Rick Rubin: Legendary Music Producer | Lex Fridman Podcast #275
- There are no right answers
for anything involved in art. We're all trying
experiments to find a way. And even for the things that I work on, I don't have a set way that I do anything. I come to every project blank. - Maybe you're just a meat vehicle, and you're channeling
ideas from somewhere else. - I believe we know close to nothing, close to nothing about anything. If we embrace that not knowing, we'll have a healthier
experience going through life. - The following is a
conversation with Rick Rubin, one of the greatest music
producers of all time, known for bringing the best
out of anyone he works with, no matter the genre of music
or even the medium of art, or just the medium of creating something beautiful in this world. And the list of musicians
he produced includes many, many, many of the
greats over the past 40 years, including the Beastie
Boys, Eminem, Metallica, LL Cool J, Kanye West, Slayer,
Tom Petty, Johnny Cash, Dixie Chicks, Aerosmith, Adele, Danzig, Red Hot Chili Peppers, System of a Down, Jay-Z, Black Sabbath. I can keep going for a
(laughs) very long time here. Most importantly, Rick is
just an amazing human being. We became fast friends,
which is surreal to say and is just an incredible honor. I felt truly heard as a
person when I spent the day with him eating some
delicious Texas barbecue, talking about life, about
music, about art, about beauty. This was a conversation and
experience I will never forget. This is the "Lex Fridman Podcast." To support it, please
check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here's Rick Ruben. Are you nervous? - I'm not shaky, but I
would say I feel uneasy, and I feel like sooner we start talking, the more relaxed we'll get. - Yeah, well, maybe we
should sit in this moment and enjoy it, the nervousness of it. Let me start with Nietzsche. He said, "Without music,
life would be a mistake." What do you think he means by that? Let's talk some philosophy. Let's try to analyze Friedrich
Nietzsche from a century ago. - It seems like music has
the ability to bring us so much depth in our soul that's hard
to access any other way. And without it, there would be a loss beyond the pleasure of it. It feels like it's a
window into something else. - Something that no
other medium can express quite the same way. - I would say not as automatically. Something about music
can do it automatically. Maybe poetry or maybe certain abstract forms can get us there, but there's something about music that really can get us there quickly. - But it's also the time,
the place, the history. There's something about, like, a lot of my family's still in Philly. There's something about
driving through Jersey and listening to Bruce Springsteen and then I'll get, like,
emotional, (laughs) like, listening to, like, "I'm on Fire," one of one of my favorite
Bruce Springsteen songs. There's a haunting kinda strumming to it. It's not a strumming. It's actually picked,
has a country feel to it, almost like a Johnny Cash feel, actually. And I don't know, it makes me feel, so for people who don't
know "I'm on Fire," that song is, I guess, a love song to a woman that you can't have because she's married, or
she's with somebody else, which I guess is quite
a lot of love songs. But there's something
about the haunting nature of the guitar, and then it has
to be driving through Jersey. And I feel like everyone
has fallen in love with a Jersey girl at
one point in their life. (Rick laughing) I don't know if that's true
(laughs) for everybody, but I feel like that. I haven't either, but I just feel like that.
(Rick laughing) There's something about Bruce Springsteen. It's like, "Yeah, I've been there." You know, and that's just
takes you to a place of emotion that you just, that captures love, that captures longing, that
captures the heartbreak of just the way time flows in life and the fact that it's finite, and just all of that in
a single simple song. Like, what else can capture that? - Yeah, I don't know, but it's true that
there's a connection both between time, and place, and music. Certain music growing up on the East Coast didn't really resonate with me until I spent time on the West Coast, Eagles being an example. When I lived in New York, the Eagles didn't really speak to me. ZZ Top didn't really speak to me. And then when I started
spending time in California and driving through Laurel
Canyon, all of a sudden the music of the Eagles felt appropriate somehow. And I started listening to it more. - Got it, so not until you went out West can you understand the sounds of the West. So it's really like New York has a sound. What other places have a
sound in the United States? - I think every place does. And that said, sometimes
we can get an experience through music of a place. Like, we can resonate with a
music and not understand why. And then maybe when we go to
the place where it was created, it's almost like we have a
knowingness of that place. It's not a strange place anymore. - Yeah, Stevie Ray Vaughn
with blues and Texas blues, you can just listen to "Texas Flood," and just, again, there's,
like, a woman you're missing, a broken heart, and somehow
that connects you to the place. The Eagles, what song of the
Eagles connects with you? Are we talking about,
like, "Take It Easy," or are we talking more
like "Hotel California"? - I'm thinking "Take It
Easy," but both are great. - Yeah, there's certain songs when I started learning
guitar when I was young, that's like, I would like
to be the kind of person that not only knows how to play this song but understands the song and, like, have that song be something I played 20 years ago. (laughs) And I've lived with that song for a while. Like, "Hotel California" is an example. Obviously, there's the solo, but there's also the
soulfulness of the lyrics, which I still don't understand. And it could be about anything. And as you get older,
I feel like the meaning of the song could be anything. - Yeah, I think that's true. I think that's the beauty of them. I think when the person wrote them, they may have had one interpretation, but it's not contingent on us
getting that interpretation to like it, or resonate
with it, or feel it. In some ways, the best art is open enough where the artist gets to have their experience
when they make it, and then the audience gets to have their experience when they listen, and they don't have to be the same. - And then it connects thousands or millions of people together. There's a togetherness of music
when you share that music, when you're listening to
stuff together, like in a car. First of all, the car is a sacred place. So I work in part on autonomous vehicles, and you start to think, well, what are the things you lose when the car stops being the
central part of American life, car ownership? It just feels like the
car, when you're alone, it's like a therapist thing, session because you get angry at other humans. And then you get to, like, sit in your own anger and emotion. You get to listen to the
song on a long road trip and remember, like, run
through your memories, the heartbreak, I don't
know, the one that got away, but also, like, the
beautiful moments, all of it, yeah, and all of that in a car. (laughs) - Yeah, driving also
serves another purpose in, it's one of the things that we can do that we have to pay attention enough not to crash but typically can essentially run on autopilot enough where
we could be thinking about something else or
concentrating on something else. And the difference between
concentrating on something or trying to solve a problem
when you're solely trying to solve a problem versus
when you have some little task that's keeping you occupied, I find, if I have something slight to take care of, it frees a more creative side of my mind to better solve problems. - You know, I'm kind of jealous
of people that found that in painting, for example. They'll be drawing or
painting and listening to, so that's the small task you do. You're coloring in the lines. It's like this gentle,
peaceful, slow process that requires just a small
fraction of your mind. And then you can listen. Some people listen to podcasts that way. Some people listen to music that way. - Mm-hmm.
- Yeah. - How do you do it? How do you free your mind? - Running is one of them. There's a process. So most freeing of the
mind for me has to go through a process of a
bit of pain for a bit. So doing something
difficult, it's just like a airplane taking off or something. Like, for example, running,
the first few miles would just be just, first
of all, the physical aspect, which is like, "Ah, you're so fat. You're outta shape. You're getting old," this, that. Okay, that slowly dissipates, and then the demons come in, who are like, "You should be getting this
and that and this done. You haven't gotten it done. You're, like, breaking promises," all those kinds of voices coming in. And after that, maybe mile four, it's like, "Fuck it." You just run, run with wind, at a very slow pace but with the wind. And then you can think,
so it's the footsteps, the physical activity. But then you could deeply
think about stuff, ideas, sort of design, whether
it's program design stuff or, like, high-level life decisions, all those kinds of things. I would say running. I used to build bridges from toothpicks. I used to be a thing. It's an engineering, I guess some people, like,
glued together airplanes and stuff like that. But the bridge is such deeply honest work because at the end of it,
you're gonna have to test that bridge, and you're gonna
see how good your work was, the little details but
also the big picture. - Do you use glue or no? - Yeah, we use glue, so
it's not pure physics. It's materials engineering, too, 'cause the way you want to do it is you actually split the
wood as thin as possible and then glue back together 'cause the glue is really strong, except for the arches
and things like that. So you're building arch bridges, which is a whole nother skill 'cause you have to bend
the wood, and it's so cool 'cause the thing can hold
thousands of times its weight, and then you get to watch it
explode at a certain point from the pressure. And when you do a really good job, it doesn't explode in a
kind of some weak point that you didn't anticipate, just kind of starts cracking. Everything cracks. Everything explodes. It's just pieces fly everywhere, and it's literally hundreds of hours of work just explode in front of you. And it's a metaphor for life maybe. And it's all for nothing, (laughs) except for the journey
that you took to get there. And no one understands. Speaking of which, back to Nietzsche, these questions are ridiculous. So you're gonna have to, (laughs) you're gonna have to try to figure out what the heck I'm trying to do here. So Nietzsche also said
a line I love, which is, "And those who were seen dancing
were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music." Do you, Rick Rubin, ever feel crazy, or maybe you're the one who's sane, and everybody else is crazy? You know the dancing,
the joy of the music, of just feeling the music, and everybody else just
doesn't understand. And this doesn't have to
be literally about music. This is about art, about creation. - Yeah, I would say I feel different, and it's hard to say. It's like, which side of the
equation is crazy, you know? - Did you ever find a group of people that you get, that get you? - Yes.
- Is that what producing is essentially is you try to find the moments when
you just get each other? - No. I would say there're definitely certain artists with certain temperaments when you're around them, it
feels like you can finish each other's sentences, you know, just see the world the same
way, comedians as well. - And that's not essential for the two of you together creating
something special? - No, no. - [Lex] So it could be a tension, too? - It could be any, there's no rules. It'd be like, think of it like a coach. A coach could bring
what they have to bring to any talented individual and, you know, help them find their way. And sometimes, you know, the right coach for the right athlete really works. And other times there's a mismatch. - Have you seen the movie "Whiplash"? - I did. I saw it when it came out. So I don't really remember
it well, but I did see it. - [Lex] So there's a coach type of figure. - Yes.
- Who is pushing a drummer to create, to grow as a musician, but also
to create something special. I don't know if it's even
special music skill-wise. It's a special moment. - Yeah.
- I don't know what he's trying to create. From one perspective,
it's just an abusive, a person who selfishly gets off on being abusive to those he's with. But from another perspective,
the way I saw that movie is it's just the two right
humans finding each other at the right moment in life and risking destroying
each other in the process, but maybe something
beautiful will come of it. Do you think that's a toxic
relationship, (laughs) or does some of that
movie resonate with you, as that sometimes is
required to create art, that kind of suffering?
