RICK RUBIN The Music Man By LYNN HIRSCHBERG (NYT)

[SamNo.2]

Everyone read this article by Lynn Hirschberg. The source is NY Times Sunday Magazine, cover story, from this weekend.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/02/magaz ... bin.t.html

Lynn does a profile on Rick Rubin that, suffice it to say, will be discussed. Read the whole thing. Write down questions/issues as you read it.

And the point of this thread is: WHAT THREE QUESTIONS/ISSUES DOES THIS ARTICLE RAISE FOR YOU?

My 3 Questions:

Will Rick Rubin save the music business by implementing his subscription model?

Who died and made Rick Rubin Yoda?

Should Rick Rubin sign The Slip?

Factiva Citation:
[Article excerpted via fair use of the DMCA.]

The Music Man
By LYNN HIRSCHBERG
8486 words
2 September 2007
The New York Times
Late Edition - Final
26
English
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company. All Rights Reserved.

Rick Rubin is listening. A song by a new band called the Gossip is playing, and he is concentrating. He appears to be in a trance. His eyes are tightly closed and he is swaying back and forth to the beat, trying at once to hear what is right and wrong about the music. Rubin, who resembles a medium-size bear with a long, gray beard, is curled into the corner of a tufted velvet couch in the library of a house he owns but where he no longer lives. This three-story 1923 Spanish villa steeped in music history -- Johnny Cash recorded in the basement studio; Jakob Dylan is recording a solo album there now -- is used by Rubin for meetings. And ever since May, when he officially became co-head of Columbia Records, Rubin has been having nearly constant meetings.

Beginning in 1984, when he started Def Jam Recordings, until his more recent occupation as a career-transforming, chart-topping, Grammy Award-winning producer for dozens of artists, as diverse as the Dixie Chicks, Slayer, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Neil Diamond, Rubin, who is 44, has never gone to an office of any kind. One of his conditions for taking the job at Sony, which owns Columbia, was that he wouldn't be required to have a desk or a phone in any of the corporate outposts. That wasn't a problem: Columbia didn't want Rubin to punch a clock. It wanted him to save the company. And just maybe the record business.

What that means, most of all, is that the company wants him to listen. It is Columbia's belief that Rubin will hear the answers in the music -- that he will find the solution to its ever-increasing woes. The mighty music business is in free fall -- it has lost control of radio; retail outlets like Tower Records have shut down; MTV rarely broadcasts music videos; and the once lucrative album market has been overshadowed by downloaded singles, which mainly benefits Apple. ''The music business, as a whole, has lost its faith in content,'' David Geffen, the legendary music mogul, told me recently. ''Only 10 years ago, companies wanted to make records, presumably good records, and see if they sold. But panic has set in, and now it's no longer about making music, it's all about how to sell music. And there's no clear answer about how to fix that problem. But I still believe that the top priority at any record company has to be coming up with great music. And for that reason, Sony was very smart to hire Rick.''

Though Rubin maintains that his intention is simply to hear music with the fresh ears of a true fan, he has built his reputation on the simultaneously mystical and entirely decisive way he listens to a song. As the Gossip, which is fronted by a large, raucous woman named Beth Ditto, shouts to a stop, Rubin opens his eyes and nods yes. This is the first new band signed to Columbia that he has been enthralled by, but he is not yet sure how to organize the Gossip's future. ''Let's hear something else,'' Rubin says to Kevin Kusatsu, who would, at any other record company, be called an A & R executive. (Traditionally, A & R executives spot, woo, recruit and oversee the talent of a record company.) ''We don't have any titles at the new Columbia,'' Rubin explains, as Kusatsu, the first person Rubin hired, slips a disc out of its sleeve. ''I don't want to create a new hierarchy to replace the old hierarchy.''

Rubin, wearing his usual uniform of loose khaki pants and billowing white T-shirt, his sunglasses in his pocket, his feet bare, fingers a string of lapis lazuli Buddhist prayer beads, believed to bring wisdom to the wearer. Since Rubin's beard and hair nearly cover his face, his voice, which is soft and reassuring, becomes that much more vivid. He seems to be one with the room, which is lined in floor-to-ceiling books, most of which are of a spiritual nature, whether about Buddhism, the Bible or New Age quests for enlightenment. The library and the house are filled with religious iconography mixed with mementos from the world of pop. A massive brass Buddha is flanked by equally enormous speakers; vintage cardboard cutouts of John, Paul, George and Ringo circa ''Help!'' are placed around a multiarmed statue of Vishnu. On a low table, there are crystals and an old RadioShack cassette recorder that Rubin uses to listen to demo tapes; a framed photo of Jim Morrison stares at a crystal ball. In Rubin's world, music and spirituality collide.

