Rock On (11 page)

“Oh, no, no. I don't think you could really move any of the papers.”

Right . . . okay, that answers my next question about rigging the ceiling with lights, moving the couch up against the window so the skyline's in the background, running steel tracking for the camera from the door and up to that desk, and basically having about fifteen crew people with walkie-talkies walking around in here. Fact is, I knew the second I walked in here and saw this place that there was no way we could ever invade this place. But I'm sure this as close as I'll ever get to the legend that started all this. I'm just some ad guy working in the marketing department and I'm pretty damn certain that isn't the kind of guy who gets a formal introduction to Ahmet Ertegun. Hands politely clasped behind my back — remember to use the kind of posture that my parents taught me to have
for special occasions when I was a little kid. I feel like I should start asking her more logical questions about the office since my only other option seems to be to gaze upon all of this with my mouth wide open until I get goosebumps and start weeping openly.

Look at these photos on the table between the couches. Here he is with Mick Jagger and Jerry Hall. Here's one with Led Zeppelin way back in the day — this might be the actual day he signed them; the day that was responsible for eventually getting
Led Zeppelin IV
into the world and eventually into my sister's suburban bedroom so I could sneak it out and listen. Wait, are they sitting on these same couches in the photo? I walk over to a wall lined with photographs from a lifetime of friendships with everyone you can think of, from musical legends to diplomats and presidents. Look at this, a framed royalty accounting statement from one of the first Ray Charles records, typewritten through a carbon and sent to his attention. Even the texture of this wall says something. Put your face close to it. Feel that? It's almost a fabric, isn't it? Get close to the smell of it, smell this world where walls feel almost like a thick parchment, a world where America is still . . .

“Okay, so, did you have any other questions, or . . .”

She's still standing behind me watching.

“Right, anyway, I'm just looking at the, uh, wall here, making sure it would work if, uh . . . Yes, yes, that's good. That would work. Good. Okay, well, thank you. Thanks for, you know, letting me . . . okay, thank you.”

Of course the location for my hip-hop TV commercial does not end up being Ahmet Ertegun's office. The location turns
out to be this guy's office on the next floor down. Vallerie meets me there to unlock it and let me in. Nice place, pretty big corner office with one of those, like, twenty- or thirty-thousand-dollar stereo systems with all the tube amps and everything; oddly, there's no music next to it. No photos of anyone anywhere, either. No framed notes or letters, nothing more personal than a very expensive collection of furniture and lighting that looks like a permanent installment at a museum of modern art in any key U.S. city. This place already feels like a set; like a façade.

“Wow, nice. Whose office is this?”

“Some guy who told someone at Warners about Madonna, or knew Madonna way back in the day and told her to sign with them, or knew her manager . . . something. Anyway, he comes in, honestly, maybe once or twice a month. This place just kind of sits here for him. He'll probably never even know you had a shoot in here,” Vallerie says.

Over the next week, a camera crew is hired up, and this guy's office is completely converted. The furniture's moved out of the way; all of Fat Joe's gold and platinum record awards are sent over; the big Terror Squad diamond piece is delivered; a metal briefcase filled with fake cash is brought in and lit perfectly; instantly these big huge floor-to-ceiling velvet drapes are brought in to adorn all windows; dolly track is laid down from the door to the desk for the opening shot, light rigging clogs and lines the ceiling; more furniture is moved out; angles are cheated; monitors are set up so I can see the shot — none of this, of course, is done by me. Foot soldiers from the video production department have made this whole scene a reality, propping me up to be applauded and probably paid a bigger Christmas bonus.

Fat Joe and his posse arrive. My God, this is how it should be. There is so much love and loyalty between these guys. I think to myself:
I don't know why white people can't be more like this. We need the nicknames and handshakes . . . more embraces
!

I check around to make sure there are food and drinks. Our stingy little budget has allowed for a deli tray of cold cuts, some sliced fruit, and cheeses for this huge man and his wife and posse of lifelong friends. And with a smile and a laugh, he changes all that and it goes something like this:

“What's this shit we got here, B?”

(B?)

“Oh, well, have some cheese, and grapes and things here. That's for you; for all of you, so help yourselves. But then let's try a run through of . . .”

“We gonna call and get some real food up in here first.” He yells into the next room to his wife: “Honey! Let's get some barbecue up in here from [name unintelligible]. And find out what everybody wants for drinks, all they got over here now is some little cheese cubes an' shit.”

Oh, my God, they're laughing at the deli trays. These guys rule! I haven't wanted to be somebody's friend this badly since I was seven.

“Yeah, thing is the budget the label has for this whole shoot is really only . . .”

“This breaks the bank, then you have 'em call Joe. They got my phone number and if somebody's sweatin' it you have 'em call me, a'ight, B?”

I'm not supposed to be calling him B back, right
?

“Yeah. Yeah! Call barbecue up. Up here. Get some up in here.”

Right on! This is feeling like some kind of super feel-good Disney script where the suburban white geek finds a new friend in a huge gangster hip guy with a heart of gold.

“Call them. I know, look at this!” I add, maybe too excitedly.

A very sobering look from one of his right-hand men. Mean-looking guy, too. Holy shit, what's his nickname? They should call him “Killer” or “The Executioner” or something heavy like that. Still locked in on me with the glare just because I agreed with Fat Joe about the fruit tray or whatever? Jesus, relax, dude. He's still your friend, okay? God.

I walk into the conference room across the hall from where Fat Joe is to see if any of his guys need any help getting the TV tuned into cable or anything. Smoke. The room is filled with it. It must be something electrical. Quick! Get a fire extinguisher. Wait. Are they smoking pot? In the conference room? You can't just go smoking pot in the conference room! Can you smoke pot in the conference room? Not cool! Not cool at all!