- Yeah, it doesn't. Well, there's suffering involved but not that kind of suffering, not for me. There's some people who
that's their process, and that's whatever works. You know, there are no right answers for anything involved in art. We're all trying
experiments to find a way. And even for the things that I work on, I don't have a set way that I do anything. I come to every project blank and see, I really listen to what
the artist plays and says and through what they
explain they wanna do, help find the best way to get there. Was it implicit in the movie that the mean teacher
liked being a mean teacher? The way you described it was that he got off on
treating people this way. Do we know that to be the case? I don't remember- - No.
- that in the movie. - But we sometimes
project that onto people, people who are really rough on students. You start to think, well, maybe that is fundamentally who they are, and if it's fundamentally who they are that there must be some pleasure in it, or it's an addiction of some sort. But it could be also a deliberate choice
made by the teacher. - It also could be a lineage. Like, you know, in the zen tradition, there are sort of the mean roshis, who, if you do something
wrong, take a physical action, and it's just in the
lineage it's considered that's how you teach. I didn't come from that lineage, so I'm much more of a, I feel like it's more of a collaboration between people working together
to make the best thing. It's not a boss-slave relationship at all. It's much more of a let's find our way. And we agree at the
beginning of the process that if either of us or any of us don't like
what's happening, we say it. And the goal is to keep
working till we get to a point where we're all really happy with it. It's like, if we make
something that an artist likes, and I don't like, or that I
like, and they don't like, we haven't gone far enough. - Hmm, in terms of lineage,
the ones that seek destruction and the ones that seek happiness all come from the same lineage. We all came from fish, so
somewhere in you, deep down there, there's the other stuff, too. It's just that you haven't
been yet, by the way, 'cause you said every new project, including maybe starting (laughs) today, is an opportunity to channel,
to plug into something that was always there, and
you haven't gotten a chance to plug into. You mentioned listening. How do you listen to a person? How do you hear a person
when you first come in? Like, we just met. What's the analysis happening? But I mean, with me is one thing. I'm an artist of sorts. I program, and I'm just, I'm human (laughs) I guess. I guess we're all creating art. How do you see, like, how do I bring out, so for people who don't know, I mean, obviously, everyone knows that you've produced some of
the greatest records ever. But the way I see that is you just brought out the best in a lot of interesting artists. And so in order to bring
out the best in them, you have to understand them. You have to hear the music of their soul. Hopefully, I'm not
being too romantic here, but just, like, is there
something you can say of how difficult that is, if there's a process, if
there's tricks, if it's luck? - I think it starts with
this, again, coming in blank, like, not having any preconceived ideas, being open and really listening, listening and not thinking about
what you're gonna say next, or what your opinion is, or, you know, not, basically being a recorder and just hearing what comes in, and then once you hear what comes in, processing that information, and trying our best to do that without any of the beliefs that we might
have to impact what that is. You know, if I ask you a question, I don't wanna listen to you and have any reaction
happening when you're speaking and wanna be as neutral as possible. For me, my goal is not to form an opinion. It's to understand. So if anything, I would
draw you out further and just ask questions
to really understand. Or if you say something that somehow triggers me in a way that, you know, I wonder
how he came to that, I wouldn't challenge you. I would ask, like, "Oh,
how did you find that?" You know, "How did you get to that place?" - From a place of curiosity, you would try to figure out- - Yeah, I wanna understand
who the person is. And through questioning,
we can usually get there, or through just spending time together, you find out who the person is. - What about finding out and figuring out how to
then take the next steps of bringing out the best in them? Like, is it just trial and
error, like, "Let's try this"? - It's definitely trial and error. It's always trial and error. - Are you afraid of making a mistake? Like, "Let's add this instrument. Let's remove this instrument." - Let's try.
- "Let's add this line. Let's remove this line." - Let's try, and let's be open. So one of the rule, we don't really have rules, but one of the agreements
in the studio is any idea that anyone has, we'll
always demonstrate it. We'll always try it because I can describe to you an idea and you can think,
"That's a terrible idea. Let's not do that." And then I can play you the idea. And then you can say,
"Oh, that's really good." And it's completely different because when we hear,
when we're told something, we have to imagine what that is. And the way you see
something and imagine it, and the way I see something and imagine it are completely different. - So you say a thing, and
now there's two humans that play that thing in their mind differently in their imagination. And then there's a cool creative step. And when you actually do it to see how it differs in the imagination,
and then the difference or the commonality will be like an exciting little
discovery together. - Well, so many groups of people making things
together in a room, one person'll suggests something, and someone else in the room saying, "Ah, that doesn't sound like a good idea. Let's not do that," and then they move on. The testing of every
idea is really important. And that's how you get to see, "Oh, that's not at all what
I thought it was gonna be." Happens to me all the time. I know because someone will suggest, "Why don't we do it like this?" And I'll think, "That sounds bad." And then I'll think, "Okay, let's try it." And then we hear it, and then, you know, eight times outta 10, it's nothing like I imagined and great. - And you try not to have
an ego about the fact that you thought it was not
a good idea in your head. - There can't be any ego in this. If everyone's there with the purpose of making the best thing we can, there's nothing else. You know, there can't be
any boundaries to that. - So there's a moment I saw with, I know you don't love talking about previous things you've done, but it's cool to dive in there every once in a while-
- I'm fine to talk about anything
- To sample it. Anything?
- We'll see. - I have this pain I gotta talk, no, I'm just kidding.
- Ah. (Lex laughing) I'll think of something ridiculous that would make you
change your mind. (laughs) I saw a video of you with Jay-Z working on "99 Problems" where you suggested
acapella, opening the song with acapella, just no
instruments, just voice. That, to me, I mean, that's
one of the characteristics of the things, of the ways you've brought out the best in artists is doing less, sort of tending towards
simplicity in some kind of way. So that choice of acapella
is really interesting 'cause, like, I could
see a lot of people think that that's a bad idea, but it turned out to be
a really powerful idea. Can you maybe talk about the simplicity, how to find simplicity, why you find simplicity is beautiful? It does appear to be beautiful. What is that? - Yeah, I don't know where it comes from. It has been with me from
the beginning of my work. The very first album I ever produced, the credit I took was reduced by me instead of produced by me for that reason. Like, I like the idea of
getting to the essential, and I have a better idea now that I've done it for a while. But at the time it was
purely an instinctual thing. And part of it is a sonic,
there's a sonic benefit, which is the less elements you have, you can hear each of
the ones that are there, and they can sound better. And the less there are, the more space they
could have around them, and the more you can
hear their personality. If you were to record 10 people
playing the same guitar part and you listen to it, it
would sound like guitar. And if you record one person
playing a guitar part, it sounds like a person
playing the guitar. It's different than just guitar. And often in the studio, the idea of building upon things and adding layers to thicken, to make it sound bigger, sometimes the more things
you add, the smaller it gets. So a lot of it is counterintuitive until you just, in
practice, see what works. - You try it, so try removing
stuff until it's just right. It's the Einstein thing. Make it as simple as
possible but not simpler. That's such a, like,
finding a stopping place, just keep chopping away and chopping away. - Yeah, there's something we also like to do called the ruthless edit, which is, let's say you're at a point
where, (clears throat) it can work for anything, but I'll give you the
example with an album. We've recorded 25 songs. We think the album's gonna have 10. Instead of picking our favorite 10, we limit it to, what are the five or six that we can't live without? So going past even the goal to get to the real, like, heart of it and then see, "Okay, we have these five or six that we can't live without. Now what would we add to that that makes it better and not worse?" And it's just, it puts you in a different
frame when you start with building instead of removing. - And you might find that
there's nothing you need to add. - Sometimes. Sometimes something happens when you get to the real essence, then when
you start adding things back, it becomes clear that it was just supposed to be this tight little thing. - Can I ask you, like, a
therapy session question? You mentioned somewhere that
one way to kind of think about music, to get into music is to look at the top, like,
hundred albums of all time, and just go down the list, and, like, just take it all
in like one piece of artwork. So I was doing that for a while. It's a cool experiment 'cause, unfortunately, I have
to admit I've gotten lazy and stopped taking in albums as albums, and, well, I looked at one
interesting top hundred list, top 500 actually, which is put
together by "Rolling Stone." And they put, this is
the therapy session part. And this has to do with simplicity, too. They put Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" at
number one, spoiler alert. So I'd like to maybe get
your opinion on that choice. The reason Marvin Gaye
is really interesting. It'd actually be cool to play
what's going on in a second. But when you just listen
to his, like, acapella, just listen to his voice. It is really good. Like, people, it makes me
wonder if it's possible to pull off, like, most of
his songs with no instruments. Like, in many parts, there's so much soul in just "Mercy, Mercy
Me," "What's Going On?" There's so many songs that
you could just be like, I wonder if you could
just, like, just go raw, or maybe in parts, or maybe
do what you did with Jay-Z, just open up with nothing. Anyway, there's something so powerful to a great soulful voice. Do you mind if I play it real quick? - No, please.
- "What's Going On?" This is probably one of my favorite songs. I mean, it's up there, - [Musician] Hey, man, hey. - [Musician] Hey, what's happening? - [Musician] We missed you, brother. What's up?
- This is a big, bug party, man.
- Yeah, brother, like to party solid, right on. - [Musician] What's happening? (laid-back music) ♪ Mother, mother ♪ - That voice. ♪ There's too many of you crying ♪ ♪ Brother, brother, brother ♪ ♪ There's far too many of you dying ♪ - There's some just very
subtle backing vocals. ♪ You know we've got to find a way ♪ ♪ To bring some lovin' ♪
(Lex laughing) ♪ Here today, yeah ♪ ♪ Father, father ♪ - This one hurts. ♪ We don't need to escalate ♪ - Father, father, we
don't need to escalate. ♪ You see, war is not the answer ♪ - Yeah. ♪ For only love can conquer hate ♪ - I wonder who the father
he's talking about is. - Oh, that's interesting. I mean, I have, so for
people who don't know, his own father ended
up killing Marvin Gaye. - [Rick] Yeah. - I mean, that one is really, I mean, for a lot of
people, your relationship with your father, your mother, I mean, there's different dynamics, but it's almost like part of
life is resolving some kind of complex puzzle you have
with the people you love, the people close to you, or
the people who were not there, all those kinds of things. There's so much pain in that, "We don't need to
escalate, father, father." I never thought if it's, I always thought it's his father directly. - Yeah, I don't get that. It could be, but I don't,
I feel like it's a more masculine spirituality. - Like a father figure or just broadly some kind of spirituality? - Could be like God,
father God, mother God, you know, like, could be. I don't know. - But there's so much, it's like both hope and melancholy. - You sing war's not the answer. It's like you don't tell
your father war is not, your blood father war is not the answer. It's a strange conversation. It's a bigger conversation
than a personal- - Don't you think it feels
like war when it's personal? What's the difference between, (laughs) war is personal, too. It's only leaders think about
war in a geopolitical sense. - Yeah.
