From Primed for Sound Editor:

Vinyl record advocate and musician Jack White led a successful project to launch and land a vinyl record player into space and back without the player stopping - or even the needle skipping. The record player, souped up for conditions to operate on the edge of earth's atmosphere, played during the entire journey of the 96,000 foot trip by balloon. The apparatus descended back to earth, eased by parachute, landed and was found with the record still spinning and music still playing.
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​Here is the full article.  

From Primed for Sound Editor:

The last month of summer is upon us along with its heat. But as we go into the fall, things inside Primary Sound will still remain hot. There will be several projects going on at the Bloomington studio as well as some significant upgrades to equipment.

Here is a quick preview of what's going on, with more info to come:

• Southern Indiana's Split Rail, an Alt-Country/Neo-Outlaw outfit with Midwestern rock sensibilities, recorded its first album at PSS this summer with the record slated to be released in September. Maximum effort is going into producing, mixing and mastering​ Split Rail's initial release by PSS and master audio technician Jake Belser. This editor got an ear sample of a few seconds of a track at PSS recently, and let me just say - it sounds f&*%$@g awesome!  
• Six time Grammy award winning Irish folklore band, the Chieftains stopped into Primary Sound Studios this summer to provide overdubs to the recording of Country/Bluegrass artist Jeff White's new album, scheduled for a fall release. With the magic of the Chieftains reverberating in the Ole' church studio of PSS, this album can't help but sound amazing.
• Another top Indiana band, Pissed Off Catfish, recorded their third album at Primary Sound Studios this summer as well. With a fall release scheduled for the album, the Country/Blues band looks to do some heavy touring this fall and winter.  
• The University of Notre Dame's Children's Choir was recorded by Jake Belser of Primary Sound Studios at the Saint Meinrad's Cathedral Monastery recently. The Christmas album is currently being mixed and edited by Belser to be ready for a holiday release.
• Jake and Primary Sound Studios is excited to announce that a Raven M12 touch screen audio control panel is coming to the studio soon. Look for a podcast presentation and review of the new piece of technology after the fellas at PSS have a go at it!
• Also new to the studio are several brand new Shure head phone personal mixing stations with eight controllers each. PSS hopes to grant each artist more control of audio input during their recording sessions.  

From Primed for Sound Editor:

Sought after studio session drummer John Marque skills on the kit keep him busy providing drum tracks in the studio for artists ranging in genre from country and jazz to rock and alternative. Recently, Marque got behind the drum set at Primary Sound Studios in Bloomington to arrange the beats and play on Indianapolis singer/songwriter Scott McClelland’s new album.

When top area artists need a drummer, Marque is routinely the go to guy to get the job done, providing both arrangement and the skillful playing necessary to produce a professionally sounding record. At PSS alone, he has played on tracks and albums by Cari Ray, Bill Headley, Ryan Beck, Carrie Pietz, Jess Kendall and Matt Epp.  

Marque holds a master’s degree in Jazz studies from the prestigious Jacobs School of Music - IU and is a high school percussion director. He also is a jazz percussion composer and gets his licks laying down rock and pop beats for the Bishops, a national party band. He and the Bishops were the featured performers this past weekend at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s Brickyard 400 Miller Lite party deck.
 

From Primed for Sound Editor:
      
Bloomington’s Secretly Canadian release of Anohni’s album Hopelessness is considered to be one of 2016’s best pop albums, according to the Los Angeles Times. The album from the southern Indiana record label and Anohni is mentioned as one of the top works so far in 2016 pop that includes a list of artists such as Beyoncé, Mariah Carey, David Bowie and Jerry Lee Lewis. New York, L.A., Nashville and London aren’t the only places where you’ll find top music being produced.
     
​Read about it here: Best Pop of 2016 Los Angeles Times article

From Primed for Sound Editor:

Veteran San Diego rockers released their 10th studio album today, titled Where The Light Shines Through. Switchfoot has always sought to uplift and inspire while rocking out. The new release is no different from previous albums in that regard but with an added twist. The single Float is a mostly R&B pop track complete with scratch rhythm guitar and high pitched vocals. Though a slight departure from the usual solid alternative rock song the band is known for, the former surfing friends pull it off quite nicely, showing that the band can pretty much do it all. Check it out below:

From Primed for Sound Editor:

With automated mastering technology like LANDR available and cheap, are mastering engineers still necessary?
Take a look at this article by Jordan Kisner, a Pitchfork contributor - and decide for yourself. 

Read about it here: ​The Dark Art of Mastering

From Primed for Sound Editor:

Paul Simon, currently on tour promoting his new album Stranger to Stranger and in New York, recently expressed a longing to leave the music industry altogether, potentially making his latest release his last.

​Read about it here: Paul Simon Quitting Music?

Also, have a listen to the single Wristband from Simon's new album:

From Primed for Sound Editor:

​​A brand new website and new name is not the only thing to have recently changed at Primary Sound Studios. Owner and chief engineer, Jake Belser, has just completed installing three new isolation booths in the PSS studio.

Now Primary Sound boasts a total of six isolation booths. Jake is looking forward to providing those who choose to record with PSS more versatility, and increased flexibility in their recording sessions with the additions.

It is an added bonus and another positive in a string of positives Primary Sound has been experiencing. Recorded at Primary Sound, the album Intercambio, released in the summer of 2015 by the Wayne Wallace Latin Jazz Quintet, was nominated for a Grammy for best Latin Jazz performance in February.

Also, Indianapolis based Lily and Madeleine have made Primary Sound Studios their choice of recording studios, having recorded their first album Lily & Madeleine at the Bloomington studio with Paul Mahern as their producer. The talented young ladies have recently released a third album titled Keep It Together.

​Check out Lily and Madeleine below at Primary Sound Studios:

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From Primed for Sound Editor:

​Prominent jazz composer and professor of music at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music,  ​David Baker, who passed away in March at the age of 84, will be honored in a most personal way by some of his former students Tuesday the 21st of June at Primary Sound Studios in Bloomington.         

Students who Baker taught and inspired will gather at the studio to play and record several of his jazz compositions. The results of the two day scheduled session will be assembled into an album to be tentatively released as Volume Three.

Baker, a long time teacher of music at IU, is credited with over 2,000 jazz symphonic compositions. He also produced 65 recordings, 70 books and 400 articles all related to jazz. He first began teaching music at IU in the early sixties, and started the jazz program at IU in 1966, where no such program existed before.

With improvised playing rooted in the jazz music language, Baker pioneered and developed teaching methods that articulated jazz and codified improvisation. His breakthroughs allowed his students deeper access to the jazz lexicon and also standardized jazz instruction at the university level. As a writer discussing jazz, and a composer, Baker was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and a Grammy as well.

A jaw injury in his early career as a jazz trombonist ended his ability to play a horned instrument with the rigor required of a professional, so improvising, Baker turned his considerable talents and extensive experience to educating and composing.

His original desire was to play in a symphony orchestra, but in the ‘50s nearly all symphonies in the US maintained a policy of racial segregation, leaving him to focus solely on jazz.

​And focus he did. Baker, who was born in Indianapolis and graduated from Indiana University, is considered to have as much influence on the distinctly American musical genre as many of the all-time jazz greats.