EVERY SPOKEN WORD
80 min read · 16,368 words- 0:00 – 2:00
Less Is More But Harder
- DSDavid Senra
[static] Five years ago, I read this biography of you. It's called In the Studio. You and I were just talking about it before we started recording. One of my favorite ideas that I took away from that book that I think about probably every week is this concept that you have that less is more, but to get less, you have to do more. Can you talk a little bit about that?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. Um, if you're l- stacking a lot of things on top of each other, each one of those things becomes less important. So if you have 10 things, each one of them is one-tenth as important as one by itself. So if you're making something and you want the least amount involved, those things have to be really critically curated because they're doing the work of everything, and nothing is hidden. It's why it's not as easy as it sounds to, to, to do less. But it, it, the... When you see it, you can get the personality. I'll give you an example with guitars. If you... A, a lot of recordings are made where a guitarist plays, and then they double it and triple it, and they create this, like, wall of guitars. And when you, when there's a wall of guitars, you hear guitar, but you don't hear someone playing guitar. You just hear guitar. It becomes more generic. When one person plays it, and you can hear their fingers on the strings, it's got more personality. It's more human. And I tend to look for those things where it's the, the singular essence shows through.
- DSDavid Senra
What I'm always surprised about people that do great things, I think especially from people on the outside, uh, it's, like, the amount of volume that goes into it before, like, before you're presented with, like, their fi- finished work.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- DSDavid Senra
W- I, I know, like, you start, you know, you're obsessed with music when you're a, a teenager. You start Def Jam in your dorm room. You're, like, 18 years old.
- 2:00 – 4:00
Def Jam From The Dorm Room
- DSDavid Senra
What, what was the first example? Was it LL Cool J? Like, who was the first example where you're like, "Wow, there's a lot more work that goes into making a great piece of art, great product, great album than I ever knew"?
- SPSpeaker
I never thought about it because this was a, it was like a mission and a love, and I didn't think of it even as work. It was just what I wanted to do, is make these things. So the fact that it took a lot of work wasn't, it wasn't even in, um, it wasn't in consideration at all.
- DSDavid Senra
When you were 18 years old, 19 years old, it was just all music all the time?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. It's just, um, as a fan, I listened to music all the time. I fell in love with it. I wanted to be involved in whatever way that I could. Uh, hip-hop was just starting in New York City. It was still a totally underground movement, so the only place you could hear it was at one club downtown where I, where I was going to school. Um, there was only one club that you could hear hip-hop, and that was once a week. But other than that, it was only in, it was in the Bronx. It was in Brooklyn, but m- really just in, like, community centers and outdoor parties. It was underground and not well thought of kind of music. It was street music.
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
And, um, and I would go to this club every week and hear the music, and at that time, there would be a few hip-hop records coming out, 12-inch singles. No albums, only 12-inch singles. And, um, there'd be maybe one new record every two or three weeks, and that's all there was. And I would so go to the club every week, hear the music there, and then I would buy the one single that would come out every few weeks. And the singles didn't represent what the energy in the club was, and I wanted to feel that energy of the club. So I started, the first record I made was called It's Yours, and the purpose
- 4:00 – 6:00
Capturing Club Energy On Record
- SPSpeaker
of that was I was just trying to capture the energy of the club on record. And I didn't know anything about recording. I wasn't a professional. I was a kid. The fact that I didn't know what I was doing allowed it to be true to what hip-hop was.
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
Whereas all of the records that were coming out, the few and far between, 12-inch singles every few weeks, they were made by professionals who made other kinds of music. They weren't made by hip-hop people. Th- so an outsider with experience was making what they thought hip-hop was.
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
But if you went to the club, you knew what it really was, and the club was very stripped down. And it was s- scratching, break beats, drum machines, and rapping, and that's what the records were.
- DSDavid Senra
The ones that were produced by people producing other or making other genres of music, was it, like, too much polish to wh- was it, like, fake? How would you describe the difference-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... between what you were hearing in the club? So this is, like, your opportunity, essentially, y- your way into this.
- SPSpeaker
The records are like a documentary of the scene that was going on, and all of the other documents of that period weren't representative of the scene. They were representative of something else, so profession- professional, the professional, like, the Hollywood version of it, but that's not what it was.
- DSDavid Senra
Is this the, uh, the first, um, like, single you put out? It sold, like, 100,000 copies. Or is that the same one?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, something like that. It sold a lot... I mean, for, uh, for a record in that world, it took a long time. Probably took 18 months to sell 100,000, but over 18 months, sold about 100,000. And it was a, a hit, as much of a hit could be in something that would never be on the radio and, and a kind of music that nobody listened to or liked. A- as a matter of fact, back then, most people who were not hip-hop fans didn't even acknowledge it as music.
- DSDavid Senra
Wh-
- SPSpeaker
That's how far it was.
- DSDavid Senra
What'd they think it was?
- SPSpeaker
Don't know. It was same thing, though, with Elvis and rock and roll. Like, the grown-ups didn't
- 6:00 – 12:30
Going Deep On Influences
- SPSpeaker
acknowledge that as music. It was just some other thing that they didn't know what it was.
- DSDavid Senra
Okay, that-
- SPSpeaker
That's how foreign it was
- DSDavid Senra
... when you were 18, 19 years old, were you already studying older versions of music? Did you, you already going back?
- SPSpeaker
I always listened. Anything I liked, I wanted to hear everything that the person that I liked, everything they listened to that they likedI always wanted to understand
- DSDavid Senra
I do the same thing with biographies.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
So th- I, I wanna know more, more about this, but, uh, I'll find somebody that, you know, like Steve Jobs for example, I find him very interesting. I read a biography of him, and then every single one of these books, they'll talk about, like, half a dozen, maybe a dozen people, and I'm like, "Who's that? I don't know this guy."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
And I'll go in the bibliography and usually find books about the- their inspi- uh, the people that inspired them.
- SPSpeaker
Same.
- DSDavid Senra
Do you remember the first time you did that? Like, who were you like, "I'm really interested in this band or this artist. Let me find out who they were inspired by"?
- SPSpeaker
It's always been the case. Or the other version of it is, um, it's like it, where I would hear something for the first time. I can remember the first time I heard The MC5, which is, uh, a band from Detroit in the 1960s, kind of a proto-punk rock band. They're before punk rock, but it s- has punk energy. And I heard that and it was really cool. And then I remember going to a, a used record store, because the used record store had, had all the cool older stuff, and they knew the most about music. So I spent hours in used record stores and just talking to the people who worked there. Same like, um, you've heard Quentin Tarantino working in a video shop and just there's so much information around the people who really love this thing. Um, and I remember they said, "Well, if you like The MC5, you might wanna check out Iggy and The Stooges." And then I listened to The Stooges, like, oh, I love this, too. And that was another also Detroit, same time frame, same scene, and it was great music. Um, so it would either be music like the music that I found that I liked or music that inspired the music that I liked. Uh, both of those were things I would always pursue.
- DSDavid Senra
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- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... and then just do music.
- SPSpeaker
I didn't know it was possible to be a job.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah. Can you talk about that?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. I thought I would have a regular job. I, I didn't, I didn't know anyone who did music professionally or I couldn't imagine it. I, I didn't have any... And no one in my family was an artist, uh, so it wasn't a realistic expectation. So I thought I'd love music the way I always have. I could participate and make music if I want, but I would have a job to support myself 'cause I didn't think that that was possible to, for music to support my life.
- DSDavid Senra
You were in a band, right?
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- DSDavid Senra
You played inst- uh, I think guitar.
- SPSpeaker
Guitar.
- DSDavid Senra
Guitar.
