QLS Classic: Chris Schwartz

Team Supreme is joined by Co-founder of Ruffhouse Records, Chris Schwartz. From the streets of Philly, to signing household names like Cypress Hill, Kriss Kross, The Fugees and even giving Quest his first internship, Chris breaks down the highs and lows of running one of the most successful hip hop labels of the 90's.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Of Course Love Supreme is a production of I Heart Radio.
This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Hey this is on pay Bill. This week's quelst classic
is with Chris Schwartz. In September two thousand nineteen, Combo
Chris talks about co founding rough House Records, growing up
in Philly, and giving our very own quest Love his
first internship episode one thirty two. Here it is suprema

(00:33):
suprema role call subprema suprema role called subprema so surema
role called suprema role. It's my turn. Yeah, living you learn. Yeah,
we're talking to the man. Yeah, who let me in

(00:53):
turn suprema role call supreme su subremo role fontes in
the building. Yeah, and it must be said. Yeah, rough
House Records. Yeah, they got all my bread subma roll

(01:14):
call subprema sub prima role called my name is Sugar. Yeah.
Last time I lived here, Yeah, I lived with a mayor. Yeah,
that was a rough house subm roll suba subma rolls

(01:34):
bills in the house. Yeah. No, I ain't on a plane. Yeah,
but I just might be a little yeah insane in
the bread roll I never got roll call sub prema
sub prema role called my name yeahs yea. You may

(01:55):
not know this, but he was my boss once Suprema
sum roll call sua su premo roll call short hanging
out quests love just Supreme, Surema roll call so prima

(02:25):
sum roll call Surema so fremo role. See it wasn't
it was pretty bad? You be like life ending Ladies
and gentlemen. Welcome to another episode of Quest Love Supreme.
Uh quest Love and we have a team Supreme here. Hello,

(02:49):
this is your life. Yes, I know right. Fron Tikolo
in the house. Yeah, yeah, and I'm paid. Bill is
in spirit. I'm sorry. Yeah, he's recovering. Uh boss Bills
in the house and uh Sugar Steve, good scene. Hey,
how are you doing good? See everybody. Yeah, it's nice

(03:09):
to see. I will say that um our guest today
was instrumental um and giving us a lot of classic
nineties hip hop man listen that shaped us. Uh not
to mention. Uh. This man also gave me one of

(03:30):
my first jobs that got me into the industry. Gave
me an edgy vacation. I asked for internship. It's like
show up at ten in the morning, be on time,
and then Uh, I was there. Um, what can I say?
Like rough House Records, Philadelphia's premier recording label that gave us, uh,

(03:52):
Larry Lair, Cypress Hill, the Fuji's, the Goats, um Criss Cross,
a little unknown group called Chris Cross. Uh even Jamal
oh Man, Jamal Ski I used to play that jump
don't do it like Jamal started the Jamalski started a

(04:13):
slew of impostafari in or on their label. But um,
even DMX not many people know that X is first
thingle was on rough House. Uh, I mean school. There's
so many book coming out when in the title of
the book rough House from the streets affiliate to the

(04:34):
top of the hip. Yes, I didn't know what the
purposes is called ladies, don't give it for the one
and only Chris Swartz. Thank you, thank you, thank you,
thank you, thank you man full circle. Yes, yes Swarts.
I mean last time I've seen you Man, you know
we were I I talked about this all the time.

(04:55):
I remember, Oh, he's seeing you either at the airport
or the trains station. You were always on the move.
And I remember I was telling Layah I was driving
to thirty Street station with somebody from New York, and
I said, I'll bet you right now, like twenty bucks,

(05:16):
that we're going to see a mirror. Right. So we
got to the train station, you weren't there, and I
forked over the twenty. But then when we we're leaving
New York to come back, you were at the train station. See.
I'm never well, see on the opposite of general, never
on time, but always there, never there. Um. I have

(05:42):
so many questions. I mean, I've known you for so long,
but I never knew your true story. Right, but where
were you born? Were you born in Philadelphia in a
hospital in Philadelphia technically, yeah, I was word at Jefferson Hospital. Okay,
what part what part of Philly did you grow up in?
I grew up in Evan. I grew up out in
the farmlands. You say that with pride a lot of people. No, no, no,

(06:07):
I'm not. I'm not rinking. I'm just saying that when
people who are not in Philadelphia see me, they're like, hey,
I'm from Philly. I was like, oh, where we're a
part And then they get the same like no, no, no,
or you know yeah, um Devon, yeah, Devon, Uh where

(06:28):
I was where I grew up? It was um, like farmland,
and then my neighborhood was this little like uh, I
guess it was like a World War two, you know,
post World War two little development and um, but you
know I uh I left home at seventeen and uh

(06:52):
joined the service and spent really yeah okay navy. Yeah
oh yeah, it's on the book. But never I'm like
on that discipline. Yeah, yeah a lot. Uh what do
you I mean, were you always uh sort of drawn

(07:15):
to music? Word? Oh? Absolutely absolutely, I mean since uh,
well I got I grew up in a family of
ten kids, so uh, number seven. So I have four
older brothers and two older sisters. So growing up, you know, um,
you know, I'm I was born in nineteen sixty so

(07:39):
having old you see, it's a thing. My family was
set up. It was like two groups of kids. There
was the older kids, right and um, and then my
parents had another five kids later on. So um. For instance,
when I was I guess five or six, my oldest

(08:00):
brother came home from he went to college and he
started his first job, and then he moved back from
Ohio to our house. I didn't know who he was.
I mean yeah, literally now, it was like one day,
one day, I'm you know, my mother wake up, and
my mother is talking to this guy and you know,

(08:23):
he's got like bushy blonde hair and a scraggly beard,
and he's standing at the top of the stairs in
his underwear talking to my mother. And my mother's talking
to him like you know, she's do him all her life.
And I'm like, I'm standing behind her, like who, like
who is this? You know? So um but but but
back to you know, so I grew up in a

(08:46):
house like a lot of music from the sixties and
the seventies, you know, was constantly playing from different rooms
and um so yeah, um I was particularly you know,
there was a lot. There was two things going on.
You had the definitive pop radio, which was AM radio,

(09:07):
which was just pop hits, and then you had, uh
the progressive FM rock station. So were you a wizard
one head? Uh No, it was actually w f I
L Yeah, And then and then there you had w
Y s P and w M w m m R
w m m R from for people from Philly you know,

(09:29):
probably don't know that it was actually one of the
first underground FM rocks the country. Every Saturday at twelve
o'clock at night, they play an entire album like New
Albline artists and you, and they would tell you how
to set your Dolby on your tape deck to record it.
It's really yeah yeah really yep, damn I didn't realize that.

(09:53):
So you you weren't You weren't part of the generation
listening up because I know that Wizard one hundred um
on the AM dial um was kind of like that.
That actually may have been a little bit before my
listening years. Okay, yeah, yeah, all right, No, I just

(10:15):
you know, the house was always on my radio, like
in the house, that radio was always on house wasn't
always on my radio. Radio always on my house, um yeah,
but usually on the weekends, uh, like Saturday and Sunday,
like Casey Casum's countdown would come on that station whatnot.

(10:36):
But all right, so you're straight up FM kid, Yeah. Um.
Do you remember what the music environment was like in
Philadelphia as far as the nightlife was concerned or anything,
or did you have to go to New York too? Well?
When I was I mean what like when I was
when I was like my like uh teenager, Um, the

(10:58):
music of Philadelphia was really more primarily known because of
p I r you know, it was really known as
the you know you had you had you had in Motown,
oh ease. But Philly, Philly was known is is the
place where you know, it played a big part of

(11:19):
the disco era. You know, um did the Tramps and
everything like that. So but you're coming of age was
more post yeah, assuming twenty two whatever like, yeah, well
I would well I was, I would have been twenty
one in nineteen eighty yeah. Yeah one. So what were

(11:44):
the musical options after the initial primary disco Well, OK,
so we're talking about that period. Yeah, one, it was
um it was you know it you had Lady b
Power Nay, yeah, that's a hip head. Oh yeah mostly yeah,

(12:12):
well here was it was. It was two things. It
was hip hop on one part of it and then
uh my my sort of bass formative thing was I
was really into electronic music. That was that was it
like to me? Craftwork? Yeah, craft work because I I've

(12:34):
been listening to craft Work since I was a kid.
I mean, I want to see um, I want to
see them perform Audubon at the value Forge Music Fair
because Audubon. Here's here's what a lot of people know.
W F I L used to play the entire album
version of Audubon. The three longest songs in history of

(12:56):
a M pop radio were Tubular Bells by Michael Field,
which was he because it was the theme for The Exorcist. Uh.
And it got a Vida Buy Iron Butterfly, and then
you had um Audubon and they used to play it,
you know, the entire thing on pop radio. So they
they did a show at the Value Forge Music Fair

(13:18):
and I went there with my best friend. Yeah. No, no, no,
no no, that's the new value for it. That's the
later on. Value Forge Music Fair actually started as a
tent really yeah. It was a big tent. It was
like a seasonal thing. They'd have like you know, fiddler
ro on the roof and stuff like that, and um
they had just built the first one, the first incarnation

(13:41):
of it, and uh yeah and it was like I
went there and it was just two guys, you know,
Ralph and Florian and like big stacks of keyboards and everything.
Uh and it was it was it was very cool.
I was so futuristic. Yeah, they were the daft punker. Yeah.
Well it's it's funny if they were, you know, the

(14:06):
way I kind of see it daft punk really yeah
if with if there's been no craft works, I'm not sure. Yes, yeah,
I see what you mean. Um, wait, is the Valley
Forts Music Fair still around today? I don't think so.
I think there's a there's either a red Lobster or yeah,

(14:29):
like Chris Crawls did the show there dr Dre and
yeah yeah so yeah, um it closed really damn. Yes,
it's always my dream to to play there, like my
dad played there once. But like they would have a

(14:50):
rotating stage in the round thing and yeah, one could
get dizzy or lose their sense, so depending on how
many degrees the how fast the stage was turning. When
I was thirteen, I worked at a banquet house down
the street washing dishes, and all the whoever was playing
at the value of Forge Music Fair used to come to. Yeah,

(15:14):
they go there and eat and uh I um, I
met a lot of people like um mac Davis. Oh damn,
I changed a flat tire for zero Mostel's limo. Yeah
in the game your gave me ride home, gave me
fifty bucks. Wow, fix a limo and get a lift.

(15:35):
Do you remember the club Cahoots? Uh, there was like
a Sheridan, a circular Sheridan Hotel like in the area
in uh yeah, in value. Yeah. I never had reason
to Frequency club. Yeah, but I know they had that.
That's the place that had the themed hotel rooms in
the top. Yeah, I'm going down Philly memory lane. You know,

(15:58):
I'm sorry. I always wanted to go. Um So for
you like listening to Lady B, Well, Lady B started
off on w H A T um Mary do you
remember Mary Mason? Yeah, she was still on. Yeah. So,
like they had a Saturday hip hop show, um, one

(16:20):
of the very first ones that Philadelphia had. Um So,
I know that Lady B started at H A T
like nine till, which is weird considering that hip hop
you know, two years in having a two hour format.
You know, you only had like thirty records to choose from,
so you had to play all those sixteen minute songs.

(16:43):
And then they took over the station that was the
there was the h I think it was w I
o Q. Then they became it was Yesterday's Now Music Today.
It was like new wave. Then I think they moved
her there and they build up the ratings like they
she was there, like it could have been you know,

(17:05):
I might have my facts wrong, but I believe it
it would played. It was all hip hop. It was massive.
They sponsored shows at the after midnight and then they
sold it. Oh and I think she went to Power nine.
Once she came to Power ninety nine eighty four briefly
had an afternoon Sunday show from like twelve in the

(17:26):
afternoon till maybe five pm on Sunday afternoon. And I
mean there she would play hip hop and uh, the
electronica of the day, so sort of like nucleas and jam. Yeah,
that's sort of you know, anything that sounds like planet rock.
And then she went away and then yeah, and then returned.

