“Everything that was make-believe, to me really manifested as a power in my real world.” — Darryl McDaniels
For as long as Darryl “D.M.C.” McDaniels can remember, he could connect to the part of himself that felt like a super hero. As a young child he was able to draw and create stories of characters with immense powers. And when he became an adult, as part of arguably the greatest rap group of all time, Run-D.M.C, McDaniels became a real-life superhero: the mighty “Devastating Mic Controller”, a.k.a., D.M.C. To this day, that indomitable spirit is as strong as ever with his newest venture — Darryl Makes Comics, LLC. And even when McDaniels’ characters are “make believe,” it has always been that connection to the creative part of himself that was very real.
But over the years, McDaniels has faced many hardships that challenged him and his self-concept. He suffered from alcoholism, depression, thoughts of suicide, and spasmodic dysphonia, which caused him to lose his voice. He also endured intense pressure from others to change his style of artistic expression, and coped with the discovery as an adult that his parents were not his biological parents.
Yet through these experiences, McDaniels uncovered his greatest superpower: his ability to reconnect with his creative side, his sense of purpose, his authentic self, in order to overcome any adversity and lead a healthy life.
Authenticity can mean many things but it generally refers to “being true to oneself.” An individual can lead an authentic life if s/he engages in behaviors that are consistent with what makes them happy and what gives them a sense of purpose. Living an authentic life not only feels good, but also can have health and wellness benefits. Research has shown that positive emotions and sense of purpose predict longer, healthier lives.
McDaniels knew at an early age that he had a gift for, and enjoyment of, creativity. “Probably when I was in kindergarten,” he said,“ because I started drawing with stick figures. My older brother was a pop culture dude that would discover stuff for us. So he would start bringing home comic books. I was reading the comic books to the best of my ability. But it was just pictures then. So I would draw stick figures.”
Soon McDaniels discovered that his private world of make-believe had “real” benefits beyond his enjoyment. He explained: “Then the stick figures evolved into tracing paper. By second grade, I didn’t need tracing paper. That’s when I knew I could create. Because all the kids would ask me ‘Yo, Darryl, could you draw my project for me?’ Even the bullies. I became protected. Because the bully said, ‘Here, sit by me! Do my paper!’ Nobody messed with Darryl. Before, they were picking on me, taking my money.”
“But now I’m down with it because I’ve got this skill. I couldn’t wait for the projects. Everybody else was still using ice cream sticks and stuff. But I was able to draw. And the teacher was like, ‘This is beautiful.”
McDaniels’ experience is consistent with the scientific literature on creativity. There is a long history of research demonstrating that engaging in creativity has both mental health and physical health benefits. Moreover, there is evidence that therapeutic approaches that involve creativity and imagination, such as art therapy and play therapy, have positive emotional benefits.
For McDaniels, drawing and creativity was never something he initially considered for a profession. It had a greater purpose for him: It transported him into a world of make-believe, where he was in control and omnipotent. “The art thing, the comic-book thing, was just like playing with my Army men or my GI Joes. It was all make-believe. Even hip-hop later on — all pretend.”
While McDaniels asserts that he was simply “pretending,” it could be argued that he was demonstrating what psychologists refer to as “multiple-self aspects.” This conceptualization suggests that self-concept is determined by a series of roles under different circumstances. A person’s identity is a composite of being able to function in these various roles in different contexts. In theory, McDaniel’s use of creativity to occupy his mind while alone, excel in school, and connect with others represented a strong ability to adapt to and meet the needs of different roles and was a positive aspect of his development and well-being.
McDaniels had already experienced a taste of how his creativity, through drawing, could improve the quality of his life. For McDaniels, there was a natural progression from drawing to DJ’ing. “‘Rapper’s Delight’ came out ’79, I think it was. I started DJ’ing probably ’78. My brother (and his friends), they were a little older than us. So they bought their own turntables because those older kids wanted to be the park DJs. And so it probably was ’78 when I was introduced to hip-hop.”
“This particular day, we were in the schoolyard. And Billy Morris had a tape recorder. And Billy Morris was like, ‘Yo, come here.’ So he says, ‘Yo, check this out.’ And he pushes ‘play’ on this box, and the voice said:
‘When you mess around in New York town,
You go down with the Disco Cheeba Clown;
Go down, go down, go down;
You just keep the pep in your step;
Don’t stop ’til you get on the mountaintop.’
