The Studio Ghosts Thread

[YZ!]

Ok, I've seen a few studio ghost stories pop up here and there, so I decided to create a thread just for that.

Let me contribute with the first story.


I was a young aspiring Recording Engineer working in a studio that had been built in a location that once was a large bomb shelter.

One day I had an important session starting in the morning, so I got to the studio very early, before anyone else.

I was in a great mood, excited with the upcoming session.

I unlocked the back door, got in, locked it, proceeded thru the long hallway, got down the flight of stairs that led to the airlock between the CR and studio.

Unlocked the airlock door, got in, went into the CR.

At that point I started humming some song that had 'good morning' in the lyrics.

Got behind the console and sung the words 'good morning'.

To which a voice responded: 'good morning'.

A strange voice.

Kinda 'disembodied' but at the same time it was like more than one person.

Sounded like coming from the monitors, so I thought that some other studio employee was joking with me and said 'good morning' into the echo chamber or something.

I ran outside of the airlock and downstairs another flight into the echo chamber, which was locked.

Then I realized that the sound couldn't have come from the monitors because I hadn't turned on the breakers yet.

Well, I thought that if I said 'good morning' and got a positive response it couldn't be that bad...

Nobody else from the studio appeared until about half an hour later.

I never said a word about it to anyone.

From that day on I kept saying 'good morning' every time I went into the studio even when I knew nobody else was there.

So, anyone else has more to contribute?

[numrologst]

i've got some stories of my own, but none of them have to do with an experience in the studio.

Great story though. I am curious to hear some more... There have been some good ones here throughout the last few years.

[Jake Dempsey]

My studio is in a converted turn of the century warehouse type building. It's huge, old and funky. There are little nooks and passageways everywhere. It was a movie theater in the 1910s-1930s, then it was a restaurant supply warehouse for the next 70 years. It sat vacant for about 7 years until we took it over and converted it to a studio.

The guitar player in my band (who is a great engineer) has been swearing to me for the past year that spooky shit happens in there late at night. He stays locked in the studio late night working on our material a lot. I've always chalked it up to him being superstitious, or just trying to stir something up. I get the creepy crawlies in there late at night, but the place is just kind of scary at 2:00 AM. (check the url in my signature)

Well, I walk in from having a cig about a month ago at 1:00 AMish. I was behind on work and stayed late to get caught up. I walk in and hear, very distinctly and clearly, someone whisper my first name, "Jaaake" from the top of the stairs, then footsteps into the lounge. I immediately walked upstairs to the lounge to see who was f*cking with me. I have a buddy who rents space from me for his photography business. He's always pulling shit like that.

No one was there. I heard this as clear as a bell. The weirdest thing was that it came from inside the room, from the top of the stairs. It had the ambience of the live room attached to it. I actually didn't think anything of it until I realized I was alone. All the hair on my body stood on end for a while. The voice sounded labored and weary. Like it was everything it could do to hack out my name. It gives me the creeps just thinking about it.

I have never believed in any of this kind of thing. I still don't know what to make of it. I'm a very well-grounded person. Definitely not prone to auditory hallucinations. I know what I heard though. I've heard footsteps and bumping around once since then after midinght.

[YZ!]

Originally Posted by Jake Dempsey

I have never believed in any of this kind of thing. I still don't know what to make of it. I'm a very well-grounded person.

Me too.

But I've seen and heard things that do not match my beliefs.

And I know the difference between seeing/hearing/feeling something that you wish or believe that you should and something that you were not expecting, anticipating or desiring.

[cassiopamusic]

Apparently The Mars Volta had a bunch of studio "ghosts, evil spirits, and curses" when recording their new album. Not sure if I really believe it though, it was probably just a good publicity stunt.

Not really that related... but I dialed up a strange pulsing sound from my sound library the other day. I auditioned it through headphones and veins on my forehead started vibrating in the rhythm of that sound. That was so odd and I haven't even cranked up the volume.

[thedommer]

Originally Posted by cassiopamusic

Apparently The Mars Volta had a bunch of studio "ghosts, evil spirits, and curses" when recording their new album. Not sure if I really believe it though, it was probably just a good publicity stunt.

I believe it. That band is well grounded and would never do drugs.

[YZ!]

Originally Posted by cassiopamusic

Apparently The Mars Volta had a bunch of studio "ghosts, evil spirits, and curses" when recording their new album. Not sure if I really believe it though, it was probably just a good publicity stunt.