(17:47):
Uh did you start out as management? First? Like, what
was your first job in the I played? I played
in bands, and um, who did you play with? Well,
my first my first thing when I when I when
I joined it, when I joined the navy, Um I
played in I started a band for a bunch of
other sailors and we did a bunch of gigs. And

(18:10):
when I came home, I um regrouped with my best
childhood friend, Jeff Coulter. He was a drummer. So when
I was in the service, he started really getting into
you know, because the craft work. He started getting into
these other I mean craftwork is kind of like at
the at the apex of this whole like community, like

(18:34):
of all these German groups like Klaud Schultze, Tangerine Dream, NOI,
um everything. And so when I came home, he had
like literally over a thousand records of this stuff and
he we get him at either Plastic Fantastic and Ardmore

(18:55):
or the basement basement of Third Street Jazz. You mentioned
Plastic Fan, one of the greatest record stores ever right
down the street from when. Yeah, I would entire set
and here's the thing, the the the the basement of
Third Street Jazz, that's all that was. And you would

(19:16):
you know, like a cloud Schultz import was like a Bucks,
but you bought it because this was like, you know,
Klouss doing a um like two sides of a duet
with some famous cellis in Clouds is playing with the
g d S computer and you know, it's just very
cool stuff. So so um, I had a set of

(19:38):
Degan Electric vibes. It's a portable vibe set of vibraphones
that you like a suitcase and you stands. So I
bought all my equipment, had it shipped back and him
and I joined up and we started this group called
Tangent and we were, you know, just devotees to electronic music. So,

(19:58):
um you were, oh well yeah with w xp N
so w x b N at two radio shows. One
was called Diaspar and the other what to call Stars End.
They played and supported electronic music. We did shows. Um,
so we did a tape for them, and uh, I
remember we drove down to their station on Spruce Street

(20:21):
and UM jumped out of the car, double parked, ran in,
knocked on the door. Some guy you know, the buzzer
opens the door, takes the tape, and like three nights
later we're we're you know, every night. That's all we
did was jam and record. And we stopped to listen
to UM two. Uh Star's end and John d Liberto

(20:43):
comes on and says, yeah, we got a new tape
from a group from Philadelphia called Tangent, Chris Swartz and
Jeff Coulter, and we're hearing this stuff. Now I've been
at you know, I've been at the Navy now three
months and I'm already you know. Yeah. So so they
this week we went and played their picnic that they

(21:03):
had and UM, then we were We did a show
at the east Side Club where we did Audubon. We
played the whole version of Audubon there and UH met
this this girl who was a filmmaker, and she introduced
me to these guys who had a band called Rhythm Aligns.
Uh at this in this period in Philadelphia. Philadelphia had

(21:26):
this really amazing live music scene for for bands, and
there was you know when you go down the South
Street or and you'd see these bills on on telephone
polls and they'd be like shows every night. You could
go out. You could go out and see any number
of uh the Stickmen, the Bells, Pretty Poison, Um, yeah,

(21:50):
Pretty Poison. So yeah, So so we joined Jeff and
I joined this bigger band called Rhythm a Lines and
it was more like a New Order Talking Heads type thing,
and we we we did a bunch of shows opened
up for Pretty Poison, the Bells shows to stick mean,
we did shows that Blondie's, Emerald Cities, Bigelow's, Phillies, um

(22:15):
and the east Side Club and um. But I wanted
to get a record deal. That was my big thing.
I wanted to you know, get a record deal, and
you know, the guys. The other guys in the in
the in the band, they weren't I don't know, they
just had their priorities were in peculiar places, I'll know.

(22:37):
So Jeff and I left. We uh we ended up
moving to a house in West Philly. Uh that a
friend of mine, Rich Murray, who was a Temple film grad. Yeah, yeah, Rich,
and so we all we moved in together. We uh
we put a student, we created, put our studio in

(22:57):
one of the rooms, and uh so Jeff and I
were now doing more traditional dance music. Um, and I
met this girl, Robin Carter, who was her. They called
her astro Girl because she had this, uh, this total
affinity for anything related to NASA and space travel. She

(23:20):
actually went on to get her degree in astrophysics and
she does work for NASA as we speak, crazy, but
she was a saxophone player. Her her her landlord was
Jack right from spring Guard Music. So, um she we're
naming all these like Philly legends of Yeah, shout out
to Michael mcquokin also from Third Stree Jazz. Yeah. So

(23:45):
we um we uh she she joined up with us.
We came up. Was that we called ourselves the Ultronics,
right and we, UM, we started doing gigs and she
got us a gig at to get Alorie Mall. It
was it was a little different, you know. UM, so

(24:09):
you know, we're doing our thing and people are kind
of coming. They're standing there carrying their shopping bags. They're
looking at us for about three or four minutes and
walking away. But there was a group of kids who
were like watching us intently the whole time, and they're
like talking amongst themselves, right, and they're just like so

(24:32):
when we're done, they kind of like, uh, they they
they they walk over and uh, this kid introduces himself.
His name is Clinton Shirley and UM his stage name
was Kid Fresh and he and he said, uh, you know,
we're hip hop group and we'd like to know could

(24:55):
you guys help us do some beats. So we bought
them over to our house and UM like the next
week and we did a bunch of tracks on the
second floor, and UM made this tape. And so you know,
by this time, we had amassed a bunch of twelve
inch dance records. So I started looking through these these

(25:19):
records because I remembered there was a record label in
Philadelphia and it was Virtue Virtue Records, and I got
the phone number. Now I gotta go back a little
bit because Rich being you know, as a filmmaker, he
was doing these videos for Philly World Records and he
got me the gig as being the cater during these

(25:39):
video shoots. So I had met Donald Robinson and Donald
came over to our house. I tried to get him
to produce us, and he said, yeah, I get what
you're doing, but your song suck. And I was like,
all right, I get it, but but the thing is,
it's that when I called the number on Virtue Recording,
I I kind of took the liberty of bolstering the

(26:02):
narrative and telling Frank Virtue that I was I was
working with Donald Robinson and that got Frank's attention and
he said, come on up. So I went up to
Frank and I played him this, uh this stuff. He
listened to it. Now, Frank had been working has a
partnership with the guy named Vince de Rosa who wanted

(26:24):
a company called sound Makers in Jersey and uh for
folks who might not know or maybe be interested. Sound
Makers in the eighties pressed up all the records for
Next Plateau, Sleeping Bag, Tommy Boy, um uh even Deaf Jam. Yeah,
all the indie labels. So they were the disc makers

(26:45):
of yeah oh yeah wait. We should also know that
Donald Robinson didn't he write Dreaming for Vanessa Williams. Yeah, Donald,
Donald did lots of Eugene Wilde. You know, you know
what I gotta tell you, Well, that song, you know,
that song was a was a was really just doing
sexual healing vine. But it was still a great song,

(27:10):
you know. Uh so yeah, well that's where I met
Donald because I was a cater on Rich was doing
the video. Yeah so, um so Frank Frank Virtue And
for people to know he was a music industry old timer.
He uh he played in the Philadelphia Orchestra as a teenager.

(27:31):
He was a prodigy violinist and um he led he
They drafted him to the Navy to lead a big
band dance band in the Navy. He got out and
he had a group called the Virtues and the Virtue
of the Virtues and the Virtuosos. He had a couple
of hit songs. He had Guitar Shuffle Boogie, uh, the Horse,

(27:52):
the Return of the Horse. He toured with like Patti
Page and somebody sent me something on Facebook the other day.
He actually did shows with the Three Stooges. It's a
three students. Yeah yeah, so um so so we Frank
and Vince formed this record company called Slice Records, and

(28:14):
uh Clinton Shirley was one of their kids. Fresh was
their first artists. So we we did these records up
at Frank's and um, it was a pretty pathetic affair
in terms of a label. They pressing plan hired this
guy in a pickup truck to drive Clinton and his
hype guy around to the to the to the to

(28:34):
the venues and everything, and nothing ever came of it. Uh,
but Clinton later on changed his name to um, Mike Elliott.
Yeah I knew that I was Yeah, Michael Elliott. But
you know, but here's the thing. He actually co wrote

(28:56):
the What's the the Sneaker? The movie? Um no, Mike
ellyt did the Source Awards. Well yeah, hang on, I
gotta look. Yeah, Mike Elliott is one of the original
Uh guy, Yeah, Um, I didn't wait, I didn't realize.

(29:17):
I forgot. He also had his own video show. He
had his own video show in Philadelphia. Um, it's killing
me now. He went in the movies. Uh, Mike Elliott
developed the Carmen movie Most Most thus Birthings sometimes in
his in this very room that we're in. But yeah,

(29:40):
Mike Elliott is a fully legend. Yeah, he did the
script Brown Sugar, I believe, so I know that he
got into filmmaking heavy. Yeah, he know. He did the
some something like Mike, what's it's at the about the
kid in the orphanage? Yeah, like Mike, like Mike, No,
something like Mike. Brown Sugar was his first. But this

(30:01):
here's the thing. Rich Murray and I were out in
l A. And this lee years later and we're at
we're at some some film company, some studio, and the
guy we're sitting there and somehow we hear Mike Elliott's
names like Mike Elliott, I know, Mike, Mike Elliott, and
and he said, uh oh yeah, you know he's a

(30:21):
hot property right now because he did, Um it's the movie.
It's about a kid in an orphanage and something to
do with a pair of sneakers like Michael Jordan like Mike. Yeah,
he did like Mike with yeah, so um so so
so so I So then then the thing is the

(30:43):
tradeoff was Frank would let me use the studio to
develop acts. I had to help him. Frank had a
gospel business. And what it would be is that, you know,
a lot of the bigger churches would record their gospel choirs.
They press up the records and uh sell them to
the congregation to raise money. And so that was a

(31:05):
big business of Frank's. Frank actually, interestingly enough, had a
a very um you know, back before Stigma Sound and
these companies. Everybody went to Virtue to record. Kenny Kenny
and and Leon did a lot of their early stuff
up there, and um, Frank, you know, I don't know

(31:26):
if some many listeners don't know about the mastering process,
but after record is made and mixed, it has to
be mastered. And what mastering is is that you you
it's a process for making sure that the record, the
record that you made in the studio is reproduced everywhere
else with the intended um audio equalization. So the record

(31:48):
has to get mastered for manufacturing UM. So it's a
it's a whole other kind of mixing process. And uh,
Frank had been doing it for years. He held patents
on the mastering p he met. He mastered the first
couple of Beatles singles for Swan and Decca Records. So
I did this whole thing with Frank for a while

(32:09):
and um, it just kinda you know, came came to nothing.
And now like I'm working at Downey's as a cook
and um living in West Philly, and I saw an
ad in newspaper for record company looking for help, and
I'm like, okay, you know something. And I called this

(32:29):
guy up and he tells me he has a company
called Nicetown Records in West Philly and his name was
Ted Wing and one of his records was Li've be
graded for prision. Yes, so yeah so Ted, Ted was

(32:51):
formerly a prison guard, right, and Ted helped actually helped
Lawrence and Dana start start pop Art, so um so
so so yeah, so you know cut the Rich and I,
you know, um also, uh did a video for pop Art.