- When people that fight wars, you lose your brothers. I mean, death is just right there. - Yeah.
- So it might feel just like that, but,
yeah, there is a dance between, like, the personal and, like, talking to the
entirety of the society. It's like John Lennon "Imagine," like, also a song where, is that hopeful? Is that cynical? Is it, like, melancholy,
like, heartbroken? Like, you hope, you wish
things would be a certain way, and they're not. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know if John Lennon's giving up on the world in "Imagine." - Yeah, I don't know. No, it's an interesting question. There's another John Lennon lyric in, let me think of what it is. It's taking me a second. And different songs keep
coming into my head, not the one that I'm looking for. - And you keep pressing next. - "Across the Universe," "Nothing's gonna change my world," and when I hear that, I hear it as hopeless. (Lex and Rick laughing) But I don't think, I
don't believe that that's, well, it may be how he meant it, but I don't think that's
how it's normally taken. - And it's also, the taker is important. I'm generally optimistic and hopeful. So I always, like, look for the hope, and, actually, the harshest love, heartbreak songs (laughs) are
always somehow hopeful to me. That's a love song. To me, like, a song about losing love is a song about the
great capacity for love in the human heart. That's what I hear.
- Yeah. - So to me, losing love is exciting (Rick laughs) 'cause it's like, that
means you really cared. That means you felt something,
and you feel something. You can sit in that pain, and that pain is a reminder
of what it means to be human. When you're that, what is it? We were just listening. "The only man who could ever reach me was the son of a preacher man." So it's like that early love or something, or partially sexual or whatever, that's not as interesting to me. It's fun, it's great,
but it's that heartbreak. That's a reminder that it can go deep, although that's a damn good song. - Have you ever heard the Detroit mix of the Marvin Gaye album? - [Lex] No. - Call it Up. (laughs) - [Lex] How, Coach? - By far better, mind blowing,
I just heard it recently. It blew my mind. (laid-back music) - Oh, wow, reverb, distant. ♪ Mother, mother ♪ - Interesting. ♪ There's too many of you crying ♪ ♪ Brother, brother, brother ♪ ♪ There's far too many of you dying ♪ - Feels like it's all
around the room more. ♪ You know we've got to find a way ♪ ♪ To bring some lovin' here today, yeah ♪ ♪ Father, father ♪
- More voices. - More voices. ♪ We don't need to ♪
♪ Father ♪ ♪ Escalate ♪ ♪ You see, war is not the answer ♪ ♪ For only love can ♪ - He's layering his own vocals. ♪ You know we've got to find a way ♪ ♪ To bring some lovin' here today ♪ ♪ Oh, oh ♪
(Lex laughing) ♪ Picket lines ♪ - It feels like there's
multiple people singing. - Yeah. ♪ Don't punish me with brutality ♪ ♪ Talk to me ♪
♪ Sister ♪ ♪ So you can see ♪
♪ Sister ♪ ♪ Oh, what's going on ♪
♪ What's going on ♪ - Yeah, that's beautiful.
- Yeah. Seems to have more energy. If you listen to the whole album, even though you just said you don't listen to albums anymore, (Lex laughing) the Detroit mix of the whole
album changes the album a lot. - I mean, that felt,
so that's the opposite of acapella, I would say. - Yes.
- Because there's layers. And maybe, I don't know if you remember, but if memory serves me correct here, he produces this own album here. Marvin Gaye was the
producer on this, I believe. - I believe so, and this one sounds more like it's a get-together,
and the whole album sounds more like a get-together,
where it's a group of people in a room playing music together, whereas the album version sounds more like a recording. This sounds less like a recording and a little more like a party. - Now you had a series of
conversations with Paul McCartney, which is amazing that people should watch. But this is continuing
our therapy session, is there a case to be made that "What's Going On?"
is number one album above the Beatles' "White Album" or "Abbey Road," above "Pet Sounds"? Can you steel man each case? - There's always a case. I mean, there's always a case. In reality, in art, there's no metric that makes sense. So you could put numbers on things, but it's like, is this apple
better than this peach? Like, it's not really a fair comparison. - But if you just had to keep one to represent the human species, that's the way I think,
(laughs) to the aliens. - So I think it's a
very personal decision. I think you can make your choice to represent the human species, and I'll make mine, you know. - Well, I would pick The
Beatles over Beach Boys. So that's my-
- Yeah. - If I became dictator of the world and was talking to the aliens, but I don't know the
full historical context to the impact of the music. I don't know if that's
something to consider. Like, this kind of thought
experiment of imagine what it was like back then to create, to go into the studio to
do such interesting work in the studio as opposed
to, like, listening to just this as a pop song almost 'cause I've never been able
to understand Beach Boys. "God Only Knows." - The song "God Only Knows"? - [Lex] God Only Knows,"
but all of it, the album, "Pet Sounds," just- - "In My Room." - "In My Room"? - [Rick] That song? - What's your favorite on the album? That one of your favorites?
- On the "Pet Sounds" album? - [Lex] "Pet Sounds." - The opening track. - Do you mind if I play it?
- Please. - It's too fun. (laughs) - That's part of their trip, though. - You open the heart with the fun? - It's possible. - Original mono and stereo mix versions. I don't know what that means. - [Rick] What's the opening song? "Wouldn't It Be Nice"?
- "Wouldn't It Be Nice." - [Rick] Yeah, that's the song. (bright music) ♪ Wouldn't it be nice if we were older ♪ ♪ Then we wouldn't have to wait so long ♪ ♪ And wouldn't it be
nice to live together ♪ ♪ In the kind of world where we belong ♪ ♪ You know it's gonna
make it that much better ♪ ♪ When we can say goodnight ♪ - The best part is near the end, and then back to fun.
♪ Wouldn't it be nice if ♪ - Yeah, that we could say
goodnight and stay together. Wouldn't that be nice? - Wouldn't it be nice? - Wake up together. - But we're not. There's heartbreak in
this one, too. (laughs) (Rick laughing)
Still to me, like, George Harrison, like, is
that the "White Album"? "While My Guitar Gently Weeps." I mean, that, with the
Beatles, it's so hard to, depending on the day, I'll
say a very different song. That's my favorite
song, but I often return to "While My Guitar Gently
Weeps" is my favorite song. - Spectacular, spectacular song. - Anything George Harrison,
honestly, "Something," "Something in the way she moves." What would you classify that? There's, like, several Beatles songs, categories of Beatles songs. So the that's like the
melancholy love songs or ballads or something like that, "Yesterday," "Let It Be." Do you have favorites? Like, how have you changed as a man, as a human being, as a musician and music producer having
done that lengthy interaction with McCartney? - Hmm. Anytime you're around
someone who's such a hero, and you spend time with them,
and they're a human being, it helps put perspective on everything. You know, it's like-
- Oh, that they're just human, that aspect?
- Well, obviously, I mean, everyone's just human. But I remember the first time I got to see Paul McCartney play live. It was in a stadium of 70,000 people, and he started playing,
and I started crying, and I couldn't believe I was in, even with 70,000 people,
I couldn't believe that this man walks the earth (Lex laughing) and that I'm in the same place as him. And he's the person who
wrote that and played that. And now he's here playing it for us. It's mind blowing. That's the voice. - [Lex] That's the- - It's overwhelming. - Is it inspiring, or is it, like, 'cause sometimes when you have, and I've gotten a chance to meet, I mean, I love people in general. Like, every person is fascinating to me. But, yeah, when you've
been a fan for a long time and you meet a person sort of, I'll just remove present company, it's like, "Oh, they're
just human." (laughs) So there's both. It's both inspiring that just
a simple human can achieve such beautiful things,
but it's also, like, almost wishing there were gods
moving around us. (laughs) It's somehow peaceful. It's more comforting to know that there's, you know, bigger fish. I'm just a small fish, and
then there's bigger fish, and they will take care
of the ocean for us. - I think we are all
capable of being big fish. I don't think that there
are special people. I don't think it's like that. - I would make a case. So the variety of artists that you worked with and
brought the best out of, it does seem that you're
out of this world. So do you think you would know, like, if you're the same kind of species, maybe you're just a meat vehicle, and you're channeling
ideas from somewhere else? - I feel like I'm channeling
ideas from somewhere else, 100%, but I think- - [Lex] Have you asked
questions about where from? - I believe we all are, though. You know, I believe we're vehicles for information that, when it's ready to come
through, it comes through, and the people who have good
antennas pick up the signal. But I'm sure you've had
an experience in your life where you've had an idea for something, and you've not acted on it, and eventually someone else does it. - Mm.
- And it's not because they're doing it
because you had the idea, and they stole your idea. It's because the time
has come for that idea. And if you don't do it,
someone else is gonna do it. - [Lex] It's being broadcast
by whatever the source is. - Whatever the source is. - Yeah, I tend to see humans as not quite special in that way. Yeah, it's different kinds
of antennas walking around listening to ideas, and ideas are, I like the notion of
Richard Dawkins's of memes, where it's kind of the
ideas of the organisms, and they're just using
our brains to multiply, to select, to compete, to evolve. And humans, we really wanna
hold onto the specialness of our body, of our mind. But it's really the ideas. So if Rick Rubin was
born two centuries ago, you wouldn't be a music producer. You'd be, (laughs) or I mean, maybe, but you
have an antenna. (laughs) - [Rick] Yeah. - And if no signal's coming in, or you'd be hearing
potentially a different signal. Is there- - I think we all have our own
antenna for whatever it is that we, you know, maybe not everyone has tuned
into their antenna to see what it is that their strength
in bringing through is. I'm lucky in that it found me 'cause I didn't know that it was a, I didn't even know this was a job. - I sometimes wonder, I mean, a lot of young people, a lot of people wonder,
like, what's the purpose and the specs of my antenna? What am I put on this earth to do? Like, if, you know, I
can live 1,000 lives, there's so many trajectories. And imagine the greatest
possible trajectory that reveals the most beautiful thing I can possibly create in this world, live in the most beautiful way. What is that? I feel like that's a good
exercise to think about 'cause it's also liberating to think that you can do anything. I mean, more and more, I
suppose that's kind of life. It's like society is
pushing conformity on you. You know, I had my own flavor of conformity I thought I'm
supposed to be following. And then early on, I would
say, like, in the late 20s, you realize, wait a minute, you don't have to do what
teachers tell you to do, what parents tell you to do,
what society tells you to do. Like, I would never wear
a suit if I listened to, like, my colleagues
and community who think a suit is like the symbol of, what is it? A symbol of conformity,
actually, which is hilarious. But it's actually a kind of rebellion and everything else, like, of that nature, doing these silly podcasts, like... - I have a question I have to ask. - Sure.