- SPSpeaker
In a punk rock band, so it was very rudimentary.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah, and then DJ. I'm still a little confused. Can you, like, try to explain the path that led you to this very singular position that you, uh, that you have now?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. I just always followed what was interesting to me at the time. So when punk rock came along... Well, first, before punk rock would be heavy metal. Heavy metal at that time was really more like hard rock than what we think of now as heavy metal. So it would be Aerosmith, AC/DC, Ted Nugent. Those were kind of the mainstays of what arena rock was like when I was 13 or 14 years old. And I loved that music, and then I got a guitar and tried to play along, and it didn't, it didn't go well. But then when punk rock came along, I could... It was easier for me to play along because it was more basic music.
- DSDavid Senra
But how do you go from that to... Is DJ the next route in?
- SPSpeaker
Uh, the next thing that happened was in, in my interest in hip-hop in high school, there were some kids n- no one in my high school liked punk rock except me, but there were some kids who liked hip-hop, and this was in, again, in the very, very, very early days of hip-hop.
- DSDavid Senra
I think that's an understatement. I mean, the, the beginning of hip-hop, 'cause I remember reading, uh, about the early, um, founding of Def Jam.
- 12:30 – 14:00
Why Reduced By Rick Rubin
- DSDavid Senra
reduced by Rick Rubin on the sleeve, and then your, your dorm room address?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. I think all of them probably had the dorm room address, 'cause that's where I lived.
- DSDavid Senra
[laughs]
- SPSpeaker
And, um, reduced by, I probably said it for the first time on LL's record.
- DSDavid Senra
This is the thing that, like, I'm fascinated with. It's like this less is more, but to do, uh, to get less you have to do more. This stripping away of everything that's just, like, almost like religious devotion to simplicity and, like, timeless ideas. You were 19, 18 years old when you put that on his record.
- SPSpeaker
Well, I thought about the idea of produced by, and I thought the word meant to build up. Like I, I think of production as building, and really what I was doing was taking apart and reducing. I thought maybe reducing would be... Reduced by is more accurate in this case, and that's, that's how it happened.
- DSDavid Senra
So he brings you a song, and you- there's just too m- Like, can, what are you, what are you taking away?
- SPSpeaker
Well, in, in those days there weren't, he didn't, they, there weren't songs. It would be, um, he would just have notebooks of lyrics, and they weren't in song order. It was just rhymes. And, um, we would look at all the lyrics together and say, "Is there something here that could be the basis of a song?" Like, I need a beat, for example. That could be a repeated phrase that ends up being a hook. And, and the reason,
- 14:00 – 16:00
Beatles Structure Meets Rap
- SPSpeaker
like, it-- Many of the hip-hop records before the Def Jam records were somebody would start rapping, and then they would rap for a few minutes, and then they would finish rapping. It wasn't like a song. It was more like a monologue.
- DSDavid Senra
Almost like spoken word to a beat?
- SPSpeaker
Kind of, but, but it was still in the rap style, but it wasn't in a song structure. It was like Jamaican toasting. The fact that I grew up on The Beatles and loved The Beatles, and my understanding of music is based on The Beatles, and The Beatles were the greatest songwriters ever, and the structure of their songs are really, um, organized and tight. So based on what I knew about li- from listening to The Beatles, I applied that to rap music so that it would be structured more like a Beatles song instead of like a monologue or a Jamaican toasting record.
- DSDavid Senra
Okay, so there is four decades separating when you're working with LL Cool J and today. How similar or different from what-- Like, if you're working with an artist today, how different is what you're doing with that artist today compared to what you did with LL four decades ago?
- SPSpeaker
Probably not so different. It's, it's probably pretty similar. Just it, it depends on the artist. Like, because LL was a solo rap artist, and he didn't have a, a band or make music, I was responsible for making the, the tracks, and my version of that was a very stripped down, minimal thing. But now I get to work with bands sometimes that have a big sound, and there are a lot of players, and I'm looking for the essence of each of these artists, and th- the essence tends to be stripped down, but it's stripped down to what they are. Just finished a new album with The Strokes, and they're a band of five people, so it sounds like a band of five people. It doesn't sound less than that.
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
It sounds like what they
- 16:00 – 19:30
The Ruthless Edit
- SPSpeaker
are.
- DSDavid Senra
You have this idea of ruthless edit. I've heard you talk about it a few times on, on podcasts.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Can you explain what that is?
- SPSpeaker
Sometimes for the sake of the whole work, removing things about it that you really love is part of the process. And instead of if you ha- if you have 100% and you know at the end you wanna have 70% of what you have, like you have 30% too much, instead of whittling down that 30 to get to the 70, I would say reduce it to 40%, let's say. Force yourself to get to 40%, and then add back what's n- what's needed to get to the 70. And it, it, it works in a different way. You, you have a better understanding of the work after the ruthless edit because you find out, especially with a group, because in a group everybody votes. So with the Red Hot Chili Peppers, we'll record, for an album we might record 40 or 50 songs, and then all of us vote on A, B, or C. And then if everyone picks it as an A song, that's gonna be on the album. If it's really divided, it might not be. You know, it'll be, it'll be a democratic process until we get down to like what does everyone together think is the best thing that we can make. That's a ruthless editing process.
- DSDavid Senra
And you're just looking for the essence of what you think could be great. So, like, in that case you're, you're recording, let's say, 50 songs.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
And you say the album wants to have 10-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... or 12.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Well, what about, there's like, there might be three that we can't live without.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Is that the thought process?
- SPSpeaker
It helps to get to that point of what are the ones you can't live without, however few it is, and build from there. Build out from there.
- DSDavid Senra
What other interests do you have outside of music? Like, are you into, like, architecture? Like, I-- Is there anybody-- The reason I ask you that is, like, is there anybody else in different domains that you still, uh, have a passion for, that you see that use similar ideas that you do?
- SPSpeaker
In every domain there are people who, to make beautiful things. I like people who make beautiful things.
- DSDavid Senra
But, like, do, are you seeing that their, their thought process, do you find similarities between their thought process and your push for-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, I think it's, it's all the same. I, I think most of what I do is not really about musicI happen to work in music, but it's not about the music. Does that make sense?
- DSDavid Senra
Say more. It does, but say more about this.
- SPSpeaker
You're at Shangri-La and you walk through the space, and you see it doesn't feel like other places you've been.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah.
- SPSpeaker
It, it has the same aesthetic as the records I make or the things that I work on, the things that I like, things that I buy. You know, the objects I buy would have the same aesthetic. So it's all fitting into a, I'd say, worldview.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah, I feel this way, too, because, like, I mean, we, we talked right before we started recording about, you know, podcasting. I think we're both... have the same obsession with it, and I've had my first podcast for over a decade. And it started out just me reading biographies of people that built businesses, but over time, I realized, like, this same personality type. It's, like, the artist, the entrepreneur, the filmmaker, the musician. I've done podcasts on all of these kind of people, and I'm like, "I don't see any distinction between them."
- SPSpeaker
It's the same.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah.
- SPSpeaker
It's the same.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah.
- SPSpeaker
It's all the creative spirit.
- DSDavid Senra
I wanna, like... I have a bunch of, like, selfish things I told you I wanna, uh, talk to you about because there's just some
- 19:30 – 22:00
Eminem: The Most Obsessive Artist
- DSDavid Senra
people that have made massive impacts on my life. I told you, like, I grew up listening to hip hop. It's all I listen to this day. I listen to more podcasts than I listen to music now. But, like, it really gave, like, a, put a voice, like, uh, words to a feeling I had, even maybe in my subconscious.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- DSDavid Senra
Eminem was the first one that, like, I was... I, I heard his first album and I was just like, "This is how I feel." I didn't grow up in a trailer park in Michigan, but I know exactly what you're talking about with certain things with your family or th- certain things of, like, just becoming, you know, coming of age. I heard you say one time, I'm, like, obsessed with... I wanna spend time with him [laughs] and hopefully get him to record a podcast. I know this would be very difficult. But e- especially for, for you, who've worked with, you know, the best, the best of the best people over almost half a century, and for you to say that he might be the most obsessive artist-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... that you've ever worked for, it was like I literally screenshotted that and saved it on my phone. I look at it all the time. Why did you say that? Like, can you just tell me about what it's like working with him?
