Raising Hell

by Ronin Ro

  Tougher Than Leather arrived in theaters in September 1988. Many hip-hop acts came to the premiere to show support, but in the darkened theater, Run-D.M.C. watched the film, and felt it should have been more realistic.

  Some film critics considered Tougher Than Leather’s mix of gunplay and slapstick comedy uneven. They liked seeing Run and Jay help D.M.C.’s character regain his footing when he left prison, and seeing all three members interact with their outspoken manager, Russell, but reviled Rick’s acting, the Beastie Boys’ subplot, and a few rambling monologues. Other critics felt the film promoted “reverse racism” toward whites, screenwriter Ric Menello recalled.

  But Run-D.M.C. fans were excited. For them, Tougher had all the best stars in it: Run-D.M.C., Slick Rick, the Beasties, even Flavor Flav providing a voice-over before the opening scene (added quickly during postproduction). The film opened in fifty theaters, mostly around New York, and when they couldn’t get in, fans grumbled and complained. Those who did buy a ticket didn’t want anyone ruining the experience for them. In Long Island, one kid stabbed another. In Detroit “one guy stood up at one point during the showing and was shot in the back,” Menello remembered. “I think he must’ve been blocking someone’s view of the screen.”

  There were few violent incidents, but some newspaper reporters immediately claimed the film was causing riots. Run and D had to go on television to defend themselves, as they had in the Long Beach incident. They pointed out that the movie wasn’t terribly violent and that violence had existed since the dawn of man—Run-D.M.C. didn’t create it.

  The first weekend brought in tremendous profit, but New Line continued to feel the movie would do better as a video, Menello recalled, and “didn’t release it nationally, like they would an urban film now.” Many people on the West Coast wanted tickets, but limited showings were sold out.

  Tougher Than Leather quickly recouped its production costs, but everyone around Run-D.M.C. felt that if it had been released a year earlier—if sync rights and the lawsuit against Profile hadn’t caused delays in its release—the movie would have been a hit. The experience of seeing Tougher Than Leather’s mediocre success further embittered the group. “It was just some cold bullshit,” D.M.C. said.

  Chapter 23

  It’s Called Survival

  After the release of Tougher Than Leather, Run-D.M.C. asked Cory Robbins for permission to do a song for a movie sound track. Cory said, “No you can’t do the Ghostbusters song cause it’s a stupid idea and it’s not cool for Run-D.M.C.”

  “But it’s Ghostbusters,” Run said. “You got to let us do it!”

  For a week, Run and D.M.C. visited Cory’s office to sit on his couch and complain.

  Cory kept saying no. “It was stupid,” he felt. “It was like give me a break! They were just desperate to have a hit and be associated with some kind of movie, a mainstream thing like that.”

  He told Run, “You guys are much cooler than this. Why would you want to do Ghostbusters?” It wasn’t even Ghostbusters, he thought. “It’s Ghostbusters 2. And it was a stupid song.”

  “But they’re gonna give you a lot of money,” Run replied.

  “I don’t care,” he said. “It’s not about the money. This is the wrong thing for you to do.”

  The movie company started calling Profile every ten minutes to offer big bucks. “I don’t care,” Cory said into his telephone. “This is no. It’s not good. It’s a bad idea.”

  Run and D were upset, so Cory heaved a sigh and gave in. “All right, fine,” he said. “You really want to do this? Go ahead. But this isn’t cool. Its not a good idea for Run-D.M.C. to be doing the Ghostbusters theme.”

  Run and D were struggling now, trying to hold on to the last of their fame. They were also struggling financially. And since his nervous breakdown, “Joe was constantly eating and getting really heavy,” Tracy Miller remembered. “There were jokes that he was gonna be one of the Fat Boys. And Darryl was drinking excessively, to the point where he almost died. Jason was the only one that could ever really handle anything. And Jay was just probably going crazy dealing with the two of them because they were so neurotic. So I think Jason decided to do some experimenting on that record, and it didn’t do as well.”

