Student mixes tunes in recording studio

The unifying element of Wharton senior Bill Elliott's recording studio is out the window. Really, it is. The wires that connect Elliott's board of infinite dials in the control room (a.k.a. Elliott's bedroom), to the the microphones in the second floor studio run down the side of 3721 Chestnut Street. Elliott, who plays guitar and does vocals for the Philadelphia band Splendorbin, invested in recording equipment about a year ago when the band was looking to make a demo tape and found the prices prohibitive. So, Elliot charged up $2,000 on his credit card, crammed all the equipment into his room at the Pi Lambda Phi fraternity house and fulfilled his teenage desire to have recording studio in his own home. Although the project started as a hobby, an entrepreneurial venture and an effort to help his band, the studio also serves another purpose. It offers local bands a cheaper, convenient way to produce an "improved quality" demo tape. While the band found studios charged a minimum of $20 to $25 per hour plus the charge of the tape, Elliott charges $10 per hour plus a materials fee. "I know there are a lot of bands at Penn who want to record something," he said. "This is affordable and close to them, if they don't have cars to transport the equipment." In his shoebox-like room, Elliott has all the equipment necessary to perform a process most people don't think about -- the transformation of live music to digital tape. To make a recording, he first decides which instrument will be assigned to which track, or connection. Each of the eight tracks is recorded separately, then mixed by "overdubbing" to achieve the right sound levels. The music is recorded on a reel to reel and then transferred to a digital tape. When Splendorbin recorded the tape for the seven-inch vinyl it recently released in Elliott's studio, he found it "kind of tricky" to make and mix the music at the same time. But no, he didn't run up and down the stairs really fast; he first recorded all the other instruments and then simply played with one hand while controlling the mixing equipment with the other. Sounds more than a little tricky. Elliott said he has invested between $8,000 and $9,000 in recording equipment since he first started the business. But the price is worth it if the quality improves, he added. Wearing a Fishbone t-shirt, black suede sneakers, that just-rolled-out-of-bed hairdo and nursing a squat bottle of Redstripe, Elliott switches his gaze from the street below to his soundboard. As his fingers dance across the dials, turning each one with the comfort of experience and the quickness of a pro, it is clear how much he has invested himself in the music industry. And Elliott is not undertaking the endeavor for purely economical reasons. "We just want to put some good music out that otherwise wouldn't be heard," he said. Elliott said his father seems to agree. "Then my dad calls me to find out if I've got my job on Wall Street yet," he said with a slight smile. "He's pretty much figured out that I'm not going to be considering that." Elliott explained that his father was in a band in his college days, and he opened for the Byrds. But salaries have changed since then, he added. "He says 'all you'll make is 25 for the night and all you can drink,' " Elliott said. "And all I make is 15 and three beers. But I'm happy this way."

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