(33:13):
We did the um rock sans rock Sands Revenge for Yeah.
We shot it at our house as a matter of fact. Yeah, yeah,
it's called rock Sands Revenge. Yeah, I'll tell you this.
I we shot at our house and it had everybody
was involved in the actual story about how she got
a record deal and got signed was in it. The

(33:35):
shooting went till three in the morning, and I'll never
forget coming downstairs in my in my living room. Uh,
Marley mar and Mr Magic are in my living room
on the couch under blankets, eating cereal and watching cartoons. Wait,

(33:57):
can you take a slight side bar? And because whenever
I get someone that tells a pop art story, usually
it's you know, told like and then I met Lawrence. No,
Dana was the dangerous one. Okay, well, this is what
I want to know. Obviously, they had the makings to

(34:18):
be a contender because they were Deaf Jam before Deaf Chair.
They had salt and pepper, they had all of the
tended for them. I had never try to get a
deal with a major label, right, So how did they
drop in the most diplomatic way you can say, or
if you don't give a tell us the truth, how
do they drop the ball on pop art? They had

(34:44):
something they had, I'll tell you what they had. Man,
they they they they they cracked the code right long
before a lot of people. And here's what they realized
hip hop music right Yeah, you know it was a
It was the purview of the indie labels because for

(35:05):
the first time since the whole disco era, you could
now be an independent label. You could make a record,
you could get it out there. And because you're using
your facilitating lifestyle marketing initiatives and every stuff that doesn't
cost a lot of money, but yet you have a product,

(35:26):
they can go out and sell big numbers. Right, And
the it was kind of like, um uh, you know,
the majors were seeing this, you know, and they were
they were coveting this whole thing. And the majors basically,
and I know no other way to say it, man,

(35:48):
but they colonized the hip hop industry. I'm not talking
to hip hop music, but the hip hop business they colonized.
They colonized it. And so so Lawrence and Dana figured
it out earlier on before a lot of people because
these companies like Next Plateau and Sleeping Bag and everything
all went by the wayside because they all chose to

(36:09):
remain fiercely independent. And I get that, but when the
popularity of a music becomes so big, you know, you're
not going to be able to deliver the manufacturing and distribution.
So they figured it out that you had to get
with a major, and so that's when they did to
do with Jove right, and I watched that and I

(36:31):
always said to Joe, I said, that's that's where we
need to be. That's that's what we need to do.
So but they had such a hefty roster. They lost
them all. They had Jazzy Jeff Fresh, Friend Prince, they
had Salt and Pepper, they had biz Jon tay Uh,
the kill top hustlers. They had them all and lost

(36:55):
them all. Like were they just whatever businessmen? Yeah? I
think it's um, you know, the the for for what
it's worth. Um there this business. You know, let's face it,
there there is no no prerequisite to get in the
record business. You don't you don't. You don't need a
college degree, you don't need a resident you don't need nothing.

(37:18):
And as a result of that, and because of the
the perliforation of all these visuals showing showing wealth and
showing you know, status and everything like that, it attracts
a lot of people, a lot of people who who
feel like, oh, this is a business I could walk
in and become a millionaire overnight. Right. And they had

(37:42):
they I always say they were great and and R guys,
and they had the musical chops. But I think they
just lacked a lot in the in on the side
of a business. Yeah, and just wow, man, I don't know,
I want to do good with Bulletproof. I never mentioned

(38:06):
that they're still around. I'm like, because I still followed, Well,
you know the youngster guys, Well they're oldsters now. One
of them is still working with Gay. Yeah, like I
don't know, how are you talking about the kid the kids? Yeah,
like one of them in her staff. But I'll tell

(38:26):
you this. I'll tell you this. Lawrence and Dana we're
very they have very definitive ideas, you know what I mean.
And that's what that's to me. It's like, you know,
they they again, they cracked the code. They figured it out,
because I'll tell you when they did the deal with Jive,
and I'll never forget that came in the studio with

(38:48):
their with their jackets at r c A and the
hats and everything, and I'm like, oh, I was kind
of like at first, I was like, oh man, they
they sold out. They went with Jibe and everything, you know,
and then and then but then to hear him talk
about it, it was like it was like the the
you know, it's like, well that's if you're un listen,

(39:09):
it's now if you're not with a major, you're gonna
ok So we're the Bill Cosby record. Right. So, so
Ted was a prison guard, a great effort, and um
he was the director of the Prisoners Activities Fund. And
so I think Bill Cosby, I think the story was

(39:30):
to get his um PhD or is his thesis. I mean,
for whatever you can say about the man, he you know,
this is the guy who who was shooting I spy
right in the sixties and then flying to do uh casinos,
to do shows and getting his uh he constantly he
continued his educational all throughout the whole thing by doing

(39:53):
these projects. So he told the prison you can have
whatever how you want to exploit this stay end up,
you can have it as long as the money benefits
the prisoners activities fun. So, um, so Ted ends up
with this record and uh, you know it doesn't have
any real artwork or anything. It's uh he had some

(40:13):
rendering done. It was just yeah. So so uh hem
I walked from forty eight in Hazel to fifty second
in park Side looking for the address of this record company. Yeah,
so there's this daycare center, right. Ted's mother answers the door.

(40:37):
She's like very uninviting. She makes me wait for Ted.
I have to sit in this chair that's like a
foot high for little kids. And I'm sitting there for
twenty minutes and like thinking this might not be the
dream job I was thinking it is. Ted shows up,
takes me up to the third floor of this building
in a room with like crumbling plaster. The windows are

(40:58):
nailed shut, and there's a desk and a chair and
a phone, and he shows me the billboard charts and
how to call these retailers and get the record charted.
And he paid me in a couple of hundred bucks
a week. And so I was working the Bill Cosby
record and at the time Bill Cosby from The Cosby

(41:19):
Show had done a jazz compilation, right, so there were
two Bill Cosby's records out and I definitely took advantage
of the confusions. Yeah, I did. And I was calling
retailers and and doing that and uh so, so we

(41:40):
had a session. Ted signed a bunch of artists. I
can't remember their names except for Bunny Siglar, but we
did a Bunny Siger record that was pretty cool. Uh
But we we had a session booked at studio for
one night and I had only been the studio for
once because I was involved in the w d S
Black History Month rap compilation and with Eddie d and everything.

(42:02):
And uh so we go to the session studio for
and our engineers Joe Nickelo and I've never met Joe,
you know, and we're in the session. We're starting now.
Ted was a pretty boisterous guy, and that he was
always bragging him out. Yeah, I got this deal going
on with m c A and doing this and doing

(42:24):
that and everything. And he's doing this in the studio
and and I guess at one point I kind of
rolled my eyes like out of you know, and Joe
caught it. Right. So when Ted walks out of the studio,
Joe's like, how did you end up working for this guy?
And he said, well, you know, it's not my dream job,
but you know, I want to start a record label.

(42:45):
And Joe was like, yeah, well so do I. You know,
so here's my number, you know, we should get up
at some point. So that happened, right. So back at
Nice Town Records in West Philly, Um, I was in
Ted's office talking about something and I see these these records.
It's see yellow labels and I pick it up and

(43:07):
the song is called Gangster Boogie by school E D
And it was on a record label called A Place
to Be Records. Now, I had known about SCHOOLI for
a long time, and I know that you know, you
remember Bobby Dance and the wind Balls all. Yeah, okay,
so Fruit of Islam, security and all that good stuff. Uh.

(43:31):
I knew about his whole thing. Yeah, And so I
said to Ted, I said, so, what, like, what's going
on with these? He goes, oh, yeah, school He came
to me and he wanted, you know, me to do
this in that for him. I told him I wasn't interested.
And I'm like, what like this place like Bill Cosby

(43:53):
Record and school he d comes in, You're not interested?
So um I I filched Schoolie number out of Ted's
roll at X and I call him up and I said, look,
you know, my name is Chris Schwartz, and uh I
think I can help you and um, you know, I
know distribution and everything. I think you should start your

(44:16):
own label and all this stuff. And he goes, yeah,
that sounds good man. You know, come over where do
you live? And he lives like like a couple of
blocks bub bubb The day care center. So we set
up a time and I'll never forget this man. I
go to his house, step up on the porch and
knock on the door. He answers the door, and he's

(44:39):
wearing a towel and he sees me on his porch.
He sees me on his porch, and then he kind
of looks around to see who's seeing me on his porch,
you know, and he goes, yeah, man, I'm taking Showery
shuts the door and I'm standing there like like, you
know what what just happened? Right? So? Um I called

(45:01):
him up later on, he goes, oh, you need to
talk to my lawyer, Warren Hamilton's And before I could
ask for Warren's number, he hangs up and I look
up Warren. I met with Warren. Eventually we met all
of us, three of us together, and I said, look,
I'm gonna I'm gonna we're gonna shoot some videos. Uh,
We're gonna do this whole thing. I'm gonna get your record,

(45:22):
you know, distributed. Uh, and I'm gonna sit up distribution
and uh. And that's how I started working with him
and um so at the this is at the beginning
of PSKY yeah, so how did you he had recorded?
He just recorded PSK and Gucci Time, but he had

(45:45):
not done the album yet. And we recorded the album
this is a crazy thing. We recorded in Center City
at a little eight track studio that recorded the Philadelphia Orchestra,
and there was no no, no real equipment, and so
we had one of the old big plate reverbs, you know, like, um,
you know I'm talking about uh, and it was just uh.

(46:10):
We should also shout out, all right, spawn, what's Jeff's
true last name? Because I keep on saying Jeff Cheese stage,
Jeff Chestick, Jeff, Yes, Jeff, why are you ready? Are
you ready? But you will hear Jeff Chestick trivia fact
hit him and I went to junior high together. Really,
I knew Jeff Chestick since uh, nineteen seventy two, seventy three, Jeff. Yeah.

(46:37):
When Jeff used to mix here, um, I forgot what
project I was working on, but um, he told me
the very first story of and he never gave the title. Yeah,
it was something you know. I was like, I want
more reverb, more reverb. And when he did this, I
was like, yeah, this is just like in PSK. He's like, well, yeah,

(46:59):
I mixed that. I know you're probably like what, You're like, what, Yeah,
can I tell you Jeff chest there we we were
in a V A D club together, right, and we
we did these A B projects, right, And this is
in uh seventh grade. He did this thing where, you know,
because since you have audience, you have a video equipment,
and he did this thing where it was an elevator

(47:22):
going up in a store and opening up in the
different departments and everything. It was really it was clever.
You know, in the seventh grade, I thought the guy
had real talent, you know, chops um so so um
so basically we're now doing stuff and um I was

(47:42):
going through it was a lot of school e up
till then, have been doing primarily West Philly North Philly
hip hop shows and everything. And I started sending out
his record to like remember Metro record, well Martin keone right. Um.