  Jam Master Jay now felt that Run-D.M.C. wouldn’t last forever. He told Runny Ray, “They’re fucking driving me bananas. I’m gonna move on and get another group in case they break up.” He was working with his old friends Hurricane, Cool T, and DJ Kippy-O, who planned to rap as the Untouchables. But one day while watching Robert Townsend’s Hollywood Shuffle—a movie about young blacks trying to make it in white-run Hollywood—they were inspired by a scene in which white film producers pressure aspiring young actors to wear big Afro wigs. When Hurricane started mimicking one character’s high-pitched voice, Jay said, “Yo, man, why don’t we just do the Afros?”

  “All right, cool,” Hurricane answered. “Fuck it, let’s go get some Afro wigs.”

  Jay decided to include his group the Afros on a new Run-D.M.C. song called “Pause,” which would appear on the B-side of their commercial “Ghostbusters Rap” single.

  In the studio, they worked without a producer. “After Raising Hell, it wasn’t as tight of a production life with Russell and them,” said Run. “We took over our own life after a while.” Sales were slipping, fewer promoters booked them, and their asking price was nowhere near the $150,000 a night they commanded during the Raising Hell era, so Jay consciously set out to imitate the R & B rap then popular on daytime radio, and Run supported Jay’s decision to change Run-D.M.C.’s sound.

  Jay programmed a thumping beat with the “Catch a Groove” drum sound, and played a horn blast like a bass line. He then invited twenty-one-year-old black keyboardist Stanley Brown to play riffs that evoked Bobby Brown’s dance hit “My Prerogative.”

  Jay then had the Afros pile into the recording booth. “Afros…,” Hurricane whined into the mike.

  The others chanted, “Yeah…?”

  “Afros!”

  “Yeah…?”

  “Brothers be out there doing crack….”

  “No….”

  “They be doing dope….”

  “No…”

  “They be gangbanging!”

  “No…”

  “All them brothers need to just…pause….”

  Jay’s new R & B track started, and Run and D ad-libbed: “Here come the Afros, and the forty-ounce crew.”

  When it was time to shoot a video for “Pause,” Run and D didn’t wear their trademark hats. D wore an Apple Jack model with the brim turned back. They also abandoned their leather blazers and matching pants. Jay wore colorful baggy shirts and jeans that evoked De La Soul, a popular new Long Island trio with a flower-power image, and instead of a hat, Jay showed fans the embryonic dreadlocks he’d been growing since working with the similarly coiffed Jersey-based group the Fam-Lee. Then he called Hurricane on the phone to say, “Get the guys together. We’re gonna do a scene in the beginning of the video with the Afros.”

  On the set, Run and D watched Cane, Kippy, and Kool—attired in wigs, dashiki shirts, and sunglasses—perform their intro for the camera. Jay then performed his rap while doing a dance he hoped to popularize—basically the preexisting “running man” with a few dramatic pauses. And during one of the song’s lengthy keyboard solos, Jay said, “This beat is dope, D. I’m telling you, this beat is dope, just slamming, it’s dope.” Then: “Ah yeah, I like this R & B shit. Pause, pause, one more time!”

  Chapter 24

  Leaving Hell

  Early in 1990, money problems were really getting Jam Master Jay down. He owed the Internal Revenue Service over $100,000 and the federal tax-collecting agency informed him that unless he remitted payment, the agency would place a lien on all of his earnings. Jay hoped to catch up on his bills, and ensure a place in the industry, by starting his own label, JMJ Records. This way, if Russell or Rush Management started feuding with Profile again, or if Run and D disband
ed the group, Jay would have a way to support his family, his then-girlfriend Lee and their two-and-half-year-old son, Jason junior.

