Phil Spallina

Studio: Jungle City Studios, Clientele: Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Beyoncé, Web: junglecitystudios.com

Phil Spallina started at Jungle City in late 2012, 18 months after the studio’s launch. Like many in the business, he started as a runner: cleaning, making coffee and so forth. His entrée to the studio came through his aunt, Grammy-winner Ann Mincieli, who happened to engineer for Alicia Keys and is the studio owner and operator. He soon found that he loved the environment. His passion fueled his performance and it wasn’t long until he became the manager. Interestingly, Jungle City was designed by noted studio architect John Storyk, whose first commission was Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Lady Studios.

Since 1995, Ann’s [Mincieli] vision for Jungle was to make it the best studio possible, sonically. So, she brought in John Storyk, who’s one of the strongest studio designers. She worked alongside him to build this, along with a five-star hotel vibe. She wanted to make the room sound as good as possible, but also to make the artists and clients as comfortable as possible. She wanted anyone who came in here to make Jungle City their base.

COVID-19 threw a curveball into everyone’s plan, especially in New York where we were doing great in the years leading up to 2020. The challenge now is to pick up where we left off. We want everybody to know that they can come here, it’s safe and we’re putting health first.

I like having a diverse clientele. I don’t believe that you can survive off of one genre. Studio etiquette is something that’s important to us. Fortunately, we haven’t had clients who have come through and destroyed the place. Everybody treats Jungle with a lot of respect and I’m grateful for that.

I love the diversity that we have going on. We can have Madonna in one room, Depeche Mode in another and Rihanna in a third, all at the same time and they may never cross paths. I come into work and know that I’ll be a part of a creative experience and that’s more than rewarding. I’ve also seen paparazzi accidentally drive their scooters into the front door.

Even before the pandemic we did remote work. Often, the artist would be in New York and the producer would be in L.A.. They’d either Skype in or use Source-Connect. Remote work for us didn’t increase during the pandemic.

People will return to the studio because they’re eager to get back to a sense of normalcy. I believe they’ll always be conscious of what took place over the last year or so. Social distancing is huge, as is washing hands. I don’t think our generation will ever forget these guidelines; they’ll be more conscious moving forward and hopefully forever.

Get to work. No playing around. Come in and get your work done.

The pandemic. When we were forced to close, that was the toughest thing that I had to explain to our employees and clients. Some don’t take no for an answer: they wanted to get in and create stuff. We’re coming out of it, though, and we have a solid schedule. We’d be nothing without our dedicated employees.

The studios that are reliable and consistent will always have a niche. There will always be a place for artists to get work done. Many of them have home studios, but they still value working in a professional one. You’re not going to fly in three producers from California to work in a home studio.

Jungle also has a lot to offer in terms of gear, whether it’s vintage or the newest synthesizers. Rarely do I have to rent anything. It’s a nice workflow when you can go into the storage [room] and grab a U47 [microphone], a Prophet-6 [synthesizer] or one of our more than 30 vintage guitars. We’re most proud of the EMI TG12345 Mark IV console that used to be in Abbey Road Studios. Before we even had a studio, Ann wanted that piece of gear. It’s her prized piece.