“Ubiquitous in all our lives”: the one band Rick Rubin compared everything to
Every producer usually has their fair share of reference records to pull from when creating a mix. Anyone who’s ever attempted to make something related to soft rock has probably looked at Rumours by Fleetwood Mac as a good starting point, and the makings of any good guitar production can be found in almost any of Jimmy Page’s classic lines with Led Zeppelin. And while Rick Rubin has a cornucopia of different influences when working on his projects, he only holds a few people in the upper echelons of rock and roll grandeur.
Because the number-one rule of any producer in Rubin’s position is to make sure that nothing is sacred for the artists they are working with. It takes a lot of guts to tell rock stars that they aren’t working with much, but it’s any good producer’s job to look at a record and see what could be added to the mix rather than being yes-men and telling them exactly what they want to hear every time they show up to the studio.
And it’s not like Rubin didn’t have some big names he was talking to back in the day, either. He had already had to argue amongst the members of Slayer about what he thought sounded great on record, but anyone brazen enough to tell Johnny Cash that he needs to do another take of a song needs to have nerves of steel. But for Rubin, it was all about coming at the song from a fan’s perspective first.
He was always a huge connoisseur of every artist he worked with, so if he was going to make a record with them, he needed to be blunt if he felt that the music wasn’t grabbing him in the same way that their classics were. When looking at any of The Beatles’ careers, though, you would have sworn that none of them lost an ounce of charm when working by themselves.
There was always bound to be some dip in quality, but every member of the band kept up that signature Fab energy when moving on to their solo outings. George Harrison had settled into his role as a spiritual guru, and John Lennon managed to make the cold truth of politics sound catchy on his later albums, but in terms of being the best source of music, Rubin felt that there was nothing better than when all of them worked together.
When being interviewed for McCartney I, II, III, Rubin remembered using the song ‘Baby’s In Black’ as the archetypal example of the profound effect that the band had on them, saying, “The Beatles’ music is so ubiquitous in our lives, it’s what we compare everything else to. To me, I just hear it as a finished thing. So I know what a waltz sounds like, but it never occurred to me that it could be a waltz, because I’ve been hearing it my whole life as ‘Baby’s in Black.’ The idea that it fit into some format was lost on me until Paul mentioned it.”
And there are also subtle hints towards other artists in how the song is constructed. Both Lennon and McCartney probably saw this as another work job when making Beatles for Sale, but the sweet-and-sour side of their harmonies is like them inventing completely different avenues for people to go down, especially when they hit the bridge and McCartney’s voice starts soaring high above everything else in the mix.
Although it’s hard to draw a throughline from them to something like Slayer or Run-DMC in Rubin’s catalogue, there’s no doubt that The Beatles are the almighty endpoint for him. Regardless of what genre you find yourself under, you’re going to be taking influence from The Beatles without even realising it.
Never Miss A Beat
The Far Out Beatles Newsletter
All the latest stories about The Beatles from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.