The wild and crazy stories behind the early days of Def Jam

When Russell Simmons first met Rick Rubin, he couldn't believe his eyes.

Simmons was at a New York party in 1984 with a hip-hop MC named Jazzy Jay, who had just released a single with T La Rock called "It's Yours." Rubin had produced and released the track on his tiny Def Jam label.

Russell SimmonsPhoto: Getty Images

" 'It's Yours' was my favorite record — I still know all the words," recalls Simmons, then a 26-year-old from Queens who was managing his brother's group, Run-D.M.C. "We were at the party, and I said to Jazzy Jay, 'Did you bring the n—a that made the record?' He pointed at Rick and said, 'That's him.' I said, 'No, did you bring the n—a that made the record?' He said, 'That's him!'

"I was like, 'Wait, the white boy?!' "

Rubin's skin color was only one unlikely detail in the history of New York City's most influential hip-hop label. While the genre had been born in the South Bronx streets, Rubin — a 21-year-old former punk rocker from Long Island — started hip-hop's worldwide revolution in his NYU dorm room, with funding from his parents.

Rick RubinPhoto: Getty Images

Once Rubin joined forces with Simmons, who handled the business side, Def Jam built a holy trinity of personalities that could appeal to almost everyone. They could all rap, but LL Cool J made the ladies swoon with his boyish good looks and romantically inspired songs like "I Need Love"; the Beastie Boys appealed to the frat-boy set and added a rock dynamic through singles like "(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party!)"; and Public Enemy was as serious as a heart attack, highlighting the treatment of black Americans as second-class citizens. It proved to be a revolutionary — and lucrative — formula.

This Thursday, the label celebrates its 30th anniversary with a concert at Barclays Center that brings together Def Jam luminaries including Rick Ross, Ja Rule, Onyx and more. But the label's ongoing success is rooted in its first few years of innovation and insanity. This is how Def Jam changed the world — as told to The Post by the people who made it happen.

The Wild and Crazy Boys: Beastie Boys

The Beastie Boys in 1987Photo: Corbis

Like Rubin, the Beastie Boys — downtown teens Adam "Ad-Rock" Horovitz, Adam "MCA" Yauch and Mike "Mike D" Diamond — started out as punk rockers, but had their heads turned by the arrival of hip-hop. The Beasties stood out for their bratty antics (their debut single, "Cooky Puss," was based on a prank call to an ice cream parlor), yappy voices and, lest we forget, the fact that they were white. Rubin was the group's part-time DJ and put out their first Def Jam single, "Rock Hard," in 1985.

The cocky attitude of their 1986 debut album, "Licensed to Ill" (which Horovitz wanted to call "Don't Be a F - - - - t") was meant to be a joke. But as the Beasties took to playing shows with caged strippers and giant penises as stage props, it got hard to separate the band from the satire.

Rick Rubin: "I volunteered to be their [tour] DJ and we opened for Madonna in 1985. I remember the Radio City shows and how horrified the parents were."

Bill Adler (publicist for Def Jam, 1984-1990, and author of "Def Jam 25"): "The Beasties were grabbing themselves and cursing. It was shocking to see how wrong it was. Ninety percent of the crowd were 12-year-old Madonna-wannabes dressed in tiaras!"

Rubin: " 'Licensed to Ill' was a really funny album, but it ended up being a bone of contention for the band. They were disappointed that everyone didn't get the joke."

The controversy did no harm to sales; "Licenced to Ill" hit No. 1 on the Billboard Album Chart.

Adler: "The album came out in late 1986, but 1987 was when Beastie-mania struck. They went to headlining arenas quickly, and it was on a par with Beatle-mania, but it was also grueling."

Rubin: "I think the worst experience was when Adam Horovitz was jailed in the UK. (A Beasties show in Liverpool devolved into a riot, and in the melee, a beer can apparently thrown by Horovitz hit a fan in the crowd. He was arrested on assault charges and spent a night in jail.) That was a bad experience for him. He was a 20-year-old city kid, and it was out of his realm. None of us knew how to deal with it."

The Beasties quit Def Jam at the end of 1987, moving over to Capitol Records, where they set up their own vanity label, Grand Royal.

The Ladies' Man: LL Cool J

LL Cool J in 1991Photo: Corbis

James Todd Smith was an aspiring rapper still in high school in Hollis, Queens, when he heard "It's Yours." Inspired, he mailed his own demo tape — recorded in his grandparents' basement — to the address on the cover of the single. For good measure, Smith called Rubin's dorm daily for two weeks to see if he had listened to it.

Finally, Adam Horovitz of the Beastie Boys fished it out of the mailbag and played it for Rubin. Impressed by the rapping and amused by the label — which read "Ladies Love Cool James: LL Cool J" — Rubin invited Smith over and they recorded his first single, "I Need a Beat." As it turned out, his new moniker was on the money, as LL became the label's resident heartthrob — even when he didn't have cash to romance the ladies.

LL Cool J: "I had no money early on, so I would track Russell around town to find out where he was eating so I could [show up and] get a free meal."

Russell Simmons: "LL used to order two steaks whenever we went out, because I was paying!"

