Started in 1995 the huge recording project took 20 years to complete with over 200 guest musicians from some of the biggest names in rock, punk, ska, pop.

After being abused as a teenager and contracting HIV, Mat Sargent’s purpose of the project is to raise awareness & funding for the beneficiary charities.

“I wanted to give something back to the charities for supporting me after what had happened.  My son had just been born and I was given 3 – 5 years to live so I really didn’t think I had long.  I called many of my musician friends and put together an album with different musicians on each track.  The project grew as more people wanted to get involved so it ended up being a double album,” Mat explained.

 The entire project was filmed and made into 28 episodes.  Each song has a 25-minute documentary and gives you a rare fly-on-the-wall insight to the musicians and how the album was recorded.

The films show the musicians arriving at the studio, meeting & hanging out with other musicians and recording their parts.

“The project was a healing time for me, diagnosed with HIV I couldn’t sweep what had happened to me under the carpet so I decided to speak out about male rape and the stigma attached to HIV to educate people,” Mat said. “The HIV medication improved over the years but there were times I didn’t think I’d live to see the project finished.”

It’s 25 years since the first recording session, and Mat is happy to still be here and see The Studio Sessions films released.

All the money raised from the album and films goes to the project beneficiary charities including SurvivorsUK.