0:00

Welcome to Ruthie's Table for a

0:02

production of I Heart Radio and Adami's

0:04

Studios. When

0:08

I told my friends that I would be recording

0:10

a podcast with Rick Rubin this weekend,

0:13

the responses were raptures,

0:16

what, wow, incredible

0:19

and can I come? It

0:21

was the same in the River Cafe the other day

0:23

when Rick was there. Grown men trembled,

0:25

women found excuses to hover near

0:28

his table. Chefs could barely

0:30

grill the sea bass. Rick Ruben

0:32

is a decades long creative force with

0:35

a voice and influence that carries immeasurable

0:37

weight. Co founder of def Jam,

0:40

winner of seven Grammys. As a

0:42

friend in music told me, Rick is

0:44

unique together with discovering,

0:47

mentoring, creating beautiful music

0:49

with artists such as Adele, eminent

0:52

Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, Run

0:54

DMC, and for me most

0:56

movingly Johnny Cash. His

0:59

values, Prince of Balls and kindness

1:01

guide everyone he comes close to.

1:04

Rick is in London with his family for his brilliant

1:06

radical book, The Creative Act.

1:09

We are at home sitting around a table, a

1:11

cook with a passion for music and

1:14

a music producer, writer and philosopher

1:16

with a passion for food. Though

1:19

in his achievements he is up there in the clouds,

1:22

and I am firmly on earth. We look at

1:24

our work in a similar way. Keep

1:26

it simple, keep it honest, admire,

1:29

respect, and love the people you work

1:31

with. That is exactly what I

1:33

feel about Rick. So

1:51

beautiful. Well, it's true, you know, we

1:53

just just recently became friends,

1:56

and it's so nice to be here

1:58

together to talk about what we love most.

2:00

And so I think what we usually do is

2:03

to ask you the gas

2:05

to read a recipe from any

2:07

one of our cookbooks, and there are quite a lot of them,

2:10

and quite a lot of recipes spanning the years.

2:12

And you chose a dish that

2:14

I love, which is also very easy,

2:17

called chicken with nutmeg. Would

2:19

you like to read the recipe Chicken with

2:21

nutmeg? Preheat the oven

2:23

to on nine degrees. Wipe

2:26

the chicken clean, Trim off all

2:28

excess fat, cut lemon in half,

2:31

grate the nutmeg. Rub the chicken

2:33

with the lemon, squeezing the juice into

2:35

the skin. Season the skin and

2:38

inside the cavity with salt, pepper

2:40

and nutmeg. Tuck the pursiuto

2:42

slices into the cavity. Put

2:45

the chicken on an oven tray, breast

2:47

side down, Drizzle with olive

2:49

oil, and roast for one and a half hours,

2:52

basting from time to time. Add

2:54

wine after half an hour, turn

2:56

the bird breast side up for the last twenty minutes.

2:59

Serve the juices from the pan. So

3:03

why, of all the recipes did you

3:05

choose this? Is there something that you particularly

3:07

like? Do you eat a lot of chicken? The reason I

3:09

picked the chicken dishes. It's particularly simple

3:11

dish, and in general, the

3:13

foods that I like tend to be the

3:16

best version of a very simple

3:18

thing. If the sauce is too complicated,

3:21

if the chef is trying to impress me, I

3:23

tend not to like it. What gets

3:25

me is the quality

3:28

of the produce, the quality of the food,

3:30

the quality of the meat, and

3:32

the perfection of the preparation. Not

3:34

necessarily the innovation involved.

3:36

It's more the craft of

3:38

the best version of the regular

3:41

thing. It's my favorite. I always worry

3:43

when somebody says I have an idea for

3:46

you know, cooking chicken or fish or

3:48

meat or vegetable, because for me, it's

3:51

not suddenly you have an idea to do something.

3:53

It's the last time you made chicken. It might

3:55

have been with tucking the pishutto under

3:58

the skin, and then the next time we had a not make

4:00

Do you feel that way? Yes, it's an

4:02

iterative process. We try different things

4:04

and then something like that was

4:06

good last time. Maybe we'll try it that way again and then

4:09

add something else and eventually get to a point

4:11

where this is the way I'm going to do

4:13

it now and it feels good. Are you talking

4:15

about music, cooking everything? I'm talking

4:17

about everything. Yes, it makes That's what the

4:19

books about really is how we do

4:21

anything, is how we do everything, and it all

4:24

is of a piece. All the choices we make

4:26

are essentially are the way we live.

4:28

Our life is an artistic choice.

