Hen House Studios Press
www.viruszine.com - 7/1/2006
Hen House Studios- Independent Culture
Hen House Studios is headed by Harlan Steinberger and Tucker Stilley, with a supportive team behind them, and together they have created a concept that leaves me wishing for something similar in Toronto. This is a recording studio in Venice Beach, California – with a twist. Artists are filmed while during the recording process and a documentary of behind the scenes footage is made. Harlan did an email interview with me in June about the project.
Who is working on Hen House Studios?
Harlan: The main person is Tucker Stilley and myself. I (Harlan Steinberger) am in charge of pre-production and production. I screen bands, and record and film them. I feel like a documentary film director at times. Tucker is in charge of postproduction, mainly editing the band’s video clips and documentary films.
They are various other people who contribute: Graphic artists, web masters web designers, videographers, recording engineers, mastering engineers, mixing engineers, and a office staff. I also spend a lot of time in the office pushing our CDs and documentary films as well as maintaining our web site www.HenHouseStudios.com
What’s the history behind this idea? The general concept of offering free recording time to artists in exchange for being filmed. (This is bartering at it’s most creative!!)
Harlan: Well, at first I was a musician and record producer and then about 13 years ago I made my first documentary film ’Tibor Jankay- The Art of Survival’. For the next 7 years or so I went back and forth between working in documentary film and music. Then one day, in the shower, it hit me that it would be great fun to fuse the two mediums, so I built a recording studio/sound stage fit with digital audio and video capabilities. I created the model based on what I would deem expectable if I was a songwriter and was entering a studio that wanted to film and record me. What seemed most fair to me was that Hen House Studios would own the songs only if they were in sync with the footage that was shot in the studio that day, and the artists and or writers would maintain ownership of their songs in every other way possible. The bands could then use their recorded songs as a demo to further their career, finished their albums, license them to movies or television etc.
Hen House Studios in return would end up with all this great footage (1000 hours to date representing over 100 bands) that we could edit into music documentary video clips and full length documentary films. There are presently about 90 clips, five to fifteen minutes long on our web site free for all to view.
Then later we decided it would be really cool to release our favorite songs in Hen House Studios Anthology CDs. So to do this we went back to the bands and licensed back one song each. So far we have released 4 anthologies.
The Hen House Studios concept also allowed me to meet bands that I wanted to do whole records with and also led to the creation of full length music based documentary films, the latest being ’Welcome 2 the Hen House’
Synopsis:
In 2000 Hen House Studios opened its doors in Venice, CA, announcing they would be recording independent bands for free, well kind of, the recording time was free and in exchange the sessions along with out of the studio encounters would be filmed. CD compilations were made as well as a music doc short for each band which is posted on their frequently visited website.
Welcome 2 The Hen House is a collage of the many artists who spent time there. This unique film blends these shorts with animation and super 8 footage to create a fantastical journey through the current independent Los Angeles area music scene. A blend of young, undiscovered talent collides with such legends as Fishbone and Doors’ drummer, John Densmore who frequent the Hen House with various projects.
What started out as an experiment evolved into over 8oo hours of footage from the 100+ bands laying eggs at the Hen House. Now, after years of incubation, co-Directors Harlan Steinberger (Hen House creator and chief) and his long time collaborator/editor Tucker Stilley have hatched this documentary feature.
And another film: ’Critical Times Fishbone’s Hen House Sessions’
Synopsis:
In 2001, the legendary, influential and voraciously eclectic band Fishbone arrived to record their newest material at Hen House Studios. The seamless blend of multi-angle cinema verité and time lapse photography turns day to night and back again as the band pleads, cajoles, threatens and uses every trick in the book to bring their music alive. The film does nothing to demystify Fishbone’s potent Juju – after nearly a quarter century touring and composing together – their unique magic is still operating at it’s nuttmost. Band documentaries may come and go – but this is Fishbone. Way up close.
What is the selection process like?
Harlan: Bands submit applications, I listen to everything and listen for artistry. I know this is a very subjective process but I do the best I can. I don’t care about musicianship, style or the quality or fidelity of the recordings, just artistry.
Harlan on the history of Hen House
’In 2000 Hen House Studios opened its doors in Venice, CA, announcing they would be recording independent bands for free, well kind of, the recording time was free and in exchange the sessions along with out of the studio encounters would be filmed. CD compilations were made as well as a music doc short for each band which is posted on their frequently visited website.’
Tell me about the label within Hen House.