Adler: "LL had world class charisma, sex appeal and dimples! When he played, the girls would scream so much, he might as well have been Elvis. He would come to the office as a 16-year-old and instigate battle raps with people like Run [of Run-D.M.C.], who was already a legend. That was ballsy, but LL was up to it. One time, after LL left, Run said, 'I don't like that man.' Fast-forward a few years and LL and Run-D.M.C. are having their photos taken backstage at the Garden, and Run moved over to LL and said, 'Let me stand next to my son.' LL won respect from his elders very quickly."

LL's first album, "Radio," came out in late 1985, and his combination of hard rhymes and good looks helped it sell 500,000 copies within the first six months. He was on a career high until the late 1980s.

Adler: "When Public Enemy emerged with a harder sound, LL was kind of put in the shade and he hit a slump. LL was close to his grandmother and she said, 'You better get up there and knock them out.' And that's where [the 1991 hit single] 'Mama Said Knock You Out' came from."

LL Cool J released 12 albums on Def Jam (the last in 2008), with most of them hitting the Top 10 on the Billboard Album Chart.

The Rabble-Rousers: Public Enemy

Public Enemy in 1988Photo: Getty Images

Rapper Chuck D (real name Carlton Ridenhour) had been a part of Spectrum City, a Long Island group, in the early-to-mid 1980s, but their first single flopped. Barely into his mid-20s, Chuck decided to leave the rap game to the youngsters. But Rubin was such a fan of Chuck's booming voice, he pursued him for months in an attempt to sign him to Def Jam.

Chuck D: "The thing that helped convince me [to come out of retirement] was when I saw Run-D.M.C. at Madison Square Garden in 1986. During 'My Adidas,' I remember everyone held their Adidas in the air and [the group's DJ] Jam Master Jay looked at me as if to say, 'This ain't that bad.' That's when I thought I could do this."

Eventually, Chuck relented and came to Rubin with the concept of Public Enemy: a group that combined a tornado of sound with angry rhetoric, designed to inspire black Americans to be more politically- and socially-minded.

To turn the provocation up to 11, Chuck D added an onstage security force called the S1Ws — who brandished Uzis, which represented the idea of being armed with knowledge. Public Enemy also boasted the clown prince of hip-hop, Flavor Flav, whose cartoonish persona (including his signature oversized-clock necklaces) helped lighten up the group's serious message.

Simmons: "Being rebellious just to be rebellious isn't that interesting. Public Enemy had things to say. They influenced a whole generation of black Americans to be more conscious. They told the hoods to grow up [with songs like 'Night of the Living Baseheads,' which criticizes drug dealers]."

Adler: "At the time, there was a lot of police suppression of black folks, and Public Enemy was an expression of the anger that they felt. They were devotees of Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, and talked about it in songs like 'Don't Believe the Hype.' "

But Public Enemy's radical mindset got them into trouble in 1989 when member Professor Griff (the group's "Minister of Information") made anti-Semitic statements during an interview.

Adler: "After that interview, I got a visit to the office by a sweaty guy called Mordechai Levy, who claimed to represent the Jewish Defense Organization. He said there was a truckload of armed Jews looking for Public Enemy! Thankfully, nothing came of it."

The critical acclaim continued with 1990's "Fear of a Black Planet." The group left Def Jam in 1999.Chuck D continues to fight the power on Twitter @mrchuckd.

The first four years of Def Jam were glorious, but with Simmons showing more interest in R&B artists like Chuck Stanley (who ultimately flopped) and Rubin pursuing his love of rock by producing thrash-metal act Slayer, a personality crisis developed at the label. Rubin left in 1988.

"We really didn't know what we were doing and then all of a sudden, we had this big successful company," says Rubin, who was only in his mid-20s when he left Def Jam to move to Los Angeles and start a new label called American Recordings. "Instead of finding a way to manage it, I just left!"

Simmons sold his Def Jam interests to Universal Music in 1998 and is no longer involved with the business, either. Still, the label continues to evolve and achieve success, thanks to acts such as Kanye West and Iggy Azalea. "What started in New York 30 years ago is now global," explains Steve Bartels, the label's current CEO. "I was in Japan, and Def Jam is as big there as it is anywhere. That's a testament to what Rick and Russell did."

Said another way: The party's still going strong. "I used to throw keg parties when I was in NYU," Rubin says. "We'd bring in a PA, and sometimes the Beasties would play. It's so funny to think that those parties ended up being held in places like Madison Square Garden."

Stories Behind the Songs

Warning: These songs may contain explicit language.

Beastie Boys — "(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party!)" (1987)

The track's famous video was an MTV staple and featured a giant food fight. "It was supposed to be like an old silent movie pie fight," remembers Rubin. "But the food was expired and was pretty disgusting."

Public Enemy — "Fight the Power" (1989)

The most potent example of Public Enemy's message, this song included Chuck D taking a lyrical stab at Elvis Presley in this now infamous line: "Elvis was a hero to most, but he never meant s - - t to me." Says Chuck D: "I find it insulting that he is considered the king of rock 'n' roll and people like Little Richard or Chuck Berry are not."

LL Cool J — "I Need Love" (1987)

LL's first crossover hit reached No. 14 on the Billboard Chart in 1987, but it didn't come without a struggle. "Rick Rubin hated it," says LL. "He thought it was soft and thought I shouldn't do it, but I ignored him. I felt vindicated when it became a hit."

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