4:31

The cooking and the ingredient

4:33

and the music. I suppose it is also

4:36

knowing that if you're going to

4:38

cook things, simply the ingredient

4:40

has to be superb, same as true music

4:42

that the individual. If you're doing

4:45

work that has many, many instruments,

4:48

in a way, they almost the sound of them cancel

4:50

each other out. Yes, they do make

4:53

something new when they add up. That said,

4:55

I like the personality of each of the

4:57

individual ingredients

4:59

and music. If you have three

5:01

ingredients, it's easier

5:04

to understand them. It's also harder to get them

5:06

right because there's only three. They're

5:09

not being it's not being masked, it's not being

5:11

hidden. I remember a producer friend

5:14

saying to me, you know, I don't know how you have the patients

5:16

to make the records you make with so few things

5:19

going on, because he'll put down

5:21

one thing and then put something on top, and put something on

5:23

top, put some on top, and he makes a

5:25

great sounding, you know, very successful

5:27

producer. But it's a different process,

5:30

and mine is, Okay, let's take everything

5:32

away and what's left. Are

5:35

each of these elements the most interesting version

5:37

of themselves they can be, and

5:40

are we presenting them in the best

5:42

light that we that we can? And that's

5:44

that's how I like to do it. For me, it

5:46

was a revelation to go to Italy because

5:49

I grew up in upstate New York, where everything

5:53

considered Italian food was very rich. You

5:55

had mozzarella, you had parmesan,

5:58

you had breadcrumbs, You bake it, you

6:00

boiled it, you did a whole process.

6:03

But then if you go to Italy

6:05

and they put a piece of fish on the grill with

6:08

a few fresh herbs and the drizzle

6:10

of olive oil, and you know that the fish

6:12

has to be really fresh, the olive

6:14

oil has to be really recently pressed

6:17

and very strong, and the herbs have to

6:19

be of the season because you can't basket,

6:21

as you say, so maybe there are real parallels,

6:24

as you think. I think so, I think it's

6:26

all related. And I remember the first time I went

6:29

to Florence and

6:31

I remember asking and what's the best fish restaurant?

6:33

And they're like, we don't have fish here. It's like,

6:35

what do you mean, it's a it's a city. It's

6:38

like and by the way, like an hour and a half

6:40

from the sea. Well that's what they said, They said,

6:43

if you want fish, the

6:45

fisher is an hour and a half away. So

6:47

that's how fresh it is. An hour and a half is

6:49

too far to travel with the ingredient

6:52

for it to be fresh in Italy. So

6:55

I so, Italy is my favorite place to

6:57

eat and uh and I spend as much

6:59

time there as possible and eat

7:02

quite a lot. It's delicious. I agree. So

7:04

how was it actually growing up when you grew

7:07

up in Long Island? Long

7:09

Island, Long Long Beaches,

7:11

about an hour outside of Manhattan, small

7:13

beach community. Not so unlike

7:16

Malibu, where I've lived for a long time. Was it

7:18

a multicultural It

7:20

was. The different parts of town were

7:23

mixed in different ways. And it was tiny,

7:25

little town, but there were these little subcultures.

7:28

And we lived on the bay, and we had a boat,

7:31

and you could walk six blocks and be on the ocean

7:33

side and you know, swimming the waves. It

7:35

was. It was a mixed community. In my high school

7:38

was a multiracial high school. And

7:40

what was it like growing up there? What was

7:42

it? The food was not great and

7:44

my mom was not a good cook. We ate

7:46

out pretty much

7:48

for every meal. We never we almost

7:51

never ate home, almost never. What

7:54

I left home maybe in nineteen

7:57

eighty one to go to

7:59

college. So we talked. I

8:03

ate the worst food, you know, I ate fast food on

8:05

a regular basis. I would say it's pretty

8:07

limited. There were a couple of Chinese restaurants.

8:10

There was a couple of Italian

8:12

restaurants, delicatessen, pastrami,

8:15

sandwich type places,

8:17

but all of the restaurants were more like mom and pop

8:19

restaurants, tending to be heavier

8:22

in the way they prepared the food, you

8:24

know, like the Italian food would all be

8:27

covered in bread, crumbson deep fried and lots

8:30

of mazzarella and lots

8:32

of sauces. Do you think you had

8:34

a healthy relationship with food or you

8:36

know you said your mother was overweight. Yes,

8:38

we we ate lots of food and

8:41

good tasting, low quality, high

8:44

carbohydrate, high calorie food.

8:46

Also lots of you know, seed oils and just

8:48

terrible stuff. It was always an argument because

8:51

I didn't like to sit for a long time in a restaurant. I

8:53

still don't like to sit for a long time in a restaurant. I like to

8:55

eat and go, and my parents would

8:57

like to eat, sit, smoke

8:59

and drink coffee. And as a little kid,

9:01

and I'm an only child, so I had no one else to play

9:03

with, I did not want to be there.