Harlan: 9 CD releases, 2 documentary films. Three records to be released this summer. We work our records! We just don’t push them for three months but rather we will push them as long as we are in business. Basically, like children, indie records need nurturing over a long period of time. We also, philosophically, stick with online distribution only because in our opinion store distribution died along time ago. We were recently offered in store distribution and we turned it down.
What is the independent music scene in Venice like?
Harlan: Lot’s of bands influenced by the sun, surf, skate boarding etc. It’s wild, filled with high-energy bands. I see a big movement back toward bands that are influenced by punk, rock, surf, reggae and ska.
What role do you feel you play within that independent scene?
Harlan: We want to provide a place where musicians feel that they can come hang out and not feel any pressure. After all, when bands record at the Hen House, they are not paying to be there and the Hen House is not paying the bands to be there either. When you remove that you remove the pressure and the result is beautiful relaxed recording. It’s incredible fun.
What do you hope to achieve with Hen House Studios?
Harlan: I dream of a label where every band involved is a stockholder; their stock being the songs they have written and recorded with us. Then we could have these big board meetings/parties with all the musicians present and vote on things like where the music should be sold and for how much, what movies we should license songs to, who to record next etc…
What are you working on now?
Harlan: Finishing touched on three records: ’Floyd Red Crow Westerman’s A Tribute to Johnny Cash. Red Crow is possible the most famous native American actor in the world and he approached me a while back about doing a Johnny Cash cover album with him singing. He is absolutely brilliant on it.
Dominica Tenement Yard. A Reggae compilation of indigenous Reggae bands from the small Caribbean Island Dominica. My good friend Trevy Felix from the international renowned reggae band Boom Shaka lived in Dominica for a year and a half and recorded the bands there on his laptop. He brought the masters to the Hen House for sweetening and we are psyched about this very special project.
‘Sunny’. Sunny was a famous Venice Beach boardwalk figure who was considered the ‘King of Venice’. Before his recent death I recorded him solo. Brilliant songs from a brilliant human being.
Also, editing a documentary film about the L.A. based poet Michael C Ford. He was the original bass player in the Doors and left early on to pursue a career in poetry. He knows more about L.A. history then anyone I have ever met and his poems are incredible moving.
A band that features doors drummer John Densmore and Iranian musician Reza Derakshani. will perform at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. on June 14th. They are billing themselves as ‘Peaceful Sounds from the Axis of Evil’. Hen House Studios produced and released their record last year entitled ’Reza - Ray of the Wine’. I have the great honor of play percussion with them that night.
They will also perform in Canada:
June 16th, in Toronto at the Lulu Lounge June 17th, in Montreal at the Theatre de National
Also, of course I am conducting various Hen House Sessions!
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Music Connection Magazine 2/28/05
Want to record for free?
Want to record for free? Giving musicians carte blanche in a recording studio is like letting wolves run amok in a chicken coop, but that’s pretty much what Harlan Steinberger does at Hen House Studios. In a town where starving musicians pay premium rates for studio time, it’s business as unusual when bands load in and set up in the Hen House, without feeling the financial scorch of money burning through their pockets as the minutes tick by like an accelerated click track.
The catch? You have to agree to be filmed. Steinberger explains, ‘What we want is the right to use their music as long as it’s in sync with the footage that we shot while recording.’ Steinberger and his crew have shot more than 1,000 hours of footage and recorded more than 100 bands so far.
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Echo Magazine - 3/7/2005
Sound Check
If companies like Sony have become the big fox of the music industry, gobbling up bands and music rights wherever they go, then Hen House Studios is the little hen that could. A digital recording facility located in Venice Beach, CA, Hen House runs a community-based program where artists can make music at their own speed, to their own vision. The studio time is free to artists, as long as they permit the studio to film them while they record; the documentary footage then graces the Hen House Web site.
Fortunately, some things you get for free really are worth a lot, and the studio time at Hen House has created a wonderful, eclectic anthology that ranges from funk and blues, to spoken word and rock. One of the most unusual pieces is the spoken word track recorded with The Doors’ keyboardist Ray Manzarek and poet Michael C Ford.
But fans of cutting edge music that doesn’t have a corporate imprint will enjoy the other bands as well: Fan Fiction, Boom Shaka, Sonja Marie, Asian Fetish Brigade, Ethan Livermore, Badfish, Drunk Acrobat, Pete Holland, Big Cat, Cattywompus, HB Surround Sound, Nikki Hong and Beyond Rhythm. The artists of Hen House Studios Anthology 4 have laid one golden egg.