- SPSpeaker
It feels like his entire life is centered around writing words. He's totally preoccupied with that, so he always has a notebook. He's always making little notes. He writes tiny, tiny letters, and he's always making notes. And at one point, I asked him, because he's got notebooks and notebooks and notebooks, and I said, "Are, are you working on a new song?" He's like, "No, I'm just, like, keep- keeping active, keeping active in the skill set." And I said, "Are you gonna put those in a song?" He's probably said 90% of it will never be in a song. He's just writing, just writing, and that's what he does. He writes.
- DSDavid Senra
Does he apply that to, like, other elements of making a song, though, just, not just writing? 'Cause he does a lot of his own production, right?
- SPSpeaker
He does, and I would say the same type of obsessive. It's what makes him great. He's obsessed.
- DSDavid Senra
Have you come across anybody that you consider great that hasn't, that's not obsessed?
- SPSpeaker
I'm sure there are. I h- have to think about it, but it, it's... That's not the only way to do it. For some people, it happens in a more natural way, and for some people, it's more of a... Work ethic is always a, a part of it, but for some people, work ethic is the reason they are who they are, and there are other people who are just incredibly talented and have enough work ethic to get over the finish line.
- DSDavid Senra
What do you think it's for you?
- SPSpeaker
I don't like to quit. I like to see things through. When I start something, I like to see what it can be.
- DSDavid Senra
From the outside, uh, 'cause, you know, you have this whole, like, very relaxed, like, Zen
- 22:00 – 25:30
Lazy Workaholic
- DSDavid Senra
vibe.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
But I, I, I swear, I think underneath is, like, a workaholic.
- SPSpeaker
Oh, for sure.
- DSDavid Senra
Okay.
- SPSpeaker
For sure. I'm a lazy workaholic.
- DSDavid Senra
A lazy workaholic. You... No, you gotta say more about that. [laughs]
- SPSpeaker
That's what it is. Like, uh, I-
- DSDavid Senra
'Cause it doesn't feel like work? Explain.
- SPSpeaker
No, no, no. I have to force myself to do it, but I do force myself. My demeanor would be to do nothing.
- DSDavid Senra
Rick, I don't believe that.
- SPSpeaker
It's true.
- DSDavid Senra
No, you love this too much, though. What do you mean?
- SPSpeaker
That's the po-... So I love the beautiful thing, and it takes a lot of work to get to the beautiful thing.
- DSDavid Senra
You like the end result?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Is that what you're saying?
- SPSpeaker
I like, I like to get there. I like to get to the point of where it's like, okay, press the send button and share it with the world.
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
That's a great feeling. Like, I, I like it enough for you to get to hear it.
- DSDavid Senra
Okay.
- SPSpeaker
But all of the work up until then, it's like, "Oh my God, I have to go to the studio today."
- DSDavid Senra
That's surprising to me.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. It's like-
- DSDavid Senra
I thought-
- SPSpeaker
... it's such a beautiful day. Wouldn't it be nice to just go out and have lunch with friends? But my whole life has been, you know, most of my life was in the first 25 years was in a dark room for 16 hours a day, seven days a week, in New York City working on music.
- DSDavid Senra
No, you'd be rather be out here barefoot, butt naked in the sun, I think.
- SPSpeaker
Now.
- DSDavid Senra
[laughs]
- SPSpeaker
But I... Not then. Not then. But I-
- 25:30 – 29:00
Protecting The Moment Of Magic
- SPSpeaker
from nothing to something really good, and then the whole rest of the process after that is protecting that because it's, it's super delicate.
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
When it happens, it's like this miracle happened and this magic thing happened, and now we have to protect it through the rest of the process to not ruin it. When it comes together, let's say a band is playing and doing take after take after take. When it's really good, we all kinda look at each other, like, as they're playing, it's like, it's scary because you don't want it to end. Like, you don't want it to stop because we know if it stops, we can't control it. We can't do it again. It's not like that. It's this moment in time where something magical happens. So we spend a lot of time waiting for those, and I can't say that's fun. It's not fun. It's, it's just, like, takes a lot of patience.
- DSDavid Senra
So you have to force yourself to do it.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Have you ever just, like, um, g- gave up in that moment and just walked away for a little bit?
- SPSpeaker
Mm-mm.
- DSDavid Senra
So you... Okay, so you do have this, like, this-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... really-
- SPSpeaker
Good work, work ethic.
- DSDavid Senra
You have work ethic and discipline.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Okay. But it would still be, if you could-
- SPSpeaker
It's frustrating and boring and takes a great deal of patience. It's like waiting for paint to dry. You're just waiting, waiting, waiting and trying different things, and nothing works until something either works or something happens, and it just comes together. And, and it... I can't tell you why.
- DSDavid Senra
Explain, like, what people do to kill these special moments, though.
- SPSpeaker
Once-
- DSDavid Senra
'Cause you kept saying, like, "We have to protect this."
- SPSpeaker
Once you're-
- DSDavid Senra
"We have to protect this."
- SPSpeaker
... aware of it, it's harder to protect. Like, in the, in the process of it happening, if you realize this is it... It's like, it's like, um, what is it in golf? The yips. You know, like wh- when you're playing golf, if you-- like, if you start thinking about it instead of just being in it, you can't do it anymore. So i- it's almost like you have to get out of yourself to allow it to happen. Maybe not me, but for the artist. The artist has to get to this place where it's like they don't even know they're doing it. It just happens. It's not a performance. It's something else. It's, it's a... It's this, like, a real moment happens, and it's thrilling.
- DSDavid Senra
I think you're speaking to my soul right now because there's, uh, something I heard Steph Curry talk about one time where they were like, "What do you think of when you're taking a shot?" And he goes, "Absolutely nothing."
- SPSpeaker
Exactly.
- DSDavid Senra
And so, like, when I... I read books for a living, essentially-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... before I started this, and, you know, people... I've had authors reach out to me after I did their book, and they're like, "How did you get to the essence of it?" Like, "What were you thinking? What are you thinking of when you're doing this?" And I was like, "Nothing. I just read, and if something sticks, jumps out to me, I don't think at all."
- SPSpeaker
That's it.
- DSDavid Senra
"I just underline it." And then I'll go back through if I, when I reread the highlight. If it's still interesting, it was interesting the first time.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Now it's interesting the second time.
- 29:00 – 32:30
Dana White And Becoming A Podcaster
- DSDavid Senra
it"-
- SPSpeaker
It's in the way
- DSDavid Senra
... nothing. I'm thinking of nothing.
- SPSpeaker
Yes.
- DSDavid Senra
That's really interesting. So let me, let me, uh, ask you this though. So you're fucking Rick Rubin. You can do whatever you want. Why are you choosing to spend so much time podcasting, then?
- SPSpeaker
I like meeting the people. And even before the podcast started, I would still, if someone was interesting to me, I would reach out to them, wanna spend time with them, hang out with them, and just learn from them, really. I can remember the, the one where it became obvious to do the podcast was Dana White. Someone introduced me to Dana White.
- DSDavid Senra
I'm recording with him next week. [laughs]
- SPSpeaker
Great. He's great.
- DSDavid Senra
He's incredible.
- SPSpeaker
And I said... He actually reached out to me, and he's like, "Anytime you wanna meet, I'm down." I was like, "Great, let's do it." We met, we sat at my house. We sat outside. We talked for about three hours, and at some point in the conversation I said, "Do you mind if I record this? Because I feel like I'm not gonna remember what we're saying, and I'm really liking this story." And that was sort of a breakthrough of like, this is kind of what doing a podcast is like. I'm al- I already do this in my life. I don't record them, but I meet the people that make things that are interesting to me, and I spend time with them, and I listen to what they do, and I ask a lot of questions because I'm curious. So it really is an outgrowth of my normal life. So I like doing that.