9:06

I didn't want to be there. When you see them lifting

9:08

up the coffee cup and then they don't put it to

9:10

their mouth and they put it down in the saucer. That's

9:12

what used to kill me as a kid, is

9:15

that I'd sort of think we're just about to

9:17

go, and then they'd sort of get it up and put

9:20

it down and said, no, drink that coffee.

9:22

I want to go home. So I

9:24

feel really interested in women who don't

9:26

cook. Mothers who didn't cook, you know, and

9:29

I feel so respectful towards them

9:32

as well. Was your mother did she work? She

9:34

did not. She raised me. That

9:37

was her full time job, and food was not an important

9:39

part of that. Although everybody

9:41

in the house loved to eat and she loved to eat, and

9:44

she was overweight. She was the youngest of

9:46

four sisters, and I

9:48

think she was always like the child and her

9:50

family, so the idea that the child

9:53

would be the cook didn't didn't

9:55

make sense in her family. But

9:57

the one thing that my mom cooked well is

10:00

turkey, and only made it maybe

10:02

twice a year, but it is to

10:04

this day maybe my favorite meal.

10:07

It had onions, it had lemon, salt

10:09

and pepper. It was it was simple, but

10:11

it was seasoned and it was cooked

10:14

to where the skin was crispy

10:16

and the meat was dry,

10:19

but there was lots of ojou. So

10:21

the combination of the dryer meat, which I prefer,

10:24

with the wet ojou was

10:26

the perfect combination. You could moisten

10:28

it to taste. And I wonder if that there's

10:30

some psychological meal that home

10:33

a simple roasted turkey that was incredible,

10:35

incredible, And now we made

10:37

it a habit at home

10:40

to do Thanksgiving

10:42

dinner once a month, and

10:44

we do Thanksgiving once a

10:46

month and invite friends and it's great.

10:49

Yeah, it is the best American

10:51

meal once a year,

10:54

absolutely and why And so this is how you

10:56

grew up And did the music start in high

10:58

school? My love of music started

11:00

before that, from the time I was probably three

11:02

years old, you know, listening to the Beatles as a kid.

11:05

My parents played music in the house and somehow

11:08

there was a lot of music around and I can't,

11:11

I can't put my finger on it. Usually friends

11:13

had older brothers or sisters who had record

11:16

collections or extended

11:18

family, and they were all really different. And

11:20

one cousin, Mitchell, who liked Bruce

11:23

Springsteen and more rock music.

11:25

And I had another cousin, Marris,

11:27

who liked things like kraft

11:29

Work and more experimental music.

11:31

And I would spend every weekend with my aunt Carol,

11:34

who was like my second mom, and

11:36

she would take me to the theater and take me to museums

11:39

and play classical music for me. And it

11:41

was a whole another world. Whereas my

11:43

parents were it was different than that. My

11:45

dad liked Latin jazz and Frank Sinatra

11:48

and my mom like the pop music of the

11:50

day, and maybe Barber Strides and certain certain

11:53

singers. And do you think when we were just talking about

11:55

music and food and about the

11:57

simplicity and the layering and they ingredient,

12:00

did you feel that growing up or did that come

12:02

later? I would say I probably

12:04

liked simple food. And I probably never

12:07

had great simple food when I was young,

12:09

but I tended to like simpler foods, I

12:12

think always. I always

12:14

had a cleftic tasted music. I would hang out

12:16

in record stores forever to learn,

12:19

you know. I would I would befriend the

12:21

people who work there, and I

12:23

like the Stooges. What else would I like? And they're like,

12:25

oh, you might like the MC five and they play

12:27

it for me in the store, and uh, just

12:30

had an education in the things I was interested

12:33

in. And so I would get home from school and she and my mom

12:35

would say, Kay, where are we going today? And she

12:37

would be my driver, and let's

12:39

go to the Magic Store. So she would

12:41

drive me to the Magic Store and she would sit in the car and wait,

12:43

and then I would come out and she'd be reading, you know,

12:46

she would just read in the car, and I

12:48

would be in the magic store for probably three hours,

12:50

because from nine years old until probably

12:52

sixteen, I was really into magic,

12:54

and I would spend a tremendous amount of time

12:57

in bookstores as well. I love bookstores and

12:59

just hang out out and read. And I spent

13:01

a lot of time in the library also, I love the library.

13:03

You talk about going to the magic

13:06

shop very endearingly,

13:08

describing your mother sitting in the car

13:11

for three hours, three

13:13

hours in a magic shop. Do you think

13:15

there is a link between the transformational

13:19

process of magic, of music

13:22

and a food. The thing with magic

13:24

is you learn to be skeptical

13:27

of everything. Once you understand

13:29

how tricks work, you

13:31

see that the same methods used

13:33

by magicians are used by

13:36

advertisers and by

13:39

the newscasters, and you start

13:42

to be able to see the layer of

13:44

what's really going on behind

13:46

this facade. So I

13:48

would say it affects everything going

13:51

on, and you look at things in a deep way,

13:53

and not necessarily in just a skeptical

13:55

way, in a more based

13:58

in reality versus an narrative

14:00

way. When I go to a show

14:03

of any kind, I'm always paying attention

14:05

to the mechanisms at

14:07

play as much as the content.