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Florida Entertainment Scene - 3/5/2005
If You Build It, They Will Rock
This ingenious rooster merges film and music in a symbiotic exchange of info and experience so musicians record for free; promotes tracks on Hen House Studios label. Critical Times: Fishbone’s Hen House Sessions documentary, John Densmore-produced Ray of the Wine debut from Persian multi-instrumentalist-vocalist Reza, Hen House Studios Anthology Volume Four – 2004 are three golden eggs in the Hen House.
Giving musicians carte blanche in a recording studio is like letting wolves run amok in a chicken coop, but that’s pretty much what Harlan Steinberger does every day at Hen House Studios, where bands record — for free. What?!
In a town where starving musicians pay premium rates for studio time, it’s business as unusual when bands load in and set up in the state-of-the-art Hen House, without feeling the financial scorch of money burning through their pockets as the minutes tick by like an accelerated click track. Producer and former Doors drummer John Densmore, who has known Steinberger ‘for years’ while working with several bands at Hen House, comments, ‘Harlan is a wonderful hand drummer, and he got this altruistic idea to open a studio and make it free to those who want to record. The vibe at Hen House is really great; it’s like a global village in there. And then everybody working there is trying to help the artists get out their muse, say what they need to say, and then providing an opportunity for that. It’s so…sweet. It’s just unheard of,’ he laughs, adding with amazement and admiration, ‘To reach out to the community, to form a community is just really rare.’
In terms of practicality, you may think Steinberger is crazy for sidestepping the straightforward monetary exchange that capitalism is built upon, no matter what drummer one marches to, or records with, but this ingenious rooster has the Hen House Studios thing all figured out. The multi award-winning documentary film director (The Art of Survival, about artist and holocaust survivor Tibor Jankay, which earned Outstanding Documentary of 1995, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Academy Documentary Committee; CINE Golden Eagle Award, 1996, Washington, D.C., as well as several other honors), record producer (The Spirit of Venice) and former Inner Secret drummer built the Venice, Calif., facility five years ago, complete with a sound stage, in a commercial hen house that dates back to the 1940s.
Steinberger’s goal was to merge documentary filmmaking and music in a way that the information would come to him, rather than schlepping a truckload of equipment hither and yon.
‘When we first started,’ Steinberger recalls, ‘the bands came to us and we would film them, and told them they could walk away with their masters and use them any way they want to get gigs, to finish records, or any way they could imagine. What we wanted in return was the right to use their music as long as it was in sync with the footage that we shot of them while recording. It was an exchange of information.’
‘We work with a lot of young bands,’ Steinberger continues, ‘and once word got out that there was no hitch, and that the fidelity was good, and we were putting together video clips of these bands and making movies, we started getting lots of submissions every day.’
Steinberger and his crew have shot more than 1000 hours of footage and recorded more than 100 bands, so far.
‘We’ve figured out a way to provide musicians who can’t afford it, to go into a nice studio and create something. We’re trying to work together with artists and have Hen House come up at the same time that they come up. We promote them, and by promoting them, we’re promoting us. Just by them offering their skills and their art to us, and to be able to capture it on video and release it on a record, it really helps them and it helps us. We’re at a much more level playing field with the artists, whereas record companies go through artists more and more quickly, it seems. The lifespan of an artist is two or three years at a label, if they get a big deal, and by the third record, they’re gone. We don’t sign artists, but we work the records for years.’
Funk-punk-ska heroes Fishbone were early benefactors in Steinberger’s Hen House of magnanimity, where he filmed the quirky collective’s creative modus operandi in 2001, which became the documentary, Critical Times: Fishbone’s Hen House Sessions, recently released through Music Video Distributors.
In addition, there’s the upcoming film, Welcome 2 the Hen House, which features 50 bands that have recorded there. Interspersed with cool Super 8 footage that Steinberger & company have collected through the years, it’s a behind-the-scenes art documentary that gives the viewer a window into the bands’ creative process and also exemplifies the Hen House concept.
Other golden eggs from the Hen House that Steinberger built are Hen House Studios Anthology Volume Four — 2004, and Ray of the Wine, the debut from renowned Persian multi-instrumentalist composer and vocalist Reza, which John Densmore performed on and produced. These, as well as three other anthologies recorded at Hen House Studios are on its Hen House Studios record label. All CD and DVD titles are available online at HenHouseStudios.com and CDBaby.com, except for Critical Times, which is also available at brick-and-mortar retailers.
‘Hen House is evolving, and the fact that it makes sense becomes more apparent to me every day,’ Steinberger states. ‘The model that the music industry has been using for years is falling apart; distribution is changing because of the way we’re delivering music through digital media. You don’t even need a CD anymore. The Internet has opened the playing field.’
And Steinberger has opened the Hen House. For more info on Hen House Studios visit: henhousestudios.com.