“And he stopped. It was probably 45 seconds. We’re like, ‘Do that again!’ We stood there for an hour and a half listening to 40 seconds of whatever that was. And that’s when I felt something. So now I’m putting two and two together. This thing goes along with what my brother and all of the kids did at the block parties.”
It didn’t take long for McDaniels to apply himself and start creating on the turntables the way he created with his drawings. “So now because of that tape, my brother would leave, I’d go down to the basement and, you know, mess with his equipment. So I wanted to be a DJ after that; But not as a career. For me, hip-hop was just pretending.”
“With comic books, I pretended to be Batman and Superman with my blanket, running through the house. I heard another tape; A cassette tape of Grand Master Flash. So I would go into the basement and practice that. I didn’t know what Flash looked like, I didn’t know he was the Bronx, none of that. Whatever he is and whatever he’s doing, he’s Grandmaster Flash.”
Just as McDaniels had created characters for himself in his drawings, he created a character for himself as a DJ. “I’m Grand Master Get High because my music will intoxicate the crowd. So I spent ’78 to ’79 pretending to be something like this guy Flash. I got really good at it,” he said. “My mother and father, because they didn’t want their son going to the park to get his sneakers and his money taken, put a basketball rim up in my backyard. Everybody would walk to my house by 2:30. We played basketball in my backyard till 4, because that’s when my mother and father get home.”
Soon, McDaniels met the friend that would help change his life and the course of music history forever. “This one particular day, Butta Love, Douglas Hayes, who was my best friend in school, didn’t come. Nobody came except this guy named Joseph Simmons (a.k.a., D.J. Run) who was in another class. I knew him but I didn’t know him. So we played ball. This particular day, he comes in, he sees me and my brother’s turntable set,” McDaniels said.
“He goes, ‘Yo, you DJ?’ And I go, ‘No.’ I do, but I’m not going to tell him.’ Joe says, ‘Well, my brother’s Russell Rush. You see the fliers up on the telephone poles? Yeah, that’s my brother.’ So now me and Joe would get out 2:30, play ball ’til like 3:15, and then went in the basement and DJ’ed. And he saw that I was good like Flash.”
“When he (Joseph Simmons) was 12 years old, his brother Russell Simmons was managing Kurtis Blow. So when Joe was young, in the summertime he would go on shows with Kurt, and Kurt would go ‘My disco son, DJ Run.’ And Joe would come out, cute little kid. He would DJ for Kurt, do a little quick mix and rhyme. They’d give Joe like $50. That was a lot, like wow, wow.”
“So that was me and his life.”
But it was soon that McDaniels discovered yet another role – that of MC. “That was 8th grade. Run and Jay (Jason Mizell) went to the same Andrew Jackson High School. I went to Rice High School. When I got to Rice High School, I discovered this DJ/MC thing that was more relevant to me; Kurtis Blow, Eddie Cheeba who was the guy on the tape.”
“I discovered a hip-hop that were dudes talking about sneakers, taking the train and going to McDonald’s. So I started getting into Cold Crush and Afrika Bambaataa and stuff that was relevant to me as a young dude. I started writing rhymes because I still wanted to be Flash, but I discovered this MC thing goes with the DJ thing. Then I discovered that Flash has these guys called the Furious Five. So I started writing rhymes to not only be a DJ.”
McDaniels soon brought the same mentality he had towards comic-book superheroes to his rhyming: He was battling, fighting injustice as a larger-than-life super hero. “My rhymes were my writing to battle everybody. But it was all make-believe,” he said. “My whole thing in my make-believe world — I’m playing with my GI Joe, creating adventures. Like when I play, I didn’t just play. I created whole epic movies, because of the comic books.”
“I’m writing all these rhymes. So my thing is, I’m Easy D, the MC that’s going to battle Furious Five, Cold Crush Four, Treacherous Three, Dynamic Two, whatever. And Grand Master Get High is going to be the DJ that’s going to battle Flash. But Grand Master Get High doesn’t need five entities. He only needs one, which is Easy D.”
At some point, Joseph Simmons discovers McDaniels’ talent for lyrics. “Now Joe’s coming over, sees me DJ’ing this and that. But then he picks up my English book, and he’s like, ‘Darryl, you wrote all these?’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, this is what I do.’”
“And in ninth grade, he says this to me — it was like a foreign language: Whenever my brother Russell lets me make a record, I’m putting you in my group.”
But McDaniels was not particularly concerned with his future in music. He was having too much fun enjoying the creative process. “Went in one ear and out the other. I develop an arsenal of rhymes. And my whole thing was, Grand Master Get High was the DJ, I’m DJ Easy D. Because my name, Darryl, begins with a D, it’s easy for me to write these rhymes like that.”