14:10

You know, My favorite trick was called metamorphosis.

14:13

It was a trick made famous originally, I believe

14:15

by Houdini. I never did it, but

14:17

I I liked seeing it

14:19

and I liked the idea of it. The

14:22

magician gets found put

14:24

in a sack and put in a

14:27

a steamer trunk, sealed

14:29

in a trunk, and then the assistant

14:32

would stand on top of the trunk and

14:34

raise the curtain and drop the curtain,

14:37

and it happens instantaneously.

14:39

The curtain comes up, the curtain comes down, and

14:42

when the assistant raises

14:44

the curtain, the magician lowers

14:46

the curtain, and the magician is now standing

14:48

on top of the box, opens up the box

14:51

and the assistant is inside. And

14:53

I love that. I love that. I

14:55

love this feeling of this instant

14:57

transposition the same as true in me? Is

15:00

it in that a certain person plays

15:02

a guitar piece and it's

15:05

beautiful, and another person

15:07

plays the same guitar piece and

15:09

there's this other magical dimension

15:12

to it that you can't put a

15:14

finger on. You don't know why it's I

15:17

don't even know if it better is the right word. You don't know

15:19

why it's different, because technically it looks

15:21

the same, but one of them

15:23

you want to hear over and over and over again forever

15:26

and you're filled with wonder, and

15:29

the other one it's the same notes in

15:31

the same order. It's the same speed, played

15:33

with great dexterity, but it doesn't

15:36

have this other life to

15:38

it. And I would say the same with food.

15:40

It's the same with the recipe is and that you can

15:42

say I always say that a recipe

15:44

is part poetry and part science. Yes,

15:47

and that the science is the court of a

15:49

teaspoon of baking powder

15:52

or three tablespoons of sugar.

15:54

And and yet, as you say, the

15:56

way it's stirred, in the way it sifted, in the

15:59

way it's put in the So I have a question

16:01

for you, how difficult is it to keep

16:03

the consistency

16:05

of the quality of the food with different people involved

16:08

over time. Yeah, that's a good question. I think

16:10

that we have very few chefs,

16:12

so it's not a big kitchen, and we don't

16:14

have like you're doing in Los Angeles.

16:17

When I was in kitchens that you have one

16:19

head chef and a lot of chefs on the line. So

16:22

there is a kind of communication really

16:25

of of how you do it. But that is the

16:27

That is what I look for every time. If

16:30

you come to eat, my fears is that

16:32

you know, I'm grilled sea bass coming

16:35

to the table going to be the way

16:37

it was the night before. And you know, and very

16:39

often when you're in the past, the head chef, I

16:41

don't know how it is in music, but the head chef is

16:43

the last person to easy to see the plate that goes

16:46

out. And it's tricky because sometimes

16:48

you just keep sending it back to the chef

16:51

who didn't quite get it right, and you're

16:53

taking away their confidence, you're diminishing

16:55

them, and you're destroying them. But on

16:58

the other hand, you know that you don't want to send something

17:00

out, so it's constant, you

17:02

know, judgment. How can you tell a musician

17:04

who's just the one that didn't play the guitar

17:07

the way? What do you do with someone who's played something

17:10

that isn't How

17:12

do you give that? I do my best to cast

17:17

the people that I that

17:20

that can do the work, and if not, I'll do

17:22

it again with someone else. Tell me what

17:24

happens when you go into the studio.

17:27

You've eaten definitely something I've

17:30

eaten before, and now the

17:32

way it used to work for the majority of my life. I

17:34

would wake up do

17:36

whatever I would do before going into the studio,

17:38

but once I would go to the studio, that would be it for

17:40

until I was time to go to bed. So I would

17:43

spend the majority of my

17:45

time, and which also means in

17:47

those days working in New York, it

17:49

would be a small room with no windows,

17:52

and I would be there for as long

17:54

as you know, until the sun came up, and then

17:56

I would walk or take a taxi home. So

17:59

the major do you in my life, I would

18:01

say for at least twenty five

18:03

years, was being in a in a

18:06

small dark room. So I had very little

18:08

life outside of a recording studio because

18:10

I worked so much so long. Now

18:12

I've found a way and just through doing

18:15

it enough understanding what's

18:17

important for me to be there for, what's not important

18:19

for me to be there for. And now I tend

18:21

to have lunch, go to the studio,

18:24

work from maybe one

18:27

till six. And what do you do when

18:29

you say you were listen to music and then talk about

18:31

what we can try next. Sometimes we do it right

18:33

then, and sometimes we're making a list

18:36

of things to try after I leave in

18:38

the evening. It depends. I always have anxiety

18:40

when a project starts because I never know what's going to happen.

