Michael Seifert from Ante Up Audio
Keeping Cleveland’s Beat Alive
By Marc Majercak

Look out Cleveland, Michael Seifert is on a mission to give Cleveland the credit it’s due. Cool Cleveland correspondent Marc Majercak caught up with Michael Seifert, a home-grown musical prodigy that recently opened a state of the art recording studio, Ante Up Audio, right here on the North coast. This twenty something award winning producer/engineer is on a mission to change the face of the Cleveland music scene and bring the city the credit it deserves. As the doors of the Ante Up Audio (AUA) opened, I immediately felt good vibes. The lobby walls were adorned with an array of gold and platinum records. The high ceilings and detailed woodwork made me instantly comfortable. I was then led into the main recording studio where Michael and his team were all gathered around the console mixing a great sounding tune. After a few moments, Michael [AUA Owner/Engineer] and I sat down in the studio with the rest of his team to discover what makes this place tick.

Cool Cleveland: Why have you decided to stay in Cleveland and build this beautiful facility? Were you involved in another recording studio and you decided to build your own? How did this all come about?
Michael Seifert: I grew up in a studio that my father [Bruce Seifert, AUA engineer, producer] owned, Great Tracks Recording. At one point in time, we were basically living on the middle floor of a converted house and there were two studios in the basement and two studios on the third floor. I grew up in the middle of all that and he gave me free run of the place from kindergarten on. So by the time I was in 2nd grade, I was recording tracks. I worked with my dad all the way through grade school and high school and even for a while after that. There came a point when I needed another facility just to do pre-production when I was doing a lot of hip-hop. That was about six years ago. I built a little project studio for that; it was just a little production spot. As far as, “why build this in Cleveland”, I was at a point where I could get out of Cleveland if I wanted to. I had some offers out on the West coast, Chicago and some possibilities in New York. But it’s always rubbed me the wrong way that people think you have to leave Cleveland to make it. I was blessed and cursed in that I had done more than I ever thought I would be able to do with my career at a fairly early age. I would rather help contribute to bringing something here that this city doesn’t have instead of going somewhere else. This was the big catalyst for it.

How did you go about building the studio of your dreams?
My business partner [Paul Shaia, AUA owner, operations director] and I have been friends for many years and when I started talking about leaving, he asked me what it would take to get me to stay in Cleveland. I said that we would have to build a really awesome recording studio that would be a hub we could grow out of. We then started scoping out spaces. That took a little over a year. Once we found a space that we liked, a long string of strange coincidences occurred. I met Brad Way [Chief Architect] and he got involved with the design of the studio. Brad was a friend of Dave Padrutt who I met through another mutual friend. Dave jumped into the project as AUA’s Creative Director. Everyone in this room, including my wife, rolled up their sleeves and contributed. I think there was an energy about it before it was even built! I really think that people like Brad and Dave saw that and believed in it. Jimmy Weaver [AUA engineer, producer] came around a little bit later, but he is helping out with Phase II now.

This studio is essentially a culmination of all your passion. You put extensive time not only into the way the studio was built, but even the equipment. You mentioned you have the same board that Kenny Rogers used in his studio? I would imagine that has a story unto itself?
We drove it back from LA in a Penske truck with no sleep. We then walked right into a rehearsal for a band that we were working with at the time. As soon as we got it back here, it went into a year of refurbishing and got re-capped.

Tell us about the way the rest of this studio was built.
Everything you see here was built from the ground up. When we took this space it looked like a parking garage; cement floors and ceilings, pillars are 20 feet on center. These new rooms that make up the studio are all sitting on completely independently floated systems. The floors are all floated up on rubber and filled with, literally, tons of sand. This room doesn’t touch that room and that room doesn’t touch this room (pointing to the live room and control room). All the walls sit on a floating floor with gaps in between. It took us about 9 months to build Phase I but we wanted to do it right.

How did you manage to build this place and still keep up with the work that was coming in?
I basically closed my project studio down temporarily and treated my basement at my house in Lakewood as a small studio. While the makeshift studio was in my house, I did produce Kate Voegele’s EP The Other Side, a bunch of work for Chuck Mosley from Faith No More, and some commercial spots for MTV until this facility was built.

