Qualla: Sound City Studios

Sound City Studios: Introduction

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The building had been a Vox musical instrument factory before Joe Gottfried and Tom Skeeter converted it into a recording studio in 1969. They bought a custom Rupert Neve console — 'One of four in the world,' as Neve described it — for $75,175. That console sat at the center of Sound City Studios in Van Nuys for the next four decades, and whatever it was that made the room sound the way it did — the live acoustics, the sympathetic electronics, the particular physics of that particular space — resulted in something that musicians kept coming back to find.

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Sound City Studios: The Console and the Sound

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The first song recorded on the Neve 8028 console was performed by Buckingham Nicks — and led to an invitation that made Fleetwood Mac. By 1976, the band was back at Sound City recording 'Never Going Back Again,' a track from what would become Rumours, one of the best-selling albu...

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Sound City Studios: Five Decades of Recording

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The list of artists who recorded at Sound City spans eras and genres: Neil Young, Grateful Dead, Fleetwood Mac, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Bob Dylan, Elton John, U2, Guns N' Roses, Nirvana, Metallica, Tool, Slayer, Rage Against the Machine, and many others. Charles Manson r...

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Sound City Studios: Documentary and Revival

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

In 2013, Dave Grohl directed Sound City — a documentary about the studio's history that brought the space back to public attention. The same year, Grohl assembled an album featuring Nirvana collaborators, Tom Petty, Paul McCartney, and others, all recorded on the salvaged Neve co...

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