18:43

We don't go in with any script. I

18:45

prefer to go in when we have songs, but

18:47

then there are a million ways to present

18:50

a song, so there's always this sense

18:52

of what's going to separate this

18:54

body of work from the rest of

18:56

the artist body of work and everyone else's work.

18:59

And I don't know what is going in.

19:02

So it's a real experiment

19:04

and we come in and I'm nervous

19:07

until something good

19:09

happens, like ah, And then if

19:11

that thing that's good, even if it's a

19:14

even if it doesn't end up this way, if it's

19:16

a clue of what the whole vision

19:18

of the project can be, even

19:20

if it's not the what it is, I

19:23

feel better because at least there's a solution. Even

19:25

if it doesn't end up being the solution, there's

19:28

a possible solution. And that feels

19:30

good because I was reading about

19:32

the way you work and you said that

19:35

you start with an empty sheet. You know that you

19:37

basically start with nothing,

19:39

and then you move from nothing to what

19:42

you're what you're going to record that day or

19:44

work. In my own little way, in my own

19:46

little restaurant. We come in with an

19:48

empty sheet of paper. Can we write the menu? Of course,

19:50

there are things that we always know we'll have months of realm. We always

19:53

know that we'll have four pastas, and we

19:55

always know that we'll have two dishes on

19:57

the grill, two dishes in the wood oven, then two dishes

19:59

to roast. But it does start

20:02

with with an empty sheet, and do have

20:04

a parallel in that. Absolutely. I

20:07

come and we

20:09

usually start by listening to any ideas

20:12

that the artists have. Whatever they are, they could

20:14

be. It could be a song.

20:16

They may play a whole song and then talk

20:18

about how to do it, or they may play a demo

20:21

of a whole worked out arrangement of a song with

20:23

with musicians and everything. They

20:26

may come in and with a riff,

20:29

you know, just a little a little snippet

20:31

of a song, or a melodic idea or a

20:33

lyrical idea, and then we

20:36

talk about ways of fleshing it out and what are

20:38

the next stages and what can it be. Um

20:41

sometimes they'll come to me with a whole, uh

20:43

you know, body of work, like an album's worth

20:46

of things that are in various

20:48

stages of completion, and then

20:50

we listen and see is this something

20:52

that we can Is this a starting point that we could

20:54

build off of, or is this almost like a recipe

20:57

that we could use to start from scratch. You

20:59

never know, it really is um and

21:01

then the experiments begin. We try

21:03

different things, and I like the

21:05

idea of in the case

21:08

of where someone brings in something, I like the

21:10

idea of stripping back the elements

21:12

and listening to what's there and even if it

21:14

wasn't done, you

21:16

know, in an intentional way for the

21:19

way that it's going to be used. Sometimes

21:21

you find very interesting things that

21:24

if you were trying to do it you might not do.

21:27

It could be very interesting to listen

21:29

to. And that goes back to what we're

21:31

saying before, is that neither you nor

21:33

I've ever had an idea really

21:36

that it is the progression of

21:38

what you did before, what you're doing

21:40

now, to what you do tomorrow. But it isn't. You

21:42

don't come in and say I have a great idea

21:44

for this song. Rarely rarely,

21:47

and the times that I do, I still hold

21:49

them lightly because

21:51

it's until an idea is

21:53

fleshed out in when

21:55

it goes from the

21:57

the the idea stage to the in

22:00

the world stage, it might not be what

22:02

the idea was. You know, you don't know it until

22:04

you try it. Or in the

22:06

studio we demonstrate everything

22:08

because if if if a, if

22:12

I tell an artist an idea or they tell me an idea,

22:14

what I envision and what they envision are completely

22:17

different. Like the two chefs preparing the same

22:19

we don't. We don't language isn't

22:21

um. We don't

22:24

have a way of communicating to where we actually

22:26

know what each other is saying or feeling. That's

22:29

also trust. Isn't it that

22:31

they trust what you're saying to them? Where they

22:33

trust what your thoughts. It's like if I gave

22:35

you two dishes of food and

22:37

I asked you to taste them and ask

22:39

you which one you like better. The only

22:42

right answer is the one that you like better.

22:44

Do you know what I'm saying? There is no right answer.