Now that you have this facility, are you under the idea, “build it and they shall come”?
Right now, I don’t feel there’s another facility like ours in Cleveland or in Ohio for that matter. There are a lot of talented people in this city making recordings and the need for a great studio. I’d like to see other studio owners really step it up like I feel we have. There are many studios out there making outrageous and untrue claims about owning multi-million dollar, 80-foot long consoles calling them the “THE BIGGEST IN THE WORLD!!” I think people in our industry just need to be completely honest, so we can turn out killer products with the Cleveland stamp on it. We need to start working together more. I believe there is room for several great studios in this market. We didn’t set out to put other area studios out of business; we actually want to contribute to the greater cause by making the Cleveland music scene a success. We hope to motivate other studio owners to step it up so that great musicians in this city can finally get major label quality recordings without having to go to NY or LA. We need six great Cleveland studios and their engineers all at once making great records. We wish to see the owners of these studios actually get along like they do in other big music markets. That’s the kind of thing that motivates people to work harder and make better records. THAT’S how Cleveland will eventually start attracting label interest for our local bands and attracting national bands to come and record here. I don’t care to mention how much we have tied up in this place because that’s not the point. When you walk into the place and hear what we do, either you want to be a part of it or you don’t. So far, everyone has been able to see the attention to detail from the way the place sounds to the way it’s decorated. We didn’t skimp on anything. We’re doing something different and we’re doing it right. I’ve had the opportunity to work at many great studios like CRC in Chicago and Sound Station Seven in Providence, RI. I am staying in Cleveland because I believe in what it can be and because I want to be here.

So, you have not only worked here in Cleveland, but you’ve had the chance to work out of state and see the best in studio production?
Yes, I did. It really got me thinking that Cleveland doesn’t really have anything like this place. At the time, I didn’t know any better. I had read Mix Magazine but I never actually had been to one of those big studios to see and hear the difference. Once I got the opportunity to start going out of town and doing label work, mixing work, and stuff like that, I thought, “wow, we are nowhere near where we need to be in Cleveland!” I was really lucky to have Paul get involved and share the same vision. He is more of a businessman and music lover. He caught the buzz and it’s the same thing with these guys (pointing to the rest of the AUA crew). You’ve got to love it to do something like this. There are so many other easy payoffs you could have. Paul and I could have invested the same amount of money and got a much better return on almost anything else. We’re doing this because we love it.

If you could pinpoint one thing that you love the most about producing and making music, what would it be?
I think the thing that I love about it is the fact that you can’t pinpoint one thing (laughs). I can work on a country song one day, a rap song the next and then record a jazz record after that. That’s interesting to me. I don’t like doing the same thing over and over again. I like being able to push limits and I like when my limits get pushed. One of the things that wasn’t initially in our plan is that we have had a lot of other engineers that have owned their own studios, many for years and years, approach us and come aboard here. My father is working out of here now. This is just awesome to me because now I get a chance to take on the burden of ownership like he did when I was growing up and working with him. He can now just sit back, be creative and not have worry about anything else. I’m lucky to have an opportunity to repay him in some small way with all of the opportunities he gave me growing up. I wouldn’t be anywhere near where I am now without his constant support.

It seems that you have assembled a great team. How did this fall into place?
One of the first guys to join was Don Dapew [AUA engineer, producer] from 609 recording. He’s produced Guided By Voices, New Bomb Turks and a ton of great indie rock stuff. I owned a lot of records that he has recorded and I kept hearing his name. I love his work and I knew he was from Cleveland. So one day I thought, “this is crazy, (that) I don’t know this guy”, so I emailed him and he emailed me back. He was amazed that someone who owned another studio in town actually emailed him. Eventually we got to hang out a couple of times and Don’s just a really talented great guy. I didn’t set out to contact Don thinking he’d want to close his place down and join the team here. He actually approached us and we were flattered to have him come on board. Jimmy Weaver (AUA’s youngest employee) is 18 years old and is honestly one of the most talented engineers I have ever found anywhere. He has a great ear, natural sense of production and knows what things should sound like. I listened to his work and invited him to join the team.

I came in here thinking that Ante-Up is tapped into the Cleveland Music Scene, but literally you are talking to local studios, musicians and now with Jimmy, local audio engineers. It seems like your reach is stretching into many communities. How do you keep a balance?
It’s two-fold for me. I never want this place to be about me. If we can get somewhere because of the luck that I had, or whatever it was, to do some of the things that I have been able to do, then that’s great, but everyone has a say here. This is a team. Everyone brings their own stuff to the table and the best part is to work with different people who are good at different things. You learn stuff from each other. The lack of this environment was one of the main reasons I thought about leaving Cleveland. It got to a point where I asked myself “Who’s kicking my ass in Cleveland?” There were plenty of people that were kicking my ass in New York, but I didn’t feel like anyone here was pushing me to the next level. I don’t want to get to the point where I am resting on my laurels. I love music and that’s why I am in this. And if I forget about that, then what’s the point?

