so my local jam room / storage warehouse might be shutting its doors sooner than later. it's hardly a huge surprise. the dude running it was getting pretty old and no one in their right mind would ever consider it to be a 100% legit jam room operation. (our room has an exposed live wire) so it was really only a matter of time.

therefore i'm starting to consider what it would cost in order to soundproof a room in a house in order to covert it into a jam room. has anyone here done anything like this before? i'd assume it's easier to soundproof a basement room than another room in the house.

either way, any tips or suggestions for making a basement jam room that could possibly be converted into a home studio at a later date would be greatly appreciated.

If you want to do it on the cheap.....


You can dampen noise with something as simple as putting down a carpet and/or hanging heavy drapes. This of course won't eliminate it all, but it's simple.

You also want to use rough-surfaced furnishings to help absorb the sound. Any smooth surface will allow sound waves to travel back and forth. If you want, you could use an acoustic spray texture or some other rough material to the ceiling.

For the walls you can use carpeting, blankets, quilts, manufactured paneling or if you want to go super cheap cardboard egg cartons.

For any doors or windows use weatherstrips for the gaps around the doorway. For windows, once again the cheap way is heavy drapes.

When setting up the monitors....put them about one metre away from you and slightly more than that apart. This way, you can use less power to hear what your playing aka the inverse-square law. It will also cut down on the sound reflection from walls and/or any objects in the room.

soundproofing.org has a decent amount of info about various sound controlling techniques and products. The site is a bit cheesy but I think the fundamentals are 'sound'. There's a 'band practice' link, too.

yeah we're already doing the cheap at the warehouse. old carpet nailed to the walls with egg cartons laid on top hehehe i think i'd want better for a house deal hehehe.


as for this deal we don't use monitors yet, just lots of amps. that inverse square law sounds pretty interesting, it's something i think we already take into consideration but not so much in a scientific sense. right now the basic plan is to have 3 corners of a room projecting into the 4th corner with a stereo mic hanging from the ceiling for now

we'd have the drums in the opposite corner of the mic facing that way with 2 amp stacks (guitar on top of bass) in each adjoining corner. i'd rather keep the instrument amps split for more distinct stereo projection rather than having both guitar amps on one side and both basses on the other.

speaking of, this is the latest addition to my wall of sound a traynor ts 140. it's supposed to be big heavy and loud. i can only vouch for the weight so far hehehe (mine has a cloth front piece instead of the grill though)

a bit cheesy? it's reads like a bob vila children's book still good advice though