My 'unexplainable experiences', in-studio or not, have been either positive or neutral.

I mean, I could even get scared but nothing bad actually happened, while some of them were definitely positive.

[Unclenny]

Brenda died two years ago........wife's best friend....cancer.

A few months before she died she came over with a couple of guitars she found in an old house she was cleaning out......she just left them here ('71 SG Deluxe, '69 EB3 bass....almost unplayed).

After she died I found her old guit from her 'hippie' days buried in her attic ('66 Stella Harmony...pretty much unplayed).

Nowadays she's always here in the studio.....always. I feel her watching and turn quickly but never quite get a glimpse.

SoundClick artist: Lenny and the Scapers - Ballad Rock

[henryrobinett]

That's the origin of that old Stella, the same Stella I used to have -- well not THE same Stella! But it looks exactly the same.

"The rest of the story . . . "

[dontfearthringo]

I don't have a Ghost in my studio yet.

But I have my eye on one...

It's one of the Soundcraft 16 channel boards, with the meter bridge. Looks like it's in great shape!

[Keire]

how about finding the ash remains of a young girl in a church turned studio...happened to me...very creepy.

[jmarkham]

After we present a bill, a lot of our clients vanish into thin air! .. It's
the strangest thing.

jeff

[Unclenny]

Originally Posted by henryrobinett

That's the origin of that old Stella, the same Stella I used to have -- well not THE same Stella! But it looks exactly the same.

"The rest of the story . . . "

[bcgood]

I love these ghost story threads but I think we should wait until mid October to get them really going, that's the best time of the year for these kind of stories.

[emkay]

Well looks like an interesting thread that I will contribute to shortly when I have a bit more time that involves the famous Studio 55 in Los Angeles that already had it's share of stories circulating before my personal experience there
Be back in a couple of days.......peace....

[Lynn Fuston]

Originally Posted by jmarkham

After we present a bill, a lot of our clients vanish into thin air! .. It's the strangest thing.

Well, if that's a ghost story, then I've got a few to share. Just pull up a chair and get comfortable....

[edvdr76]

I have 2 stories for this thread.... The 1st time this happened to me I was mixing a song for a Regional Mexican artist named "Lupillo Rivera" it was his 1st song to ever be played on the radio, just me and him in the studio late at night. Anyway as were blasting on the mains we hear this horrible growling voice through the speakers!! We practically shit our pants!!!LOL and we ran down the stairs and stayed there for a while till we built up the courage to go back up there because we were on a deadline and HAD to finish that night. Long story short maybe by coincidence, the song became a smash and we had ourselves a 1st platinum record!!
My second story happened in another studio I was working at. Now I'd heard stories about this place but had never had anything happen to me. Luckily once again I was not by myself. It was a buddy of mine and me mixing these live tracks late at night for a band of mine. There are 2 other studios in this building which were both empty. I was behind the board and my buddy was standing next to me. We left the door from the the hallway open again, because no one else was there. As I'm mixing, out of the corner of my eye I clearly see someone pass by the door!! I look at my buddy and he's also looking at the door and then he looks at me and says " did you just see someone pass by?" We freaked out, closed the studio and left!! Damn... Now that I remember that shit was creepy as hell!!LOL

[pigpen]

Dunno if I should post here since my assistant has no clue and is a part of this thread ...but what the hell, it'll lead to further convo between us later.

My studio is in an old turn of the century warehouse that had railroad tracks on both sides. Started out as a cotton mill. Went vacant, then later on a rubber tire warehouse (which matters none in this discussion.) I converted it to rehearsal spaces on one end and a few studios on the other. Big bugger.

So the contractor who helped me build the place was "tuned in" to the other side, to a scary degree. I am fairly grounded, but have seen a few things to prove me wrong so I am also fairly open minded as well. This guy had "it"...he was too bothered by it for it to not be true. Anyhoot, I digress.

It took 9 months to build the place, 12 hours a day 5-7 days a week. We got to know each other pretty well to say the least. Randomly he'd ask "Do you see them?" I'd reply "Nah man." He'd say something to the extent of, "They are watching us again." I'd ask what the hell they were doing....he'd say "Just watching. They just want to see what's going on."

......

