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Studio Of The Month

Flexible Response

Article from International Musician & Recording World, July 1985

Flexible Response in Bradford find a Flexible friend in Chris Maillard


For all most people in the music business know, the British Isles might comprise something the same size and shape as the Outer Hebrides: a densely populated but tiny island around the West End of London, a couple of offshore sandbanks in the Notting Hill/Ladbroke Grove and Brixton areas and some outlying rocky islets going by the names of Newcastle, Glasgow, Liverpool and Sheffield. And everything in between may as well be thousands of fathoms of icy water, so unwilling are they to try their delicate toes in it.

Well, in the interests of information I feel I ought to dispel that particular myth, which is where this studio comes in. They offer a very complete service to the pro bands, because their gear is up to the standard of almost any London 24-track. But because they're based in Bradford, overheads are less than the big city operations and they can therefore offer rates which will make it possible for the little bands to grab a slice of the multitrack pie. And what's more, Flexible is equipped better than almost any studio in the area.

The desk and multitrack machine are the workhorse of the industry, Soundcraft, and the mastering machine is an Otari, which is shortly to be joined by a big brother in the form of a 24-track version. The monitors are Tannoy Super Reds, driven by a Fostex power amp, or Auratone and Aiwa reference speakers driven by Quad. And the microphones include Neumann, Calrec, AKG, Beyer, Sennheiser, ElectroVoice... all the major names.

So what makes this place any better than Totally Average Studios, Anytown? The answer lies to a great extent in the place itself. It's in a big building which used to be a warehouse/clothing factory and hence has loads and loads of space. The main, dead, recording area is big. Very big, in fact. Never mind room to swing a cat, you could happily wrestle a rhino or two here, if that's really the sound you want on your next 12" remix. Down a small flight of steps and through a pair of sliding glass windows is the live room. And it really is live. It used to be a loading bay, so it's got a really high ceiling, one wall is covered in slate for better reverb, and it's generally all you could want for that big drum or guitar sound. The control room is also a fair size, all of which was designed acoustically by Turnkey's acoustic Leonardo, Andy Munro.

Upstairs in the rest of the building (which is also Flexible Response's property) are offices, equipment storage, and some large, if spartan, rehearsal rooms which bands can (and often do) rent out on a weekly basis at very reasonable rates. If you're an unemployed band, like so many are in that neck of the woods, they'll go out of their way to give you cheap time and free backline, so they're not by any means the capitalist money grabbing big business studio so many others are. Three cheers for Karl Marx Multitrack!

But the most obvious reason for the reputation they're attracting has to be the intelligent and highly up-to-date choice of ancillary gear. No expense has been spared, and quite a few brain cells used up, in getting together the rack of effects — it includes no less than six delay/reverb units from an AMS digital reverb and an Ursa Major Space Station at the top end, through a Bel BD80 to various Roland units both analogue and digital. There are Drawmer compressor/limiters and noise gates aplenty — and one nice touch is that as almost everybody wants a different unit, they'll hire in anything you want (within reason) free of charge. Ideal.

Sitting behind the effects rack is one very modern machine, the Sony PCM F-1 digital mastering device and attendant video recorder. But if you think that's hi-tech, look sideways and you'll find an Apple microcomputer — one of the first I've seen in a studio apart from the built-into-the-desk auto-mixdown systems. This one, however, isn't used to push the faders up and down, although that's a future possibility. No, it forms the basis of the Greengate DS:3 mini-Fairlight sampling system which they've got (see this very issue for more about this fabby machine) and also can be loaded with some very natty software which instantly transforms it into a real-time spectrum analyser and high-quality reverb. And it does those 3D Fairlight-type screen displays as well, ideal for impressing gadget conscious customers. More updates to the Apple's range are promised, and it's nice to see a studio setting the pace with technology rather than just jogging along.

So don't discount Bradford in your search for the perfect studio. At a top-whack rate of £28 for one hour and £23 per hour for block bookings it's already a long way below what a similar studio would charge down South — but if you're a self-financed band or an independent company, they'll go even further down. Just try them and see how keen they are to negotiate a great deal.

They're well-equipped, they're large, they're local if you're up North — and what's more, they're very Flexible.

FLEXIBLE RESPONSE STUDIOS (Contact Details)


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Publisher: International Musician & Recording World - Cover Publications Ltd, Northern & Shell Ltd.

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International Musician - Jul 1985

Recording World

Feature by Chris Maillard

Previous article in this issue:

> Tascam V-700 Cassette Deck

Next article in this issue:

> APRS Preview


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