Retro City Studios

12/04/2024

Tape delay appreciation post. We’ve had the Roland chorus echo sre-555 for some time now but over the summer we added the classic re-201. In a modern world of amazing plugins, nothing beats the real thing.

09/02/2022

Front & back.
Thanks to we had come through and capture the current condition of the A control room. Sure does look different from a few years ago!

08/14/2022

We’re loving the new Moog GrandMother synth. Especially next to it’s real Grandma, the Prodigy. But for real, the spring reverb is just amazing.

06/28/2022

Over the years I’ve found that there’s a lot of misinformation surrounding analog tape recording. I put this together to help explain the process, clear up any myths, and describe the different ways to utilize tape in recording, mixing and mastering. Give it a read through if you’re interested in analog recording. - Link in bio -

06/14/2022

This is our main MCI JH110 1/4” 2 track mixdown machine. It’s one of three JH110s we own, the other two currently acting more as service machines. It’s not only a classic mixdown recorder but also excels as a tape delay. This along with one other machine came from studios in Washington DC where it was regularly serviced and cared for. We like to think it recorded a lot of classic Terry Gross interviews. The other 110 (back left) we purchased from at and was used on multiple records of which Andy and I are big fans. We love getting gear with history, cool to see it live on and continue to be a part of good music over 40+ years later!

03/24/2022

More soundtrack setups. Ludwig/Yamaha mid 70’s tom mashup, no resonant heads. Mostly era mics, all into the Neve then through the MCI.

02/14/2022

Rarely seen angle of the live room during setup for a recent session that captured while doing some maintenance on a really tall ladder.

12/01/2021

Warm pic of the console area from .kit shot over this past summer. Since this was taken we’ve added the new racks, and done some additional tuning to the room and ATCs.

10/07/2021

We recently remodeled our Iso 2. This space gets used pretty regularly these days for recording so we thought it was time to pull down the old “temporary” acoustical treatments and re-tune with custom panels. Also, it’s a through-way to our control room so we thought it would be a nice change.

We added much more connectivity to the room during our last big overhaul while we were closed for Covid restrictions. Like the other Iso rooms in the studio, it’s easy to get signal to and from this room and connect it to any other area in the studio. This type of connectivity can come in really handy for big tracking sessions with lots of inputs.

09/09/2021

live performance filmed and mixed here at Retro City airs this evening on

09/09/2021

in studio performance filmed and mixed here at Retro City airs tonight on

08/31/2021

This Neve 88R rack of 1081s came in through recently and is finally racked up, and in the bay. We love getting gear with history, and these certainly have plenty of that. They come from and were owned by one of our favorites (Eric Valentine). He often used them at the actual source, and would run line level signal back to the converter to get the least amount of signal loss as possible. They can be remote controlled but we use them locally in our control room. These pre amps have been used on a ton of great records over the past 25 years, we’re glad to keep them in service!

07/27/2021

We recently installed new racks in the control room. After looking at other rack manufactures we realized the only way we can get the the exact size and space we needed would be to build them ourselves. We had pretty specific requirements, including the ability to roll the entire rack out at once for service as well as keeping the gear placement ergonomic and below the “close reflections” height.
With the help of the talented we designed, cut, built, stained and finished the entire rack over the period of a few weeks. However, installing the racks along with a new patchbay and re-wiring all the gear was arguably more work. Despite the massive job it turned out to be, we’re really happy with the way it turned out. Special thanks to for the helping hands.

07/25/2021

07/19/2021

Recently had and in (The Blair Brothers) working on the soundtrack to a pretty classic remake that’s currently being filmed. It’s always a pleasure to utilize the full studio the way they often do. Among other tracking like guitars and keys, it’s often centered around multiple drum setups from small vintage kits to huge tom arrays!