Scott Spain Recording Engineer Bio Page

Dust was everywhere. It would have invaded all their physical senses if it were not for the sounds of wind and barrel cactus racing past the windowless door. They felt a certain comfort coming from the snug pulling of a two inch wide safety harness securing them to a seat rapidly changing from positive to negative G’s. With goggles helping them to retain very little eye moisture and handkerchiefs wrapped around their faces allowing them to breathe what little clean air there was; the driver of this experience looked at his young passenger and yelled through the controlled chaos “Ya know how to smooth out the bumps?”

Scott Spain was 16 years old when Parnelli Jones pushed the throttle of “Big Oly” to the floor demonstrating his approach to tackling the rough spots. “Ya gotta hit em above 100 MPH !” PJ yelled as they went flying smoothly across Baja CA . This established, at a very early age, what would become Scott’s approach to production flow. It is a precise, highly focused, high performance, rapid aggressive approach to smoothing out “the bumps”.

Donny Sciarrotta, a legend in the world of pop recordings from the late 1960’s thru the mid 1970’s, owned Quantum Recording Studio. As a young high school kid Scott would find his way through the back alleys of Torrance CA to Donny’s garage, which was the beginning of Quantum. Here he would spend as much time as possible doing whatever he could just to be included in the process of record building. His first professional session experience was in 1974 for Wooden Nickel Records. While at Quantum Scott met Bobby Monaco (Author of ‘The Platinum Rainbow’). He spent four years working as Bobby’s personal engineer. Together they recorded albums for: Rufus / 3 Dog Night / Cold Blood / Carl Carlton / Candi Staton / Jackie Lomax to name a few notables in a long list.. Scotts favorite "Bubble Gum" project was Sugarloaf

Scott obtained considerable knowledge working as an independent recording engineer in studios throughout California and Southern Nevada. At Las Vegas Recording Studio he worked alongside Chips Davis as Chips was developing LEDE and TDS technology. During that timeframe Scott is privileged to have recorded such greats as Les Brown and his Band of Renown, The Nelson Riddle Orchestra, BB King, Roy Clark, Mel Tillis, Diana Ross, Robert “Bob” Goulet, Liberace, the great Dizzy Gillespie accompanied by Count Basie, Ray Brown and Mickey Rorke, again naming only a few of an impressive list in entertainment history.

Leaving the desert behind Scott spent three years working at IAM Studios in Irvine CA. where he provided engineering support for Stevie Wonder’s ‘Secret life of Plants’ and ‘Hotter than July’. He also recorded numerous projects with the Jim Christensen Orchestra for Walt Disney Productions utilizing his orchestral capture experiences. When not providing support for Steve, Scott established a relationship within the reggae community working with such artists as Earl Zero, Third World, Rebel Rockers, Flo and Eddy, to name those remembered. He also engineered and mixed the pre-recording of Kenny Loggins ‘Keep the Fire’ album for Tommy Dowd while at IAM as well as album work for independent artist's such as Hoyt Axton.

Kenny Loggins lyrics, “I want to live my life by rivers and trees …” had an impact on Scott.

Desiring a rural lifestyle Scott moved his family to WA State. There he helped to design, build and operate Robert Lang Studios, London Bridge Studios, Binary Recording and Klub Kevs Recording Co, which his wife Linda managed. KKRC was chosen by Mix Magazine to be one of the year’s top ten best studios. As an independent engineer he operated most A line studios in the Seattle area and started giving lectures on Recording Arts & Sciences.

Scott and his wife Linda have been married since 1974. They have raised three daughters in a cabin on the Hood Canal of Washington State. Their daughters now bring their children back to the home they grew up in. The list of entertainers Scott has worked with over the past forty years is long and notable but the greatest of his accomplishments can be seen in his grandchildren. Together, Scott & Linda have been awarded ‘People of the year’ from the Kitsap County Fire Commissioners Association and have received the ‘Top fund earner’ award from both the Muscular Dystrophy Association and twice from the Leukemia Society of America, for their fund raising efforts.

Scott spent a few years away from the entertainment business becoming a professional fire lieutenant. In that time he became a nationally certified fire instructor, crisis manager, FEMA USRT heavy & high angle rescue specialist, emergency medical technician, and yes …a fire engineer as well. Scott is also a DOT certified private helicopter pilot.

Meeting up with longtime friend Rick Senechal, who manages the audio team for Microsoft Studios, Scott was given the opportunity to reenter the recording studio business. In 2009 he started operating one of, if not the, largest Pro Tools HD systems assembled. He specialized in their custom music and post production packages by way of 5.1 surround or stereo deliverables for a multitude of venues. His largest distributed project is the start-up sound for X-Box 360 which set a world record in Christmas of 2010 becoming the largest selling new consumer electronic product ever by entering the market with 8 million sold. It is currently heard in over 350 million homes daily. In audio geek talk, he fooled PL2 to make it sound like AC3.

That is an old dog teaching new science an old trick. In 2013 Scott decided to stop communting and retire from day to day engineering responsibilities. His days are now filled with building and maintaining high performance machines that will help him "smooth out the bumps". He is also active in sharing the information he has assembled over the past four decades.

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