- DSDavid Senra
Deel is how the best founders turn the world into their talent pool. I've been studying how history's greatest founders operate for a decade, and one thing they all have in common is they understand that recruiting and hiring the very best talent is your most important priority. A players recognize other A players, which is why top companies like Ramp, Shopify, 11 Labs, Uber, and DoorDash all use Deel. Many of the top founders I know have personally invested in Deel after using their product, and what they discovered is that Deel is the best company in the world at building infrastructure for global hiring. Deel will help your business hire, pay, and manage any worker anywhere in the world so you can retain the best talent anywhere and spend the rest of your time focusing on what you do best, delivering value to your customers. The founder of 11 Labs has a great description of the value Deel can give your company. He said, "We built 11 Labs to break down language and communication barriers. With Deel enabling us to hire and support exceptional talent anywhere, we can accelerate our innovation and bring more voices, stories, and ideas to every corner of the world." Deel is trusted by over forty thousand businesses. Learn how they can help your business today by going to deel.com/senra. That is deel.com/senra. We were talking before we started recording, like I may be the person that's most obsessed with podcasting in the world. I listen to thousands of episodes.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- DSDavid Senra
I was listening to your podcast, Broken Record-
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm
- DSDavid Senra
... back in the day. I was like, "This is incredible," and you were heavily into, like, interviewing musicians back then.
- SPSpeaker
That was the format of that show, was just talking to musicians.
- DSDavid Senra
And then Tetragrammaton, you took, in my opinion, to another level, and you're talking to all kinds of incredible people. I listened to... I just had a conversation with Tobi Lütke, founder of Shopify.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, amazing.
- DSDavid Senra
I used one of your episodes to prep because he's so-
- SPSpeaker
He's great
- DSDavid Senra
... such a unique mind.
- SPSpeaker
Great.
- DSDavid Senra
One of the most interesting conversations I had. But I, I was-- I, I analyze people, like, you know, there's a handful of podcasters that are really great. There's a couple million in the directory. Only a handful are really great. Yours is really great, and I'm like, "Why the hell? How-- It's unfair. This guy is, like, gifted at music, and now he's gifted at podcasting. Why is this the case?" And what I came up with, and I started analyzing and thinking about what you do in your day job,
- 32:30 – 44:00
Professional Listener
- DSDavid Senra
what you've done for f- over four decades, and I was like, "He's a professional listener."
- SPSpeaker
That's true.
- DSDavid Senra
I don't... He's listening to the guest. He is in the moment with the guest.
- SPSpeaker
Yes.
- DSDavid Senra
And it's like that is why, one of the reasons why, o-obviously, you're, you have a lot of interesting things to say, but one of the reasons, in my opinion, that you're so great at podcasting.
- SPSpeaker
Well, I think in real life, people like to talk, and they don't like to listen, and often in a conversation, you'll be with someone, and they'll be saying something, and you'll be thinking about, "Okay, this is what I'm gonna say in response to that." You're not really, you're not really present. Back and forth, that's what it is. Like two people waiting for their turn to say what they think, and, um, this is different. And it really... I think it came from listening to music, 'cause I listen to music in a very deep way. I close my eyes. I really pay attention. It's not, uh, it's not wallpaper. It's like I go into the music. In some ways, I think my relationship with music allowed me to never drink or take drugs, because listening to music for me is totally a psychedelic experience. I can feel the music, and I can be transported by the music. Not all music, but good music. So I close my eyes. I feel it, and then at the end of it, I open my eyes, and I'm surprised where I am, because I've, I've been gone when I'm listening. So I listen deeply, and I wanna know. I really wanna understand things. So I'm comfortable asking questions, and I really listen to what someone's saying, and if someone says something I don't understand, I'll ask a question to clarify so that I can understand it. I also don't have any judgment. I don't, I don't think that I have a way that, like, my way is the right way, and I'm not comparing what's being said to me about what I think. What I think is not part of it. I'm just... I just want to truly understand what's being shared with me, and if someone says something that's very different than what I believe, I wanna know more. It's like, "How did you get to that? Why, why, why do you think that?" Because maybe I'll learn something. Maybe, maybe I have it wrong, you know? Like I, I don't, I don't know anything. I wanna know more. So through talking to people and really listening, you really get to meet people, and, and as a l- as a professional listener, I've found some people, it's disarming to talk to someone who really listens, because it's so rare. Most people don't listen.
- DSDavid Senra
When I listen to your podcast, I feel you have this combination of, like, sincere interest-
- SPSpeaker
Yes. True
- DSDavid Senra
... in the other human being.
- SPSpeaker
Yes.
- DSDavid Senra
And a desire, I think you just said this, but the way I think about it is, the way I think about you when I listen to your podcast is, like, a desire not to form an opinion, but to understand.
- SPSpeaker
That's it. That's it. I just wanna understand. I wanna understand to broaden my scope, to see the world. I wanna see the world through your eyes, you know? I wanna see the world through... Someone made something that's beautiful to me. I wanna understand how they see the world. Someone makes a great discovery. I wanna know what was the process that allowed that to happen. I'm curious.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah, there doesn't seem to be an end to your curiosity either.
- SPSpeaker
I'm interested. I've always been interested. I, I think of myself as a researcher. I've always... Like, when the internet came along, anything that I'm interested in, I'll go forever, going deeper and deeper and deeper into a topic just to get any glimpse and to read opposing opinions and go deeper and deeper and deeper and just trying to understand. I'm curious.
- DSDavid Senra
You think of yourself as a researcher?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. That's what I do most of the time, is research.
- DSDavid Senra
Okay, I don't know about this. Tell me about this.
- SPSpeaker
Well, a, not a researcher in a professional way.
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
But anything I'm interested in, I wanna know everything about it, whatever it is. It w- and even mundane things. If I drink coffee, I wanna taste a million coffee... I wanna find the best coffee. I wanna read what every person who knows about the best machine says about every machine, and then test every machine, and it's just a fanatical devotion to finding the best version of whatever it is.
- DSDavid Senra
Is it all-consuming for you when you f- when you find these, these pockets of interest?
- SPSpeaker
I'd say so. There's no end. I don't get to an end to that process.
- DSDavid Senra
I admire people that do things for a very long period of time, and I... You can tell a lot about people by what they admire. And it's just like, I wanna do these kind of podcasts till I die. Like, because, like, what's your s- strategy? What's, what success look like you for f- in five years, in 10 years? One, that I'm still doing it, and two, that I'm just making things that I'm proud of.
- SPSpeaker
That's it.
- DSDavid Senra
There's no fucking download number. There's no how many ads I sell.
- SPSpeaker
Exactly.
- DSDavid Senra
It's just like, that's it.
- SPSpeaker
Exactly.
- DSDavid Senra
And I'm terrified that one day, you know, I'm gonna wake up and be like, "I don't wanna do this anymore." [laughs]
- SPSpeaker
No, but the only reason that would happen is because something else would take over that you have to do, and that would be fine too. Like, I-
- 44:00 – 47:00
Fishing And Showing Up
- SPSpeaker
that feeling of, "It wasn't good. It's not good. Oh my God, it's good." And it's like a miracle because nobody knows how or why that happened. It's not in our control. That's the other thing about it that's really... It really is magic. So I'm addicted to the magic part of it, but I'm not addicted to everything leading up to those magical moments. I'm patient. I'm patient enough to wait forever for that thing to happen, but it's, it's not fun. Like, some people really look forward to fishing. It's like fishing. It's like you can go out and spend a whole day fishing and not catch any fish. It's like that. You can work in the studio for a day or for a week, and nothing good can happen. That's, happens. It's out of our control. But when the good thing happens, it's like, "Ah, there it is. That's why we're here."
