With hip-hop now synonymous with both youth culture and the inner city, it seems hard to believe that rap and hip-hop used to be considered a passing fad that record executives didn’t want to touch. Russell Simmons’s entrepreneurial sense changed all that. Cross marketing hip-hop culture into all forms of media, Simmons created a media empire.
Born in Queens, New York in 1957, Simmons grew up in a middle class household. In the mid-1970’s Simmons got his start in business as a promoter of rap concerts. As a promoter, Simmons organized concerts and managed New York’s inner-city artists.
After forming the group Run-DMC in the early 1980’s, Simmons became frustrated with trying to sign the group to a major record label. Soon Russell Simmons and fellow rap enthusiast Rick Rubin started their own label, Def Jam Records.
Simmons picked that name as a fusion between the new style of rap and the old style of jazz. The titles meaning comes from the word ‘def’ – an urban slag for good-and jam-the jazz term for music-playing.
Soon Simmons and Berman signed then unknown artist such as the Beastie Boys, LL Cool J, and Public Enemy. As these artists grew in fame along with rap as a whole, Def Jam records grew form an independent label to a major media conglomerate.
Simmons, not just content on running a Fortune 500 company, has had producer credits on many movies such as the “Nutty Professor” and “Gridlock’d”.
Eventually Simmons sold Def Jam to Universal and pursued other enterprises. He founded Rush Communications, which is now the second largest black-owned entertainment company. In 2001, he also founded Hip-Hop Summit Action Network, a non-profit organization whose mission is to advocate education and social concerns through hip-hop’s influence
Recently, Simmons has been involved in various political functions from meeting with New York Gov. George E. Pataki over drug laws, to organizing fund-raisers for Sen. Hillary Clinton. Recently, he produced the politically charged Def Poetry Jam on HBO to critical acclaim. He has also spoken out against the Iraqi War through television public service announcements.
Information in this article was compiled from the following sources www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/02/09/60II/main598970.shtml
“Russell Simmons’ Rush for Profits: Rush Communications.” Black Enterprise. Dec. 1992. Christopher Vaughn, www.hsan.org