(48:04):
Next thing, you know, my, I'm getting phone calls like
these clubs, white clubs right, loving school it d right,
and I'm sending out the record to like all these records,
all these one stops and independent distributors, um and like
City Hall Records in um San Francisco, UM, UM West

(48:30):
Coast Record Distributors, Schwartz Brothers done in Baltimore, Maryland, Encore
Distributors up in up in Brooklyn. And the thing about
in the independent record distribution business at the time is
that it's very hard to get paid. And the reason
they're very difficult and paying you is because if you're

(48:51):
a new independent label and you have a record that
goes out there and sells, that's all fining well, but
what they don't want to do is pay you. And
then when they get hit returns, they go to call
up in your phone's disconnected, so you have to you
have to have like and I used to go up.
I remember driving up to Encore Distributors and in the

(49:14):
car and the I'd have a car stacked with records
in the back and in the trunk, and I'd sleep
in the parking lot overnight, you know, wait for these
guys to get get it, to get a check and
to give them the records. So at one point I
got I set it up to where I was sending
out the singles and they were paying half co o
D so the pressing plant and I had a whole

(49:35):
thing set up. And then uh, these kids would call
in different areas and because we had no radio airplay.
So I started getting these kids to take the records
to like barbershops, pool halls, retailers, because it was just
like on a Saturday, where do you go to find
new music? You go to the record store store. Yeah,

(49:59):
so is the whole thing where you could release a
twelve inch right on a Friday. You you give it
to the clubs, you give it to the mixed show. Saturdays,
you get two guys playing in the store, and Saturdays
there again it's in the mix show and in the clubs.
By Monday, you knew if you had something right. It
was that fast. That was the excitement of putting out,

(50:21):
putting out records. So they're calling you saying like yeah
and so and so. Uh. We we ran into a
little schism with the sound makers because I was at
Downtown Records in up in New York City one day
and I saw that they had our PSK Gucci Time

(50:42):
record and it's our label. Everything's the same except it
says distributed through Warlock Records, and I thought, wow, this
is Warlock Records. That's that's that's you know. Roulette, Morris
Levy and son Adam Leave So so I didn't call Warlock,

(51:02):
but I'll never forget this man. I went to the
counter and there's this guy who's like literally right out
of Central Casting for for you know, big guy. Yeah.
I was about to say, were you your big thick
glasses and a cigar, you know, and he's sitting behind
it kind of goes yeah, at least Warlock can get

(51:25):
the records pressed up and delivered when we need them, right, So, um,
you mean collector, like like you were your own distributed Like, yeah,
I did, Yeah, what I would back in those days though,
didn't you need some muscle? Oh no, no, no, no, No.
The thing is, in terms of collecting, we had a
we had a company set up. It was school Eadie

(51:46):
Records and no I would send them to you know, distributors,
but we also operated kind of as our own one stop.
Because here's the thing. School E on his own head
started out you know Chino at Funko Mark given them
records and everything, and that became a little bit issue
issue because when I hooked us up with Universal, you know, uh,

(52:08):
you know, they they they fronted us the money to
press records and then they go to solicit funk O
Mart and and there. Yeah that that was cool. He
was always doing shit like that. But and yeah, so

(52:29):
so um so we uh you know, but a lot
of a lot of really crazy things happened, and and
then it's it was amazing that that the record just
suddenly took on this whole momentum, you know, and suddenly
the orders started happening, you know, and it was and

(52:51):
we you know, the album where like the demand was
sort of demand, yeah, because because I every time I
needed school E to write a check to press up records,

(53:12):
if I needed, you know, six hundred and forty two dollars,
he'd give me two hundred and forty two dollars. It
was just it was just yeah, it was just saying
everything constantly a day late and a dollar short, you know,
day late and a dollar short. I booked him in
a bunch of rock clubs, and you know, in the

(53:36):
in the early days of hip hop, m hip hop
promoters for the most part were guys that that didn't
see doing one off hip hop shows. It's like career
building box. It was more of a score for them.
So artists get jacked all the time. And because of this,
you know, Schooley always demanded his money up front before

(54:01):
we went on stage. And I get that, right, but
when you're doing a rock club, right, that's a an
established venue that you know that deals with booking agents
and everything like that, they don't they don't stiff bands
because if they did, they'd be perissana and grata. He'd
never be able to book. But you know, we would
do these shows and uh, he'd won his money up front,

(54:24):
and then the idea of these club managers and he'd
have to count the money out of the receipts and everything.
And then the next thing, you know, he gets on
stage and what a hip hop artist shows in the
eighties do They do their couple songs? Then they roll
and you got these kids that drove from Delaware and

(54:44):
they're they're like, yeah, so that was that was a
whole mess. And you know but anyhow, so I called Joe.
I had that business card from studio for and uh
we uh we got together, decided let's start this record label.

(55:05):
And I was managing school E and uh, my first
office you know the you know the building, you know,
the my first office was when you get down into
that basement floor when you come through the door, the
studio four built, right, they built because Larry, they built
a b room for Larry to put his Larry Gold
but it's in clavier and there, well, there was a vestibule.

(55:28):
There was a vestibule between that that room and the hallway. Right.
That was my office. It was like four ft wide
and uh, my desk was made of plywood covered with
red vinyl because it was the original reception desk for
the studio. And I had a little lamp and Joe
bought in like a pink Princess phone from home, and

(55:50):
that was the phone. And and that's where that's where
we that's where the actual business started. And then we
moved into that of the other room, which is the
bigger room. Wow. So but no, yeah, and then we
moved down the hall later on took over that whole
area down the hall. Yeah. You know what I gotta

(56:15):
tell you, man, I h It's funny because I got
years later, you know, you you you get you go
to these periods where you have gold, platinum records every
year and it's just never ending. But I looked back
on those days and I was like, I was always broke,
but I just had so much fun. You know, the

(56:38):
time of your life. Yeah, So when was rough House
as we knew it officially officially born? We we we first, first,
we we started. We had this really stupid, biguous name,

(57:00):
Pyramid Productions. I don't know how that came about, but
that lasted for like about a couple of months, and
rough House, I had to say, was probably born. Oh,
I want to say eighty six, maybe eighty six, I
don't I yeah, I know it's in my book because

(57:21):
I I had to put together a bunch of events
to you know, to figure out when it happened. But
I know where it happened. Um. We were in Arthur
Man's office, our attorney who later went on to found Rykodis,
the first CD label in the history of music, which
was an amazing thing. Um and uh, there was a

(57:43):
a cassette by some rock band called rough House r
O U G H. And Joe said, you know, that'd
be a great name for a record label, and I
was thinking, yeah, it's like, you know, and I had
a pretty rough house growing up, you know, my childhood
and everything. But we should change it to our uff
to keep it, you know, yeah, keep it rough and um,

(58:07):
and that was really the birth of the label. Our
first artist was a was an artist named mac money
um me and mcevans her um she she she was
a Philly battle rapper who did an answer record to PSK.
Really yeah it was actually it was really good and

(58:28):
um so we we signed her. And uh about there
was a group called the Dead Milkman's. You remember that
Milkman rock group? Yeah, uh, well they're managers. They were
distributed by a company on the West Coast called Enigma.
Enigma was a was a company that did really obscure

(58:52):
alternative like Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Right, um here,
let me tell you how obscure this music was. I
was living on Gerard Avenue and uh I had bought
a um a Jaguar uh x J six. Somebody broke
into my car one night, and when we went out

(59:13):
to Enigma, they gave us all these records to bring home, right,
and so I had all these all these uh cassettes
of all these different artists, these rock artists. Somebody broke
into my car, went in the glove compartment and they
took everything excepted anything that was released on Enigma. Who

(59:39):
whoever the car thief was, he he basically took his time, deciding, deciding,
deciding which, which, which records he wanted. Steve remember that
happened to us? Yeah, someone broke into my car and
left the roots albums. No they they I had, Uh,
Johnny I've just seen Walk the Line. So I was like,

(01:00:01):
all right, let me buy everything Johnny Cash. I went
and brought the Johnny Cash box set all this stuff,
and then I'd like brought Joni Mitchell's like working stuff,
and they like left everything and I appair Converse sneakers
and my door was open. I got there and I
was like, wait, someone broke in my car. But I

(01:00:23):
was like, why didn't they take anything? And Steve looked
and he's like, this is why. Oh so you guys
started eighty six. I remember you guys went through like
a couple of logos. So that's how I know the
progression of the label. UM. I first heard of you guys.

(01:00:44):
UM I guess through. Uh was Larry your first album
signing or uh? We had a group called Blackmail. UM.
Larry Layer was one of the first. I don't know
if he was absolutely the first UM, but it's funny

(01:01:09):
because he was definitely before Tim Dog. I was waiting.
I was just waiting. Yeah, yeah, yeah, is he all right?
All right? What do you guesses? Okay, where's he yet? Where?
Sim dog? I know one of the joints he finessed.
So you don't think you don't think he's dead. I

(01:01:30):
don't think he's dead at all. You think he's no,
I think I think he's dead. Man. Now, I hope
I get it, he said, I just hit my book.
I said in memoriam. You know, I'm pretty sure. I'm
pretty sure he passed away because he was sick. Ok yeah, okay, okay,

(01:01:51):
do you know the scandal? Yes? Oh yeah, Tim? Dog?
Yeah dog? What's the short of Tim Dog? He was
basically like meeting chicks online and like finessing amount of
money and ship and then he and then he died
quote unquote died putting that record out. Man, Like, were

(01:02:12):
y'all what was the thought? Were you all worried about?
You know? It was a it was it was a
dicey proposition. But um, you know I said to Tim
at one point, right, I said, you know this is
you can't you can't go and tour on the West coast, dude.
It's just you know, you're and and he got this

(01:02:34):
whole thing exactly what goes. I'm just in gangs and
everything and all that stuff. Um, but you know the
crazy thing was is that that record, like I forgot
where it charted. I think it went to maybe number
seven or number five on on the on the Rap
Singles chart. But it was the first ever music video

(01:03:01):
that was sold as a commercial release. No we sold yeah,
we sold over a hundred thousand vhs. Yeah, so uh,
you know, and you know it's crazy too. The album
Penicillin on Wax, this is like hip hop at this

(01:03:21):
point started really becoming, you know, like an album oriented
thing where, um, if you if you, if you had
a hit hip hop single in the early eighties and
you didn't album, it was a good guess that your
album was going to do well because the single drove it.
But then I think, you know, the fans really started

(01:03:43):
to want more of a narrative, you know, um and
Tim Yeah, and Tim could not break out of that narrative,
you know, his narrative. He could not, he could not
expand on it. But the production on the album, because
some company did created something. It was like where you
can mix and quad. It was really cool, and they

(01:04:06):
let Joe hold onto this machine for for like a
month or so, and he mixed the Tim Dog album
on it, and I'll never forget listening to that headphones.
I was like, God, this sounds so amazing just but
the yeah, the record, UH didn't really. Yeah, I bought
it um because at that time that was when like
just rough house, like I would buy anything else it's

(01:04:29):
on the label. So I was like, I'm like, all right,
And I came to appreciate that much later me a
shout out to my man Jay's Own, who was like,
we're like the only two people in the world that rap,
and I'm, oh, yeah, it's I mean, if you look
at it, it's like, I mean, it's comedy, but it's
just it's just a man just hollering. And that ship
is amazing. He has a song gets robbed. Also, how

(01:05:03):
did how did you guys UM get connected with Cyprus?
So I uh. While managing school starting the label, I
also did I promoted shows as shows that the Chocodero

(01:05:25):
and The Chestnut Cabaret. Yeah and uh. I also managed
a group called Executive Slacks UM Executive Slacks for my
best way to describe what they were, it was nine
inch Nails years before Nine Inch Nails. As a matter

(01:05:45):
of fact, the same label Network Records up in Canada
used to license the Slacks off of us. Um it
was a It was a drummer name Bobby Ray who
played standing up playing those electronic drums, and a keyboard
player and a singer name and to play guitar named

(01:06:08):
Matt Morello. I'll tell you one record that you know.
I just tell everybody if they're even vaguely curious about
this group. It's called Fire and Ice and it's an
awesome record and it's real techno rock. But way back,
long before the stuff really came came of age, so

(01:06:30):
um So, there was a A and R guy at
Geffen Records in Los Angeles named Mio Vukovic. And Mio
was a DJ prior to becoming an A and R guy.
And there was another guy who was an A and
OUR guy who was a He was a lawyer for
Warner Bros. Records who became an A and R guy,

(01:06:50):
and him and Mio kind of formed like a partnership.
And uh MEO's two favorite artists in the world was
school E D and Executive Slacks, and um So he
called me up one day and we got to know
each other. He flew out, We hung out, and him

(01:07:12):
and Jeff had signed to hip hop artists to get in.
One of them was a group called seven eight three
and they were um produced by Lawrence Muggs Muggarud and
the other group was a group called Silk Time's Leather

(01:07:32):
by Jermaine dupri So. Um. Those projects were what they were,
you know, they just they just didn't happen. But Joe
mixed them and I helped mark in pro the singles.
Now you gotta remember at this point, I also I
also had a market. I was marketing records for other
labels because all the labels that couldn't sign you know,

(01:07:55):
we end up signing School to Jive Records, but every
label wanted them. Every budd Electra Warner's Capital, they all
wanted to sign SCHOOLI. So the so the guys they
didn't didn't sign them, they signed their hip hop acts.
They called me up and they say, can you help us? Right?
So now I have like this little company doing this.

