have a stake in the studio as well. So they come in and, and we practice here. We record here. Uh, we just filmed a live stream here, which went out on the weekend last. Yeah. So we, we did it Thursday last Thursday, Thursday the 10th. So you can check that out on probably Theora page and I've shared it to the tone sphere page as well. So you it's out there and it's gonna be going up to YouTube as well and stuff like that. So that's like the first of a, of a few things that we've got like in the pipeline, I think, but it was nice to be able to fully have control over something within the studio. So it was all recorded live, like it was shot and filmed. Live and stuff like that as well, and then taken away and edited and, and then put out as a, as a kind of retrospective live stream where we did something like this and then played the live stream and then, and then came back again. But yeah, that's, um, Working on new material at the moment. So that's the kind of, you know, you know, the game with that it's are I doing, it's a long slog trying to, trying to get stuff that you you're happy with. And obviously, like we were talking about with that collaborative process as well, something that everyone's happy with and yeah, we have quite a, a, a collaborative approach, everything. So everyone brings something to the table and then we mix and match it and, and kind of cut it together and stuff like that. But yeah, so more focused locally at the moment with, with, with this band. So, um, we play quite a lot in the area. Um, we did have quite a few books, like shows books throughout the UK before the pandemic, and then all of that just disappeared and it's still kind of picking up the pieces from where it was before, but it's uh, yeah, no, it's, it's, we've got a lot of exciting things going on and nice. Um, yeah, really looking forward to the future of it. No,

Marc Matthews: 20:34

that sounds good, mate. It sounds good. I can't believe that's four years. I, I just didn't remember joining. Yeah. Four years goes fast, very fast. Uh, so for the audience listening, when's Chris is local. That's sort of like, uh, taunting and for our, um, sort of worldwide audience that is in England, um, in the Southwest of England. Um, and what I'll do is you mentioned the bands, et cetera, and the studio, and I'll put all the links to that in the show notes. So, um, please do go and check out, um, the bands at preference, Chris references and, and the, uh, the studio as well, but listen to the rest of this episode first and then, uh, then go and do that. Um, so endcaps quite a new venture for you. Um, yes. Tell us a bit more about

Chris Threlfall: 21:12

landscape. So that kind of popped up out of the blue. Um, I know the, the, our singer for, for quite some time, uh, Carl, uh, he's been quite, uh, a well known presence in the area of just being a fantastic vocalist really and, and a great guy. Um, and I noticed he, he put up something about, uh, his band looking for a drummer. Um, and I was like, I'm just, I'm just gonna apply straight away, uh, and say, yes . Yeah. And then I listened to the stuff and I was like, actually, I really like this, this is, this is kind of like really in my wheelhouse kind of thing. It's really melodic big choruses, you know, a bit different drum wise than I would normally play. And I think I, that was another bit that kind of drew me in. So it was less metal Drummy stuff. yeah. Yeah. More kind of along the lines of rock and a bit more modern, uh, modern rock and modern metal kind of stuff. And. And that kind of really drew me in. Um, and I went for, uh, uh, an audition up in Birmingham with them. Um, I think they got it down between me and one other person and, and thankfully I got the, the role. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and then we, we started just jamming and seeing if, you know, we all worked as, as a unit and stuff like that and, you know, took some time to kind of get what they wanted from me and, uh, and stuff like that. And then after a couple of shows, we kind of really kind of honed it in and, um, yeah. Things are running really well with them, but yeah, it's definitely completely different kind of band than I'm used to. Yeah. Which is really cool. Um, But again, they, they have a lot of, uh, like electronic, uh, input into that band as well. So there's a lot of, kind of, uh, electronic drums that, that go in there as well. Um, there's a lot of kind of sense style, uh, backings and stuff like that, that, that go in with it too. So it's, it's got a lot going on. It's one of these things that it's quite a lot to take in at once. Um, once you kind of dive into it, there's, there's a lot of layers and stuff like that as well. So we're just kind of pushing out and, and trying to get some shows at the moment. We've had some great reception from Ang radio. I did see that. Yeah. They've been very kind to us for some reason. And I was like, that's amazing. Wow. Um, and it's, it's hard to get that sometimes without trying to feel like you're pushing, like trying to send tracks to all these people. Like, please listen to this, please listen to that. It was really cool to have someone come to us and be like, oh, I've heard your track. This is amazing. Oh, amazing.

Marc Matthews: 23:41

So the rang radio, their host or whoever the production team approached you. Uh, with a view to featuring the endcap music.

Chris Threlfall: 23:50

So it was, it was passed to them from someone else that likes the band. Yeah. So they were kind of like, oh, I've, I've listened to your latest single. I love it. I'm gonna pass it to my friend, uh, Alex Baker on, um, Kang radio. And then he's just went, I love this and this has just given us some really good precedence then. So amazing. I was just like, that's gold dust as, as I'm sure everyone knows. Yeah. Um, but yeah, like that, that's not local to this area. So, um, we usually, uh, focusing kind of around the Midlands area, but we've got some shows, uh, like in Newcastle, we've just played down locally here in Bridgewater. Um, but all, I think my cameras just died. Uh, the backup camera has kicked in. Oh, dear. Am I still there

Marc Matthews: 24:39

you are. So for the, uh, the audience listed, there was a slight, I told you there'd be technical issues, but, um, uh, Chris has to, seems to have some sort of backup. So we, uh, yeah, we're still underway. Chris, carry on. I think you were mentioning about

