Little London Studios
Little London Studios - Little London Records - TaM Entertainment
About
A brief history of Little London Studios
Little London Studios began many years ago with a home-built setup in a warehouse in Rye, recording friends as a hobby. After a while word got around and other people came in to record. Next, the studio was used as a rehearsal space when not recording. Young bands doing this then asked about possible management to help them with bookings. This soon became TaM Management.
Later on, the studio was relocated to a small commercial building that had originally been a sweet factory. It was situated in an alley near the centre of Hastings. As the alley appeared to have no name we called it Candycane Alley, and the name seems to have stuck. This studio was constructed as a room within a room - mainly to keep the sound levels down for the neighbours.
It was then that we began to associate with bigger names in the music industry - we recorded a demo for Poly Styrene (the singer with X Ray Spex)of her song Code Pink, which later led to a record contract and a full album, finished shortly before her death. Through her introduction we worked with Sham 69, another early punk band, and at one point a video was filmed of them performing in the studio which was shown on Kerrang.
I had made friends with another parent with children at Icklesham Primary school - and it turned out that the father of the boy who sat next to my daughter in class was Eric Faulkner, of Bay City Rollers fame. I recorded tracks for him and also toured with him on his solo gigs around the UK.
It transpired that the landlord of the studio in Candycane Alley was a director of Left Field Stage at Glastonbury and in 2005 we were invited to work on that stage, and did it again over several years - covering stage managing, equipment tech, guitar tech, and hospitality. Doing this brought us into contact with many more known names over the years.
One memorable time was recording an interview with Mitch Mitchell, drummer with Jimi Hendrix Experience, for the US Congress Library of Recordings. What should have been a ten to fifteen minute interview ran on for two hours! After finishing the interview with the journalist in LA, Mitch asked if he could sit in on the studio drum kit. He started playing and I couldn't resist plugging in a guitar and jamming with him - I only wish I'd still kept the recording running!
Poly Styrene, who had become a good friend, helped us set up a new studio right in the centre of Hastings, in a basement in an area known as the America Ground (a Google search will show the fascinating history attached to that name.) Soon after Poly sadly passed away in 2012 the building was sold and we had to leave the studio - coinciding with my retirement.
It appears that it's not easy to retire from the music business, having made so many musical friends, so many years later I still find myself doing the odd thing working from home and still getting free entry to gigs.
Long live rock and roll!
