“Most of the best songs we’ve ever heard were written in bedrooms or hotel rooms,” Avary offers. Whether you’re just getting started with music or looking for a cheaper alternative to booking studio time, here are eight things you need to set up a fully functioning, professional recording studio from the comforts of your own home. “Not everyone can afford to have a studio booked for months at a time to accommodate their spontaneous creativity.” “It’s more cost efficient for artists working on a smaller budget,” he says. “I’m constantly writing and making music and I like to see where the music leads me as it’s happening, follow it, and then capture it right in the moment,” he says, citing his last album, “Zoetic,” which he recorded in a tiny room of a house at the bottom of Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles.įor Avary, who recently converted a friend’s backhouse into a recording space for his next album, “Having my own studio allows for spontaneity and much more experimentation, rather than coming up with ideas beforehand and then banging them out in a big-time pro studio, all whilst hearing the expensive tick-tock of the clock.”įoster agrees, saying that setting up a recording space at home is decidedly more affordable than booking a studio, which can often run up to thousands of dollars an hour.

“As long as you have space for a desk and a chair, you’re basically ready to set up the foundation of your home studio.”įor Bryce Avary, lead singer of The Rocket Summer, having a home studio is all about flexibility, and having the freedom to create on your own schedule. “Professional quality studio equipment is now so compact, it can fit on your desk or kitchen table,” says Foster. Once accessible to only those with money to burn on a pricey studio or with access to a large space, recording and mixing a decent track is now as simple as acquiring a few key pieces of equipment, and finding a couple extra inches of table space.

While sites like Soundcloud and YouTube let users upload their finished songs, access to affordable recording equipment has made it easier for people to create their own tracks as well, further democratizing the DIY movement that has made stars out of everyone from Juice WRLD to Justin Bieber. “We live in a time where anyone can release their own music online,” says Jon Foster, a Toronto-based composer, producer and drummer who, alongside his writing partner Steve Poloni independently recorded and released the soundtrack for the short film, “Camista,” in October of last year.

Macbook pro recording studio setup