- 'Cause you brought up the suit.
- Yeah. - Do you wear the suit, is this your daily uniform
outside of podcasting? - So for the longest time,
it was, some kind of suit. And then recently, (laughs)
coinciding with going to Texas, I'm such a loner, I'm an introvert, and there's a bit of a hiding from the world
when I wear other stuff. I really want to, did not make fame, recognition, money, all of those things,
a motivation at all, and the world kind of wants
you to make those motivations, not the world, but I would say maybe the Western world or maybe America, maybe a capitalist system does, but- - That's a choice to buy into that or not. - Right. It takes a brave person, a person of character to not buy in. And I'm like a baby deer
trying to find its legs. You don't have to buy
in 'cause I love people, and I think I'm kind of an idiot. And so when other people
say do this and do that, there is a pressure there. It's actually very difficult
to not listen necessarily to the advice of others and yet keep yourself fragile
and open to the world. It's easy to be like, "I'm always right," you know, just kind of
staking your ground. But if you wanna be, like,
vulnerable, if you wanna connect with people and just wear
your heart on your sleeve, then you're going to listen to them. I mean, that's the
double-edged sword of it. But then again, that pain, like, if you don't let it destroy
you, you can grow from that. Has fame affected you at all? Did you unplug from the
system at some point? - Same, I've always been sort of removed. I don't feel like I'm part of any system. - [Lex] Do you feel famous? (laughs) - I'm aware that when I
go out, people, you know, say nice things to me, which is great. (Lex and Rick laughing) But that's about it. That's about as far as it- - But it doesn't affect your art, about your creativity.
- It can't. - Or your thoughts, like,
when you're sitting alone and thinking about the world-
- It can't, it can't. It's a destructive force. The reason that you are
who you are, and the reason that you're finding the
success you're finding is because you've been true to
yourself to get to that stage. So to start changing
that, to either conform to someone else's idea
what you should be doing, it just seems like it doesn't make sense. - Do you have a sense of who you are? 'Cause I don't necessarily have a... - I don't know. I know that I really
like making good things, and I know that I'm crazy about it in that it's like an obsession. And I want things to be
as good as they could be, whatever it is. And if I finish a music project, and I have a window of time
where I'm not working on music, I might be moving the
furniture around in the house. You know, I'm always looking
for a creative outlet to find a way to make something better. Or there was a period of time where I was in a weird corporate situation that didn't allow me to flourish. And I turned, I focused the
creativity in on myself, and I lost a bunch of weight
and changed my life, and- - So that was the kind of art. Like, you've gone through a
whole process of losing weight, getting in shape, getting healthy. That was a kind of creative act. - It certainly was. It wasn't an intentional creative act, but I had a lot of energy. And I just, a series of events happened. I read a book. At the time that I was my heaviest, I weighed about 318 pounds. And I'd been sedentary my whole life, basically laying on a
couch, working on music. So I've never been
physically active in my life. And I read a book about a
guy named Stu Mittleman, a runner who ran 1,000 miles in 11 days. And I thought, "Wow, I, you
know, get outta breath walking to the corner, and another
human being can run 1,000 miles in 11 days. I feel like I have bad information. You know, clearly I'm
doing something wrong." And I reached out to a person that Stu mentioned in
the book, Phil Maffetone. - Who's a legend. I really appreciate him as well. He's MAF 180 method, too. He's such an interesting,
I think he focuses on- - Heart-rate training, and he was the first person to talk about essentially a- - Low-carb stuff.
- Paleo- - Yeah.
- keto diet. - For a person who's healthy.
- 40 years ago. - For a person who's going to
be healthy, who can exercise and actually perform at an elite level. He's the first person when I, you know, talk
about heart-rate training, him and other endurance
athletes he influenced, he gave me permission to,
like, run slower. (laughs) - [Rick] Yeah. - (laughs) It was the
first time I realized, "Oh, I can run long distances
if I just run slower, and then I take that seriously." And I actually fell in love
with running, very much so 'cause, for me, and everyone's different, but for me, the love of running happens in the longer distances. - Yeah, did you read "Born to Run"? - Mm-hmm.
- Great book. - Amazing book. There is something special about running, and everybody has their
own journey with it, and even ultra marathon
running, those kinds of things. It is, like many journeys, one that can pull you in. Like, you won't be the same person after. And I try to be deliberate
about making choices after which you will
not be the same person. And so I'm nervous about, like, the ultra
marathon running world. - [Rick] Mm-hmm. - I have to talk to you about Johnny Cash. I mean, when people ask me what my favorite musical thing is of all time, you know, it's a very difficult question to answer, of course,
but I'm pretty quick, if I'm not allowed to pick
anything by Tom Waits, (Rick and Lex laughing) I'm pretty quick to say
"Hurt" by Johnny Cash, the performance, whatever you call it, whatever the heck that is because that's not just a song covered by an artist. That's a human being at
the end of their life that the rawness of that, I mean, oh, there's also a music video, which for a lot of
people adds a lot to it. For me, just the music alone
is, I mean, the guitar, every choice on that, see, the few things I've heard about it, it seemed like almost accidental, I mean, like, little subtle
choices here and there. Can you maybe comment on that? I think you had a huge role in sort of bringing Johnny Cash (laughs) back from a different part of his life. It's like bringing something
out that wasn't there before. And it was incredible. It was a celebration of a
really special musician. And it's a totally new
kind of celebration. "Hurt" is just one of the songs that's an amazing
celebration of Johnny Cash. But "Hurt" is like at the peak of that. So what was that like,
putting that song together? Maybe it might be nice to listen to it 'cause I freaking love that song. And as a guitarist, I just, the simplicity of it. It seems like every choice contributes to the greatness of the song. (pensive guitar music) Simple, it's crisp, but it's dark, too. ♪ I hurt myself today ♪ - It's one of the greatest opening lines of any song.
♪ To see if I still feel ♪ - The shakiness.
- And that's that. - Yeah, "To see if I still feel." - Yeah, I'm talking about the lyrics. I don't even mean the performance. The words are... ♪ The only thing that's real ♪ (Lex laughs) ♪ The needle tears a hole ♪ - But those words outta Trent
Reznor are not the same. They have a different meaning coming outta Johnny Cash's mouth, ♪ Try to kill it all away ♪ ♪ But I remember everything ♪ ♪ What have I become ♪ - What have I become? ♪ My sweetest friend ♪ - (laughs) Written
probably for a young man. - Think he was 20 when he wrote it, Trent. ♪ Goes away in the end ♪ ♪ And you could have it all ♪ ♪ My empire of dirt ♪ - Anger, regret, pain. ♪ I will let you down ♪ ♪ I will make you hurt ♪ - The way the guitar is played, the choice of instrument,
the layers there, the freedom to give him, to use the voice that's fading. It's not fading. It's changing. Maybe he's losing some
aspects of his voice. And it's almost, like,
shaking a little bit, and it's a little bit
out of tune in parts. How much of that was deliberate? Like, how do you give Johnny
Cash the freedom to do that? How do you find that together? Is there any insights you can give? - I think it's a case almost of, like, the right pairing, the right role with the
right actor you could say. The song lyrics, the reason
we chose the song was because of the lyrics,
purely about the lyrics. And at that point in time, both Johnny and I would send each other songs of possible ideas to record. And that was one that I sent him, and he didn't respond to initially. I would send him, at that
time, we would burn CDs, and I would send him, like,
a CD of 20 songs or 25 songs, (Lex laughing) and he would send them to me. - You'd burn a CD for Johnny Cash, and you'd send him all different songs of- - Of, like, songs to consider recording. - [Lex] Yeah. (laughs) - And we would send these back and forth. And then I had "Hurt" on one of the ones that I sent him, and he didn't respond. And usually, if he didn't respond, we didn't go back to it, you know? And that one, I remember I sent it again, and I put it first
(laughs) on the next CD. And when we spoke about, when
he listened to the CD again, he didn't respond. I said, "Check out that first song, and I really feel like
that one could be good." - [Lex] What did you see in that song? 'Cause I-
- It's the lyrics. It's the lyrics. - 'Cause I feel like nobody, there's very few people in the world that would see these lyrics in Johnny Cash's mouth and think this is a good idea, (laughs) including Fred Reznor. - Yeah, yeah, I know that
Trent had trepidations in the beginning.
- Yes. - But if you listen to the words, if you forget the music, and if you forget what Nine
Inch Nails sounds like, and you just read it like a poem, and then you imagine a 70-year-old
man reading these lyrics, it'll be profound. It's profound. So based on lyrics, that
started the journey. And then at this point in time, Johnny was not in great health. And sometimes I would go to Nashville and record with him at his house. Sometimes he would come to California, but he was coming to
California less regularly. And because there were so
many songs we wanted to try, he would start sometimes recording just a straight acoustic version. Like, he would have someone play guitar, he would sing, and they
would send those to me, and we would discuss, like,
"Is this one to build on?" And that was one where he said, "I don't wanna record this
one until we're together. I feel like we should
do this one together." So on the next trip to California, we recorded it at my old house. And I mean, all the songs we
recorded felt special. So I can't say this one felt special, but lyrically, it's more the lyrics have such a profound sense of regret. - [Lex] "What have I become?" - Yeah, and to hear a, when
you're 20 years old talking about regret, it's heartbreaking, but it's heartbreaking in a different way because you have your whole
life to figure it out. When you're looking back
over your life at the end of your life with regret, it's brutal. - Yeah.