- DSDavid Senra
That fishing analogy is really important to me. I've heard you say this, uh, a few years ago.
- SPSpeaker
It's true. It's, it's, it's the best example.
- DSDavid Senra
I heard Akon one time describe, uh, working with Eminem, and he shows up into Detroit, and he gives him a call. He's like, "All right. I figure we're gonna do a night session." You know, these guys are usually nocturnal.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Calls him at, like, 7:00 PM, and Em's like, "Yeah, I'll, I'll see you tomorrow." And Akon's like, "Tomorrow? Like, what are you talking about?" Shows up and doesn't realize that he treats it like a job.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Shows up at 9:00 AM.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Right? He's in the studio writing, like you're saying-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... recording verses. I think it's, like, let's say noon. He literally will be in the middle of a verse, and like, "Oh, I'll be right back. I'm gonna take lunch."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
And he's like, "What?" [laughs] He goes, comes back at 1:00, goes back to work. At 5:00, he says, "All right. See you the next day."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
And people, like, misunderstood what Akon was saying. It's like he doesn't wait around for inspiration.
- SPSpeaker
No.
- DSDavid Senra
He shows up every day knowing that if he does the work-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... then it will come.
- SPSpeaker
Yes.
- DSDavid Senra
It's exactly what you're saying about fishing.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. And inspiration is a real thing, too, but it's both. Like, if you only wait for inspiration, it won't ever come. Like, you have to work and be there and show up. If you're not, if you're not in the practice of allowing the thing to happen, it won't happen. Doesn't mean it will. Just because you do the, show up doesn't mean it will happen, but if you don't show up, it won't happen.
- DSDavid Senra
Brian Halligan founded HubSpot 20 years ago, and he has this line about AI that I keep thinking about. He said, "Most companies are using AI to make their teams more productive, but the companies that will thrive make the company itself the intelligence." And that is exactly what HubSpot does. HubSpot gives you AI that works, AI that actually knows your customers and your business. Your AI needs to know what you know, your actual customer conversations, your sales history, what worked last quarter and what didn't. HubSpot connects AI to your real customer data, so when it writes an email, it knows this customer asked about pricing three weeks ago, it knows what campaign brought them in, and it knows that they already contacted support twice this month. And that's when you start seeing actual results. Visit hubspot.com to learn more. That's hubspot.com.
- 47:00 – 55:30
Johnny Cash And Constraints
- DSDavid Senra
You got me into Johnny Cash, who is a couple generations before me, and not only was the music great, but I loved you describing, like, the, what went into making it. Will you talk about that? But there was something, like, uh, the way I would like, uh, distill down what you were saying is, like, constraints are actually your friend.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
If you don't... Like, you, you can't do everything. So if you, if you artificially constrain yourself, you ca- you, it forces you to be more creative. Can you talk about this? I, I feel like you've used this a bunch in your career.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. It's like the idea of creating a palette, and the, the albums that speak to me most are ones when you hear them, you know if an, if an artist has 20 albums, but you hear a song, you know, "Oh, that has to be on that album, that seventh album, because that's the only album that sounds like that." Even though the band always sounds like the band, this group of songs sounds different than all the rest, and it, and it may be that there's some... It was either recorded in a different way, or all the songs are about a particular thing, or they're using different instrumentation than they used to use. I like it when an album, like, stands alone outside of an artist's career as a defining moment in time. It's not just more of the same.
- DSDavid Senra
But how is that tied to these, these constraints that you put on the work?
- SPSpeaker
It, that happens by coming up with, like, uh, a series of rules that only apply to this project. Those are the constraints. So that could be-
- DSDavid Senra
In the Johnny Cash example-
- SPSpeaker
In Johnny Cash's case, the first one wasI didn't know that it was gonna be a, a, an acoustic album, which it turned out to be.
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
Um, but that was something that through the process of recording I learned the most interesting version of this to me is when he's singing alone, which was really the demos in my living room, him singing me songs. That sounded better than when we went into the recording studio with musicians and played them with a band. It wasn't as interesting. I didn't know that in advance. That wasn't a premeditated idea. And then in terms of the material that he would sing, I grew up with this image, what, what spoke to me about Johnny Cash was this image of the Man in Black, and the Man in Black is a mythical character. Yes, Johnny Cash, but it's not just Johnny Cash. It's like the mythical Johnny Cash, the, the Johnny Cash who's the Man in Black. And the man Johnny Cash could sing a funny song. The Man in Black probably wouldn't sing a funny song. So the material that we picked was always through the eyes of what's something that the Man in Black, the legendary mythological character, what would he sing? And those are the songs that we chose.
- DSDavid Senra
And so in this case, the constraints are you, Johnny, a guitar. I, I think he said he didn't even use a pick.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
It was like his fingers [laughs] every, every guitar-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... every time he strung the guitar it was his fingers.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
And you guys in a house.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. But, but a big part of it too was the choice of material. That's a big part of it for, for those albums.
- DSDavid Senra
And it's looked at through the viewpoint of not a funny song, but a Man in Black would do this.
- SPSpeaker
And not even just a f- not even just a funny song. It had to have a certain amount of gravitas to fit the, a mythical character singing it.
- DSDavid Senra
When I think about everything I've read about you, and all, as much as I've heard you speak, it's like I feel like you would agree with the statement that, like, great things can't be made by a committee.
- SPSpeaker
Correct. Un- it would be unusual for that to be the case.
- DSDavid Senra
In many cases it's just a, there could be a band-
- SPSpeaker
It tends, it tends to water it down. It tends to water it down.
- DSDavid Senra
Is it... So this is the case in companies, since obviously, I, my, my main focus is on, like, entrepreneurship.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
It's like even if there is a group, there's usually, like, a main person. Is that the same thing in bands? Is there always, like, one def- like, there might be four guys in the band or five guys in the band. Is it usually the stronger personality that, that, uh, has more influence?
- SPSpeaker
In a band, what makes a band great is how the different musicians hear music and play together, and it doesn't have to be a single point of view. The Beatles are a great example because John and Paul really were very different people and wrote different kinds of songs and approached music in different ways. Jagger and Richards, same. There's opposition there. That's goes against exactly what you said. It's a different model. But then, like, in Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Tom Petty is really the, the flag bearer of the band, and everyone lines up behind Tom. They're all great, and they all can play great things, and they all add incredible things, but Tom is sort of the final word in what happens in that band. In a band like U2, it's democratic. Everybody in the band has to like it. If three of the guys like it and one of the guys doesn't, it doesn't happen, and that's another model that, that works for them.
- DSDavid Senra
So if we go back to this designing and constraints, your work with Johnny Cash was very simple. Go back all the way 40 years before that. I'm reducing, I'm not producing. I think in 2023 I listened to, I don't know, 600 to 700 individual... probably listened to two to three podcast episodes a day, so I don't know, 700, 900 episodes. I think the single best podcast episode that I listened to all that year was your episode on Tetragrammaton with Jimmy Iovine.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- 55:30 – 58:50
Church Business vs. Banking Business
- DSDavid Senra
just, like, drawn, you know, like a moth to a flame about what you wanna do.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Where he's like, "It was always work. [laughs] I never liked it."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
"It was always a job."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Like, "I like certain parts of it, but I just..." He's essentially just forced himself to do it.
- SPSpeaker
He said something really interesting that I thought really summed it up, which was, "Jimmy is in the banking business." These are his words. He said, "I'm in the banking business, and you're in the church business, and that's the difference."
- DSDavid Senra
Explain that. I love this.
- SPSpeaker
It's that I'm doing, uh, a passion and belief, and he's doing a bottom line, "What's gonna work? What's gonna be good for business?" And it's just two different thing, two different mentalities.
