
If you're an independent artist recording at home and any of this sounds familiar, you're in the right place.
You've got song ideas, but your recordings don't sound like the tracks you love
By the time you get set up for recording, you've lost the inspiration because it's taken you so long
You bounce between random YouTube tutorials and still feel confused
You're not sure if it's your gear, your room, or your skills holding you back
You want honest feedback from real producers, not just comments online
Start your 14-day free trial and fix your home recording setup step-by-step →


From the very beginning, we've been committed to helping artists get the absolute most out of their home studios. We help you:
Turn rough demos into polished productions
Turn confusion into a systematic process to pump out mix after mix
Eliminate technical confusion so that you can focus on being creative
Create music that you're proud of without the overwhelm most home studio owners experience
We have a full suite of training available so that you can crush your production goals, and get the feedback and accountability you need.
Short, focused trainings show you exactly how to record, edit and mix at home - without overwhelm.
Apply what you learn to your own songs and our monthly mixing comps with prizes and feedback.
When you're ready, go deeper through our 10-Week Home Recording Bootcamp or 1-to-1 Coaching.
Bite-sized trainings, mini-courses, and monthly mixing competitions to help you steadily improve your home recordings.
On-demand videos ranging from 5 minutes to lessons to 1-2 hour mini-courses
Monthly mixing competitions with real gear prizes
Private community of home-recording artists to inspire, support, and collaborate
An intensive, step-by-step 10-week program to take one of your songs from idea to a fully recorded and mixed, release-ready track home.
Weekly curriculum covering recording, mixing and mastering
Clear assignments and deadlines to keep you moving
Includes 3 months of Academy Membership to keep you learning
Asynchronous, personalised coaching for artists who want direct feedback on their work and a curriculum tailored to their goals.
Custom learning plan and curriculum for your goals
Feedback at every step on your recordings and mixes
Flexible schedule that fits around your life
Accountability to keep moving forward

Hey, I’m Joseph Cheek. I started exactly where you are now: recording in a tiny home studio, frustrated that my mixes never sounded like the records I loved.
I was scared to make the wrong moves with EQs, and terrified of compressors.
For years I bounced between random YouTube videos, reading magazine articles, spent thousands on plugins I didn’t need, and still couldn’t get my songs to sound ‘finished.’ I knew the music was there, but the sound wasn’t.
So I went all‑in. I paid to learn directly from Grammy‑award‑winning producers, sat in real sessions, and asked every ‘stupid’ question I could think of. It was the fastest way to level up my ears, understanding, and workflow. But it was also insanely expensive and out of reach for most independent artists.
Today, through Island Recording Studios, I work with independent artists from around the world on projects that started as rough voice notes and ended up on playlists and radio stations worldwide.
Island Production Academy is my way of taking everything I learned over years from those world‑class mentors and studio sessions, and packaging it into a clear path you can follow from your own home… for a fraction of what I had to pay to figure it out the hard way.
If you’re serious about making music you’re proud to release, but you don’t want to waste years guessing, I built this for you.

FAQs
You don't need expensive gear, but you do need some gear if you are going to benefit from our training. At a minimum, we recommend having an audio interface, a DAW, and a decent pair of headphones. If you want to record vocals or acoustic instruments, you will also need at least one microphone.
Download our Gear Guide for our recommendations across a range of budgets.
Absolutely! We offer training all the way from when you're just starting out, through to advanced techniques for those looking to really take things to a professional level.
Our academy membership has a range of topics - from DAW intro courses to specific recording and mixing techniques.
Our 10-Week Home Recording Bootcamp is suitable for beginners through to intermediate producers who are looking for a comprehensive program that covers all of the foundations of recording and mixing, moving through to advanced mixing techniques. You will also get direct access to us through the bootcamp portal for any questions about the coursework, along with weekly coaching calls to ask any questions you have in real time.
The Academy Membership is a bunch of one-off trainings and mini-courses on specific topics. You can choose your own learning path with these to suit your current needs. You will also have access to our monthly mixing competitions, where you can win gear!
The Home Recording Bootcamp is a 10-week program that sequentially steps you through the foundations of recording and mixing, moving through to advanced mixing techniques. We've mapped out the exact things you need to know to shave off the first 5 years of your music production education via trial and error and piecing things together from YouTube.
You'll get a full suite of worksheets, checklists, and cheatlists so that you always know what the next step in your process is and avoid going around in circles and never finishing anything.
Sound good? Apply for the bootcamp today!
We want you to see how great our trainings are so that you can start benefiting immediately, without having to hand over a single cent.
Just click the link to start your 14-day free trial, and you'll gain instant access to everything inside of our Academy Membership.
After the 14-day free trial is over, you will be billed monthly for your academy membership, until you decide you no longer need our help.
