“Our newly-completed BMG Australia HQ is a true creative playground for artists, staff and clients alike. It’s a truly special place where colours, textures, lights and sound dance with each other in a loft space that once served as a working art gallery and now aims to inspire a new generation of artists. Our space is not decorated with plaques and trophies, this is not a traditional major record company and we have no interest in being one. This is a space where artists can create freely and fearlessly. Artists signed to BMG Australia own their own masters, publishing and ultimately they own their own creative destiny. It’s incredibly gratifying for our team to provide artists with an inspiring space like this so we can build this exciting new future together in an environment that encourages collaboration, imagination and innovation.”
- Heath Johns, Managing Director BMG Australia & New Zealand
The Company
March 17 2016 marked the birth of BMG Australia, a young and ambitious company with an acute A&R focus and a plan to take Australian and New Zealand music to the world. BMG Australia has quickly proven itself as an ambitious and bold new entrant to the Australian music scene. In five years, the company has built a publishing roster including Alison Wonderland, Peking Duk, AC/DC, Crowded House, Golden Features, KLP, Running Touch, Client Liaison, Cut Copy, Wolfmother, JET, Kwame, DZ Deathrays, Montaigne, Illy, What So Not, Manu Crooks, Young Franco and SAFIA and a frontline recorded roster including Chet Faker, Dope Lemon, Julia Stone, Tim Minchin, Ladyhawke, Dune Rats, Hockey Dad, CHAII and Winston Surfshirt.
With a roster encompassing some of the best new and iconic talent in the country, BMG Australia set about designing a dream HQ to house its community of creatives including over 25 staff across records, publishing and production music. As the fastest-growing music company in Australia, BMG needed a home that was as lofty as the young company’s ambition.
The Building
The ‘Edward Hill & Co’ Factory was built in 1914 and is heritage listed by Sydney City Council. Originally built for the manufacture of furniture, the building later functioned as a working art gallery and is now a ‘creative hub’ housing a tenant mix of Sydney-based creatives including award winning advertising agency Special Group and high-end interior design collective Arent & Pyke.
BMG occupies the entire Level 3 penthouse, a vast 700sqm space boasting soaring ceilings that reach 6m at their highest and captures 360 degree views that take in views to the Sydney Cricket Ground to the East and the iconic Sydney city skyline to the North.
BMG Australia chose to base themselves out of the thriving Surry Hills precinct due to the close proximity to local music venues including The Oxford Arts Factory and the Hordern Pavilion and the abundant café and restaurant options on hand for client entertaining. BMG Production Music (Asia-Pacific) General Manager, Lefroy Verghese, is a long-time resident of Surry Hills and describes the suburb as "an eclectic environment filled with creative industries, touches of bohemia and a rich history of music running through its DNA", before concluding that, "Surry Hills provides the perfect tempo for BMG".
The Experience
With spectacular double height ceilings, heritage sash windows, large skylights made possible by the penthouse position, whitewashed exposed brickwork and elaborate parquetry flooring, even without further embellishment the space commands attention.
Executive offices feature custom dichroic glazing that plays with the sun and casts an ever-changing projection of technicolour light shards throughout the main floorspace. The glass itself changes in opacity and colour throughout the day as the sunlight circumnavigates the stately federation/interwar factory building that stands high amongst the residential low-rise Victorian terraces.
Paying homage to its former life as a gallery, BMG called upon local visual artists to lend their talents to the space. Famed Australian street artist Steen Jones applied a pastel palette to his trademark skull motif that makes full use of the ample ceiling height and most prominently adorns the exterior walls of the company’s brand new recording studio. The in-demand Jones is notoriously picky when it comes to his project selection and remarked that BMG made an ideal client for him as they had “the ambition, the space, the attention to detail, the determination and the calibre of affiliation” the artist was looking for, before concluding that the daily interactions with the team meant the job “didn’t feel like work and I left feeling both grateful and inspired”.
Jones’ lilac skulls are not the only ‘colour pop’ featured throughout the space, in the reception area stands a Yamaha baby grand piano wrapped in satin purple, which is both visually stunning and an incredible focal piece for performances from the world-class artists that BMG represents.
