Four release entries that credit Salad Days name four different locations. A 1995 Texas Is The Reason EP says Boston. A 2001 Darkest Hour album says Washington DC. A 2003 Thrice album says Beltsville, Maryland. A 2008 Senses Fail album says Fells Point. All four carry the Salad Days name and all four credit Brian McTernan.
That is the practical problem with searching credits for this studio. The name is not attached to one town in the catalogue, and the role wording shifts from entry to entry, so a search built on one address or one phrasing comes back thin. Below is a selection of verified credits, taken from the release entries themselves. Staple News is independent and has no affiliation with the original Staple Records label that used to own this domain.
What the entries actually name
Every location and every role below comes from a release entry’s own notes and credit fields, not from a summary. These entries are community maintained transcriptions of what a release credits, so they record what somebody wrote down rather than anything anyone inspected. An entry naming a town tells you what that entry says about that release and nothing further. It does not date the session by itself, and a run of entries naming different towns does not establish when, or whether, anything moved.
Boston, Norwood, and one entry without him
The earliest dated session in this selection is precise to the day. The Texas Is The Reason EP on Revelation, catalogue revelation:47, records the session as 29 April 1995 with McTernan credited on recording. Two and a half years later the Battery album on Revelation as REV:65 still says Boston, and that entry credits him four ways: vocals, producer, engineer, and a separate lyrics credit.
Then there is When Forever Comes Crashing, the one entry here that names a Massachusetts town other than Boston. Its note places the digital editing at Salad Days Studio in Norwood, while the structured company field on the same entry files Salad Days under mixed at. Those two halves of one entry do not agree with each other, which is a useful reminder of what these records are. It is also the only entry in this set carrying no McTernan credit at all. Kurt Ballou is the engineer, Steve Austin is a producer, and the recording itself is placed at God City Studio in Allston, running from 22 December into early January 1998.
Washington DC, Beltsville and Fells Point
So Sedated, So Secure by Darkest Hour, on Victory as VR154, was recorded, mixed and produced at Salad Days in DC across March and April 2001, with McTernan credited in all three roles. That July he tracked The Illusion Of Safety, whose entry names the studio and the month but skips the town. A month after that, Bane’s Give Blood on Equal Vision logs an August 2001 session with Salad Days credited and McTernan down as engineer only.
The 2003 Thrice album is the entry that names Beltsville. It is also the one that shows how small a slice of a record a studio credit can cover, because that single entry places work in four separate rooms.
Five years on, the Senses Fail album that our Senses Fail albums in order guide covers records the studio as Fells Point, on Vagrant as VR512, with McTernan credited as producer and nothing else. In an April 2012 post, the label that owned this domain wrote that four Senses Fail bonus tracks were cut “with producer Brian McTernan at his Salad Days studio in Baltimore”. Fells Point is a Baltimore neighbourhood, so those two statements sit together without either one dating a move.
How the same studio gets credited
| Release | Studio credited as | McTernan credited as |
|---|---|---|
| Texas Is The Reason, EP | Recorded at | Recorded by |
| Battery, Whatever It Takes… | Recorded at | Vocals, producer, engineer, lyrics by |
| Converge, When Forever Comes Crashing | Mixed at, note says digital editing | No credit |
| Darkest Hour, So Sedated, So Secure | Recorded at, mixed at, produced at | Recorded by, mixed by, producer |
| Thrice, The Illusion Of Safety | Recorded at | Producer, engineer |
| Bane, Give Blood | Recorded at | Engineer |
| Cave In, Jupiter | Recorded at | Recorded by |
| Trial By Fire, Ringing In The Dawn | Engineered at, produced at, mixed at | Engineer, producer, mixed by |
| Engine Down, Demure | Recorded at | Engineer, producer |
| The Graduate, Only Every Time | Recorded at, mixed at | Producer, engineer, written by |
| HRVRD, From The Bird’s Cage | Produced at | Producer |
| Senses Fail, Life Is Not A Waiting Room | Recorded at, mixed at | Producer |
| The Draft, In A Million Pieces | Not named | Producer, engineer |
The records he picks himself
In a June 2022 interview McTernan said the studio “was located in a building behind my house for many years”. He does not say which house or which years, and no entry in this selection carries an address, so that line stands on its own as his description of the setting. Asked in the same interview which projects he rates that went under the radar, he named five.
Ringing In The Dawn by Trial By Fire came out on Jade Tree as JT1070 in 2002, and its entry credits the studio three separate ways: engineered at, produced at, mixed at. Demure by Engine Down landed the same year on Lovitt as LOVE 28, credited only as recorded at. Only Every Time by The Graduate is credited as recorded at and mixed at, with McTernan appearing three times on the entry including a writing credit. He dates that record 2011 and the entry says 2010, so both years are worth carrying.
From The Bird’s Cage by HRVRD was recorded in January 2012 and issued in 2013 on Enjoy The Ride as ETR-027 with Equal Vision as EVR-223. The fifth pick is the odd one out. The entry for The Draft’s In A Million Pieces, on Epitaph in 2006, credits him as producer and engineer and names no studio anywhere in its notes or company list, so that entry does not document where the record was made.
Why this page is a selection
The studio’s entity page in that database lists 1,292 catalogued releases across thirteen pages. Working through all of them is not a reference article, it is a project. What is worth taking away is narrower: read the note and the company fields on the entry for the record in front of you, and treat what they say as a statement about that entry rather than as a fixed address for the studio.
The wording is the other trap. Across the entries above the same studio name turns up as recorded at, mixed at, produced at and engineered at, while McTernan turns up as producer, engineer, recorded by and mixed by in different combinations, and on one release as a singer. If a search on one phrasing comes back thin, that is the reason. Corrections and additions go through our editorial standards page.