- It's brutal. So that was the initial spark of doing it. And then when we recorded
it, I believe it was two guitar players, if
I remember correctly, maybe even three, Smokey Hormel, Matt
Sweeney, and Mike Campbell, I believe. And Benmont Tench was playing
the piano in my living room as we were doing it. And we cut the basic
track with Johnny singing, and then Johnny probably sang over that basic track a few more times. And then we comped his vocal and then built up the drama, and
you didn't get to the part, but at the end of the
song, it gets very loud. The music gets very loud.
- Yeah. - It's subtle because it's not anything that takes your ear. And the vocal is so powerful
that you don't really think about what's going on-
- But it's building- - around it.
- the whole time musically. - It's building, and it even
gets distorted at the end. It gets really, like, overpowering. And that's part of the
emotion of it, yeah. (pensive music) ♪ I will let you down ♪
- Yeah. I hear almost anger and frustration.
♪ I will make you hurt ♪ ♪ If I could start again ♪ ♪ A million miles away ♪ ♪ I would keep myself ♪ ♪ I would find a way ♪ - And then it just rings out- - Yeah.
- a clean vocal. I mean, it's so simple, so incredible. And it's interesting to
have a young man's lyrics in an old Johnny Cash voice, and heart, and mind. Are you a fan of Tom Waits? - [Rick] Of course. - Tom Waits, you know,
when he was younger, had, there's a song called "Martha," but there's a bunch of songs
he's written when he was young where it's like, how does a young man have that, like, melancholy wisdom? (laughs) The song "Martha" is about an older man calling a woman he used to love that she's now married, and he's married, and they're having that conversation. They haven't spoken for 30 years, and they realize that
there's still love there, and it could have been a
different life, a different world where they could have been together. And here's, like, a
23-year-old Tom Waits writing so beautifully about
something that's very, I've had a lot of people,
like, tell me how real that, as an older person looking
back at that love that you had and realizing it was
really, it's still there. Inklings of that love are still there. - I think there's a, when a young person writes a sad song, they almost seem more willing to go to a more hopeless place. (Lex laughing) Because they have- - So much time.
- a longer journey ahead. - [Lex] Yeah. - And older artists tend to wanna look at the bright side of things, which also I think comes
from the wisdom of aging. It's a more realistic position. So it's not uncommon for
younger people to write, I think even in the
Beatles you'll see, like, there are very heavy lyrics, middle- to late-era Beatles,
which is still, you know, they're in their you
know, early 20s, I guess. - Wow, that's hard to think
about, so much accomplished. - [Rick] Unbelievable. - And they went through the full journey from fun to darkness (laughs) in the span of a few years. - [Rick] Yeah. - You mentioned lyrics, so you've obviously produced
albums with incredible lyrics. I think you've mentioned the
interesting characteristics of hip hop, of rap is that you're writing poetry to rhythm versus writing poetry to melody. So that's, like, one
way to think about it. - Yeah.
- And I'm a fan, I mean, Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen. I'm a fan of poetry, period. - [Rick] Yeah. - Is there something about highlighting the poetry of it, the power of words as you did with "Hurt"? I have to play it, okay. It's a Tom Waits song that's, like, less than a minute long that I always go back to. It's one I really love
and has just a few lines. It's called "I Want You."
(gentle music) And all it is is him saying, "I want you." ♪ I want you, you, you ♪ - This is a 22-year-old Tom Waits. ♪ All I want is you, you, you ♪ ♪ All I want is you ♪ ♪ Give you the stars above ♪ ♪ Sun on the brightest day ♪ ♪ Give you all my love ♪ ♪ If only you would say ♪ ♪ I want you, you, you ♪ ♪ All I want is you, you, you ♪ - And then he hums for
20 more seconds. (laughs) - Yeah, beautiful. - Man, that young man, like, but for people who don't know Tom Waits, you should definitely listen to him, and his voice sounds very different now. And it's interesting to see
the evolution of a human voice, the artist over time because that's a, like,
boy-like voice, hopeful, less clever, less witty, more simple. That simplicity's there, and I mean, that takes
guts to be so simple, I would say, lyrically and musically, sort of laying that out on the table. Is there ways that you like
to highlight the voice, the lyrics, or there's no one rule? So what is the thing
that makes music special? Is it the rhythm, the melody, or, ultimately, the lyrics
are always there or the idea? - You just asked me five
different questions. - I don't care. I'll just keep asking. (Rick laughing) It's not about you, Rick Rubin. - I see that.
(Lex laughing) You don't want the answers. - I don't want the answers.
- You just wanna ask questions. Okay, I'll listen. (Lex and Rick laughing) - I look forward to your
comments, the Internet, okay. (Lex and Rick laughing) You have the greatest producer
of all time in front of you, and you can't shut the hell up. That's right, friends. But you do value lyrics. Is there a way to celebrate lyrics? - I value lyrics if the
lyrics are important. I'm not a lyric person. I'm very much whatever the
thing that makes the thing good is the thing that I'm drawn to, for me. For a long time, lyrics meant very little, I would say from the-
- Really? - Yes.
- In the beginning? - Yes, from the earliest days- - "Fight for Your Right
to Party," Beastie Boys? - Yeah, it was fun. I thought they were good lyrics, but it wasn't what was important, I mean, it was in almost a novelty way, not in a serious way. Early in my career, I was much more focused on the rhythm, first the rhythm. And if the lyrics weren't good enough, I would be aware of it, but it wasn't the driving force for me. And eventually over time, then melody became an important piece, which it wasn't in the beginning. And then lyrics became
more important over time. But it's always been always changing, what draws me in. And one of the things I
found as it relates to lyrics that can give a lyric a different power has to do with rhythm, where if there's no drum, the lyrics tend to mean more. So earlier what you were saying about if it was just
acapella, you felt Marvin Gaye in a different way hearing the acapella. - Can you comment on, I mean, in terms of one of the
greatest albums ever? (laid-back guitar music) ♪ There's a fire starting in my heart ♪ - Why does it sound so raw, her voice? - She's just a great singer. - But you're not doing anything else. There's strumming, and then
there's just a single beat. ♪ See how I'll leave ♪ - And then it builds. ♪ Don't underestimate the
things that I will do ♪ ♪ There's a fire starting in my heart ♪ ♪ Reaching a fever pitch, and
it's bringing me out the dark ♪ ♪ The scars of your love ♪ ♪ Remind me of us ♪
- This gets simpler, but it feels like it's a
giant orchestra. (laughs) ♪ Thinking that we almost had it all ♪ ♪ The scars of your love
they leave me breathless ♪ ♪ I can't help feeling ♪ ♪ We could've had it all ♪ ♪ You're gonna wish you never had met me ♪ - Those backing vocals.
♪ Rolling in the deep ♪ ♪ Tears are gonna fall ♪ ♪ Rolling in the deep ♪ ♪ You had my heart inside ♪ - The anger, I love it. ♪ To the beat ♪
♪ Rolling in the deep ♪ ♪ Baby, I have no ♪ - Like, there's something about such a powerful voice and the instruments
not getting in the way. I mean, the same with
"Hurt" and Johnny Cash. Why does it sound so, like, raw? It's the same as "Hurt." It feels like you're
in the room with them. It feels like they're not even singing. Like, they're literally
freshly mad (laughs) and angry. - I think those are the things that make great singers
sound like great singers. It's not anything that's
happening in the studio. I mean, I would say the only thing that us in the studio can do
is kinda get out of the way and not ruin it, (laughs) you know? It's like, that's what comes through of these people. - I should also, before
I forget, there is a lot of song choices on that CD. I would love to see the
full options on the CD that you sent to Johnny Cash that I love. So "Solitary Man" is one of my
favorite choices made there. Is that a Neil Diamond song? - It's funny you talk about them as songs 'cause I tend to listen
more to albums than songs. So- - So that's what you're
doing in your head? You're pulling up the album essentially? - No, I'm like, I'm going to
that song, but I don't know. I've never listened to that song, but I know that when that song comes up in the sequence of the album, it has a really powerful effect in me. Let's see what it does
if you just start it. (laid-back music) ♪ If you could read ♪ ♪ My mind love ♪
- (laughs) Oh. That's so interesting, yeah. Wow. ♪ Just like an old-time movie ♪ ♪ 'Bout a ghost from a wishing well ♪ ♪ In a castle dark ♪ ♪ Or a fortress strong with
chains around my feet ♪ (Lex laughs) ♪ You know that ghost is me ♪ ♪ And I will never be set free ♪ ♪ As long as there's a
ghost that you can't see ♪ - That's beautiful,
such a beautiful choice to try.
- Beautiful melody. Such a beautiful melody
and haunting words. - Song so simply, I have to, I mean, so I was born in the Soviet Union. When you're growing up, there's a few bands that kinda, I mean, they're probably
forbidden still, but they seep in, and you get, like, bootlegged, and they somehow take over
the culture of the young, of the young folks such as myself. So on the metal side, it was
Metallica and Iron Maiden, and on the, I don't
know what you call them, but Beastie Boys, I remember
hearing "Fight for Your Right." And it was just like, for some
reason that stuck as it did for a lot of people in Russia. It was like, "Wow, America is when you get to say fuck you to the man," the rebellion, the freedom. I probably heard it a few
years after it was released because it dissipates through the culture. You get the bootleg. I mean, it's hard to get your hands on, but I just remember, I mean, I wanted to kinda bring that up because it was such a
personally important song to me. And yet probably you
didn't even think of that. You probably thought of it as its role in the culture
here in the United States, like, in terms of musically, but it just- - I was, you know, 20, 21
years old, and we just made- - Well, you were that kid, too, right? - Yeah, we were just making
fun songs for our friends. There was no expectation. - [Lex] So that's just a fun song. - Yeah, no one thought, we never imagined anybody would like any of it. - One of the greatest albums ever. - [Vocalist] Yeah. (energetic rock music) - I have to. I love this so much. I just remember. - [Vocalist] Kick it. - This is America. (energetic rock music continues) I didn't even know, I didn't even understand
the lyrics, to be honest. ♪ You wake up late for school,
man, you don't want to go ♪ - And the lyrics are ridiculous. - Ridiculous. ♪ You ask you mom, please,
but she still says no ♪ ♪ You missed two classes,
and no homework ♪ ♪ But your teacher preaches class ♪ ♪ Like you're some kinda jerk ♪ ♪ You gotta fight for your right ♪ ♪ To party ♪ - So hearing that and hearing
Metallica "Master of Puppets," I knew I'm gonna have to end
up in America one day. (laughs) I mean, maybe now that I'm more mature or maybe a little bit more
mature, I realize, like, that was kind of the longing for freedom. It felt like, at least at the time, if this is allowed, then
anything is allowed. - Yeah.