22:47

It's with taste. It's you taste

22:49

this, You taste this, tell me which one you like. There's

22:52

no same there's

22:55

no there are no wrong answers in

22:57

taste. It is I've been lucky

23:01

that when I'm true to my taste, other

23:03

people have liked it. It's not

23:05

the case for everybody. But that's the

23:07

best chance we have is

23:10

to make the thing that we love and

23:12

hope that someone else loves it. If you

23:15

do something that you don't like with the idea that

23:17

someone else might like it, what are the what are the odds

23:19

that's going to be good? Then

23:21

no one might like it? At least at least

23:23

I like it, you

23:26

know, and I can go to sleep knowing it's

23:28

the best I could do. I love it. If no

23:30

one else likes it, it's okay.

23:44

And when you just talk about musicians,

23:46

we were talking about Johnny Cash before

23:48

you showed me that film, which

23:50

actually shows an enormous amount

23:52

of food on the table. You know, it shows

23:55

a kind of vision of someone who loves to

23:57

sing. And how are the various

24:00

musicians that you worked with, how their

24:02

attitudes food? Foods a big part

24:04

of the process. And one of the

24:07

something I learned early on is that if you're working in

24:09

the studio and the music doesn't sound good, order pizza,

24:12

and there you

24:14

order pizza. And then if you when

24:16

you're eating pizza, the music sounds better, And

24:19

is it because it is better? That it's

24:22

just a psychological and

24:24

so how like the world is better when you're eating.

24:27

Musicians eat before they start playing,

24:29

or before. Most musicians

24:33

eat before they play, with the exception

24:35

of some singers who find

24:37

it hard to sing or maybe their voice

24:40

isn't as clear after they've eaten. Tell me

24:42

about some of the musicians and their food as

24:44

a musician, that you actually that they think.

24:47

One of the things that because the

24:49

nature of the recording studio is this

24:51

place you go to and sometimes you spend a

24:53

long time knowing what you're doing, and sometimes you

24:55

spend a long time trying to figure

24:57

out what you're doing, or waiting for thing

25:01

to come that you're there to do, but

25:03

you don't know what it is yet. So eating

25:05

in the studio is a standard. And

25:07

one of the things about Shangra Laud, the studio that I have

25:09

in Malibu is most studios have

25:12

one runner, maybe two, and we

25:14

have lots of runners. And when people

25:16

come and order food, food comes very

25:18

quickly, which historically in studio you'll

25:20

order lunch and it might not come for two hours,

25:23

whereas for whatever reason, at

25:26

Changer, lads very creature comfort

25:28

oriented and we get really good food

25:30

really fast, and sometimes we even have a chef because there's

25:32

the kitchen. If you ever saw the movie the last

25:35

walls the band are

25:37

in the kitchen at Changer. Law, Um,

25:40

that's the You came into my house today and

25:42

the first thing you said was let's eight. Yes,

25:44

he did quite quickly. It is the habit.

25:46

A friend of mine once said that his family

25:48

had to rule that there should be no longer

25:51

than forty seconds when

25:53

someone walks into your house that they have a drink in their

25:55

hand. And actually, what I think that does is

25:57

actually very nice, because it means you're

26:00

opping what you're doing and you're

26:02

giving somebody something when they come in the house,

26:04

you know. And I think that means something, and

26:06

so are the artists that you do associate

26:08

more with food than others. But

26:10

that Johnny Cash did he eat? Johnny

26:12

Cash loved a restaurant in Los Angeles called

26:14

the Ivy, and whenever he would come to town, we

26:16

would always go to get into the Ivy. That was his

26:18

favorite place. Because also the way someone

26:21

eats, it tells you about the person, doesn't it.

26:23

I think I think so. I think if you go to

26:25

a restaurant, A lot of people say

26:27

to me that they wouldn't never hire anybody unless

26:29

they took them to a restaurant first. Are

26:31

they kind to the waiter? Are they impatient with the way

26:34

to do they share their food?

26:36

Bloomberg teld me that if he took somebody

26:38

out to lunch for a job interview and

26:41

they ordered a glass of wine, he wouldn't hire them.

26:43

Interesting friends sitting next to him said if they didn't

26:45

order a glass of wine, and wouldn't hire I

26:48

heard a story about Horston Wells that he

26:50

would finish his plate of food and as

26:52

soon as his plate was empty, he'd hold

26:54

it out next to him and count

26:56

to five, and if no one took the plate, you would

26:59

drop it on the floor. Really, I

27:01

will say a pet peeve

27:04

is I do not like to see an empty plate in

27:06

front of me for any length of time. As

27:09

soon as I finish eating, I really hope someone

27:11

takes it away. What if the person next to is

27:13

still eating, that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter, And

27:15

I'll often move my plate in

27:17

it and maybe you rude managers away

27:20

from me. Yeah, I don't know why it is. It's

27:22

been a lifelong I

27:24

don't know what it is a good discussion

27:26

with the therapy.

