A lot of things have been going on but nothing really to show. I’ve been talking to people about the acoustic problems that I’ve been having and finding out solutions for them. As I suspected some construction will be needed but so far nothing too outrageous. I need a wall and a door added to my control room area to decouple it from the rest of the basement. In addition to that I’m going to need a bunch of sound absorption and diffusion surfaces made. Big bass traps, a ceiling cloud and maybe broadband slot resonators. The big issue is that the room is pretty small to begin with so I have to figure out how to have all of these things in here to fix the sound and still be able to function and move around freely. Before I can get to any of this construction I need to repair some cracked concrete on the outside of the house. I realize that this doesn’t sound like it has anything to do with building a studio but it really does, so follow me on this journey.
When it rains really heavily and I’m talking about what they refer to as flash floods, the gutters on my house are unable to hold and drain the water quick enough so the rain overflows the gutters and pours down the side of the house. There is a point where the foundation meets the brick and this seam is covered over with concrete. The house is over 40 years old so there are spots where the concrete patch has cracked and it just so happens that these very spots are the same spots where the water pools up and pours down the side of the house, oh the irony! Actually they say water is a very powerful force so maybe years of water pressure have caused these cracks. Regardless of how the cracks occurred the result is rain pouring down the inside wall of my basement. Definitely not an attractive site for a recording studio!
I’ve been putting this repair off forever but now it’s imperative that it gets done, the last thing that I need is an awesome studio flooded. Unfortunately the concrete is painted and concrete will not permanently stick to paint, eventually it will fall off. So before I can hire somebody to repair the concrete I need to remove the paint. I bought 2 different environmentally safe products and am waiting for some appropriately warm weather to test them out. The instructions say not to use them unless the temperature is over 55°F. I need 2 warm days in a row to test them. 1 day to apply and the next day to remove – it seems like every other day it’s either raining or cold so I’m waiting.
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After talking to the experts about the acoustical properties of the room it has come to my attention sadly that I need to remove my record collection and bookcases from this room as they are doing all sorts of strange things to the sound. They are my pride and joy and since I am an avid crate digger and samplist it’s great to have them in arms reach, but If I must remove them than I must. I have no idea where I am going to put about 2000 records now. I think I need to go through them and trim the collection down to only what I can’t live without. It’s a long process because it is not just about what I want to listen to but what I want to sample from.
With that being said I have 2 huge Ikea Expedit bookcases of the black-brown variety for sale. They are pretty much in perfect condition so if anybody in the Baltimore area is interested send me a mail – $100 a piece.
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In other news the SE Reflexion Filter is mighty awesome:
Rhyming into it makes you feel mighty powerful like you’re operating some heavy machinery:)