(Lex laughing) - And I think that the rebellion of it, I guess it's also fun. I just loved it. If you look back to that, 'cause I mean, you were that person, not
just (laughs) the producer, it feels like.
- Well, yes and no. Like, even to us then, it
was still, like, satirical. You know, it wasn't-
- It was? - Oh, absolutely. - But isn't, like, music in part, like, you're dancing on
the line is part satirical, part serious in a sense? Like, you're losing
yourself in the satire. Like, anytime you go over the top, isn't that part of the, or is it explicitly satirical? You're making fun- - I don't know.
- I mean, "Girls." (laughs) There's a lot of
ridiculous songs on that album. - I don't know. I just think it was definitely
to make each other laugh. Like, we were trying to
make each other laugh. We weren't trying to make a point. We were trying to make each other laugh. - But that person, how's that person different
than the person today in you, the person that produced the- - I wouldn't say so different. It's like, it really is that. I like things that make
me laugh, you know? I like ridiculous things. - [Lex] It's the same person still? - I think so. - Is it strange just how many incredible- - I mean, I don't think
I would make that today, but I understand why
we made it when we did. It's in the vocabulary of ridiculous that would make sense to do, you know, for the right artist today could make something ridiculous
and gives you that feeling. - I mean, there's just
a sense when you make so many different albums, and you look back at that creation, and it can feel like a
different person created that. But you're making it seem like
if you travel back in time or maybe do a memory replay,
you'd be able to hang out with the teenage in the 20s Rick Rubin, and you'd be just fine.
- Yeah. I don't think I was so
different, honestly. - [Lex] That's hilarious. - It's funny, I ran into someone recently in Costa Rica who I
hadn't seen in a long time and who I knew from the
New York days, those days. And we spent a couple of
hours talking, and she said, "You're exactly the same (laughs) person that you were then." So I have, you know, a recent confirmation
(laughs) that that's the case. - That's beautiful. Was it Tim Ferriss that
asked you about, like, who's the most successful person you know? That's the definition of
success, I would say. (laughs) You're exactly the same person. You haven't lost yourself. Or rather, you found yourself early on. - I would say there are aspects of me that have changed for sure, but I can't say that
it's necessarily better. It's different. I would say, at that time, I was more confident than I am now. And I'm very confident now. But then I had an unrealistic confidence. And I think now it's a
little more based in reality. At that point in time, I
had never been depressed. And then once you go through a depression, well, some people, I know in my case, when I went through depression, afterwards, I was a different
person than I was before. And I feel more grounded now than I did then. And I probably relate to the artists who, so many of the artists I work with suffer. So many artists suffer because that's part of what makes an artist great
is their level of sensitivity. The same thing that makes
an artist uncomfortable other people don't feel at all. - The time you were depressed, what was the darkest moments of your life? What took you there? How did you get out? - It was triggered by a
person making a comment about something to do with
work that didn't matter. You know, it was like, to anyone else, they would hear that, and
it would just be like, "Okay, we'll deal with
it next week, whatever." But for some reason, I took it in a way that I felt like the rug had
been pulled out from under me, even beyond the rational
part of it, of understanding, you know, even after the
problem that came up was solved, it somehow undermined something in me and made me feel very vulnerable in a way that I hadn't felt before. - And it spiraled. How did you get out? - I did a lotta different
kinds of therapy, starting with alternative therapies. I was seeing, I would say, between seven and eight doctors and/or therapists a week, acupuncture, talk therapy, herbs, any possible modality. Tried everything for a long time, and nothing seemed to have an impact. And then finally, I'm wary of taking any Western medicine. I'm not a drug taker, or drinker, or partier in any way. And I found a psychopharmacologist who was a psychic, but because she was a
psychic, I was okay to see her 'cause, like, I'll listen to a psychic. But I'm not gonna listen
to a psychopharmacologist. But the fact that she had the psychic, that made her fit into my worldview, and she recommended antidepressant, which went terribly wrong in the first night
(laughs) that I took it. And then that set me
on a journey of looking for the right antidepressant,
which was a long and painful process. - [Lex] That's a heck of a journey. - Every one that I took
made me sick, every one. And then, finally, so I don't
know, five months later, six months later, I found the
magic one that worked for me, and it shifted me out of the depression. I took it for, I can't
remember, it was six months or a year, and then
weaned off, and was okay. And then I had another
event some years later. I think I took it again for a short period of time and got out of it. And I've not needed it since. - Were you able to kind
of introspect the triggers that led to the events? Is there some, or is it
random events of life? - I think it's more that because of the way that I grew up, I never had to deal with much controversy. - [Lex] Ah. - And when I was challenged, I didn't have any ability to deal with it. It's like, you know,
Jonathan Haidt talks about. It's like that. - So you actually also mentioned, like, business sometimes gives you stress. So this was business-related stuff? - Yeah, it was a business-related thing. It just made me feel bad. - One of the sadder things about art and music is that it's often
interleaved with business folk. I suppose that's the way of the world if you have
a capitalist system, but it makes that, business folks rubbing up against artists can sometimes destroy a
fragile mind and soul. To me, like, one of the
best representations of an artist, honestly, is Jony Ive, the designer from Apple, and he's just so fragile with his ideas. And he talked about,
like, when he has ideas, he really wouldn't show it to Steve Jobs or anybody except for
the small design team 'cause he was so nervous
that it would break. Give it a chance. Give
it a chance to grow. And it seems like the outside
world, business people, PR people, people that kinda have not lost themselves
in the passion of creating but instead are kind of representing or, like, making deals,
all that kinda stuff, they can kind of trample
on those little ideas. And it's sad to see. (laughs) - [Rick] Yeah. - It's really heartbreaking to see 'cause you know how much
trampling there's going on. - It's one of the main jobs. My job as a record producer is to keep the voices away from the artist, from all the people who
are really on their side but don't know, you know, like, whether it be people,
anyone on the business side who doesn't make things, they're excited to do their part. You know, they're excited. When you deliver the thing, the art that you make to me,
then we can start the project. - [Lex] Yeah. - But there's nothing to sell if the art doesn't
happen in the right way. And it has to be protected, and it can't happen on the
same kind of a timetable that business can. It's just a different thing. Art doesn't come in a quarterly way. - And that doesn't apply just to music. It applies to art. It applies
to all creative pursuits. Like, this is generally the case. Like, at MIT, there's the administration, and then there is the
professors and students, and the professors and
students are the creative folk. - Yeah.
- They create stuff. They dream, they have wild ideas, they go on tangents, and so on. They have hopes, and they go with those, and they get, like, on these
weird passionate pursuits. And then the administration
can often just trample on that. And they set up bars on all kinds of, in all kinds of ways that you think you're
not actually hurting, but you really are. And you know, I won't mention why, 'cause this happens to everybody, and I have a large amount
of leverage at MIT now, but even I get a little bit of
pressure in such stupid ways, like, "Be careful. Be careful, Lex. Like, we really want
your career to succeed. Be careful." And that little pressure
to an artist, you know, "Do you want to go acapella? Do you want to go do a country record? Like, be careful. Like, you're already a superstar. Be careful."
- Yeah. - And then in that way
you kinda push people, like flock of fish into one fish tank where they're all the same. - Yeah.
- And it's sad to see, and obviously, in the modern world, there's nice mechanism to protect, to let artists flourish a little bit more 'cause they get to put
themselves to the world and get a little bit more confidence, maybe different funding mechanisms, all that kind of stuff, but. - Tremendous problem that the
voices that don't understand interfering with the process is huge. The other side of it is, in
success, there can be a lack of reality where all of the people around the successful
person just tell them everything they do is great. And then they don't have anything to bump up against anymore or have a realistic sense of what's, how things work or how things measure, you know? So both sides are really important, both avoiding the voices getting in the way and having a trusted group of, you know, a sangha, a group of people who can say, you know, "I don't know if that's as good." And you can still, you know, say, "I don't care what you think." That's fine. But it helps to hear it, you know. It helps to have, if someone who you respect tells you something isn't
good enough, it's helpful. - When you know it comes
from a place of love, when it comes from a place of wisdom- - 100%, and not from a place of fear, not from a place of, "Oh, this doesn't sound like it's gonna do as well as your last thing." That's-
- Yeah. - That's not the point. The point is on this quest for greatness, are you living up to your ability? - By the way, is there
something interesting to say about your worldview? 'Cause you mentioned psychic and sort of the ways we can be healthy, the ways we can grow, and how much maybe medicine or science has the answers. Is there some interesting way
to describe that worldview? - I would just say I'm open minded. I believe anything's possible. And if I was gonna trust in
any practical information, it would be something
thousands of years old. - There's wisdom in that history, yeah. - Well, it's more tested. It's not always right, but at least it's been somewhat tested. - Well, science is also tested. (laughs) The thing I'm a little bit skeptical of sometimes it's just the
hubris that often comes with the modern, with
the latest, the newest, this feeling like you've
figured it all out. Everything that's been done
in the past has no wisdom. And we basically solved every problem. You know, there's nothing
else to be solved. I mean, that's a defining
characteristic of any age is like, "We've solved all the problems there are. We have the final answers, and our parents are all stupid," (laughs) that kind of energy, yeah. And you have to be extremely,
extremely careful with that. When you think about something
as complex as the human body or the human mind, you have to be very, very, very careful.
- I believe we know close to nothing. - Yeah, exactly.
- Close to nothing - That's-
- About anything. - [Lex] (laughs) About anything? - About anything.
