The Escape Clause #

We had a lease with Ruben and I think it was for a year but we could not sustain the operation and make enough money to keep it alive. I was even borrowing from Friends to keep things a float. One day Ruben asks me if I wanted to get out of the lease because there was this interested party that wanted to buy the Studio. This was great because that also kept Ruben’s and my relationship on a good footing even though after the close of that deal I don’t think I ever heard from him or he from me again.

Larry Wanagus and his team of investors were the interested party. Larry is sort of a distant relative of sorts. His Dad officated two of my cousins weddings. I almost think that both of the sisters got married on the same day as a double wedding. I am sure this was my uncle’s idea because it sure would have saved him a ton of money. Anyway, Larry had big dreams to really getting some high end gear and turning this into a high class studio. I told him I would go a little easy on that idea, because everyone else was going 16 or 24 track and leaving no place where new artists can record their demos. I really found it interesting as I would hear interviews on the radio where Larry would talk about how he was really going to concentrate on the demo market with his initial investment of the studio.

A band that was working on demo needed a female singer, so an ad was put out and a young K.D. Lang answered the ad. When Larry heard her in those sessions he took her aside and they formed a new partnership with Larry being her manager. The rest shall we say made history. If he had not gone the route I suggested for him, that meeting may never have happened. He and K.D. went on to do some great things and he did wonders for her career.

Through that whole experience of running a recording studio I realized a couple of things. That studio management was not really were my interests lie, I wanted to produce, to arrange, and write music not engineer someone else’s stuff that could probably need a producer but the ones paying for studio time did not come in here to take advice or musical direction from a studio manager. It was a real relief to get out in some way because without the expense of paying for the studio lease we could find some talent that we wanted to work with and get them ready for the studio and to cut some tracks.