(01:08:19):
Uh Roseman who I was man. I was engaged to
Rose at the time, and she started doing retail promotion
and Jackie Paul, the rap chart editor for his magazine.
So we had a little company, right, So we worked
Easy E, n W A, Tone, Looke, Young MC, whole

(01:08:43):
host of other records. So we did this whole thing
with UM with Geffen for seven eight three and Silk
Time's Leather. Uh. We mark and promote the record and
Joe mixed it and the records didn't happen. But um,
you know, we started relationship with Jermaine and his father,
Michael Malden. Michael Michael was the tour manager for the

(01:09:07):
Fresh Fest and UM and did a lot of stuff
with Russell and def Jam and everything. Um. So, so
Joe was out in l a UM working mixing Melomanes
Mentor and meloman Is sends brother from Cypress Hill and

(01:09:31):
so meloman was telling Joe he should check out my
brother's hip hop group, which was coincidentally produced by Mugs.
So Joe brings this cassette home and we listened to
it and we're digging it and everything. And it's funny
because we we went up to Colombia that day and

(01:09:54):
I'll never forget because Joe's brother Phil came with us
and we had a meeting with schedule with Kevin Ben Woodley,
who was our and our ken yeah up there. And
when we got there, they said Kevin is no longer here,
and it's like, oh, well, what's uh oh, but yeah,
you guys you could talk to Kurt Woodley and Kurt

(01:10:16):
replaced them, so one would leaves out the other wood
leaves in no relation. And Kurt, Kurt was kind of
cut from a different cloth and our wise, he was
more more I I think, much more kind of in
tune intuitive with everything that was going on. And Kurt
wasn't feeling Larry Lair and he was unapologetic about it,

(01:10:38):
you know. And we went round and round. And Kurt's
whole thing was that he felt that the Will Smith
Douggie Fresh storytelling style of hip hop. You know. You know,
I didn't even tell the whole cheapest story, but that's
all right, we'll need to get in that. Um Chiba
was actually our first record with with with Columbia when

(01:10:59):
we did and um And so when we left, as
I'm leaving, I give him a copy of the Cypress
Hill tape. I said, well, you might dig this in, right,
And he called me up that night and he said,
he goes, oh, man, that's Cypress Hill, he goes, I
played that for Donnie and that's like we got to

(01:11:21):
do this. Yeah, yeah, Donnie Eroner and um and so
uh cypers Hill. What happened to have been in the
studio they were cutting five songs for their publishing deal
of BMG, and so we offered a singles deal and
they sent us the five songs and then it became

(01:11:41):
an album deal and so that was such a groundbreaking.
If you remember who Hans Soul was, I met my
soul from, well, you were not the one imagination he
had like this spiked or this. Well he's a gospel

(01:12:07):
wrapper now, but back then, back then, he was part
of that that like that school of like like Kwame
and yeah, that whole. So we had met Hans so
on the on the at the Motown Philly UM video
and Hans lived about maybe twelve blocks away from me.

(01:12:27):
But during the crack area twelve blocks is you know
that we twelve blocks that might be twenty blocks and cracks.
So it's like seven pm and he's like, yo, man,
I just came back from New York. That's he's I came,
I came back from New York. Yo, I'm gonna change

(01:12:50):
your life. He said, y'all gotta get here. Me and
Trek we were like his little interns, you know whatever,
always rolling around. Hans is really responsible for Trek being
the freestyle aster he is now because Hans used to
do that a lot. So we're like, all right, it's
gonna be nighttime running through West Philly. Somehow we got
to Hans's block and he's like, he no build up.

(01:13:14):
He just said, listen to this first song. He plays
the Summertime by Jazz. He's done from Freshmans, and we
couldn't guess. He's like, yess who this is? We still
didn't know that was Will and Jeff, like by the
second verse with rock him no, no, no, And then
he puts pigs on and we were like what the hell?

(01:13:39):
We just we oh man, they have the scanners and everything,
and see you know the machine I was telling you
about that he makes penson on wax with the quad.
Use that for the police scanners. It's like, you know,
like crazy, No, Joe's no joke. Now that Albom sucked
me up, man, and it came from nowhere. Well here's

(01:14:03):
here's here's the other thing too. It's that it's that
we ship like thirty thousand plus albums and you're you're
seeing the um Bugs Bunny Dad, you know the thing
where he jumps out on stage and there's crickets. That's
what it was like. It was like like nothing, nothing right.

(01:14:27):
And the weeks are going by, and it's like, what's
going on here, you know, and people are calling DJ's right,
we're loving this record, but nothing and then uh, the
B side of the one um Killer Man ends up
in Juice where Omar but he's Tupaca Shore's character is

(01:14:56):
chasing Omar's elevator party. You could watch you you could
sit there in the theater and you can suddenly see
people like you know, and then it just exploded. Now
it's stilling fifty thousand copies a week, and it's just
like because I bought the Juice soundtrack thinking it was
on that and it wasn't. But shoot him up. Yeah,

(01:15:21):
It's just it was just it's it's it was like
just a real innovative master. Speaking of studio for where
is uh? Where is Kravitz today? Um studio for the
West Coast? He has a studio for in the West
It's I think it's in Venice Beach and drummer FUNKI

(01:15:45):
drummer Kravitz. You know what, Uh, I'm going to give props,
you know, Andy to meet and for where. You know
what I knew at the time. I just saw that
the guy was the most incredible getted musician, you know. Um,

(01:16:06):
him and I, you know, we started out cool, and
then there was a period where we didn't get along
for a long time, you know, but then later on
he ended up moving up to a house nearards. Our wives,
you know, became friends, and um, you know, but he
uh yeah, he started uh the Studio four West. Okay,

(01:16:32):
the time that I've met you at the one of
those Philly Hall of Fame thinking about Jiggers or whatever
you you and Roseman was there and um really I
mean yeah, I was there to see my dad get inducted,
but really I was trying to make a bee line
to YouTube to see if I could intern at Studio four.

(01:16:54):
And this is right, this is right on the crest
of criss Cross us like, yeah, about to dominate the world.
And yeah, I think you guys hired me on the
on the on the on the strength of that Chris

(01:17:15):
ross Cross was blown up so fast. Yeah, because my
first day there, I was. I felt like I was
part of the Michael Jackson Dangerous Tour. I was. I remember,
I remember the first time I ever saw you. You
were sitting there at the big conference table. And the
thing is, it's it's tunny. They gave me a this
Q and a thing from my book, and they you

(01:17:37):
know that one of the questions was about you and everything.
And they said, and I said, you had a knapsack on, right,
and you didn't take it off? And I thought, like, so,
so I'm walking around, said his kids got a knapsack on,
Like it must be kind of uncomfortable sitting there wearing
a knapsack, stuffing records and then everything. And then like

(01:17:58):
I walked past a half hour ladies had the knapsack on,
and I thought, well, maybe he's afraid that somebody's gonna
snatch it if he puts it down. You know, you know,
I always carry my soundtrack with me every every superhero
needs something. Yeah, that Chris Growth record. I'll tell you this, Um,

(01:18:21):
if if things start blowing up, then it's Tommy and
Donnie and Kevin. Kevin. Kevin's here, okay, so he's team Yeah.
So if it's like a major. If it's link Q
or Larry Lair, then it's like, oh that's what link Q.
That's that's a good. But you know, if things start

(01:18:43):
getting successful then and suddenly Sony like, yes, that was
all us. Oh yeah, oh yeah, I'll tell you what
it was. It was so funny. What's the politics? And well,
oh my god, dude, I I did. I was on
CNN Power Lunch thing right doing an interview, and then

(01:19:04):
my my cell phone rings and it's a executive from
Columbia Records who I just won't I don't want to
embarrass him, so I'm not gonna mention his name. But
he was saying, you know, Chris Um, you know, he goes,
I gotta tell you something. You know, Tommy really likes you.
I said, yeah, what I like Tommy? Yeah, but you
know it, man, you know, Tommy likes his guys to

(01:19:28):
be like, you know, laid back and go and so
this and so here's the thing. This this guy is
talking to me. He's coming through like on this frequency
that I'd never heard from him before, you know. And
then I kind of put it together that he's sitting
there talking to me and Tommy sitting right there and

(01:19:49):
then he starts telling me stuff like, well, you know,
like you know Tommy, like you know, he's really like
you know, Tommy's a star, He's a star, and all
this stuff and this whole thing. But when criss Cross happened, Um,
there was a picture of Tommy, Donnie and me and

(01:20:12):
Criss Cross staying in front of us and Rolling Stone magazine,
like two weeks later there is the picture. But where
did I go? Oh yeah, it was like that all
the time. Oh yeah, yeah. When we get to another

(01:20:34):
when we get to another part of this story, I'll
tell you something that's really just and I can't believe
I had fallen for it. But but you became a
star on your own, right though, Chris, because we can
see you on the start and everywhere. Yeah. But but
you know, I wasn't. I wasn't trying. You know, I
wasn't trying. I but the criss Cross record, and I'll

(01:20:54):
make I'll make an admission here that you know I
talked about in the book. I I I didn't like
the song that wasn't when we got the Crisscross, like
the demos, they had a song a little Boys in
the Hood, right, and what what it was about. It
was about two kids twelve years old trying to make

(01:21:15):
that decision. Okay, well my role models are like, you know,
these the gangsters with the clothes and the cash and
the cars and over that do I want to do that?
Or do I want to do this? And I thought
that was a really interesting thing for a hip hop record,
you know, like that and coming from these little kids.

(01:21:36):
So that's what I thought was gonna be right. Jump
didn't happen until later on in the project, and it
was it was I just kind of thought it was
a noisy little song, you know, and it's a noisy,
little like annoying, little like, you know thing, and uh so,

(01:22:02):
so Michael Maldon, uh David Cohn at Columbia Records and
our guy, he said, you guys should put a baseline
on this song. So Joe goes and puts a baseline
on it and mix it. And I was leaving rough
house one night and this is when we had the
one room office, the glass doors, and the facts came
to remember, facts, facts come through and it was from

(01:22:25):
Michael Maldon and said, Chris Jump is going to be
a number one song. Smash. Michael, I should have kept
that I should have kept it. So here's what happened,
um we we um. Rosie Perez was the UM talent

(01:22:48):
coordinator for uh Living Color and Richard shot. Richard Murray
shot to Criss Cross video down Atlanta. It was the
first time it ever, snow didn't landed in like thirty
two years, right, And we shot the video for like
eighteen thousand dollars, right, And they performed on in Living

(01:23:09):
Color the next day. We're my wife and I. I
lived on Sitting Line Avenue, and my wife and I
were at the Overbrook Diner and uh, I was really
hungover and my wife was giving me a bunch of
ships and um, and I was just like all I
wanted to do was just eight and you know, it

(01:23:32):
was the weekend, and um, but I'm hearing this older,
middle aged couple sitting Caddy quarter from us, and the
guy was going on and on about Criss Cross. Right,
this older white guy, he goes, these kids were so
amazing and blah blah blah blah blah blah, and I thought, wow.