- DSDavid Senra
There's a great line in The Defiant Ones where he hears... He's producing Tom Petty, and he hears, uh [laughs] a song, and he goes, "This is house music." And Tom goes, "What do you mean?" He goes, he goes, "Find me," you know, whatever, "eight more albums." He goes, "That song's gonna buy you a house." [laughs]
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, so that-
- DSDavid Senra
And, and Tom-
- SPSpeaker
It's, it... We have a different, we have a... We're different in that way.
- DSDavid Senra
And Tom goes, "I've never heard somebody describe music that way." [laughs]
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Like, "This is gonna buy me a house."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
There's a bunch of stories that Jimmy, uh, tells in that, um, podcast with you about the crazy things that you see in the music business, you know, where, uh, I think he tells the story of, like, the Phil Spector coming to the studio with, like, a butcher's, uh, in a butcher's outfit, and he's got, like, guns strapped to him everywhere. And David Geffen's in the studio, and John Lennon's getting drunk. Do you have any, like, things that stand out from you? I've never heard you here tell any of these, like, stories of stuff you've seen inside the studio.
- SPSpeaker
I can remember doing a session with ODB, Old Dirty Bastard, from-
- DSDavid Senra
Wu-Tang Clan
- SPSpeaker
... from Wu-Tang, and I remember being nervous 'cause I'd never met him before, and his reputation preceded him, so I didn't really know what I was going into. And, um, and I thought, "I'm gonna, I'm gonna bring my dog." I had a Puli, which is a dog that has dreadlocks. And I'll be... And that would be dis- whatever's going on, if you see a dog with dreadlocks, it's interesting. Like, it, it-
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah
- SPSpeaker
... it, there's n- it's fascinating in its own way. And I had a friend of mine also filming everything 'cause I thought, "Well, if there's a camera, and if there's a dog, it's gonna be okay."
- DSDavid Senra
What was his reputation for you to do this, though?
- SPSpeaker
All kinds of crazy things, like-
- DSDavid Senra
Violence?
- SPSpeaker
Could be violence. Could be a lot of things that would not be good. [laughs]
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah.
- SPSpeaker
And just things I wasn't really prepared for, but I loved him. You know, I was a fan. And I remember we walked in, and he looked, and he pointed at the dog, and he said, "He's okay." And then he pointed at the camera. "He's gotta go." It's like, "Okay," and then he went, and then the session ended up going pretty well.
- 58:50 – 1:01:00
Run On Intuition Alone
- DSDavid Senra
intuition.
- SPSpeaker
All intuition.
- DSDavid Senra
Like, explain w- like, why you... You essentially, it, your entire life is just ge- uh, is, in my opinion, like, managed or c- or run by your sh- intu- intuitive feelings.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. I've always been true to what I feel, and it's worked out. I suppose if it didn't work out, then maybe I would have to try something else. But it's... The fact that I've stayed true to what feels right to me, and luckily, by the grace of God, it has resonated with other people, it allows me to continue doing it. But I suppose if that didn't happen, I would just make things for myself on a small level and keep doing it and have a real job.
- DSDavid Senra
Is this, your guided by intuition, tied to... I feel you have a skepticism of human knowledge. I think you've said, like, "I think we know very little about everything."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Uh, Thomas Edison has this famous quote where he's like, "We don't know 1/1000th percent of anything."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. I believe that. I believe we don't know anything.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah, so if you believe you don't know anything, then what is... The only other thing you could do is be guided by your intuition.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, and, and to try things and see what works. And, and just because one thing works doesn't mean that's the way that, that's the way it happens. That's a way that happened to work in that case.
- DSDavid Senra
I found one of my all-time favorite quotes when I was reading the book Zero to One. The quote says, "The single most powerful pattern I have noticed is that successful people find value in unexpected places, and they do this by thinking about business from first principles instead of formulas." That is exactly what AppLovin has done with their advertising platform, Axon. Axon connects you with over a billion potential new customers inside mobile games. Axon allows you to capture undivided attention. Axon ads are full-screen video ads that are watched for an average of 35 seconds. That is retention that blows other ad platforms out of the water. You can launch on Axon in minutes. You set the goal, and Axon achieves it. There's no complex setup, no expertise needed, and Axon scales quickly. They can put your ads in front of over a billion potential customers.
- 1:01:00 – 1:04:30
Jay-Z vs. Eminem Process
- DSDavid Senra
Other businesses have seen immediate results, have scaled to hundreds of thousands of dollars of spend per day, and increased their revenue by millions. So you wanna get started quickly before all your competitors are on Axon, and you can do that by going to axon.ai/cenra. That is axon.ai/cenra.I, I heard you, um, one time compare and contrast the, uh, approach of Jay-Z to Eminem.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
You worked with both of them. Can you talk about just how different they were?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. Em is much more, um, well, he writes down the lyrics, and he's really studious in the way that he works. And he'll also record take after take after take after it's written and try different things. Jay is much more spontaneous. It all happens in his head, and then he'll get up and s- say it once or twice, and that's it.
- DSDavid Senra
What's the energy when you're in the room with both of them, though?
- SPSpeaker
Em is totally involved in every aspect of everything, and Jay is like, "Play me a bunch of stuff. If I hear something I like, I'll think about it, and if not, I'll see you tomorrow." It's like Jay will only be there when he needs to be there, and if he hears something that sparks an idea, he'll sit and just say, "Play it over and over again. Play the music over and over a- again." And he sits in the back, and you almost... It's, it goes on long enough where you forget he's even there because he's just silent in the corner listening, sitting on a couch, listening over and over again. 30 minutes, 25 minutes later, he's like, "I got it," jumps up. He runs into the room, hit record, and he does the whole thing just from his head. It's amazing. He's the only person I've ever seen do that.
- DSDavid Senra
Ev- I think a lot of people know that he did Magna Carta Holy Grail essentially in two weeks. Like, he did the whole album in two weeks.
- SPSpeaker
Most of his albums were made very quickly.
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah, what's always interesting, it's like, yeah, he recorded them in two weeks, but these ideas he's been refining. It's not like when he's not in the studio he's not thinking about these. He's, like, refining these ideas over a long period of time.
- SPSpeaker
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Some of them, it all happens in a weekend, the whole thing.
- DSDavid Senra
That's crazy.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
As opposed to Em, who will work on a song forever.
- SPSpeaker
Yes. Very different. Just two different styles. Both amazing, but they just come at it from different... I, I think it's just different personality types.
- DSDavid Senra
What do you think Em's personality type is then?
- SPSpeaker
I would describe him as obsessive. You know, he's really perfectionist, uh, willing to do whatever it takes for it to be great and diligent, hardworking. And Jay's much more relaxed. Jay's, it just kinda happens for him. He's doing it, but it's just a different style.
- DSDavid Senra
Of the two, which one do you think you're clo- that your working style is closer to?
- SPSpeaker
I do different things, so it's hard to say. What I do changes according to who I'm working with. It's like whatever, whatever the artist needs is what my job is. So in some cases, it's totally hands-off, and in some cases, it's, "Well, we gotta
- 1:04:30 – 1:09:00
In Service Of The Artist
- SPSpeaker
start from the beginning and try to figure this out together."
- DSDavid Senra
Oh, so you know what? I just, I'm thinking of, like, it's kinda tied to what you were saying about being a professional listener, that you take a sincere interest in the person, whether you're recording a podcast with them or you're working with them in the studio. And so your goal, if I'm reading this correctly, is like, has really nothing to do with you. You, you fill your act of service to try to get them to be the best version of themselves.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Is that the way you think about it?
- SPSpeaker
Yes. I'd say that's, that's accurate.
- DSDavid Senra
Do you have anybody that plays that role in your life for you?
- SPSpeaker
I don't know if I do. I don't know if anyone produces me.
- DSDavid Senra
Could they reduce you? I don't know if there's anything to reduce here.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. I don't know. I, luckily, I have friends who, um, friends and family who are not particularly interested in what I do. So I have reality around me, a lot of just like, "That's crazy. Don't..." You know, like, a lot of, "That's a bad idea."