27:29

What is it about the empty plate that you don't want to sit

27:31

behind. It's

27:34

interesting, though, what about the days

27:36

of Death Jam In the beginning, it is

27:38

known that you created this incredible

27:41

music recording company

27:43

by nurturing artists, by

27:46

being brave, by being radical, by

27:48

seeking them out, by being kind to them.

27:51

What was that like? I would say the recording

27:53

studio that we worked in most I dubbed

27:55

it chun King House of Metal, which

27:58

is still what it's called to day, although the

28:00

studio moved to a different location and

28:02

it was in Chinatown and we would eat

28:05

like Chinese food because we're in town New York.

28:07

Food is great. Was that when you became vegan?

28:09

No, I became vegan right when I

28:11

moved to California in college.

28:13

The first thing I gave up with soda. I used to drink

28:15

a sixty four ounce Pepsi with every meal,

28:19

insane, and then I gave that up and

28:21

I switched to a picture of iced coffee,

28:24

and without knowing I was trying to

28:26

replace the caffeine with the caffeine. I didn't know

28:28

that, but I drank a lot of iced

28:31

coffee. And then I gave up

28:33

caffeine at that point in time, and then I was

28:35

only drinking water. Then

28:37

I gave up red meat, and I got to the point

28:39

where I was basically eating chicken and vegetables.

28:42

I never really liked fish, so I didn't

28:44

eat fish. I never really liked eggs, so I

28:46

didn't eat eggs. So it was chicken and vegetables.

28:49

And I remember a friend of mine gave me a book called

28:52

Diet for New America, which was

28:54

an anti meat book, and they said,

28:56

if you read this book, you're never gonna want eat

28:59

chicken again at the and I decided before I read

29:01

the book, I'm an experiment with not eating

29:03

chicken, just to see how

29:05

long I can go. And then I ended up and never

29:07

eating chicken for twenty something

29:10

years. So at that point, you would and what

29:12

made you stop? In vegan? I weighed

29:14

a hundred pounds more than I do now. I

29:18

was terribly depressed, bad

29:21

skin, I was sick for a long time.

29:24

I worked with a performance expert who

29:27

really wanted me to eat animals, and I wouldn't

29:29

because I was a vegan and that was not an

29:31

option. What is a performance expert. It's

29:34

a person he worked with Olympic athletes

29:36

or heads of companies, different

29:38

people. He was a doctor, and

29:41

I heard about him. I read a book. This is when

29:44

I was really big, and you know, could

29:46

barely walk to the end of the block

29:48

without being out of breath. And I read

29:50

a book by a guy who ran a

29:52

thousand miles in eleven days,

29:55

and and I just thought, it's

29:57

like, I can't walk down the block, yet there's

29:59

a human who can run a thousand

30:01

miles in eleven days. Some things I'm doing something wrong.

30:04

I'm doing something wrong. And in

30:06

his book he talked about meeting this guy

30:08

named Phil Maffitone who changed the way he trained.

30:11

And I sent him a message saying I'd

30:13

like to hire him as my doctor. He was based in

30:15

Florida at that time, and I was living in California,

30:18

and he sent me back an email saying I've retired.

30:21

I've stopped my medical practice, and he and

30:23

mentioned he didn't know who I was at all, and

30:26

he said I gave up medicine to write

30:28

songs. And I wrote

30:30

back, well, if you're interested,

30:33

I can mentor you on the songwriting

30:36

if you can mentor me on the health stuff. And then

30:38

I saw him several times. They ended up living in my

30:41

house for two years and I did everything

30:43

he said. He got me to eat eggs and

30:45

fish, neither of which I ever liked,

30:49

purely as medicine. He said, just think of this

30:51

is this is the medicine you need. I

30:53

know you don't like it. You're not eating

30:55

it for pleasure. You're eating this because you need

30:57

this animal protein. So

31:00

I did that and I got

31:02

much much healthier, but I didn't lose

31:04

weight yet. And he said, I

31:06

watch everything you eat. I'm with you every day.

31:09

I see how you exercise. He said,

31:11

ninety nine out of a hundred people, all the white would fall

31:13

off. For some reason, it's not falling off. And

31:15

then I thought about, well, my mom was obese

31:17

eventually in a wheelchair. Maybe

31:20

it's just a genetic thing. It is what it is. And

31:22

then I went out to lunch one day

31:25

with Mo Austin, you know, passed

31:28

away years old.

31:30

He was one of my mentors

31:33

in music and maybe the most beautiful

31:35

person in the music industry, really beautiful

31:37

person. And if you knew his wife, Evelyn, she was

31:39

incredible, a light being, really

31:41

beautiful, beautiful people. And

31:44

we went out to lunch one day and he said, you know,

31:46

I'm really getting worried about you. You're really big.