  After inventing the Afros, Jay pitched Russell on his idea of JMJ Records. Russell agreed that the new company—with Jay, producer of Run-D.M.C. hits like “Peter Piper” and “My Adidas” at the helm—would contribute greatly to Russell’s huge Rush Associated Labels project. RAL was part of a deal Russell had renegotiated with Def Jam’s parent company, CBS, now owned by Sony, after Rick Rubin left in 1988. In exchange for bigger advances, more royalties, and money to hire new employees, Russell gave Sony 50 percent of Def Jam, but he bristled under the terms of the deal. It wasn’t as 50-50 as it looked on paper since they split profits after Sony took 30 percent off the top, Russell claimed in his autobiography, Life and Def, and kept charging Def Jam fees for administration, distribution, marketing, manufacturing, and Sony overhead. So, in trying to “figure out how to create new profits to share with Lyor,” Russell pitched Sony on RAL, “a bunch of labels under Def Jam.” Sony felt that Def Jam acting as parent company to small new labels was a good idea, so Russell created six other imprints, said Hank Shocklee, the P.E. producer, who also worked in Def Jam’s offices as a publicist. But instead of creating trends, RAL labels followed them, and glutted the market with poor imitations of other labels’ top draws. RAL signed deals with female rapper Nikki D, producers LA Posse, R & B group Blue Magic, Orange Krush singer Allyson Williams, and De La Soul producer Prince Paul. “Then they felt the ‘De La Soul vibration,’ and Lyor started getting in and brought in Resident Alien and producer Sam Sever,” said Shocklee. But these acts, and hard-core white rappers 3rd Bass, singer Don Newkirk, and female gangsta rapper the Boss, failed to match the Beasties’ success with Licensed to Ill.

  However, JMJ was one of the more successful RAL labels. The Afros’ wigs, dashiki shirts, and comical raps attracted fans of NWA, Slick Rick, and 2 Live Crew, while their song “Federal Offense” offered Public Enemy–style politics. While Jay recorded the Afros’ debut, Run and D stopped by to watch them record, party a little, and try on their wigs.

  Jay worked around the clock to finish the Afros project and soon released a single called “Feel It,” and its video, which had Flavor Flav—in a white tuxedo and top hat with shades—making a cameo. Then Jay released the Afros’ album, Kicking Afrolistics, to good reviews and respectable sales. Since fans had reacted positively to the Afros, Jay felt his company had a chance to make it in an industry crowded with new labels and rappers competing for the same audience. Though he wanted to work with new discovery the Fam-Lee, and despite his physical exhaustion (brought on by all-night recording sessions for the Afros’ debut), Jay immediately began work on Run-D.M.C.’s fifth album. “Russell was completely out of the picture,” said D. “We didn’t even give a fuck if he liked the record. And actually he wasn’t caring either.”

  Russell was busy with a movie development deal, a syndicated show (New Music Report), a move into pop diva Cher’s old apartment on nearby Fourth Street, and a change in lifestyle (giving up drugs, wearing preppy clothing, working out, eating healthier, and hanging with models). He was also overseeing the many Rush Associated Labels. When he did try to offer suggestions for new songs, the group ignored him. “‘Pause’ was big,” said Run. “We were doing our thing.”

  Jay and Run controlled the sessions, and kept session players busy adding keyboards to their beats. One night Jay invited singer Aaron Hall of the R & B group Guy onto a song. “Jay would fucking have a polka dancer on a record,” D laughed. “I wouldn’t have had the keyboard shit. I wouldn’t have had any R & B on the damn record. It would have been just rock and rap, hard shit.”

  After Hall crooned on “Don’t Stop,” Run recorded a lyric to denounce his rivals, and D’s rap evoked Chuck D: “D.M.C. the king is me and I be the voice of black community.” They abandoned another trademark, sharing sentences, and seemed to be heading in opposite directions (Run dissing like on “Sucker MCs” and D revisiting messages from “It’s Like That”). They recorded “Faces,” another confused number filled with Run’s wordy rants and D stammering: “Yo, yo, yo: they don’t understand me…when they always try to ban me.”

  “Bob Your Head” and “Not Just Another Groove” presented more of the same, with Jay repeatedly referring to the Afros. At first, Run—whose depression was no longer as pronounced as it had been during the Run’s House tour—was enthusiastic about the new sound. “Anybody who doesn’t like what me and my crew is doing, fuck you,” he yelled on one song. “Punk motherfuckers! I’ll break your fucking neck!”

  But his opinion changed for some reason when they recorded “Party Time.” This song had female singers doing a chorus that would have been at home on an old Kurtis Blow single: “It’s party time, and we came here to party. So get up and move your body, ’cause it’s party time.” After recording a lighthearted verse for this song, Run surprised everyone by snapping, “All right, turn that bullshit off.” Jay kept taping, and instead of removing the comment during the mix, Jay sent it to Russell. “Actually, Jay wanted Russell to hear how stupid his brother was acting,” Jay’s cousin Doc recalled.

