Fantasy Studios, Berkeley
The legendary Fantasy Studios continues to host inventive regional and national acts, year after year. Recent visitors include the Kronos Quartet with Rinde Eckert, and Van-Anh Vo in Studio A, recording My Lai, a monodrama for string quartet, tenor and Vietnamese instruments. The music was composed by Jonathan Berger and the libretto by Harriet Scott Chessman. Scott Fraser engineered the recording with assistance from Robert Kirby.
Additional recent sessions at Fantasy include drummer Allison Miller’s jazz group Boom Tic Boom, who tracked their next album in Studio D with Adam Munoz and producer Julie Wolf. The album was then mixed in Studio A by Munoz on Fantasy’s 48-channel SSL Duality console.
Singer/songwriter Joe Buchanan recorded his next album in Studio D with Jesse Nichols and producer Greg Sankovich, and guitarist and P-Funk All Stars alumnus RonKat Spearman and his funk band, Katdelic, were in Studio D working on their next record with Alberto Hernandez.
Mix Regional: San Francisco Bay Area, Jan. 12, 2017
In the Studio
Different Fur, San Francisco
Over the past year, Different Fur Studios has begun focusing on a team of in-house writers and producers known as Text Me Records. On June 2, the majority of the team (around 40 people) assembled for a day of communal writing, which ended with 10 completed songs. The studio intends to release the pieces on a Text Me Records summer mixtape in August. Other sessions at Different Fur include Dude York making four singles with producer Patrick Brown. Pictured here are FKJ (French Kiwi Juice) with Chaz and Matt Schory during a recent writing session.
Hyde Street Studios, San Francisco
Hyde Street Studios hosted pop band Walk the Moon (pictured) in Studio A, recording an acoustic version of their single “One Foot” with engineer Will Chason. It was recorded through the studio’s fully restored Neve 8038 console. Kesha spent a day in Studio A with her producer, Stuart Crichton, to record vocals for “This Is Me” for the soundtrack to The Greatest Showman; the engineers were Sean Beresford and Will Chason. Also, Chuck Prophet and engineer Paul Kolderie were back in Studio A, where Prophet produced a new album from The Rubinoos.
Skyline Studios, Oakland
Be still, Bay Area hearts—yes, that is the Golden State Warriors two-time league MVP Stephen Curry; he recorded his lines at Skyline Studios for an appearance on Family Guy with studio owner/engineer Bryan Matheson. Other recent ADR work at Skyline included two sessions with Ayesha Curry, who lent her voice to The Great American Baking Show and a Cover Girl TV commercial. And HGTV’s Property Brothers, Drew and Jonathan Scott, worked on their lines for the locally filmed episodes of their spinoff show, Brother vs. Brother.
Lightrail Studios, San Francisco
Rain Parade was at Light Rail Studios in May, recording basic tracks and overdubs for a Paisley Underground compilation. It was the band’s first time together in a studio since 1986! Jim Hall traveled from L.A. to produce the sessions, which were engineered by Eric Hass. Spring also saw the launch of Light Rail Sessions, a live music series featuring local and touring bands. The series is designed to be a source of musical discovery for new music in multiple genres. Freeway Migliore serves as FOH mixer in the live room, and Nick Dumitriu mixes the live stream in the control room through Lightrail’s Trident A-Range console.
Mix Regional News: Bay Area, by Lori Kennedy, July 9, 2015
Prairie Sun, Cotati
Profiled in last year’s Bay Area Regional section, Prairie Sun hosted Astronots, produced by bandmembers Allee Futterer and Niko Giamo. Kat Wright & the Indomitable Soul Band recorded in Studio C with producer (and Widespread Panic bass player) Dave Schools, engineer Rick Vargas and second engineer Jason Reed.
The Grill, Emeryville
Recent work at The Grill includes FKi 1st (Trocon Roberts) producing and Jeremy Gartner (pictured) engineering Post Malone’s multi-Platinum release, Stoney. SOB x RBE was in with engineers Sean “Sauce” Chapman and Andre Fraizer to work on the album Gangin. SOB x RBE also tracked the song “Paramedic!” for the Black Panther soundtrack. In addition, the studio hosted sessions for J-Boog’s Number One reggae album Wash House Ting and the Rose Petals EP; the primary producer was Jonas Tele, and engineers included Lev Berlak and Fraizer.
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