Well according to these three different sources, the acoustic absorption of wood is MUCH larger than concrete and actually quite significant.

http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/accoustic-sound-absorption-d_68.html

http://www.sae.edu/reference_material/pages/Coefficient%20Chart.htm

http://www.acousticalsurfaces.com/acoustic_IOI/101_13.htm

Acoustic coefficients from three to like ten times greater than concrete, depending on the frequency. Wooden floors (on beams, not concrete) are something like 15 times more absorbent than concrete at 125 Hz. Charts like these are very useful, especially the last two which show how the absorption varies change with frequency. The first will just be an average, or maybe just at 1 kHz so not super useful. Looking at those charts, I imagine wood would actually be great as it'll absorb a bit of lows, but still reflect plenty of highs. This should help to bring the room closer to neutral more easily.

I like the idea of an all wooden room with bass traps behind walls and in corners but highly reflective. Then simple hooks on walls which let you hang higher frequency absorption panels when you require a dead sound. This will let you easily turn a single room studio from a mixing room into a drum room in an instant!

And get a big couch for a cheap bass trap ;)

mattplaysguitar


Well according to these three different sources, the acoustic absorption of wood is MUCH larger than concrete and actually quite significant.

http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/accoustic-sound-absorption-d_68.html

http://www.sae.edu/reference_material/pages/Coefficient%20Chart.htm

http://www.acousticalsurfaces.com/acoustic_IOI/101_13.htm

Acoustic coefficients from three to like ten times greater than concrete, depending on the frequency. Wooden floors (on beams, not concrete) are something like 15 times more absorbent than concrete at 125 Hz. 

Something deep inside (intuition?) told that's the case, wood is absorbing more then concrete since it's way more dense. That would  go along anyway with my actual experience in both types of rooms where in wooden rooms I have never echoed.   

bitflipper

Getting the bass cats to sit in the corners might be a challenge, though. 

super glue comes to mind...

bitflipper

If you add enough cats you should be able to avoid acoustical treatments altogether. Getting the bass cats to sit in the corners might be a challenge, though.

Russ Berger, whom I consider to be one of the top studio designers, is a big proponent of cats for acoustical treatment. At the risk of offending the squeamish, he prefers dead cats - something about Schroedinger?
 
Here's the deal with studio construction, which many folks have hinted at... the control room is a system, and must be treated as such. Almost any construction approach can work. The best approach for any given setting depends on what's already there.
 
As an example, my last space was in the basement of a townhouse. I had a dirt backed concrete block wall at one end, and concrete block walls, with neighbors basements on the other side of each, on the sides. This worked really well because the space that I was building into was already pretty close to symmetrical. And block walls are a nice place to start.
 
A friend of mine copied my design, but missed one tiny detail - his was an end unit, and so one of his block walls had the great outdoors on the other side. It was really pretty remarkable, it made a huge difference.
 
In my current place, which I have not built out yet, I have two perpindicular block walls, so I need to turn the control room 45 degrees so that at least those two walls will be the same.
 
Building the new walls will depend, somewhat, on what's already there. I've become a big fan of metal studs, but they won't work every time. If you can get them to work you can skip resiliant channel, which is a big plus in terms of time and cash.
 
And then there is the wall treatment - bare block can work, so can sheetrock, and so too can wood. It depends a lot on what you wan the space to sound like. And it isn't just the decay time, it's where, in the specturm, the absorption lies.
 
Some of that is personal taste... I like sheetrock for my control room spaces, and wood for recording spaces.  And then you have to deal with the rest of the treatment - some arrangement of diffusion and absorption, and maybe even some reflection.
 
A topic for a much lengthier topic<G>!
Getting back to the question... wood is perfectly acceptable for a wall treatment in a recording or critical listening space. You do have to be aware of how it differs from other materials.

i thought we were talking about paneling here.
my bad.