Bill Adler has spent decades as one of hip-hop’s chief endorsers and archivists, running publicity for Def Jam and Rush Artist Management from 1984 to 1990 and documenting rap ever since via writing and curation. Now partially digitized as part of Cornell’s Hip-Hop Collection, Adler’s collection of personal correspondences, photographs, press clippings, fliers, and other documents chronicle a budding conglomerate and the personalities that shaped it. Adler had unprecedented access to acts like Run-D.M.C., the Beastie Boys, Salt-N-Pepa, Queen Latifah, and more, working alongside industry heavyweights like Russell Simmons and Lyor Cohen. Along with photos of Public Enemy’s signing (seen above), LL Cool J meeting New York City mayor Ed Koch (seen below), Chuck D barred outside the White House, and Flava Flav hanging out with Sinéad O’Connor, the archive is home to posters for iconic rap shows, invitations to exclusive industry events, and other bits of Def Jam ephemera that capture rap’s early wins and hiccups. Here is a look at some of the rarities inside Adler’s archive, and the stories they tell.
In 1987, The New York Times brought together established folk rocker Paul Simon and emerging rap sensation LL Cool J under the excuse of them both being musicians from Queens. Rare photos from Adler’s archive document the awkward meeting, in which the two artists sit at the foot of a bed in Cool J’s basement studio. Simon watched LL Cool J rap, critiqued his performance, and they later swapped stories about the changing face of pop music, searching for a middle ground. The profile, released only a few months before Bigger and Deffer, was a huge look for a young LL, coming up constantly in his early promotional material. It says something that rap once couldn’t get a significant boost from mainstream media without a familiar white face endorsing it first.
Some of the most extensive coverage in Adler’s archive focuses on Public Enemy’s 1988 performance at Riker’s Island. Fresh off the release of It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, the group’s visit held to its black nationalist mandate, seeking redemption for their captive audience. “We’re doing this to show brothers on the on inside that being a victim of the system doesn’t mean you have to be a loser,” Chuck D said in the official Columbia press release, issued by Adler. The press clips painted a different picture: “The prison officials who booked Public Enemy’s August 12th gig at the Rikers Island Correctional Facility, in New York City, probably weren’t aware that the song “Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos” is about a violent jailbreak.”
At the height of their success, Public Enemy faced very public backlash for anti-semitic comments made by the group, most prominently Professor Griff. Rabbi Abraham Cooper took out ads blasting the group in several publications. One flyer from the Protocols of the Elders of Zion compares Griff and PE as a whole to skinheads and the Klan. Adler preserved many letters from Cooper and the Anti-Defamation League, along with internal memos about dealing with the backlash and drafts of prepared statements for the group and label reps like Russell Simmons. A June 1989 memo from Adler to Lyor Cohen painted the picture of a group in turmoil: “Chuck and Griff have called Leyla [Turkkan, PE publicist] in a cold sweat wondering what the fuck to do.” His advice was to avoid MTV, make a statement, and “duck—and stay the fuck out of sight.” There are then drafted statements from Chuck D to the black community and Simmons to the media, both doing damage control. Within the month, a press release was issued announcing Professor Griff’s removal from the group. The archive provides a look behind the scenes of a full-fledged rap PR crisis in motion.
The Beastie Boys and Public Enemy on the Licensed to Ill Tour in 1987
Besides LL’s platinum-selling Walking with a Panther, 1989 was a down year for Def Jam and Rush Artist Management commercially—but that’s not they didn’t still make headlines. DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince won the very first Grammy for Best Rap Performance (for “Parents Just Don't Understand”), which they preceded by becoming the first rap act interviewed on “The Today Show.” Emboldened by this appearance, Adler sent a letter to Bryant Gumbel applauding his “adventurousness” in booking a rap act and pitching LL Cool J as a future guest. “We represent all of the top rappers in the business and we know, contrary to received opinion, that the majority of them are thoughtful, articulate, and amusing,” he wrote. “However exotic they might seem to the rest of us, acts like Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J, Eric B. and Rakim, Public Enemy, and EMPD are the Rolling Stones, Elvis Presley, James Brown, Bob Dylan, and Joe Tex of the day… They are ‘the sound of young America.’” Less than a year later, while campaigning against those claims of anti-semitism, Public Enemy’s Chuck D was booked by “Today” to defend his group live against Rabbi Cooper. The PR team’s drafted statements for D strikes an aggressive tone. The debate inevitably led to a mention on wax, in the “Welcome to the Terrordome” lyric, “Told the rab, get off my rag,” which only created further outrage.
