NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — Welcome to 1979 is a one-of-a-kind recording studio embracing the true spirit of Music City.
Nestled in the heart of Nashville’s The Nations neighborhood, the 7,000-square-foot facility is a time capsule of music history. Husband and wife team Chris and Yoli Mara opened the studio in 2008 with the goal of creating a comfortable and creative atmosphere to make music.
After spending a decade as a freelance recording engineer, Chris realized Nashville didn’t have what the rock bands and Americana acts he enjoyed working with needed.
“Music Row is great, but the studios are mainly pretty slick, geared towards mainstream county acts. So I thought, why not make a big space that’s really comfortable, and bands feel at home there,” Chris said.
With a one-year-old son and a baby on the way, the Maras got to work — renting out a massive former vinyl record pressing plant. The young couple stayed late painting the walls, threw parties to get the word out around town and decked out every inch with funky furniture.
Chris said he doesn’t know what came first, the vision for a vintage vibe or the name ‘Welcome to 1979’ itself — it really boiled down to budget.
“I literally went to every yard sale and bought the ugliest couches because they were the cheapest. But then they were the coolest!” he said with a laugh.
Little did they know at the time, the collection of crazy lamps and wild knick-knacks would go on to be featured in countless photo shoots and music videos — and be constantly growing.
“People give us stuff. Bands will come here, and they’re like, ‘I brought this lamp from my grandpa’s house, I think it’d be great here.’ There’s all kinds of stuff like that,” Chris said.
And it’s not just the furniture that makes the studio unique.
As independent owners not controlled by a corporation, the Maras pride themselves on making decisions that put their artists first. Nine times out of ten, if an artist has a request, the answer is ‘yes,’ they said.
Welcome to 1979 prioritizes keeping prices low for artists. Plus, when bands rent out the studio, they can record in any of the studio’s many rooms. There are over 100 places to plug a microphone in throughout the space.
“We don’t have a Studio A, a Studio B, and a Studio C. The place is yours,” Chris said.
Chris said recording is an uncomfortable process by nature, so his goal is to make it as comfortable as possible — an idea that seems to resonate well with musicians.
“The idea for me is to make it feel like you’re not in a studio. At every step,” he said. “Bands get here at 10…by noon, a lot of times, they’ll be walking around barefoot here. You only take your shoes off in places you are really comfortable,” he said.
From its wood-paneled walls to pinball machines, lava lamps and curly yellow slide, Chris believes the studio’s eclectic vibe leads to better performances.
“This week we had a band in for three days. They had drum sets set up in different rooms, keyboards all over, and then they can just wander around and create different sounds for their song. So it sounds like they were here for two weeks because it has so much depth,” he said.
Another element that sets Welcome to 1979 apart is its variety of recording gear.
Chris said when the studio opened, computer recording was expensive, so he set themselves apart by embracing what he called their “superpower” — old-school recording on analog tape, a more “organic” recording process.
“I thought, why not make the thing I don’t have, the thing I have,” he said.
Now, artists at Welcome to 1979 can choose to do entirely analog tracking and mixing, use the modern bells and whistles, or even use their in-house vinyl mastering suite. Thanks to their sister company, Mara Machines, the studio can also utilize a number of tape machines for archival purposes and analog-to-digital transfers.
“We can patch this console directly into that, and record a band directly to a vinyl master. Which can only happen in a couple places in the world,” Chris said.
When the studio isn’t being rented out, it brings artists in for community events, including several tape camps each year and an annual recording summit.
“We get people from all over the county, sometimes all over the world. And all ages — we have people in their 60s and high school students that are all here, learning from each other,” Yoli said.
Yoli quit her time as a teacher to help run the studio, taking the lead on community events, handling finances and preparing the space for each booking. She helped found and is now the vice president of the Vinyl Recording Manufacturing Association, the first trade organization for vinyl manufacturing in the U.S. She is also on the board of the Nashville Engineer Relief Fund, an organization that offers help to engineers who may be underinsured.
Click here to learn more about Welcome to 1979.