(01:23:54):
I looked at me and I said, I think this
record is gonna this record is gonna blow up. And uh, yeah,
it was it was like a Beheamo, can I ask
one question about jump besides the money? But uh, can
you clarify something? So obviously my my guess is the

(01:24:15):
backstory with jump Around? Oh yeah, I'll tell you all
about it, right of course the end of the record,
Uh Joe the biter Nickelo right right? Which? Okay, My
my guess is that because both acts recorded for a

(01:24:37):
rough House. Wait, let me let me get my theory out,
you see if I'm right now, because Mugs producer jump
Around was also a producer at at rough House, my guesses,
and I always wanted to know this because I would
do the same thing because the same midnight what's the

(01:25:02):
what's the break of of uh plat tuning Midnight Manziel's
Midnight theme or something? Yeah, alright, so the midnight theme drums?
Uh that Cypress used on kill a Man? Right? Uh,
that's all Mugs, right. My guess is that. Okay, let

(01:25:26):
me use something. You know that some of Muggs's tools
were utilized. Note, okay, say exactly what happened? Okay, So
we I passed on a lot of great artists, you know,
and I passed on House of Pain, arrested development. What

(01:25:56):
was that? Who on Alicia Keys know that's painful kind
too well now you know. But here here's the thing.
It's it if if you were there, you know what
I mean. But any happen. Let me let me get
back to this story. So so so um so we

(01:26:19):
got a We got the demo from Mugs for a
House of Pain. Okay, it was good, but it wasn't
in our humble estimation at a time there yet. But
you know, who can hear what in a demo in
this day and age. Right, But here's the bottom line.
There was not a song called Jump on that demo.

(01:26:42):
It wasn't there. Okay, number one, number one, number two right.
Amanda Cypress is one half of Cypress manager team. Mandy
Shear calls me up and she says, here's how she so,
you guys have a song coming up Jump and I said, yeah,

(01:27:03):
criss Cross Jump. Well, House of Pain has a song
called Jump, and you guys stole it and gave it
to criss Cross, right, And I was like, that's the
most insane thing I ever heard, because Jemaine dupri did everything,
you know, so he she and I said, so where

(01:27:23):
did we steal the song from? A man. He oh,
is on the demo, right, And I said really, I said,
hold on right, and I go, I've got the demo
and I'm sitting there on the film with her and
I'm listing the songs. I said, so, uh, I'll tell
you what's here. Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
blah blah. Which one of those songs is? Which one
did we take? And she goes, oh, well, the song

(01:27:46):
is called Jump. I said, well, there's no song called
Jump on this demo. This is what Muggs gave us, right.
But they couldn't let it, you know, ever last couldn't
let it go, couldn't let yeah. And here's the thing.
Muggs told me. He never Joe Jack the song. He
never thought. And the thing is that I can tell
you this right now. I mean Joe Nicolo, God bless him. Man,

(01:28:07):
I've known this man. You know intimately, there's Joe. Joe
is not. He doesn't have that thing right to take
like he would. That would require much more time, effort,
and energy and resources to do. Then then Joe wants

(01:28:28):
to expend you know what I mean. He's not He's
not that kind of like you know what was his
reaction when he first heard it? Oh, he loved it.
He goes, yeah, no, he said, oh yeah, He goes,
you should see it in the video. He gets right
up in the camera. Okay I always wanted Okay, there's
something else I'm just reminded of. He explaining nah situation. Yeah,

(01:28:55):
you guys had him first. Yeah, and then what happened?
All right? Um so so at this point, you know,
we're when we got the sony right to clumb. It
was CBS at the time. It was like, you know,
there's deaf Jam and there's you guys, right, and you're it.

(01:29:17):
We're not doing any other hip hop right. And the
next week we go up for our first meetings with
like people like Angela Thomas, product manager, and I'll never
forget Angela Thomas was eating a salad and Kevin Woodley
walks us in and he goes, yeah, this is Chris

(01:29:38):
Schwartz and Joe Nikolo. That's their hip hop label, rough House,
and we just did a deal with And Angela is
kind of like she's got her mouthful of food because
she just found out that they did Russia Associated Labels,
which is like thirty companies you know, and she goes
and she's like looking and she's like, oh, another label,
and you can just see that that look on her face.

(01:29:58):
Uh so so deaf jam. Then something happened and they left,
they got you know, they went to they went through
a renegotiation and it just didn't work out, and they
went over to uh m C A PolyGram whatever and
we were it right and we were now doing really

(01:30:18):
well and we had a lot of pipeline revenue coming
to us. You know, the labels don't have to give
it to you all at once. It's there, so so
uh mc search uh wanted to sign Nas. Now a

(01:30:39):
couple of months prior to this, um uh there's a
guy that he uh he was a manager of a
club called Revival. Um Yeah, Greg mcg yeah yeah. I
lived at Revival. I was like I was there all
the time. Greg was a manager and we used to
hang out to the wee hours and you know, and

(01:31:01):
he constantly played me this record um Live at the barbecue, right,
and he said, you know, you should find his kid
Nas and signed him. But like I know that this label,
Wild Pitch was owned by Stu Fine. I said, he's
already signed. He's already signed to Wild Pitch, you know.

(01:31:21):
So so I just that was it? Right? And so
I get a phone call from Donnie Einer and he goes, look,
he goes, I want to introduce you to Search. He's
got this artist that uh that you should you know,
look at name NAS. And I was like, oh, really awesome. Yeah.

(01:31:44):
So Search comes down to Philadelphia with Faith Newman and Nas.
We go to the Spaghetti Warehouse the After Midnight post
in the post Afterber the original After Midnight and those
guys right, oh my god. Alright, so um so we

(01:32:04):
uh we we do this deal and uh it was
two things were signed NAS and we also did the
deal for the soundtrack to zebra Head and uh are
the first thing we do if NAS was halftime Uh
Richard Murray, Uh. Production protege James Brummel did the video

(01:32:27):
for like three thousand dollars, you know. And then stuff
started happening, you know, and uh, you know John Scheckter.
Let me go back to an earlier part of the
source from I was had to school E D Records, right,
I was sending out thousands of records to retailers besides,

(01:32:47):
you know, to do stuff. I mailed out the first
issue of The Source in the school d Records package.
So I knew John and Dave Um, Dave Mason, John Scheckter,
and John Scheckter came down and his mission was to
get a copy of the NAS songs, and I gave

(01:33:08):
him like, I think five songs and then, uh, I
think he was like the first artist to get X
amount of microphones in the Source or whatever. So now
now now there's a huge, huge thing happening with NAS. Right,

(01:33:29):
everybody's excited, you know. And I get a phone call.
Rose comes in and says, oh, Chris um Um, I
was just told by somebody Columbia that that NAS was
gonna be on Columbia proper. And I was like, wow,
how's that he signed to us? He's contracted to us.

(01:33:50):
It's our you know. And uh I we called up
Donny and uh Joe and I go up there and
Donnie shows us a it's a facts from Tommy and
the subject matter is why is NAS signed to rough House? Right,

(01:34:12):
So here's what happened. Search brought it to Columbia, and
Colombia said, oh, we'll do it, but it has to
be on rough House why because if it fails then
we end up eating it from our pipeline revenues. Right,
it's no risk for them to put it on us,

(01:34:34):
you know, and it backfired on them. It backfir Yeah.
So does it feel like being there redheaded step kids,
like the redheaded step bitches? You know, was it not?
I mean, were they not? Because as a label on
their own, they weren't. They weren't doing check with hip hop. Yeah,

(01:34:59):
I know, I know, but but but here's what it is.
Here's what it is. Afterwards, all said and done. You know,
Donnie shows me this facts, right, and it's from Tommy
and it says he's saying, quote unquote you fucking asshole. Right,
it's what it's it and exclamation points and underlined right,

(01:35:21):
And Donnie was like, you know, Chris, I'm liking a
thing here. Can you please help us out? And so
we we we did a deal. We uh we let them, um,
we let them buy us out. Should we have done it?
You know, here's the thing it was looking back in retrospect,

(01:35:43):
probably not. But at the same time, it was kind
of hard to say no when this is a guy
who's kind of like your partner at the thing and everything,
and you know, we hed done a lot for us
and everything, and it was just a thing. And then, uh,
I remember later on Faith Newman, you know, kind of

(01:36:03):
conceded to said, you know, Chris, I said, part of
the pressure with this is that is that we have
nothing for Columbia proper, you know. And what they I
guess they didn't want to see was that if rough
House suddenly ups and leaves one day the way def
Jam did, and can imagine like half year revenue stream

(01:36:24):
walking out the door, you know, because you know, for
the for like really like a ten year period of time,
we were their black music department. So so so. So yeah,
that's what happened. But you know, it's funny. I would
see Nas like over I saw him on like over
in Europe and everything, and he always said, he goes Man,

(01:36:46):
he goes. I just wanted to just stay on rough
House so bad, and you know, and um, yeah, so
but he gave me a nice shout out in the
Surviving the Times. My last day at rough House, Uh,

(01:37:06):
two things happened. Uh. One freaking I don't even know
if you're aware of this. My last day at rough
House was Santy Gold's first day at rough House as
working under the Vita gar and yeah, it was kind

(01:37:28):
of like that dream Weaver moment like in Wayne's World.
Yeah it was who is that? Um? I mean the
creepy out Santy sorry time Santy was like she was
Bay of the Century um. And de Vita asked me
for a favor and said, hey, uh at you guys,

(01:37:51):
is uh signing party in two weeks? Could you let
one of our new acts open for you guys? I
was like, okay, who is it? And she gives me
blunted on reality which at that point, which at that
point was like it was a quiet two months. Like

(01:38:15):
I was gonna say, Nappi Heads didn't even have the
remix yet. This was early in the game. I knew
when I saw the eight by ten because of the
way that soap operas running my family's houses. I was like, oh,
that's the JOm from As the World turn Yeah. I
didn't even know about sister act two yetr as the

(01:38:38):
Troubled Kid for As the World Turns. So I loved it.
I was like, yeah, hell yeah, let her do it.
So how did like? So the Fujis came to my
attention two weeks like Thanksgiving of November nine. But I
she told me that you guys had had them long before.

(01:39:00):
Oh yeah, so how did you guys? Um we actually
rose Man? Okay, yeah, I mean, I I just you know,
I'm I'm real big on giving credit where credits due,
you know. And um was Roseman officially A and R?
Like what was her job at? Who? You know? Who's

(01:39:21):
an inn our guy anymore? You know what I mean?
It's like label, you know. Monica Lynch said, the best
music that came the biggest records that came to Tommy
Boy came through their their guy in the Puerto Rican
guy in the mail room, you know what I mean. Yeah,
So so, um remember the TV commercial I guess it
was in the late eighties early nineties. Uh, the guys

(01:39:43):
in the cab and the cab driver in New York
City has the dreads. You know they showed that commercial.
That's Hassan hassanhead. Yes, uh uh he always oh yeah,
so that's I guess that's a Zebrahead party is where

(01:40:04):
he met rose and so he had night during the premiere.
I guess I don't I don't know how she met him.
That bust have been because he rented a bus and
took us all to New York City. And that's that's
the that's the ill fated night where I remember Clark
Kent went back and forth on in vogues, hold on

(01:40:25):
Nas freestyle, I have my one moment with Roman with
Nasty Nas back. You know, that was my one moment
when I thought it was going to be MC and
I gave it up after that for real. Uh well,
I just a minute. This is years later, so you know,
I hope nobody recorded that ship. But so he met

(01:40:48):
her that night, he must have crazy. So so what
happened was she bug shit out of me for for
a long time. Aime, she goes, you got to hear this.
Listen to the scroup. Listen to Scroup. Listen to Scroup.
So I'm in my car and uh I put this

(01:41:11):
tape in and the first thing that caught me was
it like, oh, it's not like hip hop. Like it's
hip hop, but there's you know, he had a whole
different thing about it. And and then and and so,
well you were familiar with that because you also have

(01:41:31):
the goats. Yeah yeah, So so I thought, I thought,
all right, so this is something a little bit unique
and different. I didn't know their Haitian and I'm embarrassed
to say this, you know, I thought it was Jamaican,
you know, so this is what's new. So we go
to the uh we we Joe and I go up

(01:41:53):
to their audition at David Sonnenberg's office on the Upper
East Side and this town house and um, and there
was like seven or eight people. And but here's what
what basically the thing that right away was that why
Cleff the beatbox and the acoustic guitar. And it was like, Okay,

(01:42:21):
this is a little different, this is like and that
that's what did it for me. You know, you didn't
hear a note from Lawrence Now I get I I
talked about in the book. I don't even remember her
from the audition. And here's the thing. When we went,
there was like six or seven kids. And at the
end of the audition why Cleff like it's now stripped

(01:42:44):
all his clothes off, He's in his boxers, going nuts
and everything. And I found out later on they had
a dustioned for every major and independent. We were their
last shot, they said we were at So when we
went to do the contracts, it was there was only
three people and I was like, well, wait what were

(01:43:08):
all these other people that were there? Right? And so
anyhow we did the album. Uh, most of my dialogue
was with why Cleff and the manager David Sonenberg and
when we got when I got the first batch of songs,
it was really weird because like Prose was like the
dominant rapper, and I thought, you know, Prize was good.