Eventually, McDaniels decided that he wanted a new name. “I had typing in 12th grade at Rice High School. And at the end of a letter, you’d type your initials. So, originally, I was typing D.M.C.D — Darryl McDaniels with the D. I heard this Cold Crush tape; They had this routine. Grand Master Caz was G.M.C. Jerry Dean Louis was J.D.L. Easy A.D. was E.A.D. Almighty Kay Gee was A.K.G. These guys are gods. So I said I’m not Easy D any more. I’m D.M.C.”
“And I just delved into this persona; Coming from the comic books, being the supreme being, king of this whole universe. So that’s what I was, but it was all make-believe. It’s all in my basement.”
As McDaniels’ creative life was moving along nicely, soon McDaniels’ “real life” started to pull him in two different directions. First, he started college. “I’m getting ready to graduate, I get accepted to St. John’s University. So I wrote a rhyme about it. The famous rhyme that you hear — it wasn’t for a record.”
Then a second opportunity arose. “This was August, trying to figure out my life. The phone rings. It’s Joe,” he said. “He’s like, ‘Yo, remember in 9th grade when I said whenever Russell let me make a record? Grab your rhyme books. We’re going to the studio.’ It was August of ’82. We went to Greene Street Recording studio here in New York City. We record ‘It’s Like That.’ Russell’s whole thing was ‘D, get out the way.’ Because it was originally supposed to be ‘DJ Run and the OK Crew.’”
“Russell was going to let Joe have this record. He was going to have this white DJ lady to be his crew. Joe was like, ‘I don’t want to be with them, and I don’t want to be alone. So he basically went to Russell and said, ‘Russell, could D be in the group?’ Joe was telling him ‘D could write.’ So Russell’s thing was ‘D could write, but he’s not an MC. He’s not a showman.’ ”
“So what Run did was, ‘Russell, if you don’t put D in the group, I’m holding my breath.’ Russell’s like, ‘I don’t care.’ Ten minutes go by, and Joe’s starting to turn red now. He’s starting to turn purple. ‘OK, Joe, I’ll put D in the group.’”
“When I walked into Greene Street, it still didn’t dawn on me that I was making a record to be in the record business. I walked into Greene Street. It was the first time I saw the gold and the boards and the records on the wall. And all of these machines. And I’m like, ‘Oh, my G-d, I am inside the boom box.’”
“Russell knew what he was doing. So we make ‘It’s Like That.’ So, it’s 2 p.m. Now it’s about 11 at night. And I’m like, ‘I need to tell my mother and father I’m here.’ She thinks I’m at Run’s attic, because it was either D’s basement with my equipment or Run’s attic with his equipment. So when I left that day, Joe came to pick me up, I’m like, ‘Mom, I’m going out with Joe.’ So it’s 11, 12, 1 in the morning. I’m like, ‘I’m about to get my ass beat,’ because they don’t know where I’m at. We didn’t have cellphones or beepers.”
They still needed a “B” side so Joe went in and laid and then said, “‘D, go in there and say a rhyme.’ And I was like, ‘No, Russell’s already mad that I’m here.’ He’s like, ‘I want Russell to see that you really can deliver. You gotta impress Russell and show him your skills.’ All I could remember was my rhyme about being at St. John’s University. So I kicked it.”
“For the rest of the session, who sat around me, hugging me? Russell.”
“And I went home. I wasn’t even thinking about the deal yet. I’m thinking I’m about to get my ass whipped. I get home. My mother and father were like, ‘Boy, it’s 3 in the morning. Where the hell were you?’ I said, ‘Oh, I fell asleep at Joe’s house.’ They said,‘ Don’t you do that no more!’ Cool.”
McDaniels originally chose business administration as a major, but he said, “I don’t like accounting. I don’t like math.” He recognized that his skill in drawing could become a career, and he considers a shift. “I can draw really, really good. So I’m rehearsing this: ‘Ma, I’m changing my major to graphic design, architecture — anything that has to do with drawing. Even if I have to drop out and draw the funnies in the local paper. My mother’s like, ‘Oh, hell, no!’ My father, I love him, may he rest in peace says, ‘Calm down, listen. If that’s what the boy wants to do, let him do it. I don’t care if it’s only going to make him $75 a week.’ So that was the plan.”
