Wayne Rathbone Producer/Composer/Studio

MonkeyShine Studios JHB, a full DAW facility is privately owned by Wayne Rathbone who as a freelance composer has opened up his studio for the pure enjoyment of loving music. Apart from Composing or Recording in the studio,he offers himself as a Producer, an Engineer and your personal music adviser on all your songs. The studio can also provide Mixing and Mastering services. MonkeyShine Studios JHB has a sister studio MonkeyShine Studios Howick, run by Don Clarke.

(Bio)
I have been involved in music since the 60's and played in live band's from 1974 onwards.
I studied organ/piano (though not for long) whilst at school through private tuition and played in the New Forest High School Pipe Band as a side drummer. Upon leaving school in 1973, I formed with some friend’s my first rock band. We practised a lot in my lounge at home which drove my mom and the neighbour’s nuts, but this never went anywhere. There were many bands, but first real gig band was Just Magic doing weddings and functions.
In 1979, there was the contract at ”The Causerie” in The Edward Hotel in Durban as the resident dinner dance band called “Eclipse” , although it was a paid gig, with free food at the Edward ***** nogal, it was very boring. The requests were strange (I remember the POPCORN song was popular hmmmm) and I was a rocker, what was I doing at the Edward?
Then came the founding of “Brooklyn” as my saviour in the early 80’s. This was my first real serious rock band, initially doing covers. We moved practising to my double garage as the gear; PA system, keyboards etc took up a lot of space. My keyboard setup was huge, Fender Rhodes Electric Piano, Organ, 3 synths (all Korg), no softsynths or VST’s in those days. If I remember correctly we played together for 6 years , with the band members changing over time (especially bass players), but the key long term ones were Geoff Munro on vocals, Mali Sewell on drums, Gavin Muller on Bass and Colin Evans on guitar. Good guys, good friends even today and great musicians. I am proud of Brooklyn, the music and the friends I made. One of the amazing bass players we had with us during the Wagon Wheels days was the late Gary Ellis ☺ ……..
In the early days as the band Brooklyn, We entered many competitions and had great success, Mali Sewell got the best drummer award and me the best musician at one of them held at the LA Hotel, the judges must have been high. Then we went semi pro, as we all had days jobs as well. We played at and had many long term contracts, notably at the “Wagon Wheels” club in Florida Road, the Kiss Kiss Club in Malvern, the St Georges Hotel near Albert Park and lastly at the Empress hotel in the hot nightspot “Easy Beat” on the beachfront. This was in the same block as Magoos Bar, just one hotel away, where we went over to during our breaks and which got bombed the one week in June 1986 we had off. Hectic!
During this time we also started writing our own songs and still today I listen with amazement at the sound we had. BIG!

During the early 80’s, I met the legendary Don Clarke, (he had a studio☺☺) and I started doing part time engineering sessions at his C & G studios in Westville. I worked as the assistant engineer and even ran some sessions when everyone was otherwise engaged ☺☺. I engineered, recorded and produced on occasion, whatever was required. This was my learning curve in a studio, been told what todo all the time, recording the artists, writing jingles with Don, working on the Cadac 16 track analogue desk, using the 4 track then 16 track Studer tape systems. Wonderful, those analogue days.
In 1990, Don Clarke formed the original music studio band "Adult Art". I was one of the founder members and in 1990 we recorded our 1st album called “Acoustic Flush” which was released in 1992 and had the song “Sanbonani” on it. Our 2nd album “Small Mercies” was recorded on a property known as Mkomazana at the base of the Sani Pass in the Drakensberg Mountains of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa and was released in 1996. One building was used as the `control room`, which has an enormous fireplace in the center of it which kept the producer (Don Clarke) and the equipment (all digital recording) warm. The other building completely empty was used as the `live studio`. The 3rd album “Pickering Street” was released in 1998 and nominated for a SAMA in 1999 in the Best Duo or Group section. The 4th album “Soccer Safari”, was released in 2010 during the FIFA world cup and Don Clarke’s song “Kick It Up” was SABC’s official FIFA song.
One of my musical highlights apart from the enjoyment of playing in Adult art, its music and members, was spending 3 weeks in New York at “Soundtracks Studios” (http://soundtrackgroup.com/ - 128 West 22nd Street New York) , having our 1st album Acoustic Flush produced by an international top producer Fernando Kral, and working with some top session musicians. One who stood out was Jimmy Vivino, ( http://www.jimmyvivino.com/ ) now famous in New York and a great guitar player. He did an amazing solo on one of our tracks which I filmed and is priceless to us.
During the 90's and in the 20’s, Adult Art did several TV features, played at many music festivals especially Splashy Fen, SABC used us as a featured band during the FIFA world cup in 2010 in South Africa. I had the enjoyment of playing with many musicians who passed through the Adult Art doors, Ronnie McNamara (guitar/bass), Mali Sewel (drums), Anchen Fisher (vocals), Dave Atkinson (guitar), Dean Squires (bass), Shaun Herbert and of course my friend and partner Don Clarke (vocals/guitar/songwriter/producer)