Months after the buildout is done and I am up and running and I am immediately just busy as hell, it happens.
Let me backup a sec...at this point, my hallway is VERY Shining like. Damned thing used to be over 160' long and only 8' wide... lasted forever!
Late one night, of course alone, after a session, I exit a room 2 rooms down the hall from the studio door which is actually right around the corner of the hallway turn. I look down the hallway towards the studio (about 40' away) and clear as hell watch a person turn the corner to my studio door. I shit you not. The hair on every part of my body stood up. I called out to see if someone had forgotten something, all the while knowing it was not one of my clients. As you can guess, noone was there.

That was years ago. Since then I have only seen one other similar instance, but it was more of a blur, but it was in the exact same spot of the hallway.

Creepy, but hell I figure they must like good music like the rest of us.

[dontfearthringo]

You didn't mention this AT ALL in the job interview, dude.

[pigpen]

Musta slipped my mind....

[Kiwiburger]

I don't have a specific studio ghost experience, but i've had a few wierd spiritual experiences that I wouldn't want to discuss in public. As you may have guessed from some of my OTT rants - I believe in a spiritual realm (pick your choice of words). I'm also interested in science/engineering/logic/software, etc, and I find it fascinating to understand the real mechanics of what is going on. I am quite sceptical of the status quo of both science and religion, and I think there are many artificial barriers between the two. They shouldn't be mutually exclusive, but some people try to keep it this way. Can be a highly emotive issue for some people.

There are multitudes of people - as far back as history goes - who have experienced 'ghosts' and/or spirits of various types. The Jewish & Christian Bible refers to them - anyone of those persuasions should be convinced of their reality.

At one time, I did extensive reading of near death or out of body experiences. From all perspectives - ancient, modern, eastern, western, pagan, christian. I also found a lot of crossover and similarity with UFO reports. And yes, the signal to noise ratio is very high. Although people who have died and returned are generally more serious and believable than UFO freaks - don't think for a moment i'm a completely gullible fruitcake who can believe anything. People lie all the time. I don't even trust myself.

Something that i'm absolutely convinced about is that we are spirits, living in a material body. I am convinced that our mind is centred in a spiritual dimension, and our brain is like a modem link (if that makes sense).

I have read the experiences of many people who have left their body and subsequently returned. An interesting observation is that many of them say that animals can see them, but most humans can't.

I have had experiences where a cat or dog in a room is freaking out over something they can obviously see, but I can't. I call it the 'Baalum effect'. My last experience was helping somebody clean out their house which was being sold after a bereavement. I realise animals can get excited about insects and stuff - but i'm talking about when animals appear extremely freaked out, fixating on an apparantly empty point in space. People who astral travel have observed that animals can see them.

Anyway - I have read accounts of people finding themselves outside of their body. What do they do? Where do they go? In some cases they describe meeting passed over friends, or angels. Some people report very disturbing experiences, although they are more likely to supress these or simply not talk about them because they are so disturbing.

Some people have described spending time flying or walking around earth, but they get frustrated that nobody can see them. They can go to places of interest to them, and see what's going on. Being earthbound like this would appear to be abnormal or temporary.

Lets face it - if you found yourself in this predicament, where would you go? Theatres and studios are probably more interesting to disembodied observers than pubs and restaurants.

And I also don't believe humans are the only spiritual entities by any stretch. But even if you look at the human population - there are some extremely nice helpful people, and some extremely ugly nasty people too. If the mind exists in a higher unseen dimension, and survives death, there must be zillions of spirit entities going about their business.

Very interesting to speculate about. People have captured strange things on tape or on film (even digital). The people photographing orbs around graveyards and things may (or may not) be discovering something of interest related to this. Some think that spirits in flight take the shape of an orb/small sphere.

Personally, i'm not looking for trouble and try to stay well away from unwelcome guests. I'm more interested in the engineering side of the vacuum/aether (choose you words). I believe that the fundamental understanding of the fabric of space is not understood properly, hence all the confusion in particle physics and the apparant lack of a Unified Field Theory. I believe the original Aether theory was more right than wrong, and when we understand that empty space is not "nothing", the mechanics of this stuff will be easier to understand.

[BudgetMC]

Jake,

Great lookin' space... good place to be a ghost.

[alexp]

I have a couple experiences.

