| The story of Gula goes back to 1995, when the famous
Tambourine studio needed another recording facility. The Tambourine
crew settled for a space in what was originally built as a cigarette
factory and purchased the Neve mixing console and the 2" MCI
tape recorder. They named the place "gula studion", meaning
the yellow studio, as the other Tambourine studio was more greenish.
Four years later the studio was bought by five in-house
mercenaries. It was the Mopeds, a three-piece band that had recorded
all their material in that studio complex alongside being session
horn players on several Tambourine productions. It was also Marco
Manieri, producer and sound engineer, who often worked at Tambourine
but also elsewhere, and it was batti, he too a sound engineer and
producer, whose whole recording experience so far had been Tambourine-
and vintage-filtered.
The five new owners refurbished and reorganised some
and kept some, bought a hard disc recording system, and started
lifting the old studio to new heights. The name Gula was kept, as
so much fine music was already connected to it. The choice of instruments
and audio equipment was upgraded and renovated, and new spaces were
created for a greater variety of sound and atmosphere.
After three successful years it was time to move to
larger premises, and an old printing facility was chosen for its
perfect size, generous ceiling height and its many windows.
The work of transforming it into the new Gula began in October 2001
and the first sessions took place in March 2002. By then, only the
Mothership was finished, so the performers had to put up with walking
through a building site between sessions. That situation continued
in diminishing extent until October 2002 when refurbishing was finished.
However, we will never rest in our search for more cool furniture
and art to keep the Gula atmosphere reaching even greater heights.
The steady flow of musicians and performers has since
kept us very busy indeed, from the truly famous international stars
and groups to the very indipendent, sometimes even unsigned bands
and artists, and everything inbetween, that keep our work interesting
and stimulating.
And they keep coming back for more.
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