31:48

I know you work, I know you walk, I

31:50

know you care. You know you're diligent

31:53

about what you eat. But you're really getting big, and I'm

31:55

worried about your health. I'm gonna get the name

31:57

of the nutritionist. I want you to go to my guy,

31:59

and I want you to do what ever he says. And I said,

32:01

final, I'll do it, knowing it wouldn't work because I've

32:03

tried everything, but I'm

32:06

I love him. I'll do whatever he says. And

32:08

he sent me to a weight

32:10

loss specialist at U C l A. And

32:13

he put me on a diet of seven

32:16

protein shakes a day and

32:18

it was just water and egg protein,

32:21

and then one meal a

32:23

day at the end of the day, a meal which was fish,

32:26

soup, salad, very low calorie,

32:28

low carb, high protein meal. And

32:31

I did that and in fourteen months I

32:33

lost pounds. That's

32:37

it's like a whole like a whole person probably,

32:41

so at that point in time, I

32:43

was eating drinking egg shakes, still

32:45

eating eggs, still eating fish,

32:48

but not eating any other meats. And then

32:50

I read a book called The Paleo Solution, pretty

32:53

explained how all the different foods work in our body,

32:56

and I believed every word of

32:58

it. And it talked about how timately

33:00

red meat is the single best thing that

33:02

you can eat. And I was torn

33:05

because in my mind, I'm still a vegan.

33:08

I'm eating fish and eggs

33:10

as medicine. I'm drinking these

33:12

egg shakes to lose weight, but

33:14

I still don't eat flesh. You know, I don't

33:16

need animal flesh. And

33:18

I believed in the book so much

33:20

that I bought a hundred copies and I was giving them people,

33:23

but I wouldn't do it because I was a vegan, so I could

33:25

you know, it didn't I couldn't do it. And

33:28

after about a year of giving this book away,

33:31

it just felt like it's disingenuous

33:34

to be sharing this information and not

33:36

doing it myself. Doesn't seem right. And

33:38

it was on my birthday. Modiella and I. Modielle

33:41

was a very I was a vegan, she was

33:43

a vegetarian. We went out to dinner

33:45

one of our favorite restaurants in Los Angeles called

33:47

Capo. If you've been a Capo in Santa

33:50

Monica, spectacular restaurant, maybe the

33:52

best in l A. And they

33:54

grilled meat on an oakwood fire.

33:56

Really, I think it's oak,

33:58

might be Pecan in its oak. Incredible

34:02

meat place, although I always went there and eight fish

34:04

and they had great fish. So we

34:06

both ordered fish like normal, and we ordered a steak

34:09

and we had it in the center of the table

34:11

between us and we ate

34:13

our fish, and then each of us had

34:15

one bite of the meat. And it

34:17

was a terrible experience because

34:21

if you haven't eaten meat for in

34:24

that point twenty three years, it's

34:26

like eating human flesh. It's

34:28

it's an insane thing to get over the way

34:31

our brains work. Even the smell

34:34

of meat cooking was a hard thing to be around back

34:36

then. But I believed it was what was healthiest,

34:38

even though I had been weaned off

34:40

of it through this, through this process,

34:44

and we did that maybe every week or

34:46

two we would go to Capo and have

34:48

a bite or two of meat, and then

34:51

after about six weeks we

34:53

were able to just order a steak. We were just talking

34:55

about your house in Italy. So you chose

34:57

to live in Italy, which has passes every

35:00

few times a day. Do you eat carbs?

35:03

Now? We eat in Italy?

35:05

All the rules change said certain things,

35:08

there are certain there are certain rules at certain times,

35:11

have one called travel day, which is on a travel

35:13

day where you're flying. I don't really like to fly,

35:16

so one of the rules of travel days you can eat

35:18

anything you want. Most

35:21

of these things have more to do with what you do

35:23

all the time. So on a on

35:25

an all the time basis, we eat

35:28

red meat and some vegetables. That's our

35:30

that's what we mean. And I'll say I'll eat

35:32

meat, I'll eat chicken, but I think it

35:35

seems like grass fed beef seems to be the best.

35:37

Or wild game will eat, will eat a good

35:39

amount of wild game bison. Um,

35:44

that's pretty much what we care.

36:01

My last question to you, Rick Rubin,

36:03

is what would be your comfort

36:05

food? Pizza? And I

36:08

try to do it as infrequently

36:11

as possible, but it is the one that's the default.

36:14

Too much going on, tired,

36:16

bad mood, nothing,

36:18

you know, nothing feels like it's going to make it better.

36:22

Maybe pizza, okay?

36:24

And and I hope you don't need that

36:26

awful I don't. I want you to have. Thank

36:30

you so much for coming. Thank you. The

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