Pictures from the tour
The meeting began at the CRAS Gilbert Campus, where the small tour group met up to carpool at Mr. Lamont's request. Upon their arrival at the premises, the group was welcomed by Mr. Lamont, who escorted them through a fence into the studio itself, which, from the outside, looks like a large shed in the owner's backyard. The unassuming exterior, however, was deceptive; inside was a plethora of instruments and equipment unique to the studio. Mr. Lamont explained how the majority of the recording equipment in the studio was built from scratch, from the board and mic pres to the outboard compressors and plate reverbs. He explained how he built each of these devices using circuitry and designs similar to those of LA-2A Compressors and other iconic devices, and quality sound, to match. The control room was set up for 5.1 surround with an array of hand-built speakers, arranged with a left, center, and right speaker in front and one each of left rear and right rear speakers, controlled by a section of switches and a potentiometer at the bottom-right of the console. A drum set was already set up in the live room, as well as a piano, several custom-made guitars, a pedal steel guitar, and a sitar; the drums and piano were already miked up, leading those in attendance to believe that there had been recording taking place recently. Mr. Lamont also showed the tour group the homemade mic pres, which appeared very simplistic and unimpressive but provided a deceptively clear sound. The group's attention was then called to several microphones around the room, which were actually hand-built interiors with old cases, providing completely new sounds. Through another door in the live room was a small plate reverb chamber that Mr. Lamont had made himself out of a closet and some plates of sheet metal. He quickly pulled up a session in Pro Tools to demonstrate the sound of the plate reverb, sending a vocal track from one of his recent session through it and letting the tour group listen to hear the difference; though not as mind-blowing as those in some more high-profile studios, the Lamont Studio plate reverbs had a unique and high-quality sound and added an excellent color to the track. From there, the studio owner played several more tracks, both straight from Pro Tools and from Vinyl to showcase some of the work he'd done. After a conversation about the state of the music industry and the pros and cons of different DAWs and a discussion of analogue vs. digital recording, the tour group was dismissed at around 4:30 PM.
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