Rick Rubin

A lot. Because it's a world where you never really know what's true. It's a world of mystery. And great skill is involved in what they're doing. And there's a story. And it's a story sometimes of people who seem to hate each other. Do they hate each other? They might be best friends. You know, it's like, we don't know, but sometimes they really do hate each other.

And then the matches are different when they really hate each other. But you never know when it is. So there's a sense of, and I think it's more honest than any other form of any other sport or any other form of entertainment. See, it's funny I say it's the only legitimate sport is pro wrestling because it's the most like the world. In the world, we don't really know what's true.

Everybody has a facade. People put on, you know, airs or a performance. A mask.

Or the politician talks and we don't really know who they are. They say these things that are often written for them. We don't know. So there's this like performative aspect of the world. that wrestling, that's what the world's really like. We say that, you know, wrestling is fake. It's like the world is fake and wrestling is real. That's what it is.

And, you know, I started my first record company not knowing that was something you can do. It just really happened automatically. I wanted to start making records. I wanted people to hear them. I never knew that you could get signed to a label. I just thought, well, if you want to make a record, you make a record.

It's something that I've experienced before I knew what it was. So when I say it's like... I feel like it has to do with the purity of the intention behind what you're doing. If your intention is pure and you're doing it for the right reasons, it seems like things tend to work out. And that ends up being a manifestation mindset, but it didn't start for me that way.

It just was like, I really believe in what I'm doing. I really care about it. I want it to be the best it could be for me, and I'm excited to share it. And the results have shown me that you can manifest things. It happens. But I'll say when I do it, it's never based on the outcome. Ooh, what do you mean? I'm never asking for a result. What are you asking for?

I'm asking to rise to the occasion, to make the best thing that I can, for the thing that I make to be great. Great is a vague word. I don't know what great means. I came to realize recently what great means, but I didn't know. Most of my life I was aiming for great, but I didn't know what that was. And I've come to realize that great means it's a devotional kind of greatness.

It's a gift to the universe. It's a gift to God. Wow. If you're making a gift to God, there's no greater gift. You can't put more into it than that. You know, you can't. What about the single? What about, what about what someone's going to say? Who has anything to say if we're making a gift for God? You're putting all of your purest intention into this thing for the universe. Wow.

That's where it's at. I didn't know that. I came to realize that recently. Again, my word was greatness. Greatness. That was the word of what I was shooting for. But I've come to realize what it is.

So I made records and, you know, print up 500 copies of a seven-inch single, for example. So I think there's always a way. You don't have to wait for permission from someone else. I think that's a big part. People are waiting for permission. To actually make their art. To make their art.

Yes. And it's a gift of yourself to God. It's like, this is the best I can do. This is my offering. This is what I have to offer.

I don't know. I don't, I think, um, it sounds like a shortcut and I don't think there are shortcuts. I think it's always a, A version of doing the work, of finding your way into what it is that the universe wants you to do, and then...

really dedicating yourself how do you know what the universe wants you to do and when to do it the right timing because you could be like i have this idea for this thing maybe it's the right time now maybe it's five ten years away from now how do how do we really tap into that knowing i think it's it's it's situational and i think the again if you're tapped into the universe it tells you it it it directs you an example i may have three different ideas that i'm i'm excited about

And I kind of get them all going. And then one of them just seems to take off on its own. And one of them, no matter how hard I work on it, it never seems to come together. Can't find the right collaborators, some obstacles in the way. When that happens, I feel like it's the universe saying now is not the time.

That is part of it. I'm not saying to turn away from the obstacle, but I'm saying when the obstacles become insurmountable consistently, And there's another path that's going smoothly. And you feel the same about both of them. Go for the effortless way. Well, pay attention. See when is the universe giving you a push? When is the wind hitting your sails the right way? There's something to it.

I would never suggest not fighting through the work. It's grueling no matter what. It's grueling no matter what. That said, sometimes it feels like now's not the time. It's like everything you throw at it gets deflected.

Taking on its own life. Earlier you asked about what I perceive to be a shortcut. And a shortcut is... How little can I get away with doing? And I think that the real question is, how much more can I give to the thing I'm making? What else can I give to it? And thinking in terms of how much more can we do, not how much less can we do. it's not about shortcuts. It's not about getting it done.

Someone has to say, you know, I'll hire you to do this or I'll publish your book if you write a book or set the stage to allow you to do it. But I don't think that's the way great things are made.

You know, it's not about a four hour work week. I loved it. You know, I loved it, but that's not, it's like whatever it takes for it to be all it could be, um, commitment and total commitment and dedicating your life to making the best things you can, whatever it is. Yeah.

Doing anything that's within our power, it doesn't have to make sense. Nothing has to make sense. You know, it could be, when I wear these purple socks, I can write a better song. Great. Doesn't matter. Don't question it. Just do whatever works. Do it.

Combination of giving them away for free and selling enough to be able to make another one. That was always, any of the things I've made, it's always been about sustainability. As long as I can make another one, it's a success.

I still think in those terms that I want. I feel like I want to make it where it's sustainable by itself. There's something that feels good about that, that you make something that can live on not because of an endowment. Yeah, that's interesting. I don't know why. I don't know why that is.

I would say thinking is the least part of it. It's much more about feeling and being true to themselves, whatever that is. Feeling their truths.

It's just a feeling. It's a feeling.

I think it's being concerned what other people think and a feeling of the people who make great things are somehow special and that they're not special. And that's just not true. We're all, everyone has the capability to make great things and none of us are special.

