Background Producer Tony Bongiovi and former
Mediasound Studios co-worker
engineer Bob Walters partnered to open the recording studio, putting together a team of people that included engineer
Ed Stasium, Ed Evans, and
Bob Clearmountain. They located an abandoned building at 441 West
53rd Street, between
Ninth and
Tenth avenues, in New York City's
Hell's Kitchen neighborhood, which Bongiovi purchased from New York City for $360,000 as part of a building rehabilitation program. Bongiovi, Walters, and their team worked with Stephen B. Jacobs Associates to design a studio that would apply Bongiovi's ideas regarding
acoustics, naming the new studio Power Station in acknowledgment of the building's origins as a former
Consolidated Edison power station.
Power Station (1977–1996) Power Station opened in 1977, The studio's largest room, Studio A, is a
pine-paneled space with ceilings and several isolation booths and a control room equipped with a 40-channel
Neve 8068
mixing console. The new studio became a favorite for the
Nile Rodgers/
Bernard Edwards project
Chic, which recorded several hit albums with Clearmountain at Power Station in the late 1970s. Chic's production team also collaborated on
Sister Sledge's hit album
We Are Family and
Diana Ross' best-selling album
Diana at the studios. In 1979,
Ian Hunter recorded his album ''
You're Never Alone with a Schizophrenic'' at the studio with members of
Bruce Springsteen's
E Street Band as the backing band. In 1979 Springsteen himself came to the Power Station to work on his album
The River. Other albums recorded at the studio in 1980 included
David Bowie's Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps),
Carly Simon's Come Upstairs,
Suicide's Ric Ocasek-produced
sophomore album, and
Dire Straits' Making Movies, co-produced by a young
Jimmy Iovine. Choosing Nile Rodgers to produce his next album, David Bowie returned to Power Station to record ''
Let's Dance'', which became Bowie's best-selling album. Dire Straits returned to the studio for
Love over Gold (1982), and
John Waite recorded his
debut solo album there the same year.
Roxy Music recorded
Avalon at Power Station with Clearmountain, and
Pat Metheny Group recorded the first of many albums they would record at the studios. In 1982,
Jim Steinman produced two songs at Power Station that would simultaneously top the Billboard charts the following year:
Bonnie Tyler's biggest career hit, "
Total Eclipse of the Heart" and
Air Supply's "
Making Love Out of Nothing at All".
Mark Knopfler returned to the studio to record his award-winning soundtrack album
Local Hero, and
Bob Dylan recorded
Infidels at Power Station in 1983. 1984 marked the recording of
Bon Jovi's debut studio album, the band's frontman no other than studio co-founder Bongiovi's cousin
Jon Bon Jovi, who had been working at the studio since 1980. The same year, Bruce Springsteen recorded much of his hit album
Born in the U.S.A. at Power Station, and
Madonna chose to record
Like a Virgin with Nile Rodgers at the studio. In 1984, a
supergroup composed of
Robert Palmer,
Chic drummer
Tony Thompson, and
Andy and
John Taylor of
Duran Duran came to the studio to record a one-off album, subsequently naming both
the group and
its debut album The Power Station after the studio where it was recorded. and renamed them Power Station at BerkleeNYC. The studio reopened in 2020 after a full renovation, while maintaining the studio spaces. == Power Station New England ==