Recording used to be quite an ordeal for local roots-punk band Larry and His Flask.

In the late 2000s and early 2010s, during the Flask’s busiest touring and recording period to date, the band would travel to studios for weeks at a time to record, often in the dead of winter when shows would dry up. The experiences were often stressful, taking the musicians away from their friends and family back home. Things came to a head during the recording of 2013’s “By the Lamplight.”

“The last (album) we did out in Flint, Michigan, or outside Flint, Michigan,” stand-up bassist Jeshua Marshall said. “And it was like we all were just in this house going crazy, not dealing with the situation, drinking too much.”

After going on semi-hiatus in 2015, the Flask slowly ramped up its touring in 2016 and 2017, and in early 2017 released a two-song single online, its first new music in four years. This time, the band got to stay home for the sessions: The single was recorded at The Firing Room, a small garage-turned-professional recording studio located on the outskirts of southeast Bend on Yukon Lane, with engineer Dayne Wood, who also plays drums in a Flask side project, Woebegone.

“Dayne is amazing,” drummer Jamin Marshall said. “He’s so good at what he does and he has such a good ear for it, and he’s so calm and professional. It’s really impressive, actually.”

Beyond the musicians’ own words, it’s clear the band is pleased with the results — it is now hard at work on its first full-length album in five years, once again tracking at The Firing Room.

“We did those two songs out there, … and we were like, wow, this is some of the best-sounding stuff that we’ve actually done,” guitarist/vocalist Ian Cook said.

“Why the hell would we go to Portland or anywhere else?” Jamin said. “It’s right here in Bend.”

Building sound

Getting out to The Firing Room can be tricky, especially at night — often a prime recording time for local musicians with full-time jobs and other responsibilities. Even during the day, it’s easy to get lost on the winding roads — many closed off by gates — leading up to the isolated house.

“I’ve been out there a number of times, and it seems like I always get there a little bit different of a way, and same thing coming back,” said Nate Giersdorf, saxophonist and flutist for local Balkan folk/rock quartet Alovitiman, which recorded its self-titled debut at the studio late last year. “But the location’s killer. I like it because you go out there, and if you’re gonna take a lunch break, you’re gonna be gone for like an hour and a half. … You gotta come prepared.”

The house and garage, owned by Wood’s parents (He rents the studio space and an apartment upstairs.), look like a typical residence from the outside. After passing through a small room, visitors enter the studio through Wood’s control room, housing the mixing board, a computer setup running industry-standard ProTools recording software and an isolation booth built into the wall. Large windows offer a view of the recording room itself — wide-open and clean, but homey, packed with amplifiers, guitars, Wood’s drum kit and an electric piano (Wood plans to upgrade to a baby grand at some point).

“When I built it, the idea was just to (have a place for) any situation I could find myself in,” Wood said. “If you have a seven-piece band that wants to come in, they want to track live, I want to be able to facilitate that. The whole thing is making sure the artist is comfortable and that they can do what they want to do here and not have it be a burden to do something they want to do.”

Though technically a home studio, it feels more like a professional operation than someone’s bedroom project. It took Wood almost a year to construct, from late 2014 through much of 2015.

“It was pretty close to eight months to a year, and basically just doing it myself, too — like going on YouTube and typing in ‘how to frame a wall,’” Wood said. “Just looking like, all right, I need to bring somebody in to look at this. And luckily I had a lot of good friends that are in construction come up and point me in the right direction, so I’m not making a death trap here.”

Behind the music

Wood, 31, has plenty of recording experience. He has lived in Bend since age 4, other than a five-year stint for college, first at Lane Community College in Eugene and then at SAE Expression College in Emeryville, California, where he studied audio engineering.

A multi-instrumentalist who spent his formative years playing in various bands around Central Oregon, he explored home recording early. His earliest experiments were with hand-held voice recorders.

“I would be like … just in the band room, just put pillows and stuff all over it to kind of get it to work,” he said.

He later got a mixing board with computer-interface capability and a $100 condenser mic.