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
And, and it's interesting for me because some ideas I hear, "That's a bad idea," and it's like, "Okay, maybe you're right." And so, and many ideas it's like, "I'll show you. I'll show you it's a good idea. I'm, I'm, I feel I have to do this," you know?
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah, I could see that you take a lot of input, but I think you would be resistant to-
- SPSpeaker
I won't change my mind, but I'm open to hearing ideas and definitely open to help. If, if someone suggests something that makes it better and I see that, it's like, that's the best. I'm not closed-minded. Because someone offers information, even experienced wisdom, I might not always choose to use that information.
- DSDavid Senra
Do you think you have a big ego?
- SPSpeaker
I don't think so.
- DSDavid Senra
You have a lot of self-confidence, though.
- SPSpeaker
I have a lot of self-confidence.
- DSDavid Senra
But they even said, I read somebody met you when you were like 19, and they're like, "That's the most confide- self-confident 19-year-old I ever met."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. I think that's the mi- that's the mix. I think, you know, I'm lucky I learned to meditate when I was young, and meditation's been a big part of my life. So, uh, it, it's never been about ego. It's never been about me. You know? It's, it's, uh, I'm confident in being able to share what I'm experiencing. I hear something, like, "That's amazing," and I hear something else that's like, you know, it's not good enough, and nothing anyone can say will tell me otherwise. It's like I, I know. I can feel it.
- DSDavid Senra
So this confidence in your own judgment, 'cause you were just saying-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... you can have somebody who has a lot of experience wisdom.
- SPSpeaker
And when I say, when I say confidence in my own judgment in, this is how I see it, I'm not saying I'm right. I never say I'm right or I know what's best. None of those things. This is how I see it. I see it clearly. This is how I would vote for it. If I get to vote, I vote for this.But it's not my way or the highway at all.
- DSDavid Senra
What is your inner monologue like when you're making something? Is it positive, negative? Are you self-critical?
- SPSpeaker
Depends. Like, it, I would say rarely critical. What it usually is, is it starts apprehensive when we start because it could be anything. So at first it's scary, so I don't know what's gonna happen.
- DSDavid Senra
Even today?
- SPSpeaker
Even today. And there's usually expectation, because I've had success in the past, that if I'm there, it's gonna be great. So I feel this pressure of like there's expectation, and I know I can't control anything. It's gonna be the way it's gonna be. I know I'm patient, and I know I'll wait until it's great. And we start by experimenting and see what it could be, and as soon as there's a glimmer, as soon as I hear something that's good, then I relax. But until then, it's too open. You know? It could be too many things. But once something lands, whatever it is, I relax. It's like, okay, we have a, at least a direction to move in. It doesn't mean we stay in that direction forever, but having a direction is better than not having a direction. And when we start, we don't have a direction.
- DSDavid Senra
So you would say you don't have an, your, a, a, a s- like a self-critical inner monologue constantly playing in your mind?
- SPSpeaker
Never.
- DSDavid Senra
It's interesting. The reason I ask you this question is because, um, I was with a, a, an entrepreneur yesterday. Guy's worth $10 billion, and he wakes up every morning at 5:30-
- 1:09:00 – 1:13:30
Work As Diary Entries
- DSDavid Senra
paranoid.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
He lives like a paranoid life, and that's why he thinks he's good. This is very common with, like, a lot of people.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
And, um, I used to have a, a self-critical, like, kinda mean... I was fucking pretty mean to myself. There's a guy named Brad Jacobs, uh, yeah, I've actually had him on the show, and his... I've talked to him a bunch, and he used to have that, too, and now he's in the 60s. It's like it's counterproductive. It's not helping anything. And some- something I talk about this on the podcast. You can hear me mentioning it over and over again for a few years, and just something one day just fucking snapped, and I just don't do that anymore.
- SPSpeaker
That's great.
- DSDavid Senra
And I went back and I was reading my notes on you, and I was just telling, uh, my partner Rob about this, this way I look at the work we're doing now. It's like, I like Rick's framework that, like, if you look at your work, it's just like an entry to a diary.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
It's like there's nothing to be critical about because, like, you did the best you possibly could have done.
- SPSpeaker
In that moment.
- DSDavid Senra
In that moment.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
And then that was 10 years ago, and that was five years ago.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
And then what we're making today is-
- SPSpeaker
And I might not do the same thing I would have done 10 years ago, and that's fine. But I don't have any regrets about 10 years ago, that's what I thought. That's real. Each, each of those installments are real, so it's always true. It doesn't mean that that's who you are forever. That's who you are in that moment. It's really freeing. It's helpful for an artist to think that way because usually, especially when we're younger, we think the thing that we make is this is my o- this is my magnum o- magnum opus, and this is gonna define me for the rest of my life. And it's a, it's a daunting hill to climb. But when you realize it's like this is just the one today, and we're gonna make another one tomorrow, and hopefully the one tomorrow's gonna be as good or better than the one today. What's true today? What's the one... I s- I usually say that if you are excited to share it with your friend, like if, if, if I'm working in the studio and before, you know, long before a record comes out, if we're, we're making something, and if someone comes and I'm excited to play it for my friend who has good taste, who I know likes good music, it could come out then. Like, if, if I wanna play it for, for them, that's good enough for everybody. Do you know what I'm saying?
- DSDavid Senra
Yeah.
- SPSpeaker
But we-- But usually artists will feel like, "Well, I'll play this for my boys," but it has to be a lot better before regular people can hear it, and that's ridiculous. It's like as soon as I liked it enough to share it with one person, chances are it's ready for everybody.
- DSDavid Senra
I've seen you talk to a ton of musicians and artists on camera. Uh, I just fini- finished rereading this profile of, uh, that was in Colossus Magazine on Josh Kushner, and it starts out with him coming to seek your counsel. There's a ton of people that come to seek your counsel, and I feel almost like you're hold up, like your modus operandi is, like, holding up a mirror to them and just telling them to do what they know they want to do, but it's somehow more valuable if they hear it from somebody else. Does that make any sense to you? Do you resonate with that at all?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. It sounds right. I mean, there are occasions where someone will come to me and say, "I'm thinking about doing this crazy thing," and I'll say, "Hm, I, I wonder about that." But more often than not, when people share their hopes and dreams, that's all you need to know. It's like, "These are my hopes and dreams, but I'm afraid of this, this, and this." Mo- most often it's go with the hopes and dreams. Don't worry about any of that stuff 'cause that stuff doesn't matter.
- DSDavid Senra
What is the stuff that they're afraid of, over here?
- SPSpeaker
What someone's gonna say. Uh, will I be able to keep doing it? Um, my last one was successful. What do I do now? Success is a funny thing. You know, when you're young and you get successful quickly, no one's prepared for that, and it's awkward and uncomfortable. And you think that's the thing that you want, but when you get it, it's not like what you think it is. It's very different. And there are all these, uh, pressures that come with it that no one's ready for and no one learns how to do. And it's not like whoever, uh, you learn good habits from over the course of your life, they don't know how to deal with it because they're, they never got, you know, overnight famous or successful or, like, it's, it's a weird thing. Um-So a lot of artists kind of
- 1:13:30 – 1:16:00
Four Ways Success Destroys You
- SPSpeaker
implode in success.