Chris Threlfall: 24:51

praying in Bridgewater. Oh, the heady days. Maybe that's what,

Marc Matthews: 24:56

maybe that's what stopped the feed from working. I dunno, for those of you from, from the area who know Bridgewater. So that will make sense. Well,

Chris Threlfall: 25:03

I was surprised last time after we mentioned Minehead the stream, didn't like completely break down. I don't know. We have broadband in mine head. We were on some kind of dial up, um, yeah, carry pigeon. We have to record this and then send it via carrier pitch. that? That was mine. Head's a lovely place. It's a lovely place. I think that, that was pretty much the long and short of, of, of it, to be honest. So like, yeah, you could, you could check out the NCAP stuff. Okay. And, and we go to NCAP. band.com question mark. Uh, yeah. Uh, scap band.com. That's got like gigs that are coming up. It's got links to all our music and stuff like that. So, um, we're working on a new single now as well. So that's, that's very exciting. I've just heard a, a first mix of it and it's oh, it's good. Very looking forward to that

Marc Matthews: 25:48

exciting times, mate. Um, looking forward to seeing it. And, um, what we'll do is depending on when this episode comes out, which I believe it will be out in March, probably the beginning of March. I dunno if you have new music then, but we'll, the podcast will help promote that release. Okay. As we deal with everyone, Let's take a quick break from this episode so that I can tell you about a free resource that I made for you. There's a PDF checklist that describes what you need to do properly prepare a mix for mastering. So you've done the hard work and you love your mix yet. Suitably preparing a mix for mastering is often overlooked by musicians resulting in delayed sessions, excessive back and forth conversation and frustration on both parts. I want to help fix that. So if you want this free resource, just go to www dot synth music, mastering.com. As this checklist will help guide you to make the mastering process as smooth, transparent, and exciting as possible. So again, the URL is www dot synth music, mastering.com for this free preparing a mix for mastering checklist. Let's get back to the episode. So tone for, so it's a studio we've been through that. It does various different things. As I mentioned at the beginning there, so we've got live streaming, we've got photography, videography, um, . So when you sat out with your, your brother, Ben, uh, what was the initial goal for, for tone SP did you have a, a vision in mind for it or was it sort of like we'll, we'll create the studio space

Chris Threlfall: 27:10

and see what, um, I think we, we kind of had two separate goals, so like goal number one was definitely, I'm sick of paying for practices. studios. I want somewhere that I could leave my pin that was like, number one, like that's, that's the dream, isn't it being able to walk in and, and your stuff's there and you don't have to book and all that kind of stuff. Um, so we were definitely very keen to, to build a kind of HQ as it were for, for our bands to, to kind of be like where we don't have to worry about booking in or, or paying for studio space somewhere else. We can just go, right. We'll just go to the studio. Brilliant. Um, and then idea number two was to have a fully fledged kind of studio that we can get people in to record with. I was very keen to get live streaming as a part of it. Um, cuz during the lockdown, um, we were very kind of active doing live streams, albeit mostly gaming live streams. Um, but we did a few, well, I should probably say I had the studio set up in my living room before um, we, we moved and built this place. So I remember you'll remember from coming over, it was an absolute mess mm-hmm um, and just had piles and piles of gear everywhere and webcams and, and all that kind of stuff. So it wasn't an ideal situation there, but we kind of had the, the equipment that we could use already, but it was just not in a space that was anywhere near good enough for, from recording or, or using in. So it was, it was definitely born out of wanting to make our own lives a bit easier and, and have a place that we can kind of experiment with sounds and, um, Just just, just to be a way separate it from, from home as well. Um, but also with the idea to kind of get other people involved and we, we really wanted to, to get people in and kind of see what we could do with it as well. Yeah.

Marc Matthews: 29:00

Exciting stuff, mate. And I know what you, I know you kind of want that separation don't you, because you get you bedroom produce a bedroom artist, bedroom recorder, cetera. Um, but having that separate space is that psychologically, I dunno for me, it just makes it more creative. I dunno about you. I just feel like if I, if I'm in that zone, I'm in a particular place whereby I know this is where I go to meet music. I just, I just feel more creative, whereas like, say if you're doing it in your front room, , it's kind of like, ah, this is my front room where I also eat and. And I don't know, exercise, maybe.

Chris Threlfall: 29:33

Yeah. It kind of comes down there's ups and downs to that because when you're done, you can just, aren't gonna go, doesn't go to bed. I'm done. Whereas I've got like an hour drive home now and I've just because it's so closed in. Like, it could be any time of day right now. And I've forgot to look at the clock on many occasions and it's been like, oh, it's one in the morning. Oh no, all right. I've got a close down. I've got a buck off. I've gotta drive home. So yeah, I mean, but then you wouldn't be able to do something like that. If you were like renting out a normal rehearsal space, you know, like, oh, we've got, you know, seven until 10 booked and then we've got a got ship off again kind of thing. It's at least we've got that fallback of it's. Okay. We can, we can crack on and, and just, you know, have a, have a tide line in the morning.

