Former Beastie Boys recording studio G-Son to be restored, but your help is needed

A restoration project to revive G-Son Studios in Atwater Village, LA, is underway. G-Son was the former rehearsal and recording space for the Beastie Boys, and was also the headquarters for their own label, Grand Royal.

The project is being led by LA local, Adam Englander, with a vision to reopen G-Son as a living cultural venue for LA: a place for performances, screenings, workshops, DJ sets, gallery nights, rehearsals, and community programming. A public fundraising round will begin in May via Kickstarter.

G-Son studios became “one of the most mythic creative hideouts in LA”. On the outside it may have seemed like an unassuming old ballroom, but it was not only a studio, but a clubhouse, skate spot, basketball court, and experimental bunker where the Beastie Boys crafted some of their most famous works, including Check Your Head, Ill Communication, and Hello Nasty, as well as music videos like Pass the Mic.

After the Beastie Boys left, the building continued to house creative tenants, including Mad Decent Recordings, before eventually facing the risk of being gutted entirely. Other artists who utilised the G-Son space include Beck, Biz Markie, Run-DMC, Redd Kross, and Luscious Jackson.

According to the restoration team, construction crews were already inside preparing to tear things down when Englander and his project partner, Alex, stepped in. Since then, they’ve been slowly restoring the space by removing a collapsing stage, repairing infrastructure, fixing lighting, and uncovering original artwork that had been covered up, as pictured above. You can see more images from inside the venue below.

In the UK, similar action is being taken to save London’s iconic Battery Studios, which is currently under threat of demolition and redevelopment into residential flats. A petition has been launched to save the venue, which was originally founded in 1967 as Morgan Studios. In the petition, organisers describe the studio as an “irreplaceable cultural landmark”.

Rachel is a DIY musician who began learning guitar and keyboard from her bedroom at 14. She has written news and features for MusicTech since 2022, and also has bylines across Kerrang!, Guitar.com, and The Forty-Five. Though a lover of heavy music, her guilty pleasure is 2000s pop.