  The group was beginning to splinter, and Jay made matters worse by saying, “Yo, we gonna have Glen Friedman do a beat.”

  D was taken aback. “Glen Friedman? He’s the photographer!”

  “Yeah, but it’s gonna be dope,” Jay promised.

  The thin, wiry photographer had helped nine other people shout “Run’s house” on Tougher Than Leather. Now Friedman suggested they call the album Back from Hell and rap to the groove on the Stone Roses’ recent single “Fool’s Gold.” The group loved the idea, Friedman claimed, so “I stayed in the studio and tried to help them ’cause it was my song, or I was working with them on it.” Friedman wanted it to be as political as punk rock bands he used to manage, so Run rapped about gunfights and ambulances in the ghetto and D yelled, “The Ku Klux Klan is fucked up! And every good man will understand.” Then Jay mixed the song and, Friedman felt, “kind of fucked it up.” Friedman received a producer’s credit but was unhappy with the result, “What’s It All About.”

  D meanwhile watched Run cram even more words into every sentence of his new lyrics. He figured it might just be another symptom of the erratic thinking Run had been exhibiting since the onset of his depression circa 1987. “I just got mad when they told me, ‘D, you got to write like Run,’” said D.M.C. “I was like, ‘Okay,’ but I should’ve just been me.” D would try to sneak simpler rhymes into songs, but Jay would stop the tape and say, “It needs to rhyme more,” meaning add more words like Run.

  Jay and Run also alienated D by discussing grandiose marketing strategies. Instead of letting ideas come naturally, as with Raising Hell, Run and Jay wanted to imitate the latest groups and sounds. While they discussed ideas, D sat nearby, thinking, “Just put the damn record on, let me say my rhyme, master it, and let’s give the people what made us the group they like.” But he didn’t speak up. He listened to people say things like “Oh, we need to be like Rakim,” and shook his head. “No,” he thought. “We need to be like the motherfuckers from Hollis that the world loved since 1983.” After recording his part for a song, D would tell the others, “Call me when you want me.” He now made a habit of leaving the studio, heading for a lounge, and staring at a television screen, alone. “D really wasn’t feeling it,” said Ray.

  Then they had songs in which they tried to sound as hard as chart-topping gangsta rappers NWA. For D, NWA’s style—expletives, descriptions of violent acts, odes to their crew—reminded him of stuff he’d written in his basement back in 1980, about shooting people and leaving them in alleys. Now D wrote about getting drunk with his new “40 Ounce Crew” and smacking people with a gun. Run and D.M.C. rapped about crackheads on “The Ave,” convicts on “Back from Hell,” and an armed-robbery gang on “Naughty.” D’s solo moment, “Livin’ in the City,” promoted education, but most new songs strayed from the
ir simple, heartfelt lyrics, tag-team vocals, and hard, empty beats.

  Their hangers-on said the new songs sounded great, but behind Run-D.M.C.’s backs, gossip was poisonous.

  Unhappy with the new material, but unwilling to speak out, D.M.C. drowned his sorrows in Olde English 800 malt liquor. During shows he got onstage while “stinking drunk,” forgot his rhymes, slurred them, spoke through Run’s part, and tried to keep from falling while rushing across the stage to high-five a fan. His boys would warn him of how he was pissy the night before, but he’d still drink before shows and interrupt Run’s self-congratulatory onstage banter.

  When Run and D attended a concert by Heavy D & the Boyz— a group led by an affable tall, overweight rapper who wore dapper suits and occasionally rapped for the ladies—Heavy, a loyal Run-D.M.C. fan, told his audience, “D.M.C. in the house.” D got onstage and asked for the mike. Someone said no, but D.M.C. wouldn’t leave the stage. Heavy’s audience witnessed D.M.C.’s complaining. He didn’t stop until Run appeared in front of D.M.C. and said, “Yo, D, get off the stage. You’re making a fool of yourself. D, you’re drunk, people can’t understand what the fuck you’re saying.”

  Other times, in nightclubs, Runny Ray would have to stop his friend D from embarrassing himself by yelling lyrics at some kid who wanted to battle him.