Marc Matthews: 30:17

Yeah. I remember those when we used to practice or rehearse, or it was like eight o'clock at night and then, um, Where do we do it down in talk down near Toki or something? For those of you who know the area of the Southwest coming from to, to Toki of an evening is probably a good hour. That was, um, hour or so and Abbot. And, um, and ITST yeah, that was in new Abbot, big

Chris Threlfall: 30:36

red studios we used, we used to practice out, which is sadly no longer. There no is. Its great lot of quite, it was part of a, like a charity that closed down completely. I think so

Marc Matthews: 30:50

shame. Mm. Yeah, we rehearsed in quite a few places. Mm-hmm and there was Exeter and Bridgewater cer Bridgewater again, hopefully it doesn't break feed again. So. So with the guard to create in a studio, I'm sure the listeners, the audience, um, who for this podcast and there's, there's probably a number of them who want to, who would like to have their own studio. What were the challenges you faced when, when putting it together? Yeah,

Chris Threlfall: 31:16

that's a, that's a good question because there were many, um, the, I can imagine biggest of which is finding somewhere to build it like that kind of outweighs everything else. And because it's been something I've been thinking of for years, the choices are you either rent somewhere or you ha own a house that has a big garden and you build something at the bottom of the garden. I dunno a house I don't have a garden that was like off, straight away. And then the problem comes down to, to affordability. So, yeah, unless you're gonna be running a fully fledged studio, that's open all the time. You can't really justify unless, you know, you quite well off, um, renting like an industrial unit, which is where you normally find studios quite a lot of the time. Um, but where I work is in, uh, an industrial estate and we had an office spare at the bottom of our complex that, um, couldn't be rented out for noise based reasons as there's quite a lot of other noisy businesses in the area. So I had a, just on the off chance outta the web and my boss at the time. And I was just like, what we doing with this office down, down at the bottom, it's quite, you know, seems quite large. And, you know, I could probably do something really cool with it. And he was like, oh yeah, no, this is how much I'd rent it out with. And it was, it was very reasonable and that kind of sparked the idea of like, of like, so I think me and Ben sat down and we were like, how much does each of our bands spend on practices? Assuming that we practice once a week. So we kind of did the maths and it was not much less than the rent. So we were like, yeah, well, there's a no brainer straight away. Like if we could just, even if it's just in an empty office space, It's it's our office space. We can lock the door, we can leave gear in here and stuff like that. And then lockdown happened and of course, yep. Having a lot of time to think about stuff, cuz we were cause at the time I was living with Toby, our, our old guitarist, uh, from engrave disillusion and we got to a point where drinking wine in the garden kind of started to get a bit I should probably stop doing this like seven days a week. Right. Let's try and do something. So we started recording, um, and going back and picking apart old, like grave disillusion songs and, and like rerecording some bits and having some fun with that. And that kind of made me think that would be really cool to be able to do that properly and, and record some drums properly and stuff like that as well. Um, and then yeah, it, it was kind of a. How would we do it? What would it entail? Is it affordable? All those kind of questions started coming up. But because we had that baseline of, we've got a room to rent, that's not gonna be crazy and is, is gonna be there for a long time. Um, we just, you know, you, you spend long enough thinking about this and no one gives you a reason not to. And you're like, all right, let's do it. Yeah, let's do it. and I do have this kind of thing where, when I set my mind to something, I'm kind of like, well, I'm gonna do it. This is gonna happen. It's gonna be horrible sometimes. And I'm gonna stress about it, but I've come this far. um, so yeah, we started kind of looking around the ideas. So the first thing I did, uh, a friend of mine, uh, Nick built a studio, um, and I took quite a lot of inspiration from that. Um, it's called the kennel studio. So I I'd recommend looking that up. Um, you can kind of see immediately the similarities, because this wall here is a kind of knock off of what their entire design kind of looks like. Um, and that was for a reason obviously, but, um, yeah, and he was absolutely fantastic and, and talked me through the process that he went through building it. We didn't have a budget or an area quite as big as, as he did necessarily, but he recommended, um, a book to me, which is, uh, home recording studio, build it like the pros by Roger vez. I would highly recommend anyone that's thinking about it to, to just grab a copy of that book. It goes yeah. Beyond in depth. So , it's, you know, as you can go as deep as equations to like work out sound resistance of materials and all, all this kind of stuff. Mm-hmm, . And they kind of go in saying, this is what it could be like, this is how like the pros do it, but don't worry about it kind of thing. And it will just take you through every aspect of how to build a studio and you can kind of choose whether or not you need to apply it, like having a big sprung floor or having, uh, complicated air, air flow systems and all that kind of stuff. And I think that was good to have as a kind of baseline. So we could always refer back to this book and be like, how would they do it? And then we would take that away and be like, how could we do that? But for less money . Yeah. And that's obviously where YouTube comes in and mm-hmm I watch so many videos, like many and a lot of that just confused the matter a little bit, I think. But, um, I think there was one and I can't remember. Where it was or who made it? I, I checked my history earlier just to see if I could kind of pull up the references for this podcast, but it's gone. Um, but they mentioned building it in kind of like pods. So yeah, always at the back of my mind is it is a rented accommodation. So what happens if they ask us to move out and I don't wanna have to knock down a studio no one does, you know, so it, it is kind of built in, so we've got two rooms. We've got no, we've got three rooms technically. So we've got like a live performance area, which is out in the open, in the normal kind of office space. Then we've got a control room, which I'm in at the moment. And then we've got like a, a, what we call the drum room, which is primarily designed for recording drum. Or anything that needs a controlled audio environment basically. Um, and it's built in, so the walls of the ceiling and the floor are all built in three to six separate kind of bolted together, wooden frames. Um, so that was a kind of worst case scenario. It will damage it, but we can unbolt these frames, pull it apart, shift the pods to a new place and then fix it up. Ah, nice. So I wouldn't want to do it. it's but the option, but the option is there. So instead of starting from scratch, you've got all of these panels that you can then kind of put it back together, like a jigsaw, whether they'll go back together or not , but that was the whole kind of point of, of that kind of idea. So we didn't have the, the thousands and thousands that it would take to kind of do the whole room reposition kind of like lighting and air conditioning and, and all that kind of stuff. So we just kind of worked with the space. That we had. Um, yeah, and then it was, it was very difficult working on the budget because there was a lot, we, we went in having no idea what we were doing basically. So we were learning as we were going by referencing people that we knew that had done it and, uh, and like the book and, and stuff like that. So, but it came in less than we were expecting. So it was kind of like a, no, that is actually doable if we spread it out over some time and we don't like brush everything together. And I think a big part of it was we had a lot of equipment already. So like, we didn't have to go out and buy studio monitors or a big PC or a mixing console or anything like that. Cuz we had that equipment in the house. So it was kind of like, well that would just go over there and we'll build the room around it kind of thing. So that was that, that wouldn't have been the case if we didn't have that because we'd just been building a room with. Not a lot of idea of what we put in it. So yeah, yeah. But yeah, I mean, that was the initial kind of idea of, of the, uh, of the build, basically.