- That place of humility is a good place to start
to figure it all out. In the end, we'll still
know almost nothing. - Yeah, I don't think we need to know. It's like we need to see what works. So we need to see what works for us. It's interesting to know. I know on the art side,
knowing how it works isn't what makes it work. You know, the magic of
it isn't how it works. The magic is the magic. And the magic happens in
a way that's intuitive and accidental at times, or incidental where
you're trying many things, and all of a sudden something works, and you don't know why. And it's okay not to know why. It doesn't really matter why as long as it does the thing
that you want it to do, whatever that is. - Yeah, that's so weird. When you know the components, you don't, you still, yeah, the magic. What's the magic? Where's the magic? Like, we know the components
for stuff I care about, artificial intelligence. We know the components of
powerful computing machinery. Where does consciousness come from? What is that? Where does the brilliant moments of insight come from? What's that? Even in simple games of chess or any simple, where do
those breakthrough ideas of taking the big risk that
doesn't make any sense, and then all of a sudden it
becomes something beautiful. Yeah, we don't need to
understand why. It just happens. - It just happens, and often
the things that end up breaking through don't break through
in the way we thought or turn out to be a third
iteration of something that we thought was an
entirely different thing. We don't know, you know. And I think, if we
embrace that not knowing, we'll have a healthier
experience going through life. - You've made a lot. It's not just music, everything, rearranging the chairs,
the furniture as well. You've done, like I said, the documentary, I guess you would say,
with Paul McCartney, and you've done a podcast yourself, "Broken Record Podcast," and just you've done conversation, too. So what have you learned from that process about the art of conversation? And also maybe what advice would you give to me about what to do with conversation? Like, what is interesting
to you about conversation? - One of the things that I like is to not feel like there is any stakes or almost that it's not happening. Like, the fact that when I came in, you were setting up cameras
made it less good for me. I knew that that would
impact the conversation in a negative way. The best version of it would
be if we didn't see the cameras and if we were, and we
didn't see any technology, and we were just sitting at this table having a conversation, maybe even if we were mic'd beforehand, would be okay if it was necessary. But then we were just sitting
here having a conversation, no people in the room, nothing, and feeling like we're
just having a conversation, I feel like it would get closer to the relaxed feeling, same thing we do in the studios. Like, you know, you've heard
of red light fever, you know, when artists get nervous, when, like, they play a song great, and then the tape starts
rolling, and they can't play it. And we're all to some degree like that. - When you were with
Paul McCartney, I mean, were you cognizant of cameras? - We had the room black. Everybody who was working
there was dressed in black. Everything was invisible. We were lit in a way where, even though there were probably 20 people, between 12 and 20 people
working in the room, within three minutes of
starting the conversation, Paul and I were alone in the room. - So it-
- That was the feeling. On occasion, you'd hear a noise, and it would be weird. We also had, nobody was
allowed to wear shoes. Because we were trying to
create this intimate space, and I know from in the recording studio when we're recording, if
even one person is there that's just watching and not working, you know, like, there's usually, I'm usually there, and
an engineer is there technically making it happen. If anyone else is in
the room, it's different because then it goes from this moment where the person's doing a
performance to the sense, or where the person is feeling something internally. And we're capturing it to, the other version is they're
performing for someone. - It's so interesting. So, like, to push back
on the alternatives here, so one about the third person, not to make people self-conscious, but I find that I'm so torn on that 'cause sometimes when that person, like, so Evan is in the room here. He's been in the room before. He's a huge fan of yours by the way. So (laughs) he'll nod. Yeah, yeah, he'll get excited. And you can see that nodding. And for some reason,
for me, it's like, yeah. - Yeah.
- You get like, yeah, (laughs) you get excited together. I mean, that third person can
be, like, a really special, so having an audience when it's a friend or somebody that has that love in them- - It depends on the performer. I'll tell ya.
- Right. - Yeah, some people really
thrive in front of an audience. - [Lex] And you're saying
you like that simple intimacy of everything dissipates?
- Well, I like the reality of it not being, I want it to be as far from a performance as possible. - Got it.
- And if someone, I'll tell you a story, a
story that just happened, and it was viewed as kind of a, it seemed uncool in the moment to the person that it happened to. It wasn't at all. We were recording the
new Chili Peppers album, which is coming out, I think, any day now. Like, I don't know what today's date is, but within the next, maybe
by the time this airs, it will be out. And the band was playing in the studio, and it was ripping 'cause
they're incredible. And one of the members walked through the control room after a particularly great performance. And the engineer said, "Wow,
that solo was really great." And the person who heard this said, "Please don't say that," and walked away. It's like, it just changed- - Yeah.
- this feeling of we're in this place where
we're doing this thing, and there is no outside world. You know, we're doing this for us. We're going as deep as we can for us. And as soon as there's an
acknowledgement to someone else, in a way, it breaks the concentration of being inside of it. - That's so well told. But something about saying, "Wow, that solo was great," shows that it reminds you that
there's an outside world, but I feel like there's a way to enter the inside world as an audience. So you just have to do that. (laughs) So it matters what you say. It matters how you look. It matters. So there's, like, these generic
compliments, not generic, but they sound in the way an outside world would interact as opposed to in that creative thing
where you're dancing around the fire together or something. - Yeah, I can tell you there's
another interesting one that happened to me,
and I didn't know this until I saw the film of it,
which was a strange one. We were recording with the Avett Brothers, and the song was called
"No Hard Feelings." And it was this recording
of "No Hard Feelings." (mellow music) ♪ When my body won't hold me anymore ♪ ♪ And it finally lets me free ♪ ♪ Will I be ready ♪ ♪ When my feet won't walk another mile ♪ - Such a great voice. - So beautiful. ♪ Kiss goodbye ♪ ♪ Will my hands be steady ♪ ♪ When I lay down my fears,
my hopes, and my doubts ♪ ♪ The rings on my fingers
and the keys to the house ♪ ♪ With no hard feelings ♪ ♪ When the sun hangs low in the west ♪ ♪ And the light in my
chest won't be kept ♪ ♪ Held at bay any longer ♪ ♪ When the jealousy fades away ♪ - So bright, so hopeful, so lighthearted. ♪ For cash and lust, and
it's just hallelujah ♪ (Lex laughs) ♪ And love in thought, love in the words ♪ ♪ Love in the songs they
sing in the church ♪ ♪ And no hard feelings ♪ ♪ Lord knows they haven't done ♪ ♪ Much good for anyone ♪ ♪ Kept me afraid and cold ♪ ♪ With so much to have and hold ♪ ♪ Mm, mm ♪ ♪ When my body won't hold me anymore ♪ ♪ And it finally lets me free ♪ ♪ Where will I go ♪ - Does he sound this good in studio? - Yes, every bit.
♪ Those trade winds ♪ ♪ Take me south ♪
- Whoo. ♪ Through Georgia grain ♪ ♪ Or tropical rain ♪ ♪ Or snow from the heavens ♪ ♪ Will I join with the ocean blue ♪ ♪ Or run into a savior true ♪ ♪ And shake hands laughing ♪ ♪ And walk through the night,
straight to the light ♪ ♪ Holding the love I've known in my life ♪ ♪ And no hard feelings ♪ ♪ Lord knows, they haven't done ♪ ♪ Much good for anyone ♪ ♪ Kept me afraid and cold ♪ ♪ With so much to have and hold ♪ ♪ Under the curving sky ♪ ♪ I'm finally learning why ♪ ♪ It matters for me and you ♪ ♪ To say it and mean it, too ♪ ♪ For life and its loveliness ♪ - This is building, and building, and building
♪ And all of its ugliness ♪ ♪ Good as it's been to me ♪ ♪ I have no enemies ♪ ♪ I have no enemies ♪ ♪ I have no enemies ♪ ♪ I have no enemies ♪ - Wow. That, he's got the power
of, like, Jeff Buckley with more, like, so much more sort of flavor to the voice. Just he can go so many different places. It's cool when it's, like,
acapella, just mostly him. - Yeah.
- He could do, like, "Hallelujah" the Jeff Buckley way. I could tell.
- Yeah. - It's incredible. That's
an incredible song. Is this a new record, relatively? - This was, I don't know,
four or five years ago, something like that. But what happened with
this, that happened, and I mean, they're great,
and it's always good, but that performance in that moment felt like the sky opened. (laughs) - Oh, yeah.
- It was unbelievable. - But this was a single take? This was-
- This was a single take. - Oh, wow.
- That was just like- - That was incredible.
Yeah, that was perfect. That's perfect, yeah. - When it ended, I said, "Great, what do you wanna do next?" And they said, "We just
need a few minutes," and they walked out,
and that's all I know. It's like, "Okay," and
I'm laying down waiting until they're ready to start again. And in the film, there was a film made of the sessions of this, they went out, and they
were like, "What was that? Like, didn't he get (laughs)
what just happened?" Like, because it was so heavy. - [Lex] Yeah. - And it was just as heavy for me. And in the spirit of, we're here to make the most great stuff we can, we're not gonna, like, open champagne. Like, it's like, "Great,
what do you wanna do next?" It's like, "Let's not revel in this." But they took it as like, "This guy just, like,
doesn't even understand what we're doing." (laughs) (Lex laughing) - That's funny.
- But I had no idea until I saw the film. - That's funny.
- I was like, "Whoa. That was the reaction." - Yeah, but I think your response
is the right risk to take, right, 'cause it's the
celebration at the end of a, you wanna keep, like, people
celebrate too early. (laughs) - Yes, great, and now
let's use that momentum. We're in the zone.
- Yeah. (Rick and Lex laughing) - What's next?
- Yeah, yeah. But you yourself in
conversation, so you said that you wanna create, would
you use the word intimacy? Like, is it to create,
or just the most real, like there's no cameras, there's no mics? - I would say a place where
you're comfortable to be naked. You know, a place where you
can be your most vulnerable without questioning it. You wanna really be able
to let your guard down, and, you know, if you wanna start crying when you're singing, whatever
it is, whatever it is. And it's hard to get to that place. And again, just the idea
of someone, you know, like, "Hey, that was good," that could take you right
out of that going in, you know, going in. - [Lex] It's so interesting to think about how to achieve
that and still have mics. - Yeah. - [Lex] That- - It's hard. It's harder. It's harder. - Some of it is space. Some of it is raw conversational skill. Like, there's something about certain, well, some of that is also
just, like, you have that, as I'm sure you're aware,
there's a legend to Rick Rubin, and like my now friend Joe
Rogan, there's a legend to him. And when you show up
into Joe Rogan's studio, the legend creates an aura. And he, I think, subconsciously
or consciously, uses it to, like, somehow it's
nervous, nervous, nervous, and then you realize, "Oh, he's just human or something." There's a relief. And then, yeah, you could be yourself. So that's that nervousness,
nervousness, nervousness. And it's like, "Oh, it's not that. This legend is just a
human, and it's normal." So I don't know how that's done, but it's so interesting
to think about how that's, because I forget recording. I just enjoy it when it's real. Like, this microphone gives us an excuse to connect on a human level and forget, and nobody's listening. It doesn't matter. - I would say I felt maybe
in the last 15 minutes I was less aware of anybody else being in the room or any equipment here. - Yeah.
