In a crowded, well-lit living room, a band is performing for two men with digital cameras. The band—The Traveling Suitcase—hasn’t performed in Toledo, but came here between tour dates in Wisconsin and New York to be videotaped by Rob Courtney and Brian Gross-Bias after seeing the duo’s work on Youtube. Together, those two men own and operate Little Elephant Recording Studio, and are among the most ambitious music entrepreneurs in Toledo.
Courtney, a Toledoan, and Gross-Bias, a Georgia native, interned together at Aire Born studios in Indianapolis, where they attended school at Butler University. As seniors, they decided to move to Toledo to start a recording studio. “The idea for the name came from : Little Studio, Big Sound. Little Elephant,” says Courtney. Little Elephant studio opened in June, 2011.
Turning Point
Courtney says the turning point—when Little Elephant went from just another studio to being one of the definitive music recording studios of Toledo — was when they recorded local ukulele duo The LeLes. “The duo attracts the young and old crowd,” Courtney said. In early 2012, that group managed a highly successful drive to raise capital on the crowd-funding website Kickstarter. The effort was so successful that their promotional material made it to the website's front page. By association, the Little Elephant name went in front of thousands of eyes.
The studio rents space inside a Rossford home owned by Courtney’s parents. “They're our investors,” he quips. The Little Elephant home is now a fully-functioning studio with a virtual mixing board, isolation booths, a large collection of tube amplifiers and a drum room. The studio holds so much equipment, in fact, that Courtney requested that the address not be printed.
From hardcore to pop music, the studio takes all comers. In 2012, Little Elephant was booking studio time three months in advance. The formula works, and Courtney and Gross-Bias make a profit so long as they keep artists in their booths. During down time, they need to get creative.
Going Viral
“We had two cancellations in a row,” leaving the pair with an unexpected block of available time. Courtney and Gross-Bias filmed three videos in the house’s living room. Despite the pair’s lack of prior video experience, the videos went viral within the local Toledo music scene anyway. Shortly, they decided to create a website exclusively for videos. Little Elephant Live now garners more hits than their recording studio's website. Little Elephant Live has videotaped bands across all genres, from psychedelic collective Tree No Leaves, to grindcore act Serpent Speech.
As of October 2013, more bands seek out Little Elephant for videos than to record albums. “We're trying to make this a true video website that people from all over the country will visit,” Courtney says. Little Elephant's ambition is paying off—the studio recently recorded the band Sundowner, whose 2013 album Neon Fiction garnered critical acclaim nationwide. Little Elephant has taped several touring bands that have not played locally, like The Traveling Suitcase. When Courtney is accused of abandoning his local roots, he retorts: “We are trying to do this to make things better for Toledo. We want to bring more bands to Toledo. We have Toledo in our hearts.” And Toledo truly isn’t far from Courtney and Gross-Bias's minds—the downtown Toledo skyline is the background on the Little Elephant Live website.