Marc Matthews: 39:23

It's interesting. Um, circling back to what you said right at the beginning there about how you got the, the, I think it's the same with mixing and mastering or music production as well. There's so many resources online. Like you say, you could watch YouTube days, um, and you could just get overwhelmed with the sources of information, telling you how to do X, Y, Z. And I think also circling that's what you said about, like, you just had a vision in mind and you just went for it. And I think it's quite easy to get put off by, am I gonna do it right? Um, is it gonna fall within budget? Do I know what I'm doing? And I think sometimes you just gotta take that risk. Yes. Um, is it, I mean, I'm gonna come back to another question in, in, in a minute. Is there a risk that you would do again?

Chris Threlfall: 40:05

Um, I think it is like, it, it's hard to say that. Considering we have this now. yeah. Um, I don't want it anymore. I'll give it back done. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, like it depends on the situation as well. It was the right time to do it because like, I think we were lucky enough. I mean, I say we, I was lucky enough to be on furlough at the time, so I wasn't stressing about losing a, a job or anything like that. So I do count myself very lucky to be in that situation, over lockdown to not be too worried about like finances and stuff like that. And my brother had a job that was continuing throughout. So he was working all the way throughout as well, but obviously you can't go anywhere and do anything so spending was coming down. So it was kind of like right over these like few months, let's put some stuff back, let's make some plans and it was kind of, I'm not sure if that would ever happen again in a, in a, like a normal situation. I think we just got very lucky with. All the different aspects just came together at kind of like the right time. And we were like, for the first time, in a long time, we're not like, oh no, but I have to spend this huge thing next month. Like, I don't think we had, uh, any big like studio. We I'd just come out of the studio from recording an album, um, a few months prior to that with a, with a different band. And so we didn't have like huge expenses coming up and I think BES in a similar or, or slightly different thing. So it wasn't kind of like, no, I've paid all this money to go into promotion and PR and all this kind of stuff. It was like, we can't gig. Right. Let's let's do something kind of thing.

Marc Matthews: 41:45

Yeah. So it's kind of like, it's, it is, it's the old saying, isn't it making the best of a bad situation? It was

Chris Threlfall: 41:49

absolutely. Really. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Yeah.

Marc Matthews: 41:52

And going back to what we said earlier about, um, artists moving into the synth side of thing, and it's, it's kind of making that best of a bad situation whereby you're stuck at home. So. You could either sit in the garden and drink wine, as you say, uh, which you might do anyway, you might do that whilst making music. You never know. Um, but it's making that best of a bad situation. So interestingly, when, uh, online, I'm sure if the, the audience listening, when you scroll through social media, you you'll see specifically during the pandemic. And now, cuz I think we are, the pandemic has forced change in the industry and the way we consume content and music specifically online. Um, so with the, with the studio itself, you mentioned live streams. Is that a case of you diversifying sort of like trying, trying to bring in a, a different audience? Is it something you're gonna continue doing or do you think you're gonna revert back to being mix mixing? Um, and, uh, like mastering recording, or are you gonna continue to experiment with these, with these new content ideas and

