Recording Studio Guide:
Bruce Robison puts a premium on natural reverb
In a digital world, this Austin musician revels in analog
By Michael Corcoran
August 25, 2005
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Photos by Larry Kolvoord/AA-S Bruce Robison sits at the control panel at Premium Recording Service, his Hyde Park studio. Most of the analog equipment in the studio was purchased online. |
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No that's not a basketball recruit. That's Bruce Robison inside the reverb room that he built. The room cost about $6,000, and it's worth every penny to Robison.
XL's Recording Studio Guide:
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The demonstration is to show just how much better natural reverb sounds than the digitally enhanced style or simulated "plate reverb" currently in vogue. "Natural reverb gives records that larger-than-life quality that we fell in love with when we started listening to Elvis, Roy Oribison, Jerry Lee Lewis," Robison says. "What would Frank Sinatra sound like without reverb?"
Robison is such a fan of the vintage echo sound that he has built his own reverb room, using the blueprint from Jack's Tracks, the Nashville studio where so many classic country records got their engaging shimmer.
The reason every singer thinks they sound great in the shower is because of the natural reverb in the tiles. For Premium's chamber, the walls are made from plaster and there are no parallel surfaces; a chunk of the wall can be removed for a miniature entrance, though there's no real reason to go inside the room with speakers and a mike.
Robison estimates that the reverb room cost about $6,000 to build, but considering that reverb samplers cost about $10,000, it's a bargain.
After penning smash hit songs for Tim McGraw and Faith Hill (who later was the first artist to record at Premium), George Strait, Lee Ann Womack and the Dixie Chicks, Robison put money back in the business by building Premium with sound architect Larry Smith. It was initially intended to be a demo studio for Robison, wife Kelly Willis, sister Robin Ludwick and brother Charlie, but Bruce says he got a little carried away in the process, buying the best analog equipment available, mostly over the Internet. The idea is to make records the way they were made 40 years ago, long before digital workstations could edit out the mistakes.
"All the technological advances in recording, like Pro Tools, don't make the music any better," he says. "The attitude of 'Don't worry, we'll make it perfect later' (with computer enhancement) just makes for mediocrity, I think. If you said to Picasso 'Why don't you quit using oil? It's too messy and we can make the exact image you want with computers,' it wouldn't really be the same."
Robison says he was influenced to make records the pre-digital way when he went on iTunes and listened to 10-second samples of artists such as Solomon Burke and Al Green. "You could tell the difference between a record Solomon Burke made in the 70s, when everybody used natural reverb, than one he made in the '80s. We just want to go back to the old way that people used to make records." Hence the nod to Sam Phillips' Memphis Recording Service in Premium's full name.
If the most recent yield of sessions at Premium, an as-yet-untitled third studio album from the Damnations, is an indication, Robison is well on his way of achieving his goal. On "Where To Begin," sisters Deborah Kelly and Amy Boone sound like offspring of the Everly Brothers and, on "Shoulda Been the Water," producer Robison does an homage to Brian Wilson with strange, yet fulfilling, vocal overdubs.
"We may have went a little overboard on this studio," he says, "but if we can make one interesting and lasting record in the next 10 years, it'll be worth it."
mcorcoran@statesman.com; 445-3652
