Studio Safari - See the photos!

Dec 7

It’s become an annual tradition to invite our esteemed delegates and press on a STUDIO SAFARI, a tour around Iceland’s brilliant studios. Our aim is to show off our incredible recording facilities, from the obvious to the unusual. Over the years we’ve visited some of Iceland’s most stunning studios including Sundlaugin, Gróðurhúsið, Hljóðriti, Harpa – and many more.

This year we turned it up a notch, starting in the incredible new studio space at the INNI offices in downtown Reykjavík. It’s not only a studio, but an independent music company based in Iceland founded by Colm O’Herlihy and Atli Örvarsson. It’s primarily a publishing company, but also serves as an independent record label and music production house. There, Nanna from Of Monsters and Men with RAKEL performed songs from her latest album ‘How To Start A Garden’ in a stunning and intimate rendition.

A bus greeted us outside INNI to take us to our next destination: lunch at Fjöruborðið in Stokkseyri. The experience at Fjöruborðið was truly magical and delicious, we got to enjoy an Icelandic lobster soup with unique scenery on the side and some much needed energy for our next stop.

If you think the only place to record music is in a studio, think again. We’re in Iceland after all, so why record in a studio… when you can record in a cave!

This leads us to our next stop, Raufarhólshellir. Raufarhólshellir is one of the longest and most renowned lava tubes in Iceland. It is located just 30 minutes from Reykjavík and accessible year-round.

Turns out (who knew) that due to the nature of the rocks in the cave there is no echo in there – so there is absolutely no natural reverb in there! Thankfully we came geared up, and the one and only Elín Hall performed her hauntingly beautiful music for our guests and left everyone utterly mesmerised.

Finally, no studio safari trip is complete without a DJ and some bubbles. We ended our day back in Reykjavík at Smekkleysa (Bad Taste SM), a label and record store in downtown Reykjavík. DJ Kevin Cole maintained the positive atmosphere while the others mingled and enjoyed some delicious appetisers provided by Record in Iceland. Now all there’s left is to catch the Iceland Airwaves performances!