(01:43:32):
But he he I'll tell you what You're ready or not.
You have to admit he's what he does on that track.
But I just wasn't feeling him carrying these songs. And
I call up David and I said, David, you and
this is this is this problem but and he goes, well,

(01:43:54):
he goes, yeah, it is a real problem. He says,
because why Cleff is or Proses? Why clips cousin? I'm
like gos ship but I said, fuck it, you know,
let a cigarette. He got Cleff on the phone and
I said, yeo, man, I said, it's cool. But is
there any way that you know, blah bla Blah's diplomat
is possible? Because oh yeah, man, I got you right

(01:44:18):
like a week later, different different thing. You know, Proz
is more pushed to the back, you know. Uh, and
that first album and the touring. And here here's the thing, man,
And I always said this, there was like three groups,
three hip hop groups from that day. The toured that
was the Fuji's cypercill and the Roots constant touring Constant,

(01:44:47):
those were the Mare Scott Thomas, you know Scott Thomas
over in the UK booking agent. Yeah, he would tell me,
he said, he goes, yeah, all through those he You
would always say, those the artists, those are the ones
you know, uh you had. But but how about this.
Two years after the release of Blunted on Reality, we're

(01:45:12):
still selling six eight copies a week sound scan, right,
So that's showing that this record. And I gotta tell
you that whole thing with with Sony and Columbia was
hanging not by a thread, but by like a spider
web thread, like it was. They did a show in

(01:45:35):
London and I wasn't at the show, but Luke Verge,
who later on became head of every like he became
my guy for Europe for everything. He was our he
was had a very national marketing for Columbia Records. He
called he's he's off, He's from Marseille um and he
called him he goes Chris. He was rowed a cat

(01:45:57):
back with these guys last night. They're talking about dropping Fuji.
You must do something, you know, and uh I, I
called up Donny and uh I said, Donny, I said
that they were gonna win Grammy's we just gotta we
gotta stay with we gotta do this and stay with
it and everything. And do you know what it is

(01:46:19):
like the lack of faith, because the thing is, I
would even like to think that, like, Okay, the money
by this point, you know, you have some gratitude because
the money is good. You know you guys are doing
the numbers. Yeah. Yeah, it's like each time out the
out the gate. No, I'll tell you this. At this point,

(01:46:42):
at that point, I I had a lot of confidence
in the relations. I'll tell you this when when the
first the first five years at Colombia, right, I was
I was the wimpy kid, you know, I was easily
easily bullied and and you know, talk to to ship
in another diplomatic way. How how approachable is Tommy And

(01:47:12):
is he one of the guys or is you know
what you'd be like, hey, yo, but told him kind
kind of got I got. I got a little little
story that that I'll get into um um alright. So
so um Lauren this record, right, the Miseducation of Lauren Hill? Okay? Uh?

(01:47:42):
Are we allowed to talk about that record in here?
Nons inside the record? The record that the project is
the vehicle for the story, right, but that she she
was going to Japan to do a show for the

(01:48:06):
Sony executives. We had just did this whole thing in
in in the UK, and uh, and I was going.
I was going with her to Japan. And this is
shortly after my remember the phone call from the executives
about you know, all right, right, so she's so we

(01:48:28):
got this big thing happening. I bought my ticket, all
ready to go, and I get a phone call and
it's uh, Tommy's assistant, Oh, Chris, Um, Tommy needs you
to come up to a meeting with him and uh
Danny de Vito. And who's the woman who runs Jersey Films.

(01:48:51):
Um you know I'm talking about, right, And and I said, oh, yeah, yeah, cool, right,
so when's when's the meeting? She gives me a I said, impossible,
I'm gonna be over in Japan with um per with
miss Hill, right, And she goes, oh, well, Tommy is
UM really asking if you could, you know, make this

(01:49:14):
It's really really important, you know, And and I'm like,
and I'm thinking, wow, Like, how can I say no? Right?
So I said, all right, I go in the clickman's
office and I said, yeah, it looks like I'm not
going to the thing in Japan with miss I'm doing

(01:49:34):
the UM Tommy wants to have this really important meeting
with Danny DeVito and all this stuff. And Kevin just
laughs at me and he goes, he goes, yeah, what's
gonna happen. The plane is going to take off, they
cancel They're getting canceled the meeting. I said, I said, nah,
it can happen. It's not like that. And of course

(01:49:59):
the plane takes off. The call, Oh, Danny had to
do some re shoots, you know, and and so and so.
How else could I look at this? Right? And to
think that that he didn't want me meeting the Sony guys,

(01:50:19):
the Sony UM you know over there. But you know
that the reality is like, what what what would I do?
You know, I'm just you know, what what am I
going to talk to these guys about? You know, I'm
just there was part of the you know, with her
on the show and everything. But but but you know,

(01:50:40):
here's the reality. I could never prove this in a
court of law, and it's only speculation on my part.
But you know, but the only thing I could say
if that meeting was just so fucking important, how come
it never got rescheduled because I had called up? So
when are we doing the meeting with Danny? And it

(01:51:02):
just kind of like, you know, yeah, so what was
your breaking point? Because you said that you probably was
a pushover for the first like five years, but what
was the moment when you were like, um, it was
the I guess the breaking the breaking point where it's no,
I didn't suddenly become nasty and mean, it was just
sort of um when when you really like, I'll tell

(01:51:25):
you this. There there's a guy, his name is Chris
Blanckwell and he's the founder of He's one of my
best friends and he's been my mentor for years. And
when you really get a grasp of the type of

(01:51:48):
money that those companies make, it's it's, uh, it's mind boggling. Uh.
For instance, at a time, you know a major distribution power, right, well,
there's manufacturing costs, right you deduct that you pay for
your manufacturing. The company that's manufacturing the record. It's the

(01:52:15):
same company but your but you're paying for the manu
like in other words, they're paying you're you're paying them
to manufacturing. You're not getting any break on that, you know. Um,
so it's and then let's face it, uh international, Okay,

(01:52:37):
I can tell you this that uh there was an
old there was an old time industry account named Bert
Podell and well it's guys got the biggest he was
an account. Biggest out of him out on the Bert
Padell was that you know, when you go to do

(01:52:58):
a co venture right as a label, they just don't
get it to you. You know, remember Andre Horrel the
fifty million dollar mc A thing, right, they don't. Yeah,
they just don't. When you renegotiate, you gotta you have
to come to them with a whole plan, like a prospectus.

(01:53:18):
You have to have projections, you have to have a
pro forma, you gotta have all that stuff. You have
to because if in order for them to cut loose
with that money, they have to be able to justify
it to whoever, the board of whatever whatever it is.
But that's part of the process. Like in any business. Right.

(01:53:39):
So so when I when we did our finally did
the co venture, uh, I had to get Bert Podell
to help us put that stuff together because he's got
he's got all that stuff. But what I the reason
I bring him up is that the majors is that
were they one place that they really get you at
that time when we have when we relying on the

(01:54:01):
physical product, which was the lifeblood of the business was
international internationally. You think about it, you everything is all computerized.
So and somebody renegotiates a record deal or something, you
okay for international, we're gonna get this particular royalty rate
and they raised it by you know, a couple points. However,

(01:54:22):
but somehow somebody forgets to put that in the royalty
accounting program. Right. So then when you go back and
you do a um we audit, you would believe the
hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars that you find
and rough House if we were anything else worldwide, we

(01:54:44):
were one of the biggest hip hop labels in the
world because our artists were massive, you know, and and
you know we were making so much money for them.
And so that's at that point I just kind of
felt like, you know, I knew you know what I mean.
So that gave me a lot of confidence in and

(01:55:06):
you know, dealing with them. So when did you when
when did you officially leave Sony? Uh? In nine right
after right after I was having I was having meetings
with in l A with like uh, David Geffen, heads

(01:55:31):
of like E and I and Warner Brothers. The day
after the Grammys. Yeah, a forcat because with Rough Nation. Yeah,
and then the product from Dude. You should see the
you should see the video they did with Liz Ldy.

(01:55:53):
It's it's incredible. Rich shot it in this place in Delaware.
It's like it's a white psych that goes is around
the room and it's a camera that's on this like
robotic thing. So the way it's it's one continuous shot.
So you see this video and you see like hundreds
of people in it, but there's no edit. It just

(01:56:15):
keeps going. It just keeps going. And it's this whole
system with the computer in the camera. That's a really
awesome video. I can't find it though online. So where
did you Where did Rough Nations? Was that Warner or Warner? Okay,
I want to be the guy to bring black music
back to Warners. That was my goal. Man. It wasn't
even about money. I actually took less money to go

(01:56:38):
with Warners because and to me, the last real things
in regards to to black music of any significance was
um iced tea and prints, right, and if you want
to talk about cold chilling, I'm not sure, but you know,
uh that that was it. And I felt like if

(01:57:00):
I could come there and kind of inject that rough
House DNA into the into the gig, you know that
I could do something significant. So at the time when
I started at rough House, you guys were just implementing
a new system. Sound scan hadn't really started yet. So

(01:57:20):
every day I'm hearing all your people calling saying, hey,
I need five hundred pieces of reported in Billboard for this.
And it was a little more subtle than that. But
my point was then there was a point two months later,
oh yeah, where all that stopped. I was like, wait,

(01:57:42):
how come you guys aren't and people are being letting
go because they're like, well, we have sound scan now,
we don't need that anymore. How crazy when they chipped
when they went when it went from from regular, when
it went from the bullshit charts. The sound scan suddenly
labels like us were the king of the help. Right.
We we sat there, man, you're you're trying, you're you're

(01:58:03):
working a record and you're legitimately selling records, and yet
you're like trying to break an artist and you're in
the hundred and ten spots and Billboard. But then you
see some god awful thing like sitting at number fourteen
that you know is not selling's there? And then when

(01:58:26):
sound scan happened, suddenly hip hop was like the first twenty.
It was crazy. So how do you feel now today? Uh,
the way the streaming is and and s Facebook lags Instagram. Well,

(01:58:51):
now you know, it's funny, not as much as I thought, like, say,
a month ago. Uh you know, I have I somebody
I started a Twitter account and Instagram count like years ago,
but never paid attention. Then I just started looking like
a couple of weeks ago, and it's like I had
over a thousand followers on each. I said, oh, that's
a nice little start, you know, And so I just

(01:59:12):
started figuring out how to do that. Guy never paid
attention to that stuff. But in terms of the industry,
I'll tell you what I think is first off, when
the whole thing, you know, digital and streaming for the
first time since the fifties, there's now level playing field.
But if you look at global music revenues, eight of

(01:59:38):
global music revenues are independent artists, and that that's a
big thing. I mean, what would would that have been
twenty years ago? Independent artists I'm not the artists not
signed the record labels. Artists putting out music make up
eighteen percent of global music revenues. And so this year

(02:00:04):
is the I guess, I think it's the third year
that uh, global music revenues have taken a northernly upturn,
you know, because let's face it, ever since the death
knew the stranglehold in the early two thousands, you know.
But um so yeah, so it's it's growing, and it's growing,

(02:00:27):
it's gonna keep growing. And I I'm starting to see, um,
you know, labels now being a little bit more speculative,
you know, in terms of artists and everything like that.
And so in walking I've never spoken to anyone that
once had a label and then walked away from the

(02:00:48):
distribution deal whatever. So what happens to like a group
like Cypress Hill will be a legacy act. So that
album will continue to sell over and over. But they bought,
they brought us out, they bought the artists. Yeah yeah,
yeah because the Yeah, because it was not even so yeah,

(02:01:08):
the Carnival that wasn't rough House was it was. Yes,
a matter of fact, I paid for that record personally
when we started, Oh wow, I love that albument. That's like,
well that was. Here's the thing, you know, they didn't
like the Carnival. When when I when I when I
went in the meeting, When when I went Now when

(02:01:30):
I went to the first meeting, here's what happened. Why
Cleff Why cleff um. Originally I'd gone to Haiti a
couple of times with them, right, and we had this
idea to do a Haitian traditional Haitian kind of pop record, right,
but mix it with some like hip hop and everything.