Do you feel that there is some competition that is now pushing you?
I believe that we have created our own competition that is pushing us internally. It’s not a competition, it a “coopertition”. That’s what I really wish more studios in town would get into. We all play our work for each other and ask for advice. No feelings get hurt if one person’s recording doesn’t sound like someone else’s. It’s part of the learning experience. I want someone down the hall pushing me as an engineer and producer making me feel like I need to work harder at what I do. I want someone at another studio in town to do the same thing. Having someone else around that can “one up you” motivates you to work harder and turn out a better product. I never want to get to the point where I think I know it all and I’m done learning because then it’s time to hang it up. In the end, what matters is when the client gets the work home and it sounds good. You’ve been able to capture the performance that was inspired by the vibe and the atmosphere. Being able to capture the sound of this performance has a lot to do with the way the rooms are designed, the engineer’s ears and the gear. The proof is in the pudding. You put the CD in and it sounds good. That is where I think we have succeeded more than anything.

You have created a facility that allows you and others to flourish and grow as musicians. Do you find it strange when people are surprised that you are doing this in Cleveland?
The idea that you can’t do it in Cleveland is silly because we ARE doing it in Cleveland. We just had a band that is signed to Road Runner Records come in and book out a week in the studio. We’ve done a bunch of spots for MTV. We are working with great musicians, engineers and producers from all over the country. Dave and I are working on a movie score for Francis Ford Coppola’s re-release of “The Outsiders”. We are doing it right here and we are not going out to LA. Not only can it be done, it IS being done.

How did you get hooked up with Francis Ford Coppola?
We had a connection and they were looking for someone to score this film. We got our demo in first and they loved it so they didn’t even ask anyone else, they just hired us because they liked what they heard. Dave and I have been working on music for a few independent films. Things have already been happening and we really haven’t even advertised yet.

It seems like you are one of the best-kept secrets here in Cleveland. How do you feel about this? How do you plan on getting your studio and the local music scene on the map?
We don’t advertise and I’ve always stayed busy because if you treat people right and turn out a good product, people tell other people. I guess we have built a little bit of a mystique and think that it is warranted. We're more than just a recording studio; we are an umbrella for the Cleveland music scene. The reason I believe Ante Up will succeed is that we’re not just in it to make a quick buck. We’re in it for the long haul and we’re in it to put this city on the map once and for all in a positive light. We use our website not only to promote our studio but to feature the bands that are here. There is so much talent in this city and no one knows about it. For example, Jimmy and I produced a full length CD for Cactus 12. They are a local rock band and there is no way you are not going to hear about them. I played their rough cuts in our lobby after a J Mascis show and I had so many people come up to me and ask me, “Who is this band?” That is what it’s all about. It is such a cool thing when you start getting a buzz like that over a local band. There is going to be an explosion of things that are going to come out of this studio in the next 6 months. That’s what it is going to take to have labels finally start looking at Cleveland. Also, we need to have the music scene finally begin uniting and stop competing for the one good gig, but make ten good gigs. We need to put on better shows, ones where you have three bands that make sense together on one bill. This way people that came to see band one may stick around to see band two, buy their CD, instead of leaving because the lineup is a metal band, a folk act and a polka band.

How do you plan on uniting the Cleveland music scene?
In addition to what we’re doing with AUA and Take Manhattan, we are starting up something called The Cleveland Music Coalition. It is one of the big things we are going to launch in the next six months. The goal of the group is to get local musicians together, stop competing with each other, and start working together. If someone needs a studio drummer, we want to set up a network of musicians to share members from each group. We want to help put on better shows and promote better shows. We want to produce events and bring in keynote speakers to help bands promote themselves even if they are not recording at AUA, create compilation and live discs. We want to go after it and do it 100% right. Nothing is going to put Cleveland on the map more than working together and doing things right. You look at Seattle as a music scene that made it and there really is no difference really between Cleveland and Seattle. The bands out there started working together, like Nirvana, Alice in Chains and Pearl Jam, and put on great shows together. It wasn’t like they are better than us. They just put on awesome shows and all of a sudden labels are there. This type of talent base is here, but it is so segregated right now. Cleveland is its own worst enemy when it comes to stuff like that. People believe that you can’t make it in Cleveland, therefore people don’t make it in Cleveland. The only thing that will change this is a huge group of people saying, “That's enough, and we are not going to do this anymore.”

