The world champion DJ and now sought-after producer known as Infamous remembers
the first time he visited the Hit Factory Criteria recording studio in
Miami. “They gave us a walking tour,” says the man who subsequently
helmed the boards for the hot Lil Wayne
and Jay-Z collaboration “Mr. Carter” at Hit Factory Criteria. “The GA
said, ‘Oh Eric Clapton recorded “Layla” there.’ As soon as I heard that
I froze still and tried to inhale as much of the room as I could.”

Iggy
Pop also remembers his first glimpse of the stucco building in a quiet
warehouse district. The rock legend, who eventually recorded most of
his album Skull Ring there, says that one of the first things he
did when he moved to Miami in the early ’90s was drive by Criteria,
just to see where songs like “Funky Nassau” were made. The punk
pioneer, who recently returned to Hit Factory to record with the band
Jet, and calls metal engineer Chris Carroll the studio’s “secret
weapon,” was smitten with the two-story building’s funky Miami charm.
“You don’t feel like you’re walking into some goombah’s armpit,” says
Pop. “It’s still very Florida; you can still chill.”

For 50
years, the studio founded as Criteria then acquired by Hit Factory in
1999 has been host to a slew of recording legends: James Brown, Aretha
Franklin, Eric Clapton, Bob Marley, the Rolling Stones, the Bee Gees,
Michael Jackson, Ricky Martin, Madonna – the list goes on. I recently
spent a month talking to a number of the people who built this iconic
space and have helped it stay alive (to coin a phrase) for an
Associated Press story: You can read the whole thing here.

Criteria,
and then Hit Factory, have drawn a dizzying array of artists together
into one space. Founder Mack Emerman was a gear-head, and the rooms
have been a haven for audiophiles ever since, from Tom Dowd and the
Albert Brothers to Scott Storch and Timbaland. “It was the people
behind the scenes who made the studios here,” says Robert Lanier, Hit
Factory Criteria’s executive vice president and COO. “It was the
engineers, the innovative individuals who were part of the growth of
the recording industry. They came up with different sounds, new
techniques.”

Eric Schilling is one of the many serious music
heads who revere Hit Factory Criteria’s big rooms and state of the art
consoles. The freelance engineer has relied heavily on Criteria since
the ‘70s, twiddling the knobs on tracks for such artists as the Eagles,
Gloria Estefan, Juan Luis Guerra, and Janet Jackson. “It’s the sound of
the rooms that keeps me here,” he says. “They’re good spaces for
recording live. They don’t make rooms like that anymore.”