Rick Rubin has admitted that he knows “nothing” about music, and that he has no “technical ability” in the studio.
The legendary producer – whose genre-spanning career has included work with JAY-Z, Kanye West, Eminem, LL COOL J, Beastie Boys, Run-DMC and Public Enemy, as well as rock acts like The Red Hot Chili Peppers and Black Sabbath – said in an extensive interview with 60 Minutes that “barely” knows how to make music or even play an instrument.
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“Do you play instruments?” Anderson Cooper asked in a clip shared on Twitter. “Barely,” Rubin replied, to which Cooper retorted: “Do you know how to work a soundboard?”
“No. I have no technical ability, and I know nothing about music,” Rubin said, causing Cooper to laugh.
Elsewhere in the interview, which airs on Sunday (January 21), the music veteran said his taste in music has always been the driving force behind all creative choices. Rubin released his debut book The Creative Act: A Way of Being earlier this month, which further details this process.
“I know what I like and what I don’t like,” he said. “And I’m decisive about what I like and what I don’t like.”
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“So what are you being paid for?” Cooper asked. “The confidence that I have in my taste and my ability to express what I feel has proven helpful for artists,” Rubin modestly concluded.
Arguably one of the most revered and accomplished producers in all of music, Rick Rubin co-founded Def Jam Records with Russell Simmons in the early 1980s. He also launched the rock-oriented label American Records and at one point served as co-president of Columbia Records.
The 59-year-old has won nine Grammy awards and helped craft some of the biggest rap records ever made, lending his “reduced by Rick Rubin” touch to LL COOL J’s Radio, Beastie Boys’ Licensed to Ill and Public Enemy’s It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back and more recently Kanye West’s Yeezus.
Rubin’s lack of technical experience in music has been public knowledge for years, and in a previous interview with Channel 4 News said his creative decisions in part come from avoiding comparison to whatever’s popular or successful at the moment.
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“We each have a singular voice, we each have our own voice,” he said. “What I do is different than what you do…we all do something different and they’re not comparable. They have nothing to do with each other. It’s apples and oranges.”
He added: “So if you make something today and you think it can be better, tomorrow you can improve it. You can continually make the thing you’re making better. You can learn and practice and do anything.”