- But it took that long. - That's so interesting.
I didn't have that at all. All I had, I mean, the
wind calmed down outside, but there was a wind before, and there's something about
the wind that you can think of it from an
audio-engineering perspective. Like, "Oh, I wonder if
the wind creates sound," or whatever that you hear. But I was thinking, like,
none of this matters. (laughs) Like, the wind, like, nature will be here before us, after us. And all of this will
be dead and forgotten. That's what the wind was reminding me of. It's almost like laughing at the fact that we would even consider ourself important enough to
put on clothes (laughs) and talk. But you love it? You love talking? You love the podcast and just that- - I-
- Why did you dive into that? Like, why? - It was a strange occurrence. My friend Malcolm said he
wanted to start doing a podcast about music and asked if
I would do it with him. It's like, I like Malcolm, and I thought it would
be more like his podcast, which it's not an interview podcast. I thought it was gonna be telling stories in the music world using, you know, audio stories. And then it just started being interviews. Again, it wasn't intentional. It just started that way
and ended up being that. But I love it, and I love both because I get to talk to
people that I don't know but also when I get to
talk to people that I know and ask them about things that we would never talk about ever. You know, I don't know
that origin stories of any of the people, any of my friends. So to get to hear their perspective, another, like, relating
to the Chili Peppers 'cause their album's coming out now. I interviewed all four members
of the band individually I interviewed John, and midway
through, Anthony came in, and then I interviewed Flea separately, and interview Chad separately. And it was fascinating, and
I've known them for 30 years, and I learned a tremendous amount because you don't ask
people about themselves when you're just, you know,
workmates (laughs) or friends. - (laughs) I do this sometimes. I'll just set up microphones, and I'll record a thing
for private consumption with friends or loved ones. - Yeah.
- It's fascinating. - Good idea.
- 'Cause you get to ask, yeah, those ridiculous questions,
first of all, about life, about the future, about the
past, about little fears and the things you miss, and, yeah, there's something
people just reveal, first loves, all those kinds of things, your view on love, your view
on, and those are things don't come up (laughs)
in regular conversation. So it's so nice to,
that's something about, see, that's the pushback. There's something about this microphone, or maybe it's just the deliberate
nature of sitting down, and let's just talk. There is something about the microphone that, for me, thinks
the same with the suit. I'm gonna take this moment seriously. I've long forgotten that
anyone is listening, and I'm gonna try to really listen to another human, first of all, and to also ask the questions that, like, are really interesting. Like, I feel like when I talk to normal people out on the street, I'm not allowed to ask anything. I'm allowed to ask only the
more sort of generic things. - I think you can ask anything. - [Lex] I'm starting
to think that. (laughs) - I think you're allowed to ask anything. - Yeah. I think you're allowed
to basically do anything, especially in Texas. - Yeah, I think it's okay to ask people, and I think people like
it when you ask them. People like to be seen and
like to show who they are. - (exhales) As the wind blows again, do you have advice for young people? You're, have a fascinating life journey. Is there advice you can give to people in high school and college about how to have a life like yours in whatever pursuit, in terms of, success is such a silly word, but just find success or maybe happiness in career
or just in life in general? - Yeah, the only advice
I would have would be to not listen to anyone (Lex laughing) and to do what you love and
to make things that you love, whatever it is. Make your favorite things. You be the audience. Make the thing for you, the audience. And it doesn't really matter what anyone else thinks,
and if you have to get a job to support yourself so
that you can make your art, that's fine. You can't make art with
someone else in mind. I don't believe it can be good. - So what does success feel like? Are you grateful? Are you proud of the work
you've done in the past, or is there some engine of
constant dissatisfaction, like self-criticism of I
could have done better? - No, I'm pleased with
the work that we did, excited to keep working. It's fun. I don't know what else
I would do with myself because I like making things. It's fun. I feel like it's my reason
to be on the planet. So I just keep doing it. (Lex laughing) - Whatever ideas are actually
coming from elsewhere and are using your mind
as a temporary vehicle, that's their purpose to be on this planet. Your purpose is to procreate, and not die, and eat regularly enough
such that the brain is alive. It's a biological (laughs) purpose. - Yeah, and anything I can
do to keep the channel open to allow what wants to come
through to come through, I'm a willing channel. - It's so interesting 'cause
I'm extremely self-critical. So you don't have that
self-criticism harsh, like, this could have been better. This- - If it could have been better,
I would keep working on it. It's like, if it could
be better, it's not done. - [Lex] So when it's done, it's done. - Well, it's the best it can be. I've done everything I can to
make it the best it can be. And I can't do more than that. So there's nothing to
be critical of. (laughs) If you always give all of
yourself and do your best, which you're capable of doing, I'm not suggesting that you're capable of doing more than you can do, but whatever it is that you
can do, if you've given all of yourself to it, you've done your best, where could there be regret? - Yeah, I mean, there
could be you re-listened to an album or anything you've created and think, "Oh, there's so
many interesting ideas missed." - It's fine, though, but
that was that moment. It's like everything is like, it's almost like a diary entry. Everything we make is a reflection of a moment in time, a window in time. Could be a day. It could be a year. You know, it could be whatever
window you decide that it is. But if you give it all of
yourself, and you know, if you're not interested
in working on it anymore, it's done. Now you may decide it's not good enough to share with people, and that's fine. But if it's good enough share with people, there's no regret looking back. - That's funny 'cause, like,
think of it as a diary entry. It's hard to look back at a
diary entry and say, you know- - "I did it wrong."
- "I did it wrong." - It's impossible. - Yeah, and even if
it's read by 100 people, 1,000 people, a million people, it's just a diary entry. - [Rick] Doesn't matter. - Speaking of doesn't
matter, this life is finite. All of us, even Rick Rubin,
will be forgotten one day. Do you think about your- - Tomorrow. (laughs)
- mortality. - Tomorrow? Yes. (laughs) Do you think about the, the
finiteness of this thing? Do you think about mortality,
about your mortality? Does it make any sense to
you? Do you think about death? Are you afraid of death? - I don't think about it. I don't think about it very much. - Are you afraid? - I don't think I'm afraid. I mean, I don't wanna die, but I know that that's in the cards. And when it happens, it happens. - Your nature of not wanting
to die is kind of like you don't wanna go to a shitty restaurant. You'd like to go to a nicer one. So it's just a preference thing. - Well, I wanna keep living because I wanna do what I like to do, so- - [Lex] Got it. - Now, who knows? Whatever comes next may be even better. Maybe we're, you know, I don't know. I haven't experienced
it yet, so who knows? - [Lex] What do you think
happens after we die? - I believe we go on in some capacity. I don't know what that
means, but in the same way that everything recycles, you
know, everything comes around. I don't know why we would be different. - In some way.
- In some way. I don't know what that way is, and I don't know that it's
in the same being, you know, or in the same grouping of
information, whatever that is. But the thing that makes us us, that information, I imagine, goes on. - Yes, it does seem like our world here, at least on earth, is like a memory, and just like history, it kinda rhymes. It brings back creations of the past and riffs on them,
improvises on top of them. And in that way, humanity propagates. - I mean, you see it with garbage. You see the, like, mountains of garbage. It's like, it doesn't really go anywhere. Even when it breaks up- - Yeah.
- it disintegrates, but it's never really gone, same. - Is there anything in this
world you're afraid of? - [Rick] A lotta things. - But not death? - I mean-
- Why? - I don't know. I don't know. - What are you afraid of?
- It's more of a question. Death is more of a question mark. Again, I'm not-
- (laughs) Yeah. - I'm not in any-
- To be answered. - Yeah, I'm not in any
hurry for that to happen. - Yeah.
- But it will happen. And when it does, we get
to experience what that is. - Well, okay then the big question mark, what's the meaning of this whole thing? What's the meaning of life, Rick Rubin? (Rick laughing) - Putting my name on it makes
it harder to answer. (laughs) - [Lex] It's just a diary
entry, like we said. - It's true, it's true, and you will get a
different answer tomorrow. Let's see, what's the
meaning of life today? - And later today. It could be, so for people who don't know, we were maybe thinking of
maybe meeting in Austin, have some barbecue, and
now we're in the middle of nowhere in beautiful West Texas. And this is basically a
glorified delivery of barbecue, of my favorite barbecue, maybe one of your top favorite barbecues to one of my favorite humans. So we get to eat some barbecue today. Maybe that's the meaning. Do you have something
bigger than barbecue? - Barbecue's pretty big. (Lex laughing) Barbecue's pretty good. - [Lex] Where's your love
for barbecue come from, by the way? Is this-
- Well, I was a vegan for 20 something years.
- Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. - And once I found my way
back into eating meat, I think barbecue is my favorite of any of the things that I
didn't eat for so long. - I have to ask you. I almost forgot. So there's an "SNL" skit with Will Ferrell that he wrote about
"Don't Fear the Reaper," where Bruce Dickinson is the producer. I always think about you
when I see that skit. I don't know why. People
should definitely watch it. And he demands more cowbell into the mix. And the whole band, this is how I imagine
people interact with you. The whole band is really impressed. Like, "We get to work with
the great Bruce Dickinson," and then it's played
by Christopher Walken. And he says, like, "Fellas, fellas, I put on my pants one leg at a time just like the rest of you. But once my pants are
on, I make gold records." (Rick laughing) And then the whole skit continues, and he wants to add more and more cowbell. And Will Ferrell said he wrote that skit 'cause he always heard the
song, "Don't Fear the Reaper," and there's a distant cowbell. It's very light in the mix. And he's like, "I wonder what the story of that cowbell is." Like, if we just look at that one layer, who's that guy that was in there?" So is that basically
exactly how your life is, is Bruce Dickinson from the cowbell? I don't know if you've seen that skit. - I don't think it's like that. - It's not? Okay, all right. I'm just gonna pretend then. Rick, this is a huge honor
that you sit with me. I mean, (exhales) what can I say about how
incredible of a human you are? You truly are out of this world. And thank you so much for talking today. - I'm a great fan. I'm so happy that you
agreed to do this with me. - Thanks for listening to this
conversation with Rick Rubin. To support this podcast, please check out our
sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you some
words from Albert Einstein. "Imagination is everything. It is the preview of
life's coming attractions." Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.