Chris Threlfall: 42:51

platforms? Uh, I definitely continue. Yeah, it it's, it's a lot of work. Um, I, some sometimes you don't quite realize how much goes on behind the scenes in a lot of these, but yep. It's, uh, I, we recently did, uh, a two day live stream for the charity mind, which is, uh, like a mental health charity in the UK. I dunno if they international, but I, I they're definitely in the UK. Um, and that was another case of me having an idea and saying we're doing it with not really much else to go on . Um, but the way I built the studio was to have the ability to like send video here, there, and everywhere. And another key factor was that we had a fairly good internet connection here, which I think. A lot. I mean, maybe it's different now, but historically that wasn't the case at rehearsal rooms. Like you were lucky if you got wifi, let alone. Yeah. Real good, reliable wifi. So, I mean, I've seen since obviously being knowledgeable of, of the kind of thing I want to do and the, the kind of thing that we do here, I've seen other studios with similar and you know, much more extravagant setups. Um, but at the time it was kind of like, well, I don't really see anything similar to that around at the moment, especially not on like a, a fairly small scale. Um, but yeah, we just kind of jumped into that two, two day live stream. We managed to get, uh, seven of seven acoustic acts interested. Um, Carl, the singer from scape being one of them who, who very kindly closed the entire livestream for us with a crazy performance. It was so good. It's actually probably. Due to be released very soon on the, the tone sphere page. If not this evening, I can't remember, but it's coming up soon. so definitely check that one out. Uh, as well as the historic performances are all up there as well. So they're all, um, mm-hmm,, they've all been posted and stuff as well, but yeah, no, that, that went really well on, um, a friend of mine, Emily helped out as well, who was tuned in earlier and we know very well, um, and helped post it and, and run it and brought some of her kind of like really cool streaming equipment and her knowledge of streaming as well. And we really managed to kind of knock it out the park as far as the stream was concerned. Um, and we are really happy with how it went and it was very exciting and it felt like it, the, that was the weird thing. It felt like a show like a, an actual kind of live show. I mean, I know they. They're not many people. I mean, because we had people come in to play and there was quite a few of them. We had like a green room downstairs and there was a big screen down there where people watching the stream live and, you know, having a cup of tea and some donuts and stuff at the same time as well. But it really felt like there was a connection between like the people posting in the chat and donating to charity at the same time and the, the people performing. And it was just a very odd kind of, but good like feeling and situation that you don't really come across or haven't, if you haven't run a live stream or performed on one, you wouldn't necessarily pick up on, um, I suppose watching it as well, if you feel that that was my whole point of, of wanting it to be live. So rather than doing pre-records all the time, which is fun as well. Cuz you can do more with yeah. But. If it is actually live, you've got that instant kind of feedback from, from people that are watching. Um, and once you get a bit of back and forth on it, I mean, that's why TWI stream is a massive, it's just that yeah. Community, that conversation, um, back and forth kind of thing that people really enjoy. So it's, it's a nice aspect to bring to, um, to music and you, you always, we got people tuning in from all over the world. So there was people's families watching from like Canada and, uh, there was people from America and obviously a lot from the UK and stuff as well. So that was like, they're never gonna come to your show down the local pub or . Yeah. You know, but that just lets you reach kind of like a completely different kind of, uh, audience, I think.

Marc Matthews: 46:53

Yeah, I totally agree. And it's, uh, it's a very good segue for me to now go and check, um, our audience of three people now. Um, so it has gone down, but you are three very valued people. Um, so just a message from Jamie. Yeah. Great charity. It is a fantastic charity really is. Um, and Emily as well, uh, fun live stream. I didn't realize that Emily, uh, was involved in hosting it as well. That's my bad. Yes. She came along

Chris Threlfall: 47:18

for day one. Um, and Ben came along for day two. Um, so we kind of split the, the workload. Um, I was obviously there for both days. um, yeah. Yes, can't get out of it. yeah, but, uh, no, no, it was great to have to have Emily down there and, um, yeah, it was, it was just a, just a really fun weekend and I'm definitely gonna be doing a minimum of, of like one a year for, for charity. Might do something else again in the summer, but it's, it's just trying to fit it in and, and see if there's a want for it. Yeah. And stuff like that. And. I love doing it for charity, but you can't do it every week for charity. If you see what I mean. Yeah. Like I definitely won't do like a big charity event every year or twice a year. I'm just trying to kind of figure out, is there a different way where we can get people to be interested and donate to like the performers and stuff like that? It's, it's a tricky bridge to cross really. It

Marc Matthews: 48:07

is. It is. And I think, um, when it comes to these streaming situations, I dunno about you, but podcasting is, is, is kind of similar in a way in that you think this is a great idea and it is fantastic fun. And I, I love podcasting, but you don't realize the work that goes in, in doing it in the admin, you think? Ah, it's okay. I I'll just rock up with my microphone, interview someone and I'll put it online, but there's so much that goes into it. Yeah. So, and that's with a podcast. So that's even, I mean, once you start introducing other artists and then having to do all that organization, Um, and the logistics are unperforming and then you're at the mercy of technologies we found out earlier, there's a massive amount that goes into it, so I can totally see why you would only, you could only do it a certain amount of times, but I think having seen content and the way it's consumed online, I think it's a fantastic way to go. Um, and I think it is only gonna, it is only gonna happen more and more my sort of next thing, my cuz you mentioned there about like the way you set up cameras and stuff, and it's interesting in terms of when you are live and you have that instant feedback and you have that real time interaction. So I suppose my question was gonna be, I dunno how verse you are with TikTok, but from research I've done with content and content generation, is there less, I dunno if you could say it's the same with audio, I suppose you want it to be a really good audio performance audio capture, but is there less emphasis now on quality in terms of video or do they, or are people more interested in just seeing something that's live and real. does that make sense? Yeah, I think it's, it's a

Chris Threlfall: 49:37

tough one. So I think it can go both ways. So I think people want both just quick, like things that are throwaway content almost, that's just a bit funny or distracting. Um, and they also want something that's very. In depth and meaningful or well produced, um, it's towing the line. So there's, it seems to be anything in between gets a bit shunned almost. It's kind of like, oh, you've tried to put a bit of effort into this to, oh, what are you doing that for? Or, um, you know, oh, you've just kind of thrown out this music video and it's not really got much to do with it. What, what are you playing at? There's. Yeah. You either kind of go all the way, one, like I'm just going live on my phone and oh, oh, everyone loves this. This is fantastic. Or I'm gonna spend like six months making this piece of content, but so if you wanna get like likes and like responses out of it, I mean, yeah, go for like the everyday kind of stuff. Like don't hurt all that work. I don't think, I think something quick and easy, this film be your phone is like, fine. It's just hard. If, if you're kind of like a producer or someone that, that performs or something like that, you just want it to be like, oh, I'm gonna go in and I'm gonna like, oh, I'm gonna pull my voice out of this video. And I'm gonna like Ize it and I'm gonna like put a compression on it and oh, it sounds so much better now. And then no one will care. yeah.