Elsewhere in the office, BMG restored an original 1970s Incredible Hulk purple pinball machine “because the shade of purple matched Steen’s skulls” and had custom motorcycle builders Sol Invictus build a one-off ‘apocalypse ready’ bike named BOOMBOXX that much like BMG is ‘built for the new world’. And yes, in the case of a zombie outbreak it can actually be ridden. “The whole space is designed to be experiential, each time somebody visits us we want them to discover something they hadn’t noticed before. Whether it is the subtle change of scent as we switch up our ‘candle of the month’ or a gnarly piece of theatre like BOOMBOXX it all adds up to tell people that BMG Australia is different”, says Johns.
Making use of the commodious space, horticulturalists High Swan Dive were instructed by BMG to "load up a truck of your largest plants and make the place feel like a jungle". The space now sings with over 100 plants across various species potted and suspended throughout the space. During the COVID lockdown, the plants took ownership of the office with vines contorting themselves around structural beams as palms and fiddle leaf figs shot ever closer to the lofty ceilings. Adjacent to the creative pod, a regal Japanese maple planted in volcanic ash stands proudly as if it had been there for decades.
“When you walk into BMG Australia, you aren’t walking into another sterile, stock standard office that is running on recycled air. It’s a carefully curated environment that feels like a mini oasis with fresh air from open windows, a range of beautiful (and exotic) greenery and stunning natural light. I always feel light, happy, creative and most of all motivated when I come to work”, said Bridie McGuire, Director of Streaming (Australia, NZ & SE Asia).
Interiors were a collaboration between BMG and The World Is Round and showcase high-end designer pieces alongside garage sale finds and vintage items acquired after several trips to antique stores around Sydney. The Russian 1930s chandelier that suspends above reception is a particular highlight, "I love when the afternoon light from the skylight passes through the vintage crystal and shoots hundreds of rainbows across the reception desk as I make my afternoon cup of tea”, says Craig Redfearn, Director of Marketing. It should be mentioned that said desk is a custom cube of Norwegian rose marble honed by local stonemasons, a natural material that is replicated across various pieces of bespoke joinery throughout the office.
In what Johns calls "a ceiling height flex", BMG commissioned a local welder to create a raw industrial metal staircase and balcony to create an ‘open air loft’ on the Eastern side of the office. Decked out with candy floss carpet and handmade Koskela modular lounges the space is equally at home when being used for artist promo or break-out staff meetings. “The loft is my favourite part of the office. Whether it’s a guided meditation session or a brainstorming meeting for our next synch marketing blast, the energy in that loft inspires innovation”, said Cameron Elliott, Director Synchronisation and Licensing.
Kai Schindlmayr, Project Manager from Sydney-based firm Kernel comments, “BMG’s space just absolutely oozes personality, and is the physical manifestation of the of the culture and values of the BMG team. More than most spaces I know, when you walk in, you instantly feel the urge to be creative”.
The Gallery
BMG Australia’s masterpiece is The Gallery — a state-of-the-art, full-service recording studio located quite literally in the heart of the new space. “Our artists are central to everything we do here, so what better way to embody that spirit than to have them creating at the epicentre of our space? We don’t want to hide them in a studio in the basement, we want our artists interacting with us throughout the day. We want to hear the music they are creating and we want to meet their collaborators, nothing makes me happier than when an artist walks into my office and asks me to enter The Gallery so I can listen to something they’ve been working on”, said Johns.
Before a note could be recorded, The Gallery needed an engineering marvel. Tom Sherington of SPM Constructions managed the entire build and commented that “over 60 tonnes of material was used to create The Gallery and over 8 tonnes of steel was brought into the building (under heritage supervision) ensuring that there was no transfer of vibration or sound through the existing herringbone flooring of a lightweight heritage building to the tenancies below and the exposed roof above.”
While the team at SPM grappled with the near impossible engineering task, acclaimed acoustic engineer Michael Fronzek created schematics for the three live spaces and the control room with his greatest achievement being his ability to achieve "the flattest reverb times he had ever seen, it is flat down to 40Hz which has always been a ‘holy grail’ but incredibly illusive. Flattening the low-frequency response of a room allows for better low-frequency reproduction and greater confidence in your EQ-ing and mixing".