My studio is in the basement of my home. My home is in Niagara, where the war of 1812 was fought, and my house is super old (1816). The story I have of the place from going back through records and whatnot, is that the place was built by a British Captain, who sailed his family over here after the war to settle. Its a beautiful place, and the whole top floor has open beam construction with 30 foot high ceilings (My studio would be great up there, but powers to be will not allow it!) Anyways, this guys son killed himself by hanging himself off one of those beams (you can actually still see rope marks in the beam which gives me the creeps every time I see them)

Anyways around here I have only seen something once out the corner of my eye. Someone walking across the pantry door.... But the thing around here is smells.... Really strong smells. Pipe smoke is one, which is odd as no one here smokes. Then things like baking bread, fresh flowers.....

The other thing is sounds. Lots of voices. I keep thinking their outside but I always look and see no one..... Really bizzare.

The other encounter I have is with a radio station thats not far from me. I could go on and on about the place, but its all been documented on this website. Enjoy!

Haunted Hamilton - Investigations - The Merritt House, St. Catharines, Ontario - Page 1

[dmbandtimmy]

Keep them coming! I don't have a studio and have only had one semi experience (atleast I don't know how to explain it), but for some reason I'm really intrigued. I'd probably poop my pants if something like what some of you describe did happen.

Anyone watch ghost hunters??? I love that show! I wouldn't mind doing that for fun, but at the same time I'd be a little scared.

[Unclenny]

Originally Posted by Kiwiburger

People have captured strange things on tape or on film (even digital). The people photographing orbs around graveyards and things may (or may not) be discovering something of interest related to this. Some think that spirits in flight take the shape of an orb/small sphere.

I have read of this theory also.

Interestingly enough, just last week I was fooling with a new camera and snapped a few pics of my workspace. The following two shots were snapped in fairly rapid succession.

Note the.....anomaly....just above the KSM32 in front of the guit case in pic #1 but not in pic #2.

[zooloo]

Originally Posted by Unclenny

I have read of this theory also.

Interestingly enough, just last week I was fooling with a new camera and snapped a few pics of my workspace. The following two shots were snapped in fairly rapid succession.

Note the.....anomaly....just above the KSM32 in front of the guit case in pic #1 but not in pic #2.

Dust on/near the lens (Out of focus). Quite common and sometimes described as "orbs" by people unaware of what it actually is.

[Led]

The studio I started in was built in an old 5 storey factory, I think it might have been a biscuit factory. The studios were in the basement and the toilets were out the back. To get to them you had to go down a passageway and turn a corner then walk down another corridor past an old service lift, the sort of wooden cage ones with mesh wire. Sometimes at like 2am when nobody was upstairs the lift would start and go up to the top floor, even though nobody was up there. Might have been a short in the call button, but they had it checked several times over a number of years and no fault was ever found. It was known however, that in the early factory days the lift cable had broken and a loading dock worker had died in the lift when it hit the bottom. If we were there and heard the lift go at night one of us would invariably say "biscuit man".

[Led]

Now, even older, one of the first studios in Melbourne was called "W&G" in Batman Street, West Melbourne, one of the older parts of town. My mom recorded there in the fifties. It was eventually bought out years later by the studio I began at. One of my first jobs was dismantling that studio. There was always a strange smell there we could never find the source of, but that could have been anything. But I didn't really like being there, despite the fact mom had recorded there and a lot of great Australian music had been made there. Combination of the smell and something about the layout of the place, but I was left there on my own a lot pulling stuff out and I always felt a lot more comfortable when I left and went up the street for lunch. A few years later I was talking to an engineer who had worked there on a few albums and he said he got bad vibes from the place. One night he heard the piano tinkling and went out to tell one of the players to stop it cause he wanted to record something else, but there was nobody in the live room let alone at the piano. He was a bit of a hippy who liked his pot, but he was the most serious I've ever seen him when he was telling me about it. He was glad it was pulled down because it meant he didn't have to work there. Something I didn't notice from the outside, but was told later was that the studio originally was a church in earlier settlement times, and the carpark used to be the graveyard.

[orange]

Originally Posted by zooloo

Dust on/near the lens (Out of focus). Quite common and sometimes described as "orbs" by people unaware of what it actually is.

yep....and shows you how easily a ghost story is formed.

I'm reminded of a scene in Close Encounters of the Third Kind where a journalist suggests that just because there are no photos of UFOs doesn't prove that they don't exist. He uses the analogy of a car crash, saying that news cameras never manage to take a photo of them as they happen, but we know that they occur......WELL.....

That was true in 1975 but not in 2008, with the advent of digital cameras, there must be billions of photos taken every day (car crashes, natural disasters etc) and not one demonstrates CONCLUSIVE proof of anything supernatural....what are the chances of that ?