Marc Matthews: 50:56

Yeah. I totally agree. And I, I, I think you're right and it I've I've, I've had a similar situation myself. So I think when I, when I first started doing, um, sort of content generation for like music production tutorials, I think I've put together this, this fancy video and I stuck up on YouTube and. To be fair. I mean, YouTube is what it is. It is, is there's a lot of noise on YouTube and trying to stand out is, is, is tricky and it's hard and you gotta play the game. And then I put all this effort in all this fancy, what have you probably got about six views? Yeah. Um, over the course for about a year. And then I think like last week or the week before I put together a video, which was just using my phone of how to create, I think it was like how to humanize a high hat mm-hmm and I had about 300 views in the space of 24 hours. And it was a, it was a 12 second video down on my Samson S seven. I do need an upgrade um, cuz it is bloody terrible. Yeah. But yeah, it just goes and I think it's also, I think you could, you could spend hours talking about content and content generation, what works, what doesn't work and, and what you need to do and stuff mm-hmm and there's no

Chris Threlfall: 51:55

set formulas there. It's it's very kind of, you can go down a rabbit hole. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I think it's choosing between what you're gonna advertise and what you're gonna put out. I think if you're gonna advertise something, that's where you wanna spend the time. Putting in the, like the work and the money and stuff, but from the day to day, you're not gonna be, you know, putting out a fully produced, edited video every day, unless you're like a big time. No, even if you're big time, you're probably not.

Marc Matthews: 52:20

no, it's bloody hard as well. And doing that, like, because I, I do my research, I do my due diligence and I, I look at what other artists and, and producers and, and mixed engineers as you do, you take reference from other people. And I see the content they're putting on. They've got X, they've got X amount of views. Not that I I'm bothered about views and stuff. I'm all about, I just wanna help people create music, but, and you see the videos and you're like, actually their videos, they've got a better phone than me. Pretty much. 99% of the world has a better phone than me, or maybe not the world. That's a sweeping statement. 99% of the UK, um, has a better phone than me, but you can still do it. But as I say, it's a total, you, when it comes to creativity and I've had this discussion, as well as you, you said you binge the podcast and you chat to other artists and as a creative, as you are as well, you just wanna create and you wanna make music, uh, or whatever it is, your creative fashion. And the trying to get your, your music, your, your, your creativity out there. There is so much you have to do behind the scenes. Mm-hmm like when we were in the band and spending hours cutting up business cards. Yeah. Um, and then for no reason, I found some the other day or cutting up stickers. Yeah. Um, and then just emailing people on the off chance that they'll play your music stuff. You never thought you'd do.

Chris Threlfall: 53:34

And there's so like, or you don't, you don't see that like being like the big bands do and stuff like that. They're like, oh, they've probably got someone that they pay to do this. And you're like, no, no, I'm, I'm gonna sit here. And like in like add this video to 76 different Facebook groups in the hopes that three people will like it, or I'm gonna email 70 different promoters or venues and, and try and get like one show. Um, mm-hmm yeah, it's so much that goes on behind the scenes, if you like, if you're inclined to push, um yeah. And you can get lost in it. And the, the danger is burning yourself out, I think is, is a lot of time I've come so close to, or like being over the line, like several times of just kind of like, I don't enjoy this anymore. I don't wanna do this anymore. And, and you come so close to just walking away, but the creative, it just always kind of overcomes that and you're like, right. Okay. I've just gotta kind of take a step back and give it a couple of days and delegate. It's like, if you can, if you're in a band. Delegate some stuff out because it'll make your life a lot easier. And like you, you said you do with the podcast as well, like getting, uh, like editors and stuff like that to help. And cuz I didn't do that with the previous podcast that I did. And so I just kind of like, oh I gotta do it. It's fine. But it saves you money. Sure. But it's just that workload, like something like cutting up five different audio inputs from a podcast and cleaning them up and mm-hmm, mixing them and then putting it back with a video and everyone doing the video and uploading the video and scheduling it. And then it's just kind of like, this is just for a podcast haven't even written any songs yet. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. It's crazy. Isn't yeah.

Marc Matthews: 55:16

Yeah. Um, shout to uh, Z CF studios as well. Who does my podcast editing? I'll put a link in the bio he's he is a great guy, Zach. Um, very, very good. Can't recommend enough, but yeah, it is exactly that. And I think I've been in that situation whereby you do all that stuff behind the scenes and it actually takes the fun out of it. Mm-hmm and it turns into like a part-time job and you're like, actually I don't wanna do it. um, that's

Chris Threlfall: 55:37

the thing, like if I, I enjoy mixing as, as I'm sure you do and it is kind of like, I want to be able to do that in a situation where I enjoy it. and I think that's the hard bit is, is getting that. And I think when you get involved in other people's projects, that was kind of a big part of wanting to open the studio up to other people was I love working with my bands and I love recording the music that we do, but sometimes it's nice to have a separation from that material. So you're like, I haven't written this and scrutinized it and been over it a hundred times and done 70 mixes of it. They've come in, they've recorded it. We're gonna do a couple of mixes until they're happy with the mix and then it's done kind of thing. Yeah. Like that. You've got to do that sometimes. I think just to kind of be like, okay, no, I do still enjoy this. This is fine. yeah,

