Who’s the Yoda of the Music Industry? – A reading recommendation

I’d love to start with a dramatic pause to make it more exciting and let you guess… and then transition into a drum roll. Would it be Al Schmitt? Most likely he would show up on the short list as an outstanding personality and extraordinary engineer and producer, but – tataaaa… My vote goes for Rick Rubin!

I would guess that everybody is somehow aware about parts of his vast variety of work he has achieved and due to his extraordinary wide spread of genre and vast amount of output probably a different band name would pop up now in your minds. (Johnny Cash [American IV], Beastie Boys [Licensed to Ill], Slayer [Reign in Blood], Tom Petty [Wild Flowers], Adele [21], Rage Against The Machine [Renegades], Kanye West [Yeezus] just to mention a few). 
In my case it would be “Californication” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and then the less glorious loudness disaster of Metallica’s Death Magnetic album, which was probably a reason for me to put less interest into him as a person; until recently. 

It so happened that a good friend of mine who is an artist and daily meditation practitioner for decades brought Rick Rubin into my mind: “Did you know, Friedemann, that Rick Rubin is also practicing TM  (Transcendental Meditation) for decades. You must read his books.” As a side note I must tell you, that my friend talked me into learning TM too, and I am very grateful about that. But this deserves another blog entry of its own, but one thing must be antedated: The Beatles were the first famous musicians who got into TM. Since back then you can find the who is who of all creative industries practicing TM. Steve Jobs practiced twice a day, just to mention one celebrity. But this was just the link which caught my attention of Rick Rubin’s stunning book “The Creative Act”.

I have learned to act on the spot when I feel a good impulse coming along so I ordered the book on the same day.

So, what makes Rick Rubin being the Yoda of the Music Industry now?

It’s not about his music because there is no obvious causality between his outstanding work as a music producer and record man and real Yoda qualities, at least on the first glance. (After you have read his book you will agree that there is indeed a causality between his success as a music producer and his mind set and wisdom).

When I started reading the book I was just stunned. At the beginning I just thought “wow, that´s a manual about what I think and feel about creativity.” I was in alignment with every single word so I thought “I’m gonna order ten of those books and hand it out to everyone who doesn’t understand me”. But I was still at the beginning of this book…

Long story short: I am deeply impressed about the perfectly well distilled wisdom of this outstanding book. Every single word is well thought and filled with Yoda-energy. There is not one word too much. It’s probably the bible for every person who works in any creative field. It is so filled with wisdom and knowledge that I will read it multiple times. For me it turned the probably greatest producer of all times into the greatest Yogi-music producer of all times. Rick Rubin is a wise man. He’s at least my Yoda of the music industry.
Act on the spot, get it, read it, read it again, and continue your creative career fueled with inspiration for your next creative act. Thank you Master Rick!

Friedemann Tischmeyer, July 2023

Side note: If you guys are into audiobooks, it’s even more impressive to hear Rick Rubin himself reading his book.