(02:01:52):
And it was this wasn't going to be like what
we call a frontline release. This was going to be
like an independent project. I was gonna be see if
Chris Blackwell when you involved with it on palm and stuff.
So we start doing this record and then next thing
you know, it starts to kind of turn into something else.
And now we think like, okay, now this is like

(02:02:12):
a frontline rough house release, right, And but I had,
you know, spent money at this point. And why Clef
calls me up on a Tuesday night with Sonenberg to
tell me that he booked like an ad piece orchestra
for that. And it was like, I haven't even gotten

(02:02:36):
like a budget approved or anything. And I had a
meeting with Donnie on a Wednesday and I played him.
I gave him the CD of like the five five
or six songs, puts it in, listens to it, and
does one of the worst things ever that could happen

(02:02:57):
to you when you're trying to get somebody to like something.
He handed it back to me. We're staying alive on there.
Uh no, no, but no no. But he handed it
back and he goes, I don't know, he goes sounds
like something like vacation music or something, and I'm like,

(02:03:18):
they're going, yeah, now we got to the orchestra going
and ship like but Larry worked on that one too,
right down, Yeah he did. He didn't that album. Oh yeah,
So it's a brilliant record, man, it really is. It
really is. But but here's the thing that that the

(02:03:41):
miseducation was the really that was the struggle. That was,
like they first off, they didn't want a solo record
from her, yet they wanted another food record, and of
course who could blame them, right, another Fuji's record is

(02:04:02):
gonna sell billion, you know whatever. Um. But the the
they say, they say, okay, so now she's gonna do
a record, but we want we want Puffy, we want this,
we want all these. And the problem was like, you know,

(02:04:24):
I had a thing at my house, like a barbecue,
and I invited her to come, not thinking that she
would come, you know, and uh her mother called me
up and says, oh, yeah, we're coming out, and I
was like okay, so and we she came. We hung
out for a little bit and I had my house
at the time. I had this room, like this music room,

(02:04:46):
and she started to tell me about this record and
it was gonna be like, um, sixties and seventies soul,
like hip hop in this whole book, real organic, you know,
if analog and this whole thing, and it's like cool
all this and when we I was in Bath, England

(02:05:12):
with my wife and it was like three o'clock in
the morning and the phone rings and I knew who
it was. I knew it was going to be Tommy
and Donnie, and I had given them the five songs,
five or six songs, and yeah, and they said, and

(02:05:36):
Tommy's on speaking, Donny was on speaker phone. He goes, yeah,
Tommy and I listened to the record, and we think
the songs are very, very very mediocre. Now now I
hang up, and then whatever. I hang up, and I'm
sitting there in the dark, right and my wife's asleep,

(02:05:57):
and she's like, Chris, what's the matter? I said, they
don't like record, you know. And I'm like, and you know,
but you gotta this is but see for me, you know, Okay,
I like I said, yeah, I talk all this bravado
about my dealings with them and everything. But still these
are two guys who were, for the all intensive purposes,

(02:06:17):
pretty powerful guys in the music business, you know, who
have years and years and an experience, you know. But
the one thing that that I held onto was that
they were wrong about the Cleft record, completely wrong about that.
And the record was good. It was just like it

(02:06:38):
just like, how how could they you know? I didn't. Okay,
this is the thing, though, I don't think it matters
if it's good or bad. Could they no, no, no,
I'm just saying, but it's the truth. Could they not
see that it was going to be effective? Like? How
could they not? Because she could have done any okay
at that point, because they would have one because these guys, right,

(02:07:02):
I always used to say that. I used to tell
her her this all the time. Earlier on. I used
to say, you could sing over five minutes of static
kiss and don't be a hit record. But but they lived,
They live in these monolithic glass and steel places where
everything is about radio and Greatest Gainer and weekly this

(02:07:22):
and all that, and everything is formatted and this and that,
and it's like, but the thing is, like I saw
both the carnival and miseducation these to me, this was
like circa nineteen six w MMR FM radio, Like you know,

(02:07:47):
this isn't about this is about a body of work,
you know, And this the thing is, it's like, um,
I felt that that I wasn't thinking not thinking singles.
You know, I'm thinking this, but you know, Michael Malden was.
You know, we did a white label twelve inch for

(02:08:10):
Lost Ones. We did it, rough House did it Columbia
had nothing to do with it, and we didn't even
tell him about We just did it and we sent out.
It was her idea and we sent that out and
oh my god, the ship hit the fans. All right, yeah,
the ship hit the I mean they, oh, well, here's

(02:08:32):
the thing. Michael Malden was angry, you know, because you know,
let's face it, he was head a black music department
and I just and I just went and did that ship, right,
But he said, Donnie's gonna get ready to blow up
your phone. But you know what, I never heard from Donnie.
You don't know why, because no, no, I never heard

(02:08:55):
from Donnie because it was so incredible the way it started.
The whole thing. It was like that song lost Ones,
what a perfect entreevous for a project like that. But
they've literally had doubts that the album is going to
work even though. So how do they feel about the

(02:09:17):
score then, Oh no, no, well well no, no, not
at all. But but I'll tell you this. They they
wanted they wanted um, not only did they want that,
that all that crazy you know, commercial production, they definitely
wanted and eight nineties female R and B singer style photography.

(02:09:49):
It's like so so think about this, think about think
about what the cover is, and think about what they're
thinking about. Yeah, it's have been another cover. Yeah yeah,
Now it was like and no, they eventually they gave
in because I know this that there was a there
was a marketing meeting and Miguel Bagower and a bunch

(02:10:12):
of people in the room all said that the anticipation
and the early feedback and everything was that this record
was not only gonna be critically acclaimed, it was going
to be massive and everything. And then then, of course,
you know, because it was lost ones and to do
to do. Yeah, I just can't believe that they didn't

(02:10:36):
know that they had an easy yeah, especially after killing
well you know, he was killing me softly. Was never
even uh, it was never supposed to be a single.
The Fuji's didn't didn't even really want the song on
the record, and um, and they didn't want to promote it,
as you know they did. We did a video and

(02:10:57):
and it just they hated it. So we be shot
it with them in the movie theater throwing popcorn at
each other like like a non video video. Right. Um,
but yeah, that song, you couldn't stop it was that.
I loved that wasn't on Love Joe, that wasn't thinking.
I think it's possible that both can be right. I

(02:11:18):
mean it's not I'm not one of the die hard.
Technically that album actually changed my life in a technical sense,
it affected my life. But I think I'm just shocked
that they couldn't see that this was a no brainer. Well,

(02:11:39):
they just they were you know what, I'll tell you this.
They didn't trust their record to have all of it
to be pulled off by her and her alone, Okay,
because at that point she had gotten rid of her management,
she was disassociated, did with everything and everybody up there

(02:12:04):
except me and that was it. So it was kind
of like, um, you know, they they would have loved
that that the A list, R and B nineties hit,
Uh producers, you know, they didn't realize that she was
the answer to the coming backlash that no one saw coming. Yeah. Yeah.

(02:12:27):
And the thing is that I heard all sorts of stories.
Uh somebody said that, you know that Puffy had this
big meeting and pulled everybody into a room and held
up the record and says this is where we need
to be going and all this stuff and it just
h it, really, you know, that's crazy. How did the
lawsuits and stuff affect you, guys? If at all? I

(02:12:50):
don't wanna, I don't want to say anything. You know,
I know I knew Vada, right. But here's here's the simparioity,
the fact that they claimed that they wrote lyrics and everything.
How How because I know these songs and I know
everything that she's talking about in the songs. You know,

(02:13:10):
moving records on South Orange av right, Okay, I used
to take records there, you know, to move in records
on South Orange j ab. So why would why would
those guys come up with that reference in that song?
Why would they? How could they have wrote lost? Like?
It's so crazy? But here's the biggest thing, right, and
and here's what it is in the nutshell, if they,

(02:13:32):
in fact were the ones who made this monumental contribution
to this production, well why haven't they made a similar
monumental contribution to somebody else's production since you know what
I mean? And making another Yeah? That's uh, yeah, I

(02:13:55):
guess with all these due respect, James is not here too.
Oh no, no, James James. I know what James did.
James James, he wrote the thing I'm like after a
while it was just like Lauren did everything and then
people was like wait minute, hold yeah, yeah, but I
don't think one person does everything everything. Yeah, exactly, but

(02:14:17):
it was a nice mark. It was needed at the time.
I'll tell you what I know of some major, major
market name producers who are out there who are given
the ultimate credit for projects that they basically yeah, they
would come in and listen to some mixes and say Okay,

(02:14:40):
do this and do that and go home. And there's
quite a few of them and they rely on a
lot of people. Yeah, is all about Wow, the lessons
we learned today, Chris, we thank you, thank you, thank you,

(02:15:00):
thank you, thank you. This year is the anniversary. Yeah,
I was like, wow, you'll know, we're just um, yes,
we're What we're trying to do is to figure out
the research. You get a definitive date and we're gonna
probably use when we really just started with Colombia is

(02:15:21):
the real anniversary, because that's when all the records that yeah,
that would yeah, that would be uh yeah, thirty am.
I forgot about how did you find DMX and why
did you not? Uh we did we we well, you know,

(02:15:42):
you know what the biggest problem was we never like
it was a good song, but we didn't have the
like I never really got to hang out with him
or anything, you know. And we did this song Bord Loser,
which at the time it was it was a good
track for for when you look at the time when
that came out that, yeah, that was good. But we

(02:16:06):
only did a singles deal. And I think what happened
was that by the time we started trying to figure
out what the next move was, something had already elapsed.
And I know that that Rough Riders had already And
you know, I'll tell you this, I didn't get upset
or anything because well, if I if I was so like,

(02:16:28):
you know, like, if this was something that was important
to me, I'd have been up on it. You know. Wow,
who knew? Yeah, Well, I'll end all right, Chris. We
thank you very much the bills, Sugar Steve and this

(02:16:51):
quest Love Supreme, and we will see you on the
next go round, all right, m hm. Of course. Love
Supreme is a production of My Heart Radio. This classic
episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For more

(02:17:15):
podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,