Okay, I'm cool with it
.

It's cool, it's cool, alright
.

I'm down with it, no big deal
.

Pot's no big deal
.

Shit, stop staring at them
.

You're staring at them
.

Stop it, you look uptight
.

It's illegal, though
.

Whatever
.

Apparently I've stood here stunned too long and it looks like I want some. And now the mean looking dude is holding it out toward me. Be cool about it.

“Nah, I'm all set. Thanks, though. Thanks.” Okay shut up.

The food comes and one of the foot soldiers from video production pays the tab with cash and gets a receipt. It's like a big cookout up here. The shoot is almost secondary to all of them getting together, high and laughing, telling stories about the neighborhood back in the day, watching the Knicks game on the TV, talking about the record business and what's happening and how it didn't used to be that way, talking about how it's gonna be. I wish these guys worked here.

We get to shooting the commercial for his new album. And the whole idea to this thirty-second-long commercial is that we see Fat Joe sitting behind this huge desk in this gorgeous piece of prime Manhattan real estate. A briefcase of cash on the table, a light in front of him, but he's sitting back and his face is in a dramatic shadow. The camera tracks up toward him. When I give him the cue, he leans in and says the name of his new album,
Loyalty
. That's the whole idea; camera moves through huge corner of prime Manhattan real estate, we see the platinum albums on the wall, the diamonds on the table, the briefcase filled with cash, and large man sitting behind a huge desk; the large man behind the huge desk leans forward out of the shadow and into the light, we see that the man is Fat Joe, and he simply says the word
Loyalty
. The viewer of this commercial will then see an album cover that has a picture of Fat Joe on it and the word
Loyalty
. The viewer will then say to themselves, “Ah, I see the new Fat Joe album is titled
Loyalty
. I would expect it to be available in stores now.” If there is any doubt in the viewer's mind, an announcer's voiceover will say, “
Loyalty
. The new album from Fat Joe. In stores now.”

I sit down at the little monitor, put a pair of headphones on, and we try the first one. I'm watching the shot unfold and I've just realized I'm not going to be able to sit here silent.

“Cut! Okay, Joe, don't tap your foot like that, because I'm seeing it in the bottom of the shot. Let's do it again.”

“Okay, yeah, won't do that. Sorry.”

Whoa. No way. That was so easy. He was so kind and professional about that.

“And it's important that you lean forward when we get to the end of the shot. When we push all the way in, we need your face in the light just in front of you.”

“Ah, yeah. Some kinda Scarface shit, right, B? B knows how to do this shit, let's go!”

As we run through a few more takes, I have that moment we all have at different points in our lives; that moment where you see a side of yourself you've yet to meet. And it turns out, I really kind of like telling huge hip-hop kingpins what to do. There's a bit of charge in that for a white guy with middling confidence. I start coming up with a lot of great things to add on when I say “Cut.”

“Cut! Okay, remember, I don't know who's in the shadow yet, Joe. The first time we're seeing you should be when you lean in. Alright, people, let's do another one!”

The camera starts back at its first position and I can't help thinking,
Ooh, I have to say that little part at the end where I say, “Alright, people! that was nice
.” We continue shooting a few more takes and I've got a nice assortment of things to say that I must've picked up watching
Inside the Actors Studio
or something, because they sound perfect. I've got, “Cut! I'm still seeing a hot spot when the camera hits the mark, can somebody check that?” and I also trot out a little number that goes, “Cut! That was beautiful, let's do one more like that, but Joe, don't be in a hurry to say the line. You're running the show here, you're taking your own sweet time to speak up — don't
make the move in a hurry for the camera, you don't care about the camera. Okay, everybody, let's go again, please.”

When we're done shooting the commercial, they're gone. Just like that, which seems so fast for all of the work leading up to it, but I guess come to think of it, once you actually get around to it, it doesn't take too long to get five, ten, or fifteen takes of one thirty-second shot, for one thirty-second TV commercial, featuring one guy, saying one word. And just as quickly as Fat Joe and his posse arrived, they recede into the night. I walk over to the window and look down from way up here; an aerial view of the Range Rover and Mercedes caravan leaving at the bottom of the building. It snakes its way past Radio City Music Hall and Rockefeller Plaza, rolling out of view and off to all of the places I imagine them showing up. I head back to my office and fill out one of those voucher things so a sensible luxury sedan will come to take me home.

1. Hello, Dawg.

2. What is up, my niggaz?

3. Respec (
sic
).

4. True dat.

5. Steve from accounts payable is a hater, yo.

You're making seven figures. You're probably responsible for some label's big superstar's success. Or maybe you're just good at convincing people you're responsible for some label's big superstar's success. On the low end, the books probably show a high six- or low-seven-figure salary, but it's no secret that the bonuses would most likely double or triple that each year. What confuses me about you guys is how credibility varies wildly amongst you — there are the good apples; met one once that was asking to take a zero salary until things turned around in the business, was saying he was fine taking one for the team by setting aside his salary and just getting paid on his acts' records if they sold. But there's the other kind of apples, too — I saw one of you in the elevator just before you got put on the cut list. I was riding up to some meeting. You got on the elevator with the co-whatever. Copresident, cochairman, co-something. You were still intact in the company, in control, in the money, still in the big corner office upstairs, in well with everybody. The Co-Guy was talking to you, and I was the ghost standing there overhearing the whole thing. And since everyone's so good at ignoring each other in the elevator, you guys just talked like I wasn't there. Your partner told you there was nothing to worry about, said something like, “I think we look fine, and I don't think there's anything you need to worry about. Honestly.” Of course, three weeks later you were a grown man literally weeping as your assistants started bubble-wrapping everything in your huge corner office. Whoops, turns out you had something to worry about after all.