Should we really care about what is happening in music outside of Cleveland?
Yes, we should pay attention to what is happening so we can understand where to set our mark. It’s difficult to do that when you don’t know the position of everyone else’s mark. The goal here isn’t to produce the best band out of Cleveland, it’s to produce the best band period. We need to stop thinking just on the local level. Sure you can be the best singer/songwriter in Cleveland, but does anybody know you in Pittsburgh, LA, or New York? There is so much competition going on right in our own city that people never get out of that rut. That’s why the people who do realize that there is no cooperation, like Trent Reznor did years back, leave and make it somewhere else. We need to change this line of thinking to succeed. If we can just use that same energy and work toward the same goal, we all have a better chance of making it and doing it without having to relocate. Getting your band signed here could help another ten bands get signed. We have to bring the labels here and it could happen. It’s just how bad do people want it?

Once you create this united band of musicians, how will you get it out to the public?
We are thinking about transforming part of our space into a place where bands can come just play. We are thinking of making it a combination venue and recording facility. We not only want to record live shows, but we want to simulcast it on radio and television. This would be a high-end venue. Not a run-down place where there is beer spilled all over the floor, but a place where you could come to actually listen to the band.

You have assembled a great team here to make this dream a reality. What drives you to make this work?
This isn’t, “let’s play it safe and take the easy way out.” What Paul and I are doing isn’t the product of a trust-fund baby or something. We’re risking everything including our houses to make this happen for Cleveland! I could have very easily gone and taken a half-million dollar publishing advance 4 or 5 years ago and “got out of Dodge”, but I didn’t because I believe in Cleveland. I took the chance and I believe it is going to pay off.

If I am the “Average Joe”, why should I come to your studio to record my next CD?
The answer is simple. We can take your music to the next level. We can help arrange and create parts of your music. We can bring in session players who will help contribute by bringing in their parts as well. We can be as involved or uninvolved on this level as a band or artist wants us to be. We can supply the production that can make your music come alive. Most people underestimate the amount of production talent that goes into a recording. It seems that a lot of musicians shop for a studio like they are buying a building and not who is running it and their experience. Michael Cartellone recently recorded here and was highly impressed by how the room responds so effortlessly. I mean, the guy has recorded with Freddie Mercury, Damn Yankees and Peter Frampton; and he’s now the drummer for Lynyrd Skynyrd! He has recorded at every major studio from here to London and he said that the drum sounds he got here were the best he has ever achieved! So why should someone come here? Do your homework! We have over a dozen platinum records attributed to our engineers and have worked with artists ranging from Bone Thugs and Harmony to Jim Brickman to Stabbing Westward to Levert to Guided by Voices and everything in between.

If I am a musician, what is the best way for me to show up to the studio? Should I come in with a bunch of songs already written or do I show up and start from scratch?
It is completely flexible. I have worked with talented artists that have brought in their own material and others that have given us free reign to create something completely different. I have to believe that right now people are beginning to realize that the majority of recordings out there right now sound like crap. If you listen to pop radio, every record sounds sterile, brittle and the same. Sure there are bands like The Muse, Outkast and Jet that are doing something a little different, but it is few and far between. When I go into a project, I try to figure out what that artist is trying to say. I don’t tell them you need to sound like so and so, unless they want to sound like so and so, we can do that too (laughs)!

You are running Ante Up Audio, starting the Cleveland Music Coalition, and now I understand that you are working on your own music project. Out of all these things what is the most important?
I am going to go back to my answer that I like it all. I constantly like to be doing something. I can’t take vacations because I go stir crazy when I’m not working. I always want to see how far I can push things. I’ll never really feel like I’ve “made it” and achieve true happiness through business. My only real shot at that is through my marriage and raising a family with my wife. Above anything else, I have a strong relationship with God and I don’t think that He would like me sitting around being lazy with the gifts that I have been given. To me it is not about the money. I have what I need in my family and friends. I don’t need a $40,000 Rolex to make me feel vindicated and successful. I would rather take that $40,000 to promote the Cleveland music scene so at least I can say I tried!

What is next for Ante Up Audio?
We are continuously working to expand our studios. We just wrapped up the new score for the re-release of Francis Ford Coppola's classic movie, "The Outsiders" which we wrote and recorded 12 original cues for. We also will be featured in the July issue of Mix Magazine (the definitive magazine for pro audio recording). Things are happening here in Cleveland and we want as many people as possible to be a part of it! http://anteupaudio.com

'''Interview and photo by Marc Majercak marcmajercak@yahoo.com

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