[CONTINUES AT NYTIMES.COM]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/02/magaz ... ref=slogin

[Guest]

well its an interesting article, apparently rick is yoda. I cant imagine having to pick bands here and there that you think will make it, thats pressure. He seems to have lived an interesting life, but what more can he do? Popular music has changed so much, for better or worse, it seems all to easy to direct a popular hit to an audience today. Everything is divided into its own category, depending on what people are interested in. Either way it seems he has quite the ear for what will make it, which is either good or bad, is he influenced by trying to make money now, or trying to get music worth listening to out there?

[tonygaboni]

well its an interesting article, apparently rick is yoda. I cant imagine having to pick bands here and there that you think will make it, thats pressure. He seems to have lived an interesting life, but what more can he do? Popular music has changed so much, for better or worse, it seems all to easy to direct a popular hit to an audience today. Everything is divided into its own category, depending on what people are interested in. Either way it seems he has quite the ear for what will make it, which is either good or bad, is he influenced by trying to make money now, or trying to get music worth listening to out there?

that was yo, lo siento

[Phrazz]

This is a brilliant article, and from what I understand, Rick Rubin is one of the few truly visionaries who has the valuable ears of the recording industry on his doorstep. Maybe he'll talk some sense into them. It's already a cliche that subscription-based services are the wave of the now: this should have already supplanted the main revenue streams. The whole idea of CDs being obsolete as technology miniaturizes music libraries into cell phones is hardly new -- even Apple just took a great idea and perfected another "must have" product.

I like Rick's job: he just has to listen and give advice. He openly admits he has no technical skill -- in this way he's a bit unlike Yoda (who could carve a flying turkey with his lightsabre). I'd say he's more like Gandhi. And his disdain for the corporate bureaucracy and crusty old conventions of "business" make me want to work for him right away.

In a world of misguided selfish pursuits, Rick's philosophies are very much a breath of fresh air for a stuffy old industry that's had a hard time trying to reinvent itself faster than new kids can steal MP3s. Indeed, some revolutionary kind of thinking is a godsend for and industry that is on the border of major crash and burn. If he can't rescue the record industry, maybe it was doomed to die in the first place. Plastic is falling by so many roadsides, being scratched and buried by thousands of speeding wheels...and covered by the sands of time.

-Phrazz

[harrymcq]

Good read, thanks for the heads-up Phrazz. Rick Rubin seems to be as much the right guy in the right place at the right time as much as he is Yoda... I don't see the subscription model taking control any time real soon. We already have Rhapsody which though some seem to like it really hasn't taken off as far as I can tell. People seem to like to own their own music, or at least steal their own music. For me the argument is what if you can't pay your fee one month - do you lose all your music? Also Rhapsody has personally failed me in taking off all those old recordings of live Slip. At some level you are putting your music collection in someone else's hands and what if they decide your music isn't popular enough any more, or what if they lose a contract with your favorite band?

I would welcome Rubin's ears on producing the next slip Album. It sounds to me as if he is a better producer than architect of the 'new music industry' though it seems as if they just signed to Bar-None a few minutes ago and it might be seen as a betrayal if they high-tailed it over to Columbia.

I personally would stop buying CD's if I could pay for downloads of full CD quality (or better) digital audio. The only reasons I still buy CD's is to support the artists in question and to get the highest possible sound quality. Album art or cool box set packaging occasionally make me want to splurge though after reading the booklet a couple of times the box sets go in the drawer rarely to see the light of day again.

What is scariest to me was the proposed model where the label takes 50% of the artists' ticket sales, merch, etc. If I were in a band I would be seriously wary of such a deal.

So if I have to come up with 3 questions...

I'll take "Should Rubin sign the Slip?"
and...
"Does Rubin really have any good ideas for revolutionizing the industry other than subscriptions and nicer offices for Columbia?"

"How many CD's will be sold 3 years from now?"

[harrymcq]

I was just reading this excellent article by David Byrne in Wired and it reminded me of this discussion:

http://www.wired.com/entertainment/musi ... 1/ff_byrne

[hoby]

I was just reading this excellent article by David Byrne in Wired and it reminded me of this discussion:

http://www.wired.com/entertainment/musi ... 1/ff_byrne

This is a great article and the accompanying sound clips contain my ULTIMATE fly-on-the-wall wet dream: Byrne and Eno chatting over lunch.