Marc Matthews: 56:23

I totally agree. And I dunno about you, but I know for a fact, when I, when I'm really, when I'm writing and producing my own stuff and I'll just dwell on something for so long and I'll do, I'll do another mix or I'll listen to it on my headphones. I'll be like, ah, that top end. I just need to bring that down a bit, bit a dynamic ECU on there and I'll go in and I'll spend an hour and I'll just reduce it by half a DB for no reason. But when I work, when I work on other people's stuff, I, I set myself a deadline and more often than not, what I do for them is better than what I do for myself. Yeah. Purely because I'm more focused. It it's really odd. And I don't quite, I haven't quite got my head around it yet and I need to adopt that practice in my own style. Mm-hmm cause then I get frustrated with myself and it's a vicious circle anyway. Yeah. But I digress. So it's sort of like, just to wrap up the interview cuz I realize we're coming towards, towards an hour now. What do you think? This is quite an open ended question. What do you think is the future of recording studios? Where do you see them going? Or let's let's let's refine that a bit actually. So maybe not the Abbey roadside studios, but maybe like the studios in a similar situation to yourself. This is a tough

Chris Threlfall: 57:23

one. Yeah. It's it's um, it's an odd kind of area. I think so bands are always gonna need, or people in general are always gonna need somewhere to practice. Um, so I think the art of like a practice room or a practice studio, or a studio that offices a space to rehearse in, isn't gonna go anywhere. Um, just because it's a physical place that you can make a lot of noise in. And that's it really, um, in terms of the studio side of it, I think more and more people are producing in a bedroom, uh, and the tools to allow you to do it are, are getting better and better. And it like things like, um, like drum machine programs, uh, like drums, um, et cetera are becoming so good. And so like widely used that people kind of are accepting that. Why do you need to go and record drums? Um, or why do you need to go and put a, you know, a Messer cab in of room and mic it up and record it when you've got like a neural D. P kind of plug in that kind of does it for you and stuff like that. And yeah. Yeah. So it it's, it's not necessarily a, a growing business. I would say it's probably kind of struggling more than anything, but at the same kind of time, if you can get like a, a certain like level of quality and consistency from a studio where you do record things, I think there's always gonna be that need of people that want to come and get that kind of level of, you know, be it begin a mediocre or excellent kind of sound out of it. I mean, we are no, you know, middle farm studios or Abbey road or anything like that here at all, but mm-hmm, , it's kind of like from what we can get in here, we've recorded drums in here. We've, you know, we've recorded a full EP in here and stuff like that. You kind of know it's, it's gonna be. Whether you just use it to record in, or, and you get a mixed engineering or, you know, we do the whole lot. Um, it's kind of a thing where you can kind of say here, you can come and, and get this kind of out of it. Um, without having to worry about going in and mixing it all yourself and trying to book a one place out to go and record, and then sending it off to someone else to mix. It's kind of a nice kind of all kind of in-house kind of solution. Um, So, I mean, I don't, I don't know where it's going in all honesty, but I think it's a tough question. Yeah. Diversity is, is a huge part of it, which is why I want this to do the kind of, uh, so we've got like a full, like blacked out room and stuff where we, when we've got lights and stuff. So we can do videography to a certain extent we can do photography, we can do live streams. Um, we can do mixing, we can do mastering, we can do recording. You know, it's kind of like just a versatile space where we can come and create, and I've seen other studios adopt that. And prior to, to this, obviously we weren't a trend set up by any, any, any part. But, um, I think having more to offer out of a space is, is increasingly more important than just being like, I'm gonna run a recording studio and that's it. I don't, I don't think some, a small time recording studio is, is gonna be something that's just there on its own. Come, you know, 10 years time possibly. Who knows?

Marc Matthews: 1:00:44

Yeah. I, I think you're right. I think diversifying is, is the way to sort of be successful is the wrong word, but definitely relevant to remain. Yeah. Relevant. Yeah. Yeah. And diversification. I think also being, I dunno, I, myself, I, I like to consider myself a reasonably early adopter as well of technology and embracing that and, and seeing where you can go with it. But as you say, it, it, because of what people were able to do at home now, it does not negate the need for a studio, but I, but on the flip side to that, you, there is that studio experience, like, like we've been in the studio mm-hmm and having that studio experience as a band, as a collective or as an artist as well is something that you'd pay for just to have the experience, I think. Yeah. And I think that's for one of that, for that reason, there will always be music studio a hundred percent and there will always be, um, mix master and engineers that you send music off to because you want get that particular sound that you want to get. there is particularly a set of ears on your work, or you just wanna have that experience. Yeah. It's

Chris Threlfall: 1:01:41

it's about what we were saying earlier as well about the separation as well. So you've kind of spent all this time making this, this music and maybe even doing pre-production and all that kind of stuff for it, going into a room as a collective, knowing that your only job is to play that music is very refreshing. like it's worrying and you're like stressing about it. Like going into last time I was in the studio, recorded a 13 track album. So I was like, I've gotta come in and play a lot of drums over the next few days. And it's just like, oh, am I gonna remember it? Or how am I gonna do it? Oh, okay. But yeah, going, having that collaborative experience in one room with a deadline is, is something that is, is definitely worth doing. Um, so yeah, like you say, I think the, the music studio will always be there. Um, unless people really wanna save money or are, you know, want to do everything in house and not have, have stuff like drums. But I think it does sometimes. I mean, it's down to personal preference, isn't it? But sometimes it does take away from that experience of, of being away and booking a studio and, you know, having a whole, definitely, it's definitely something that goes hand in hand with being in a band. You know, you kind of like wanna go practice and then, you know, go out and get drunk and have fun. You wanna record an album or you wanna go on tour. Those are the kind of big kind of day, one dreams of a band, I suppose, from like a teenager in a garage or something, you know, . Yeah. Yeah, definitely.

