Phil Freeman writes in The Wire 367: "Sara Leavitt and partner Ryan Douglass were barely born when the subject of their documentary, Sound And Chaos: The Story Of BC Studio, came into being. Producer Martin Bisi, then collaborating with Bill Laswell in Material, opened the space in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn in 1979. Some of the early financing came from Brian Eno, who invited Bisi to engineer portions of what became 1982’s On Land, and from the French label Celluloid, for whom Laswell and Bisi produced singles and albums by Massacre, Fab Five Freddy and others. One of the studio’s earliest major successes was Herbie Hancock’s “Rockit” and the Future Shock album from which it came, which earned Bisi a gold record and Hancock a Grammy."
Throughout the 1980s and 90s, BC Studio was a nexus for the New York underground: John Zorn’s Archery, Yankees, Locus Solus and Spy Vs Spy and Naked City’s Torture Garden were recorded there, as were Sonic Youth’s Bad Moon Rising and Evol; Foetus’s Thaw; Swans’ The Burning World, Love Of Life and The Great Annihilator; Last Exit’s Iron Path; and albums for Cop Shoot Cop, Helmet, Lubricated Goat, White Zombie and more. Bisi continues to run the studio out of Brooklyn.
Click here for more information about Sound And Chaos and click here for forthcoming screenings.