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Los Angeles Business Journal - 6/18/2001
Independent Beats
By offering local bands free studio access in exchange for limited music and video rights, Hen House is trying to create a multimedia company for the 21st century.
You’ve been jamming with your friends and it’s time to get out of the garage and start playing gigs. But you don’t have a demo CD so clubs won’t book you. And without the gigs, you can’t afford the studio time to cut a demo.
For an increasing number of L.A. bands, the answer to that chicken-and-egg conundrum is Hen House.
Nineteen months ago, musician, producer, sound engineer and documentary filmmaker Harlan Steinberger opened his small Venice recording studio to the Los Angeles music community. As word began to spread that Steinberger was offering free recording time and professional engineering in exchange for video rights to the sessions and limited rights to the music, his phone was soon ringing off the hook.
And while Steinberger, 39, hopes to create a profitable business through the venture by producing and marketing compilation albums and licensing music and video footage he is primarily motivated by a desire to create what he calls a multimedia company for the 21st century. One that makes use of digital technology to capture images and sounds that are adaptable to a wide variety of platforms. And, just as importantly, one that thrives while allowing musicians to retain ownership and control of their creative output.
It’s about building a community of artists, and I think we are really starting to do that, said Steinberger. I like being on the cutting edge of this business, and I like not dealing with the labels and distributors.
Besides helping fledgling bands get off the ground, Hen House, through Steinberger’s extensive contacts in the local music scene, is also bringing more established names into the studio such as John Densmore of The Doors and L.A. underground mainstays Fishbone.Everybody in L.A. is talking about Hen House, said Fishbone founder Norwood Fisher, whose other band, Trulio Disgracias, will appear on Hen House”s first compilation CD, Hen House Anthology Volume 1, which is due out this summer.
I go down there just to hang out sometimes, Fisher said. There’s a lot of cross pollination going on down there. People are playing on other people’s stuff. It s just a very creative vibe.
Hen House is tucked in the back of an industrial complex on a Venice side street where sculptors and painters occupy space next to machine shops and marine businesses. The property was originally a dairy farm and Hen House takes its name from its location, which is where an actual hen house stood when the farm was in operation.
Bands invited to record are given enough time to put down three songs. In exchange, Hen House receives the rights to videotape the sessions and can pick one of the three recordings to use on a compilation CD.
Some musicians will come in with substandard equipment, so we can set them up with a lot of great gear, Steinberger said. The more successful musicians want to record during the day, because they’re gigging at night. A lot of the younger bands come in at night.
Besides holding an option to use one of the songs on a CD, Hen House can pursue other deals for the material. That includes licensing as background music in ads or use on the company Web site, Henhousestudios.com.
But Hen House only has rights to the music recorded in its studio, not to the song itself. After a grace period of six months or a year, the artists can release the music in any format they like.
Hen House s evolving business model is anything but a sure shot. But Steinberger, who splits ownership of the venture with a group of silent investors around $200,000 has been invested so far said he has the funding to continue operating for at least four or five years. In his view, that s enough time to build a valuable music and video library, release 20 to 25 CDs and establish the Hen House brand as a symbol of quality and artistic integrity.
Rather than teaming with a major distributor, Hen House plans to market its compilations in-house, using its Web site and word of mouth to push the brand name locally. The studio also recently sent out 5,000 mailers to subscribers of Billboard magazine. Hen House’s video library already comprises hundreds of hours of footage.
(Bands) are signing over the master to us, but not the intellectual property rights, Steinberger said. I’m a writer myself so I understand why writers should never have to give up their property rights.
Fatal Charm, was one of the first to take advantage of free studio time. At the time the band members were attending St. Monica’s Catholic School in Santa Monica and Steinberger had to get their parents permission before the band could record in the studio.
Lead singer George Nakhla said hearing their tape was a revelation for the band, which had all ready been playing live thanks to a loyal following from fellow students.
We’d been together for four years and when we got into the studio we found out that we didn’t sound like what we wanted to sound like, we knew we had a lot of tightening up to do, Nakhla said.
Ultimately, Hen House put together a mini-documentary of the band, recording them in the studio, playing live and even accompanying band members to their high school prom.
It’s was a great opportunity because people don’t understand how expensive studio time is, Nakhla said. Plus, now we have this whole documentary of when we were a young band.
For Steinberger, helping with the maturation of bands like Fatal Charm is where the fun comes in. We want to sell our records but we’re more interested in being the ones who help bands get over the hump, he said. Sometimes it feels a little philanthropic but less so everyday. the growth so far has been phenomenal. Over time, I feel it’s really going to pay for itself.
