HISTORY>>

Introduction

The Early Years
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The Next Step

Turnabout

Unusual Tastes

The Early Years - Page 2

After seeing all this new talent at the festival in 1967, perhaps a light bulb went off in his head that something was happening in San Francisco. The later conflagration of souls that became Crosby Stills and Nash probably was the final deal-maker. CSN labored in Heider’s Studio 3 in Hollywood for months recording the epic “Crosby Stills and Nash” in 1968 but Wally knew they and their ilk were migrating North.

Around the spring of 1969, Wally Heider opened a studio at 245 Hyde Street in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco in a building that was previously home to an assortment of film offices, screening rooms and storage for 20th Century Fox. It was also across the street from the famous Blackhawk Nightclub where Wally recorded Miles Davis in a series of live recordings for CBS in the mid 60’s. To Wally, the area had the right “vibe” for recording.
It would be Wally’s great triumph. The Bill Putnam influence was clearly obvious in the electronic designs of his studios. Wally had Frank DeMedio make all of his custom gear, especially the consoles, and they were built like NASA projects. Frank must have pulled major defense industry talent to wire his consoles, for the wiring harnesses were flawlessly tied; the wires as straight as the bundled cables on the Golden Gate Bridge. The audio path was simple; one preamp for everything - and he used UA console components, military grade switches and level controls, balanced everything, and transformers everywhere.

This console design - 24 channels with 8 channel monitor and cue, was repeated for Studio 3 in LA, the remote truck, and Studio C in San Francisco. Neil Young reportedly had one, and Graham Nash got a later version in 1972. And the monitor speakers were another Putnam influence - the ubiquitous Altec 604-E, powered by McIntosh 275 Tube power amps. At the time this system kicked ass.

The construction of Wally’s studios were originally done by a chap named Dave Mancini, the son of the famous film scoring Henry Mancini and later a studio owner in the San Fernando Valley. I’m not sure how much Dave actually knew about acoustics, but his guys got the studios built on time and on budget and the rooms were the best there was at the time for the loud rock and roll combo acts that were evolving.