- DSDavid Senra
Okay, so I wanna ask you why you have not imploded over this, this, this many decades. One of the most interesting things, uh, that Jimmy Iovine told me, we talked a lot about this, because, like, I'm obsessed with people that are just further down the line than I am.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
It's like there's just... The, the, the wisdom they gain from experience. Like, I'll re- I, I got the book knowledge. I need, like, the stuff that's not in there that they can, like, tell you. And he was just like, "Most people cannot handle..." You know, you guys have been around some of the most talented people, genius level talents that have completely imploded, maybe destroyed their lives, maybe died prematurely. And so he broke it down to, like, four things for me. He's like, there's like, "People can't handle success, and these are the pitfalls, David, that you should watch out for." One was drugs, second was alcohol, third was women, and fourth was megalomania. That, you know, it's really hard to get on stage and there's 80,000 people screaming your name, and over time they just think they're some kind of, like, they're not even human anymore, which you seem to be like, "I'm not special. I have no..." I know you say you have no talent, all this other shit.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
But, like, I, I'm not special.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
I, you know, I, I think that's... There's a lot of wisdom to that. It's just like, man, there's 10 million mes and 10 million yous-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... th- all over the world or wherever the-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- DSDavid Senra
... whiz. Do you think Jimmy's perspective on that is, like, the people that you've seen that were, had talent and had success and then destroyed it, is there anything else that he's missing from there?
- SPSpeaker
I think those are all of them. The, it's like, because the last one takes into account a lot of, like, there's both the, the mask of overconfidence and ego, which is hiding insecurity, or there's the insecurity, but they're, they're really the same. You know, they're just presenting in two different ways. Two different people have the same overnight success. One of them gets really boastful, and, "I'm the greatest that ever lived," and the other one is like, "Oh my God, they're gonna find out that I'm not, uh, it's r- that I'm really a fake." But those are both the same people. It's the same... They're two sides of the same coin. The, the megalomania is a way of hiding the insecurity. It's a, it's a brave face. They might not know this. They rarely know it, you know. It's different sides of the same imbalance.
- DSDavid Senra
So that leads me to the question
- 1:16:00 – 1:21:00
How To Sustain Success
- DSDavid Senra
I hinted at or maybe even said, like, how have you sustained suce- success over such a long period of time then?
- SPSpeaker
I think the fact that I learned to meditate when I was young and always had a, a, a, a grounded... And, and I, and the fact that I know it's not me. That's an... It's, like, those two things. Like, I'm grounded, and I know I'm lucky to participate in this magic that's happening. I get to be in the room when it happens, but it's not from me.
- DSDavid Senra
What do you mean it's not from you?
- SPSpeaker
I'm in the service of it.
- DSDavid Senra
You're, you're the conduit? Is that... What do you mean?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, I would say that. I'm in the service of it. I'm devoted to setting the stage to allow it to happen, and I'm patient and waiting for it to come. It's not like when it's great, it's like, "I did a great job."
- DSDavid Senra
Mm-hmm.
- SPSpeaker
It's not that.
- DSDavid Senra
No, I think the people that sustain greatness over time, even if they do something great, they don't, like, rest on their laurels. They don't go to sleep on wins. They just make something great, they're like, "All right, next." They try to do it again the next day, and they don't really think too much. Uh, Jimmy Iovine has... I keep bringing him up, but, uh, he has that great line where he's just like, "I don't have a rearview mirror, and I don't have a trophy room."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
He's just like, "I don't give a..." Even when he, we did the show, he's like, "I don't wanna talk about the past. I wanna talk about, like, what I'm working on in the future."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
They're all like that. I just had lunch with Jeffrey Katzenberg, same thing. He's just like, "Yeah, we can do the show, but, like, I wanna talk about what I'm working on now, not just what happened at Disney and, and everything else."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
It's just very, very common.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
Uh, like staying in the moment, being present. I, let me... Tell me if you disagree with me, uh, 'cause again, like, I have this interpretation of you in my mind 'cause I've been a fan of yours for a very long time, and going back to this, like, sustained success over a long period of time, I talked to James Dyson, the guy that invented, you know, the, the vacuum cleaner guy.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- DSDavid Senra
And he's a fascinating person to me. Number one person I wanted to meet because his first autobiography I think is so great, 'cause it's all about, like, him just enduring through struggle and refusing to quit. And something I didn't understand, even though I read his first autobiography five times, his second autobiography two or three times, and his encycl- He wrote an encycl- This, I love obsessed people. He's inventor. He wrote an encyclopedia while he's building his company on a history of great inventions.
- SPSpeaker
Got it.
- DSDavid Senra
And he's, there's like fucking 200 inventions in there. He's like, "Look at this little weird thing," and he's just, like, complete-
- SPSpeaker
Obsessed
- DSDavid Senra
... obsessed. But what I didn't understand what was driving him was, he told me this great story on the podcast where he, he goes, this is his or- his simple organizing principle. He's like, "I pick up a product," right? Cup. Pick up product. It exists. I go, "How can I make this product better?" Makes it better, puts it back down. Waits a little bit, picks it up, goes, "How can I make it better?" Makes it better, puts the dad down. He goes, "I just do that over and over again."
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
"And I've been doing it for 50 years."
- SPSpeaker
Yes.
- DSDavid Senra
So w- if I had to guess what your organizing principle was, that I think also influences the sustained success that you've had, is you just making things that you yourself like?
- SPSpeaker
That's it. And sometimes I'll go into a friend's house, and I'll think, "Hmm, the furniture in here isn't arranged in the best way. Maybe I'll rearrange the furniture."
- DSDavid Senra
No, you don't.
- SPSpeaker
I've done that.
- 1:21:00 – 1:23:48
The House On The Mountain
- SPSpeaker
making things for myself. You know, I give the example in the book of if you were to move into a house on the top of a mountain that no one could ever come and visit, and you made that the place that you most wanted to spend your time, and you really create, y- curated it to your taste. That's the job. It's not about I'm making this to show off to someone else. I'm making this because I wanna inhabit this. I make the music that I wanna-- I'm excited to listen to. Now, it's ridiculous. It, it doesn't work out that way because in making the music, we work on it, we listen to it a thousand times, and then when it's done, I... it's fine if I never hear it again. I never put on music I worked on, which is funny because I'm making it to be the perfect version of what I wanna hear. But in the process of doing that, there's so much listening involved that it's not fun to go back and listen to it for me. I wanna hear something new.
- DSDavid Senra
This idea of the u- the example that you use in the book of the house on the mountain-
- SPSpeaker
That no one can ever s-- no one will ever see
- DSDavid Senra
... say more about the thinking behind that, though.
- SPSpeaker
Well, it's, it's tr- I just know for me, if I was-- I don't decorate my home for, to impress someone else. I decorate my home to be the best version of the house that I wanna live in, and it's not typical. I'm willing to go to extremes to make the thing that I want to inhabit, and it's not for anyone else. It's just for me. Now, often, other people, if they do happen to come over, they're like, "Wow, I'd love to live in a place like this. I've never been in a place like this."
- DSDavid Senra
I think the metaphor that you're using there, though, is like a, almost like a, a map for people to find their life's work if they haven't found it yet.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
It's like, what are you already doing?
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. And what will you-
- DSDavid Senra
For you
- SPSpeaker
... and what will you do no matter what? What won't you stop doing regardless?
- DSDavid Senra
I always say it's like people say, "Oh, you know, if you love what you do, you would do it for free." And I was like, "No, there's another level to loving what you're doing." If you love what-- If you truly love what you do, they couldn't pay you to stop.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- DSDavid Senra
I think it's excellent advice for, uh, for helping people find their life's work. Rick, this was awesome. You've been a huge inspiration to me. Uh, I've used a ton of your ideas in my work, and I hope this is the first conversation of many between me and you.
- SPSpeaker
Great. Pleasure.
- DSDavid Senra
Thanks for doing this.
- SPSpeaker
Thank you.
- DSDavid Senra
I hope you enjoyed this episode. Please remember to subscribe wherever you're listening and leave a review, and make sure you listen to my other podcast, Founders. For almost a decade, I've obsessively read over four hundred biographies of history's greatest entrepreneurs, searching for ideas that you can use in your work. Most of the guests you hear on this show first found me through Founders. [electronic sound]
Episode duration: 1:23:49
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