But Joe had a different idea. “Right as I was having that discussion, Joe called. ‘Yo, D, you know the record we made in the summer? Russell got us a record deal, Profile Records, this and that.’ OK, Joe, cool, but I’m trying to figure life out.’ Boom, hung up the phone. He’s calling everyday. This is September. In November, he calls me one night, ‘D, I got contracts, you gotta come sign them and this and that, we gotta take it to the lawyers.’ OK.”
McDaniels’ parents were not initially swooning. “Then I realized I never even told my mother and father that we made a record. So I had to go downstairs and say, ‘Mom and Dad, remember that night I came home late? Well, I really wasn’t at Joe’s house. Remember those things we used to do with your turntables when we took it to the block parties? Well, a lot of people are getting record deals, and Russell said the name of the group is going to be Run D.M.C.’”
“My mother was like, ‘Focus on school.’ My father was like, ‘Hold up. What in the hell is a Run D.M.C. and what in the hell is rap music?’ To make a long story short, he was like, ‘Hell, no.’”
“So, Joe’s calling every week with information. We got turned down by all the majors. All the other labels said there’s no way anyone’s going to want to hear an MC rhyming about chicken and collard greens at St. John’s University. But this label called Profile Records heard it and saw it was differently.”
“So we ended up on Profile Records, and Joe’s calling with all this information. And I figure out how to get to my Mom. I said, ‘Mom, Run said we’re going to make some money doing these records. Whatever money I make off the live performances, I’ll use for my tuition.’ So that’s why they said, ‘You can do this.’”
“So I said, ‘OK, Joe, let’s do it. But I’m still not realizing it’s going to turn into what it’s going to turn into. Run saw the opulence, the prestige; Because he was an 11- or 12-year-old kid watching Kurtis Blow and Russell discuss business, so he saw the inside. He saw ‘Rapper’s Delight’ making money. Me, it was just fun. Even to the point of when we went to make ‘It’s Like That.’ It was all make-believe to me at that point.”
“‘It’s Like That’ and ‘Sucker MC’s’ hit radio. When the record was finished, I’m transitioning, getting ready to change my major and all that. So the record comes out. But it didn’t really dawn on me because I was like, ‘We’re going to make money this summer, and then I’m going to be back in college next year.’”
“So ‘Sucker MC’s’ and ‘It’s Like That’ blew up, so Russell was like, ‘Y’all gotta make another record.’ My main thing is I might not even make money — as long as Mr. Magic and Red Alert played us.”
It was then that Run-D.M.C. found its third and final member — Jason Mizell. “So we made another record, and we made ‘Hard Times’ and ‘Jam Master Jay.’ We did ‘Hard Times’ to have a follow-up to ‘It’s Like That,’ a socially conscious record. Russell said, ‘We gotta go do shows. Who’s going to be your DJ?’ Jay’s crew, Two Fifth Down, was a DJ crew, did all the block parties. So Joe went to Jay and said, ‘Yo, me and Darryl McDaniels, Butta Love’s best friend, got this record. We want you to be our DJ.’ Jay was like, ‘Hold up. You mean y’all going to pay me for doing what I do in the park for free? Hell, yeah, I’m in.’”
“So when we started doing these early shows, they were like, ‘Who’s Run? Who’s D? Who’s M? Who’s C?’ It was all over the place — and even if they know that’s Run, that’s D.M.C., who the hell is this other guy? Nobody knows we’ve got a Jay. I said, ‘Don’t worry, Jay, I got you.’”
For inspiration, McDaniels went back to his comic-book mentality. “And this was all comic-book stuff. The jam is the party (‘Yo, last night, that jam was sick!’). The jam was also the record (‘Yo, play my favorite jam’). I was like, ‘Jay is going to be the master of the whole thing — of the whole universe. He’s going to be Jam Master Jay.’ That means he not only masters the jams on the turntable, he masters the parties. So I go back. I go, ‘Jay, I got your name — Jam Master Jay. And not only that, I got this record ‘Jam Master Jay’ about you.”
“We did that in ’85 and then that worked. Russell goes, ‘Yo, we going to make an album.’” So they do the whole business, studio-time thing. And I wasn’t even conscious that it was going on.”
“It was all make-believe.”
While it was “pretend” for McDaniels, the connection to his art was very real and made him feel good. “My fun was the whole creative process of it. What’s the beat? OK, let me go home and create a chapter in this comic book. And I could create all of this in private, and they would put it out.”