Marc Matthews: 1:03:01

And I think, um, having done that as, as, as we did for those those two weeks, where were we? Two weeks in? Oh, it was just outside. I learned it. Wasn't it. I can't remember where. That was it Baral and we terrorized the whole campsite for two weeks.

Chris Threlfall: 1:03:15

Yeah. Threw someone in the late, uh, cell tape, someone to the ceiling

Marc Matthews: 1:03:20

yeah.

Chris Threlfall: 1:03:21

Had had a fire, had a few

Marc Matthews: 1:03:22

fires, turns out you're not allowed fires on, on the campsite, which I don't necessarily agree with. We didn't. Anyway, I'm fairly stone. We were, there was at one point a sofa was gonna go in the lake. That

Chris Threlfall: 1:03:33

was, yeah, there was a key change in the song. And for some reason we decided that was a cue to throw a sofa in the lake.

Marc Matthews: 1:03:40

there is never a better reason to throw a sofa in the lake than a key chain and I'm fairly certain, it was a Michael Bolton key chain. Yeah. Yeah. I'm

Chris Threlfall: 1:03:49

fairly makes sense. Certain anyway, it probably was. Yeah,

Marc Matthews: 1:03:53

circling back then. Just before we finish up now, um, you mentioned about videography in the black screen and the black, um, curtain and whatnot. It just reminded me now of, um, this is for the audience. Now, if you go check out engraved disillusion into oblivion, Um, and it reminded me of a music video. We shot in a storage container. in Western super mayor. Um, yeah, yeah. Go watch that video. Let us know what you think. It's, uh, it

Chris Threlfall: 1:04:19

was an experience. We were very hungover and interesting fact, the, the two black pieces of, um, material I have on my ceiling are from that very shoot. No way are they really they've survived this long. Yeah, absolutely. So I've got like curtains that go all the way around the side of the room, but I had to put something across the roof tiles it's from that video. yeah.

Marc Matthews: 1:04:40

It's uh, it's an interesting video. If you do watch that video on YouTube for those listening. So that's engraved disillusion into oblivion. I'll tell you what, I'm gonna put this in the show notes. I just want you to like, leave a comment on there saying that I sent you or Chris and I have sent you from the inside the mix podcast, cuz I'll be interested to see how that translate. um, so just before we finish up, I'm gonna just jump over. Um, so for the audience, if you've just joined on your podcast platform of choice, halfway three, this is a live podcast. So, um, I'm just gonna go over Facebook now and see are three viewers, um, three viewers. So it's quality over quantity. Might I add? And I just wanna say a big thank you to Emily Lawrence, rod, Jamie Ryan, AKA. TAGT this Scottish detective for joining us and supporting this live stream. And it's, it's been good. I mean, we had one technical issue, which we overcame like absolute troopers Mayad I blame Bridgewater, but there we go. So whilst we wrap up now, so Chris, yeah. Big. Thank you. So where can our audience find you online? So the studio, where can we find you online? So

Chris Threlfall: 1:05:44

the studio is tore studios. So if you type that in, that should come up on most, uh, social media platforms. So, uh, yeah. Facebook is tore studios. Instagram is tone for studios. Twitter is tone sphere live, and YouTube is kind of coming soon cuz I haven't got quite there yet. And also we're tone sphere on Twitch. So when we do live streams, we multicast to Facebook, YouTube, and Twitch at the same time. So you can kind of catch it wherever. I dunno when the next one's coming up, but there will be one um,

Marc Matthews: 1:06:20

ACE. Yeah, what I'll do is I'll put links as I always do to, to all these references in the, in the episode description. So. Chris a big, thank you for spending the time with me this afternoon. It's been great chatting about the studio. I, it's not a conversation I've had with any other, um, interviewees. So I think the audience are gonna get a lot out of this. And I think the key thing is there is if you wanna create a studio, just do it, just give it a go and see what happens, but don't come back to me with a lawsuit saying I told you to do it all right. If it doesn't work out. Absolutely. Um, but give it a go, nonetheless. So yeah, really, really good. I think our audience are gonna get a lot out of this and yeah. Big, thank you for joining me today. Yeah.

Chris Threlfall: 1:06:52

Nos. Thanks. Thanks for having me. I'm I'm looking forward to, uh, listening to, to season two. So , it's good to be part of it. I've got,

Marc Matthews: 1:07:00

I've got some cracking interviews lined up and um, this has been a success. I I'd like to say others might say differently, but I think it's been a. And, um, we'll do some more live streams as well of the podcast interviews, but yeah, Chris I'll, uh, I'll speak to you soon. Cheers, buddy. Thanks a lot. Cheers. Thank you so much for listening to the inside the mix podcast. Make sure to rate us everywhere you listen to podcasts, including Spotify.