Such mixing is done on a one-of-a-kind, fully-loaded Rupert Neve Designs Shelford console, but in keeping with the aesthetic of The Gallery, the trademark RNS Walnut was swapped out for a custom ‘musk stick pink’ chassis that was flush mounted amongst bespoke studio joinery constructed out of Norwegian Rose marble. Elsewhere in the studio, audio nerds are spoiled for choice with Australia’s first Moog One, a 16 Channel Moog vocoder, a selection of outboard gear, monitoring options from Barefoot, Genelec and Amphion and a range of instruments and microphones that make just about any style of recording possible. With the best of modern technology on offer, The Gallery offers a range of fully-restored vintage outboard gear and microphones from the famed Alberts studio and used on iconic Australian recordings by super producers Harry Vanda and George Young.
For all the tech on offer in The Gallery, it is perhaps the light source that is most impressive. The Gallery is the first application of innovative Coelux technology, an Italian synthetic skylight that provides analogous sunlight that can be ‘dialled in’ by the artist to achieve morning sun or an evening setting at any time of the day. Coelux has been scientifically proven to provide Vitamin D and help with concentration and fatigue, a welcome suite of benefits for international BMG artists heading straight to the studio from the airport.
“Recording studios must be functionally perfect performing spaces that achieve quality sound performance within a building. Traditionally sound studios are dark, cavernous spaces where the team can be in for up to 12 hours a day. The team believed the studio needed to feel light, feeding the artist and engineer to allow creativity to thrive. Coelux was the perfect solution as it meant light didn’t come at the expense of a decrease in acoustic performance”, says Andrew Cliffe, The World Is Round.
Acclaimed, multi-platinum Australian artist Angus Stone (of Dope Lemon and Angus & Julia Stone) held a series of exclusive listening sessions in The Gallery commenting that, “besides the team being a bunch of champions, the space they have created is actually pretty stunning. Being a man of Stone, the slabs of rose marble they have used in the studio is a rare find and it is really nice to see the detail the company has put into the space, it’s a sign of the attention to detail BMG have with their artists”.
In a world of monochromatic man-cave studios, with its lush upholstery, marble embellishments and fine timber moulding, The Gallery feels like a hug from the coolest grandmother in the world.
The SoundLabs
While The Gallery is perfect for long studio lock-outs while artists work on EPs and albums, BMG Australia also offers two high-end, self-contained and north-facing production suites known as SoundLabs. A&R Manager Jodie Feld calls the SoundLabs “the perfect combination of quality, comfort, collaboration and convenience. Bathed in natural light and housing incredible gear including Slate Raven MTX consoles, Manley Reference Gold microphones and VOXBOX channel strips, the rooms inspire creativity. The SoundLabs were built next to each other and designed to be used every day to encourage a diverse group of artists to create and interact. We could not be happier with the music and friendships that have resulted from these rooms.”
Acclaimed electronic artist and BMG songwriter Young Franco said, “the BMG SoundLabs are some of my favourite studios in Sydney. Simple and well-designed, everything is set up for getting ideas down quickly and efficiently.”
The ‘creative utopia’ envisioned by BMG Australia was built on the idea that rather than investing time and money on creating a writing camp each year in a far-flung destination, there was a better solution at play. “Sure, we will continue to send our writers to our international SoundLabs camps around the world from Jamaica to Shanghai, but in Sydney we have curated an environment where we are literally running writing camps 52 weeks a year with no recoupable expenses to our artists and writers”, says Heath Johns.
The Catch
…well, there isn’t one. Imagine the coolest studio in Australia was also completely free. The Gallery and Soundlabs are for exclusive use by BMG clients and the company will NEVER, EVER charge its artists and songwriters to use the recording facilities. There is no bill shock when an artist realises that the time at their label’s studio was actually fully recoupable. Record your own masters at BMG Australia and leave with full ownership of the music you create.
See you in the future? BMG Australia is already there and we’ll have a pink lemonade waiting for you on arrival.
The Team
Builder – SPM
Project Management – Kernel
Architects – The World Is Round
Design and Interiors – Heath Johns and Andrew Cliffe
Art – Steen Jones, Bodie Jarman and Alex LeHours
Acoustic Design – Michael Fronzek
Green Design – High Swan Dive
Photography – Terence Chin