Apple opens Apple Music Hall in London

Battersea Power Station seen from across the Thames, its four white chimneys against a cloudy sky

Apple opened a 600-capacity venue inside Battersea Power Station yesterday. The room borrows from the power station it sits in—heritage brickwork, fluted arches, bronze balconies. In an age where concert venues are usually not much more than a black box with a logo over its door, this looks beautifully done.

The hall seen from the side, with bronze balconies cantilevered over the floor
A greenroom in the Apple Music Radio studios: red sofas on a red rug, brick walls, a turntable on the sideboard
The foyer of Apple Music Hall: a red velvet sofa and a staircase under exposed brick and steel
Apple Music Hall and the new Apple Music Radio studios, images courtesy of Apple

There are two mix studios, a 48-speaker spatial system around the audience, and sixteen-odd hardwired cameras feeding a broadcast control room. An artist can play one intimate show and leave with a finished Spatial Audio recording, a broadcast mix and multicamera video.

Very clever, and a very expensive way of funneling listeners to an Apple Music subscription. (I guess this explains the push notification I received for a new two-month trial.)