How Russell Simmons sees the world

Growing up, I was obsessed with Russell Simmons. At some point in my very early teens, I had dreams of breaking into hip-hop and was convinced that my friends and I could become the next Beastie Boys. All it would take was reading and rereading Tougher than Leather, the unauthorized biography of seminal rap group Run DMC, which Simmons managed and grew to international fame (the Run of Run DMC is brother Joseph). Simmons and the company he co-owned with Rick Rubin, Def Jam, did the same with the Beastie Boys, LL Cool J, Public Enemy, EPMD and other groups that were the soundtrack of my youth. If I could just get in front of him, fame, fortune and Brass Monkey would follow.

I gave up on that dream. Practices were hampered by strict limits on sleepovers; I lived far from Hollis, Queens; memorizing a paperback biography turned out to be a poor path for breaking into an industry. And I couldn't really rap.

But I continued to follow Simmons. It wasn’t difficult to do.

Music was just the start of a decades-long run in which he took his entrepreneurial genius and applied it to clothing (Phat Farm), TV (Def Poetry, Def Comedy Jam), advertising (Narrative, ADHD), media (All Def Digital), and even banking (RushCard). What tied them all together? He was able to spot trends — and demands — in a massive markets that the largely White business power structure missed. And what he built was as attractive in cities as in the suburbs. Based on my own experience in Louisville, Ky, being influenced by Simmons, I can tell you he had it nailed.

Simmons recently dropped by LinkedIn’s NYC offices and we talked about what he sees that others don’t.

Some edited excerpts from the video:

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Daniel Roth: You have been involved with the music industry for such a long time. Are you optimistic or pessimistic about things today?

Russell Simmons: [Performing artists] are making greater percentages. People are going to live events more and it's a big success story for everyone — except the music industry itself.

The artists are now big brands. The emotional attachment you get with a client or the music fan allows you access to do a lot of things. Most artists are making as much money now as they could have made … in the heyday of Def Jam [when the] Beastie Boys would sell 10 million records or DMX would sell 6 or 7 million records. Those records are one thing, but then all the other ways to exploit the emotional relationship between artist and community is so much greater that I would guess that they're making as much or more money than they could have ever made.

DR: Do you see the alternative media channels, the digital channels, as being something that could be as big as the traditional media?

RS: You call them alternative but let me say that movie stars walk the street with some of our digital stars, and people run up to the digital stars. The old world is quickly disappearing, and the new opportunities are opening up.

[All Def Digital] is the fastest growing YouTube channel, one of the fastest if not the fastest growing Facebook channel. We're building a real media company that comes from social media.

If we're talking about 150 million impressions a month, then we have to realize that that is the beginning of something way bigger than what the TV or cable networks are counting on. Imagine if you have a million views on a show and they say it's a hit on some cable networks. I could put out a piece of content that has 20 million views.

DR: Do you feel like advertisers and brands are fully recognizing it?

RS: They're just catching up. That's why we [built] ADHD, which is our ad agency, which targets a very difficult, under-served community — which is the best brand building community in the world.

I think Hollywood is incredibly segregated. I've never seen any place like it. [T]here's nobody Black in charge of anything in Hollywood.

Our stuff is integration. The lack of integration is part of the White space. I see the world this way: I think Hollywood is incredibly segregated. I've never seen any place like it. The gatekeepers who are the most progressive activists inspired to make the world better ... they're better people, right? They're segregated. It's self segregated in some cases, but there's nobody Black in charge of anything in Hollywood.

I shouldn't say there's no Black agents. There's one or two and they represent the Black client until the Black client becomes big and then they lose that client.

DR: So what do you do? You're then creating other channels for them or do you want to take down that structure?

RS: The lack of diversity is costing money. I think that the bosses, the chairmen, want the CEOs to create and the CEOs want people to create success and money. Without a diverse team then even if you're a good story teller, you're telling a story that is maybe not cultural. If it's not cultural then you have a big hurdle to jump like [with the movies] Carol or Brooklyn. It's not Straight Outta Compton. They'll see that before they find out if it's good or bad.   

They're lacking culture in Hollywood. That gives me a big up, right? I know something about pop culture. Urban pop culture is its own phenomena that is for some reason is left out of Hollywood. It's the most mainstream thing there is.

DR: In addition to what you're doing to to exploit the blindness among Hollywood executives, you're doing the same thing in banking. Would you talk a little bit about RushCard? You've gone through some tough times, paying a $20 million settlement over a technical malfunction that locked customers out of their funds. What was the market that you were trying to fix with the RushCard, and how are you going to overcome what you just went through?

RS: It's a whole new form of banking. There's this opportunity to change the way middle class banks. That's the idea of RushCard now. It started for just underserved community members, or people who are unbanked, and then they become underbanked.

DR: What was that whole malfunction and settlement process like?

RS: Oh that was frustrating as hell. Oh my God. It was very frustrating.

I don't blame anybody. I take it all on the chin. Obviously there are many multi-billion dollar companies that operate along with us and I gave them a pass. I took the brick myself and our company is growing again very quickly. It was a terrible moment. I think we have to be more careful. Our partners especially have to be more careful.

I was literally calling my customers who were complaining on social media and having a dialog with them, and sending them money.

I'm glad to give every customer something. I was trying to do it all by phone. I was literally calling my customers who were complaining on social media and having a dialog with them, and sending them money. Obviously I had to stop that until we got it regulated and everybody involved. We got a class action lawsuit to settle and we settled and that was good.

DR: What were your customer saying?

RS: "I can't get my medicine." It was distressing. "I can't pay my [bills]. I can't go to work. My car is out of gas." It was difficult to digest, but it was part of the process. You plunge through things like that.

When you have a struggle, you wake up, you go to work.

DR: Any lessons you’re applying here to your other businesses?

RS: You know, everyday I say the same thing: You just have to smile and breathe. You do the best you can with what you have and that's it.

DR: What do you say to entrepreneurs who say they want success li

RS: Success is happiness. People say, "Oh that sounds corny." No matter how rich you are you can only sit your ass in one seat at a time. You have to be comfortable in that seat.

No matter how rich you are, you cannot transport yourself to the future or the past. You have to be present, awake and happy now.  

I don't miss a day of yoga. I don't miss my meditation... They're way more important.

If you recognize that, you can at least operate from that principle. Of course you don't fully believe it because you're not enlightened but you struggle with it. You've got to keep reminding yourself of what's important.

You've got to do things that promote what's important. I don't miss a day of yoga. I don't miss my meditation. I don't miss the things that kind of move me towards the more present state of mind because they're more important that the other shit. They're way more important.