I however always wanted to compose, mix and produce music myself on a permanent basis, so one evening in 2009 around the campfire one night, just after a Splashy Fen gig, after some thought, I decided that I do not want to go to my grave wishing I had done this or that, having a studio facility was top on that list. So I made the commitment there and then to do it.
Do it or lose it I said.
During 2010 my Monkeyshine Studio was finished built from the ground up as a private DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) Composing and Production studio. I wanted a professional facility that could match any international studio, have sound facilities better than most with easy accessibility, especially to me. Being built at my home, the room was specially designed right from soundproofing, acoustics, layout, room design, building implementation to ensure quality and peace of mind.
Very important is that I wanted something special especially from the studio speakers (Nearfield) perspective, so I embarked on a search looking for a studio monitor that would suit my requirements. It took me a while, in SA only the most popular speakers were available and they didn’t meet my specs, on listening to them, they all had a similar narrow sounding band. Mine had to be totally flat in response, 20Hz – 20kHz, meet all power requirements and be that something special one needs especially during mixing and mastering.
I found this with Thomas Barefoot, (http://barefootsound.com/) a new and upcoming speaker designer. I flew to San Francisco to meet him and test his designs, intending to buy the entry system. On hearing the 2 different types he had at that time (now more) I realised I had to bite the bullet and get the top of the range, as truly amazing they were.
The studio was therefore designed and built around a pair of his MicroMain Barefoot27 monitors, hand-built and specially designed for near-field placing and mixing. You hear what you record and they have a totally flat response curve, no bulllsh*t. I also designed my own curved console desk, which has the computer hidden inside, a Kurzweil keyboard that slides out when needed, raised platform for the monitors and the typical 19” rack that could move. All cables had to be hidden, all options must be cater for in the future, so I also wired the studio for midi, 5.1 surround sound and video if needed.
I love this digital world, the toys and being a technical person I found I could marry the music and digital computer technology very easily.
I commissioned the studio on the day I received my MicroMain monitors as Don Clarke was up in Johannesburg and we were about to mix and produce Leon Shuster’s new album “Bok Joppie”, released in 2010. The monitors arrived just in time from the USA and the recording of Leon started in earnest.
I am very proud of Monkeyshine Studio’s, it is setup as I wanted it and I spend most of my time in it, finding my soul, composing, mixing and really get lost sometimes with the music. The sound is amazing, I sometime play songs I know though my MicroMain27 and I hear elements of these songs I have known all my life that I did not notice before. They are so true and clean. Amazing…
The studio although private is available for special projects upon request, as I am hearing so many great musicians and singer/song writers these days it is hard to say no, but it is primary used as a composing studio for me and the projects I work on as the producer or doing mastering and mixing. I use Cubase 7.5 as my DAW, but can import any stems or sound files from other DAW’s. There is a huge sound sample library, many plugins and some great VST Instruments like Omnisphere, including Orchestral and Cinematic sounds. I keep the studio up to date as and when necessary.
All it now takes is networking, patience and creativity…..