Among Adler’s preserved Def Jam correspondences, the most interesting ones show moments in the making. In a letter from Adler seeking the advice of then-Def Jam executive Lyor Cohen, the two plan the infamous rap boycott of the 1989 Grammys, less than a week before the ceremony. They already had Salt-N-Pepa, Jazzy Jeff, and Will Smith on board. LL Cool J, who was the face of the label at the time, had agreed not to attend but wouldn’t make a statement, much to Adler’s dismay. “He has refused to get involved other than not to go,” he writes. “I don’t know what the fuck L’s thinking, but I think he’s blowing it by not participating. I also think our press conference will be weaker without him.” Years later, LL would go on to host the Grammys for five consecutive ceremonies.
In hopes of building support for their cause, Adler floated the idea of reaching out to LL rival Kool Moe Dee to create a unified rap front against the Grammy committee. As it turns out, Kool Moe Dee didn’t stand with them; not only did he attend and present (in a slot originally reserved for the night’s Best Rap Performance winner, Will Smith), he threw Rush Management under the bus. “One management company started it and went to the papers and figured all the rappers would follow,” he told The Los Angeles Times. “It was wrong. They were trying to turn it into a race thing… I felt it was a negative move not to come to the Grammys—like crying over spilled milk.”
Through clips, memos, and other documents, the archive creates a mosaic of one of rap’s most intriguing beefs. In 1989, LL Cool J vs. Kool Moe Dee created a template for later clashes. Kool Moe Dee is to LL Cool J as Kendrick Lamar is to Drake: a more cerebral alternative to an uber famous chart-killer. USA Today called it “contemporary music’s biggest battle since Mick Jagger and Keith Richards,” while BET tried to orchestrate a promotion playing up the animosity. Adler quickly shut down this approach in a previously-unseen correspondence that oozes rap bravado. “Essentially, the problem is that Kool Moe Dee doesn’t belong in the ring with us,” he writes. “In real life, among the kids who love this music, Kool Moe Dee does not compete with LL Cool J,” before pointing out the sales disparity and suggesting Michael Jackson (!) as a fair rival for LL.
LL meeting former NYC mayor Ed Koch
One of the more bizarre items here is an invite to LL’s Valentine’s Day tea party in 1986, showing just how hard Def Jam pushed their biggest rising star as a rap romantic. The promotional event presented an opportunity for local DJs to meet LL: “Bring your box! A special Valentine’s Day gift will be given to every DJ who brings a radio with them,” it read, promising a Def Jam jacket to the owner of the biggest portable system.
The undigitized portion of the archive is filled with boxes of other Def Jam memorabilia, including promotional materials for the near-mythic Fresh Festival ’84 national arena tour, featuring artists from Simmons’ Rush Productions. Back then it was unprecedented for hip-hop to book stages that big, with rap-industry leaders Run-D.M.C. playing in their native New York for crowds of around 3,000. The Fresh Fest lineup consisted of D.M.C. (on the heels of their self-titled debut), Kurtis Blow, and Whodini, along with Fat Boys, Newcleus, Mag Force / Swatch Breakers, Fantastic Duo Breakers, and the Uptown Express Breakers. It was an ambitious idea that paid huge dividends in the long term, boosting rap’s profile to new audiences and drawing the attention of skeptics who had previously viewed the genre as a fad. With the tour picking up steam, The Wall Street Journal even ran a feature citing Debbie Harry and Stevie Wonder as hip-hop pioneers and praising the business acumen of Simmons. But the strongest (and strangest) endorsement came from an eager fan identified only as “a young white woman in red leather pants”: “Rap is friendlier than rock’n’roll.”
