Drive-In Studio was a

recording studio A recording studio is a specialized facility for Sound recording and reproduction, recording and Audio mixing, mixing of instrumental or vocal musical performances, spoken words, and other sounds. They range in size from a small in-home proje ...

in rural

Winston-Salem, North Carolina Winston-Salem is a city in Forsyth County, North Carolina, United States, and its county seat. At the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 249,545, making it the List of municipalities in North Carolina, fifth-most populous ...

, founded by

Mitch Easter Mitchell Blake Easter (born November 15, 1954) is a musician, songwriter, and record producer. Frequently associated with the jangle pop style of guitar music, he is known as producer of R.E.M.'s early albums from 1981 through 1984, and as frontm ...

in July 1980.

R.E.M. R.E.M. was an American alternative rock band formed in Athens, Georgia, in 1980 by drummer Bill Berry, guitarist Peter Buck, bassist Mike Mills, and lead vocalist Michael Stipe, who were students at the University of Georgia. One of the fir ...

's debut single, "

Radio Free Europe Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a media organization broadcasting news and analyses in 27 languages to 23 countries across Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Middle East. Headquartered in Prague since 1995, RFE/RL ...

" (1981), and their first

extended play An extended play (EP) is a Sound recording and reproduction, musical recording that contains more tracks than a Single (music), single but fewer than an album. Contemporary EPs generally contain up to eight tracks and have a playing time of 1 ...

, ''

Chronic Town ''Chronic Town'' is the debut extended play (EP) by the American alternative rock band R.E.M. It was released on August 24, 1982, on I.R.S. Records. The five-track EP was recorded at Drive-In Studio in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in October ...

'' (1982), were recorded at the studio six months apart in 1981. The studio was established in what was initially Easter's parents' garage, at 4527 Old Belews Creek Road, and became an important part of the early

indie rock Indie rock is a Music subgenre, subgenre of rock music that originated in the United Kingdom, United States and New Zealand in the early to mid-1980s. Although the term was originally used to describe rock music released through independent reco ...

scene of North Carolina. At the time of R.E.M.'s stint at the studio, "the set-up was really simple," Easter said in 1994. "I had almost nothing in the studio back then, except a tape machine and a console and two compressors and one delay device. We couldn't do any fancy stuff." Easter explained the studio's layout in 2021: Due to the confined space of the interior, studio sessions often also took place in the home's driveway, under the

carport A carport is a covered structure used to offer limited protection to vehicles, primarily cars, from rain and snow. The structure can either be free standing or attached to a wall. Unlike most structures, a carport does not have four walls, and u ...

Equipment

An early advertisement, which listed Shady Boulevard as a mailing address for the studio, itemized its recording technology: * Quantum 20-input

mixing console A mixing console or mixing desk is an electronic device for Audio mixing (recorded music), mixing audio signals, used in sound recording and reproduction and sound reinforcement systems. Inputs to the console include microphones, signals fro ...

* 3M M56 sixteen- and two-track recorders *

Lexicon A lexicon (plural: lexicons, rarely lexica) is the vocabulary of a language or branch of knowledge (such as nautical or medical). In linguistics, a lexicon is a language's inventory of lexemes. The word ''lexicon'' derives from Greek word () ...

Prime Time M93 digital delay * Allison Gain Brain limiters * AKG,

Shure Shure Inc. is an audio products corporation headquartered in the USA. It was founded by Sidney N. Shure in Chicago, Illinois, in 1925 as a supplier of radio parts kits. The company became a manufacturer of consumer and professional audio-electr ...

and

Electro-Voice Electro-Voice (EV) is an American manufacturer of audio equipment, including microphones, amplifiers, and loudspeakers, focused on pro audio applications such as sound reinforcement and commercial and residential audiovisual installations. As ...

mics * Electric and acoustic

reverb In acoustics, reverberation (commonly shortened to reverb) is a persistence of sound after it is produced. It is often created when a sound is reflected on surfaces, causing multiple reflections that build up and then decay as the sound is a ...

TEAC () is a Japanese electronics manufacturer. TEAC was created by the merger of the Tokyo Television Acoustic Company, founded in 1953, and the Tokyo Electro-Acoustic Company, founded in 1956. Overview TEAC has four divisions: *TASCAM - con ...

four-track * Cassette * Drums * Organ * Electric piano * Amps * Toys

Artists

Other artists who recorded at Drive-In include Pylon ("Beep"),

Suzanne Vega Suzanne Nadine Vega ( Peck; born July 11, 1959) is an American singer-songwriter of Folk music, folk-inspired music. Vega's music career spans 40 years. In the mid-1980s and 1990s she released four singles that entered the Top 40 charts in the ...

("Gypsy"),

Game Theory Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interactions. It has applications in many fields of social science, and is used extensively in economics, logic, systems science and computer science. Initially, game theory addressed ...

('' The Big Shot Chronicles'') and

The Connells The Connells are an American musical group from Raleigh, North Carolina. They play a guitar-oriented, melodic, jangle-pop style of rock music with introspective lyrics that often reflect the history or culture of the American South. Though the ...

( ''Boylan Heights''). Easter closed Drive-In in 1994, and moved to Kernersville, North Carolina, where he opened his current recording studio, Fidelitorium Recordings.

References

{{coord, 36.136778, -80.174154, type:landmark_scale:2000_region:US, display=title 1980 establishments in North Carolina Recording studios in the United States Buildings and structures in Winston-Salem, North Carolina