It starts with a feeling. The analysis comes in later to try to understand either the feeling, if there's a reason. Like if I'm just feeling something, I can experience it and be fine. If we have to act on the feeling, then it's like, okay, this feels like this. Is there a way to figure out why? Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't.

And if you can figure out why, or if you think you know why, then you can say, hmm, could it be this, this, or this? Let's try those things. See what happens.

That's beautiful.

I'll say when we're starting a new project, I always have anxiety. Really? Always. Because I don't know what's going to happen. You know, there's a real question mark when we walk in to start. And I know that it could go a lot of different ways. And I don't have... I'm not interested in having a playbook in advance. I'm interested in seeing where it's going to go. And it's scary because...

it could not go good. And sometimes some artists have an expectation that I'm going to do something. I can't do anything. It's either going to happen or it's not going to happen. But then usually within, sometimes it's the first day, sometimes it's the third day, sometimes it's the second week, where something happens like, whoa, what was that? How did that happen?

And then that might give us a clue. It's like, oh, this is what it wants to be. And that may change also. That may be the first inclination. It could start that way, and then it makes a left turn, turns into something completely different. The work itself tells us where it wants to go. So because we have, the reason it's so scary is because we have so little control over it. That's what's scary.

No, because I know it's not in the interest of the work. It's like we're all on the same page. Even the people we're ignoring, the record companies, the managers, the agents, the people who are yelling, I need this, I need this now. Ultimately, for everyone involved, if the artist makes the best possible work that they can, everybody wins.

It's just that no one involved in the process understands what it takes for that thing to happen. I had a conversation with a basketball player, a member of the Golden State Warriors, who told me there's all this pressure now to do a lot of stuff on social media. He said, and it's getting in the way of our playing.

And I said, well, if you tell the people who are asking you to do the social media stuff, don't you want us to win? It's like, if you want us to win, let us focus on winning. And he said, they don't seem to care. They want us to do the social media stuff. They want us to distract ourselves from, From the work of the game, from the flow, from the practice, putting in the reps.

And then I say, well, if then it's up to you, what's more important to please them or to win?

The first thing that comes to mind would be Johnny Cash because he had gone, you know, 25 years of not having success and he had been dropped from two labels. And when I signed him, he didn't, he didn't even know why I was interested. That really was a conversation. It's like, what, why, what do you think, why do you think working with you is going to be any different than working with anyone else?

Like he had given up. Um, And for him to get into it, we recorded in my living room. And he would just play me songs on an acoustic guitar. And there was an honesty in what was happening there. We didn't know that we were making a record. At that time, we were just looking for songs. So he was playing me songs. It was almost like a way for us to musically meet each other.

He would play me the songs he loved, either from childhood or songs that he thinks he'd like to sing, or a song he wrote. And it was just a very honest experience. And then we went into the studio. We picked some of those songs. We went through hundreds of songs.

and then picked a handful to try to record and we went when we went into the studio with the band it didn't sound it didn't have what the living room recordings had there was some intimate honesty and we'd never heard johnny cash that way before Um, so that led to the first album, which was a solo acoustic album.

Again, we didn't set out to make a solo acoustic album, but it revealed itself as that's the most interesting thing to do. And that ended up being very successful and very successful with young people, which he had not experienced since the 1950s. Um, so that was a.

And after that, after the success of that album, we made five more albums together and he had confidence based on the experience of the first one, which he'd expected nobody to care about really, uh, took to cold with people. And then on, I think it was on our fourth or fifth album, um, he did a cover of hurt the nine inch nail song.

And that ended up being probably the biggest, you know, maybe the biggest hit of his life, certainly of his later life. Wow. And, um, and that was a real revelation.

I'll say it's not as simple as that because there's a vulnerability required for the artist. that if you're confident to the point that it disguises your vulnerability, that doesn't work. So it's like a dance between being wildly open and vulnerable and commitment to do whatever it takes to get your work through. That combination, which is a difficult combination.

That's true. There's, I'll say though, to get up in front of people and sing.

Yes. And it's not about perfection. That's the thing. It's like, humanity breathes in the mistakes you know in the it's what it's what's not ordinary if it was if it was machine like perfect it's not so interesting it's cookie cutter all right it's all the same so it's the it's the edges it's the frayed edges that make it interesting

I think taking action is a really great thing and not, not setting up barriers of entry. Like, um, I can imagine a musician saying, I can't play this song because I don't have the right guitar or I don't have the right equipment to do it. And there are no barriers to entry. There's always a way. I come from a punk rock background. So in punk rock, it was a do-it-yourself mentality.

I learned when I was 14, and it's been a big part of my life the whole time. I can't say I've done it continually, but I go through phases of five years on, two years off, or something might replace it that's another kind of a meditation, like I may go from a TM sitting meditation to learning Tai Chi and Tai Chi will be, will fill the slot of my TM time.

I would always say just have as much fun as possible because we, um, I, I'm a workaholic by nature and I love making things and I love making good things and a great deal of time and effort goes into that. And, uh, and I'm hard on myself in that way and that I, I have high expectations. Um, And I think we can have fun too.

I think probably quality time in nature with my family. That's probably the best. Being in a beautiful place, being close to my family, breathing fresh air, walking on the beach, laughing together, reading together, watching movies together, you know, watching wrestling. I like pro wrestling. Yeah, of course. Pro wrestling with my son's fun.

always been pro wrestling. UFC feels like they might hurt each other.

That's why I like wrestling. It's like it's more everybody's on the same side for it to be the best show.