“I started writing songs on my own where I’d play drums, bass, guitar and keyboards and everything myself — that idea of just starting with nothing and creating something and then you can listen to it and it’s there forever,” Wood said.

Wood returned to Bend in July 2010.

“I always want to stay local,” he said. “That’s the main reason I came back here and opened a studio: because I was in bands here and there really wasn’t a lot of recording studios here. And if there were, they were pretty expensive and that kind of stuff.”

In order to keep the studio affordable for local musicians, Wood works within a band’s budget; he said his standard rate is about $30 an hour — or $300 per day — comparable to or slightly less than what some Portland-based studios charge Jackpot! Recording Studio, known for working with Elliott Smith, Eddie Vedder and Pavement, charges $50 per hour or $350 per day, for example.

Paterson Colson, drummer for local doom metal band Strange Rover and local indie rock group Cosmonautical, cited Wood’s enthusiasm and expertise — as well as the studio’s affordability — as major reasons why Strange Rover decided to go with The Firing Room for its upcoming EP and album releases.

“Once back in Colorado, I got to be in an actual, full-on studio just for half a day, and there was a ton of equipment — all kinds of drum gear that you could pick and choose from to get the right tone and all of that,” he said.

“And Dayne’s place feels a bit like that, but without so much of the added pressure of, ‘oh, my God, I’m paying this many dollars an hour.’

“He’s a little more flexible on that front and realistic about pricing. It really feels like you’re getting a professional studio experience, but with kind of the more home-studio feel to the whole process.”

Documenting the scene

Woebegone was the first band to record at The Firing Room, in late 2014 while the studio was still under construction.

Wood would join the band as drummer following the sessions; the group’s 2017 debut album, “Supple Rock,” was also tracked at The Firing Room.

So far, most of the bands and musicians who have worked with Wood have been in the rock world, including Cosmonautical, garage quintet Gonzo, rockabilly/punk hybrid Boxcar Stringband and acoustic singer-songwriter Chase Eliott.

That makes sense, considering the producers Wood looks up to — Steve Albini, Chris Wall, Eric Valentine and Rich Costey — are primarily known for big, loud drum and guitar sounds.

“I think people like the drum tones that I get, and a lot of my amps are rock amps — that kind of stuff,” Wood said. “It’s just what the first few things I did (were), so I think that naturally will happen. But yeah, I’m open to doing any style of music; I love it all.”

Thanks to word-of-mouth, Wood has grown quite busy. He has seven projects in the works, including the new Flask album and upcoming records from Strange Rover and Cosmonautical.

Alovitiman chose to work at The Firing Room thanks to bassist Brian Martin, who knew Wood through mutual friends in Larry and His Flask. The band did much of the tracking live in-studio with minimal overdubs.

“(Wood) was just really focused. Whenever we were ready to go, he was ready to go,” Giersdorf said. “There was never one time when we were really waiting on him for something. It was all about how fast we want to move and how efficient we play, and he definitely could keep up with us and our efficiency rate, I would say.”

When Boxcar Stringband toured the studio before recording its two 2016 EPs there, the trio was impressed with the space and with Wood’s credentials, said guitarist/banjoist/vocalist Joseph Balsamo.

“He’s really knowledgeable. He would get excited about my amps and my guitars, and he had a lot of really good gear on top of that,” he said. “As a drummer, it was pretty obvious he’s super geeked out on Sean’s (Garvin) drums (and) getting everything miked exactly right and perfect. But it seemed like every step of the way, he was really excited and had good energy. It was really fun, and it seemed to go easier than it should have.”

Wood said he hopes to eventually move the studio closer to the main population hub of Bend.

He wants to remain dedicated to local music, but is interested in having nationally known bands record there, too. The Flask, which rose to national prominence in the early 2010s, is a start in that direction.

“I really want to focus on getting just some bigger national acts that can come in — set up some sleeping quarters somehow and really just hole up and make a record with somebody that’s not from here,” Wood said. “I think coming to Bend to make a record would be pretty awesome for somebody. It’s a great place to come and hang out.”

— Reporter: 541-617-7814 or bmcelhiney@bendbulletin.com