Korva is a scroll of the internet’s best ideas.
Four ideas for forty years
He founded Def Jam, one of the most iconic hip-hop labels, in his dorm room. The ideas are not complicated: love of simplicity, reduction instead of production, always working with the very best people possible, and building the product for yourself first. He makes the things he wants to see.
Few people stay with the same four ideas for 40 years, and that adherence is what sets him apart. He thinks of himself as a researcher who finds what he is intensely curious about and studies it as far as it goes.
How did Def Jam begin in a dorm room?
Rubin started Def Jam in 1984 while a student at New York University, and he soon partnered with the promoter Russell Simmons. The label signed LL Cool J, the Beastie Boys, and Public Enemy. The Beastie Boys' Licensed to Ill, released in 1986, became the first rap album to reach number one on the Billboard 200.
How did Rubin strip down a record?
Rubin's 1994 production of Johnny Cash's American Recordings featured little more than Cash and an acoustic guitar. Parts of it were recorded in Rubin's living room in Los Angeles. The album won the 1995 Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album.