Photo by Wesley Davis

Submerge had been hearing rumors for a while about legendary Sacramento recording studio The Hangar closing after 20-some-odd years in its current downtown location, but until owner John Baccigaluppi blogged about it on Feb. 18, 2013 at Thehangarstudios.net/blog, we were holding out hope that they were untrue. “In March of 2013, we will record the last band in the space and move out, ending an over two-decade run of making records in the building,” wrote Baccigaluppi before going on to list some of the things he’s proud of, some of the things he’s bummed about and some funny “celeb type moments” that happened at The Hangar (cameos from Kanye West, Ian MacKaye and others).

We don’t have enough space in this issue to talk about how many amazing records have been recorded and/or mixed there (seriously, look into it, you’d be surprised), just know that there are a lot of them!

“So that’s it really after 20 something years here,” he wrote. “A big pile of recordings coming out of Sacto that hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of people have heard. But for me personally, it will always be more about the people and the small things we shared making these records.”

He pointed out that The Hangar as we know it will be moved into a house at the base of Mount Tamalpais overlooking the Pacific Ocean and Point Reyes, Calif., and will turn into a residential studio. Baccigaluppi also said that he and fellow engineer Chris Woodhouse are building a new studio a few blocks away from The Hangar’s current location in the historic General Produce Building.

“It’s gonna be badass!” he wrote. “Chris has some great ideas on a streamlined, analog-centric room where he and the rest of us can get rock bands up and rolling super quickly and get a great record done fast, which also means cheap. The building is really cool. It reminds me of what the Meatpacking District in NYC must have been like before it got super gentrified and trendy.”

So at least there is some good news coming out of this! Head to The Hangar’s blog to learn a lot more about the closing, as well as read some funny stories and also check out what a few musicians have to say about their memories of The Hangar.

    Jonathan Carabba

    View Articles

    Find me at the bowling alley. Co-founder + Advertising Director + Marketing at Submerge. Contact: jonathan@submergemag.com

Comments