Moreover, McDaniels was starting to see how his D.M.C. persona was starting to address actual insecurities in his real life. “This was an outlet for the quite shy little Catholic school kid that read comic books and wore glasses. You know I was an underdog. But psychologically, the pretend world was a world where I was the most powerful being. There was no bullying. I was Four Eyes, this and that, Catholic school kid, pussy, punk, all of that. But comic books put me in this whole universe where I was protected, I was powerful. Hip-hop allowed me in this realm to express that. But what happened in the make-believe was really a part of it. But that was me just doing with them what I was doing in my basement. It wasn’t like me consciously saying, ‘I’m going to be in show business.’”
“Bill Adler, our first publicist, said this in the first Run D.M.C. book he wrote: ‘It was amazing to see mild-mannered Darryl McDaniels transform into the mighty King of Rock.” He knew that Run was a flamboyant, good-looking, fly kid. For me, that ‘One two three in the place to be — that was just Son of Odin, Thor!”
Part of the key to the effectiveness of the D.M.C. persona was turning perceived weaknesses into strength. “I was afraid to wear my glasses outside. My whole life until Run D.M.C., I was blind in the street. You’d probably see me as a kid and say, ‘D, why didn’t you say ‘Hi’ to me?’ I didn’t know it was fucking you! Run said these words to me, prophetic: ‘Yo, keep your glasses on. They’re going to be famous.’”
McDaniels was starting to realize that while his persona of D.M.C. was very much a part of him, the discrepancy between D.M.C. and Darryl McDaniels puzzled some people. He explained: People since Day One have said, ‘D, you’re nothing like your records. They expected a diva. They expected the energy, persona on the record in real life. And I was nothing like that. It was crazy fun. But I never thought about it. When I wasn’t onstage, I was quiet.”
McDaniels also started to realize that people were starting to have opinions about his creative work. What was previously private, and reserved for his basement was now open to critique from others. In particular, the rhymes he wrote to have “fake” battles with other rappers were now being heard publicly — and not everyone took them kindly.
McDaniels explained: “In 1985, when I did ‘I’m the King of Rock, there is none higher,’ Kurtis Blow called himself the King of Rap. Melle Mel – King of Rap. We were touring with Kurtis Blow. We did the New York City Awards. Run-D.M.C. got an award for music. Russell had it that Run-D.M.C., Houdini and Kurtis Blow was going to perform to promote the tour that we was about to go on. So we were in the dressing room, everybody left, Kurtis Blow comes over to me, and he says, ‘Yo, D.’ And this is like Kurtis Blow, he’s a god to me. He says, ‘You gotta stop saying you’re the king.’ And I say, ‘OK, cool.’”
D.J. Run, however, was not nearly as understanding of nor amicable towards Blow’s concerns. McDaniels described: “This was the day that the father had to let the son go. Joe comes back in. And he says D’s acting different. Joe said, ‘What happened, D?’ I say, ‘Well, Kurtis Blow said I can’t say I’m the king no more. Joe said, ‘What? Where’s that motherfucker at?’ And he caught Kurt in the hallway in front of everyone. ‘Motherfucker this and that don’t you never talk to my man like that.’ I’m like, ‘Oh, shit, I shouldn’t have said it.’ I felt bad. When Kurt said that to me, it just bugged me out. I didn’t realize what I was doing. I was just having fun.”
As time went on, McDaniels began to feel that he didn’t have an equal voice in the group. “It wasn’t that I didn’t want to talk. Nobody wanted to ask me because Run was the leader. People would always say, ‘What the hell is D thinking?’ I had a lot of opinions about things back then. But my thing is like if no one’s going to ask me, I’m not going to interject,” he said.
This began a pattern of emotional suppression, in which McDaniels would keep his thoughts and feelings to himself. Research demonstrates the negative effects of emotional suppression. Attempting to suppress negative thoughts or moods usually has the paradoxical effects of making those experiences more intense.
McDaniels also started noticing that Run-D.M.C.’s music was not getting the attention it previously had, and there was pressure to change their style. “It was getting exceptionally good in the ’90s. And we were getting respect, but it was like, ‘Give it up for Run-D.M.C.,’ but they didn’t want to talk with us. We were old. Everybody was more famous than us, but nobody was better than us. We were getting called to be on all those MTV shows, but nobody cared.”
Worse, and perhaps in response to these external pressures, McDaniels felt that the creative process of the group was changing. “Before it was just me doing stuff because I was doing it. It was, ‘D, just show up and be you. Here’s a beat, D, what do you want to say?’ And then it became ‘Here’s a beat, D, you gotta say this.’” In ‘Tougher than Leather,’ I had no input. So I would come in and say, ‘I don’t want to go, ‘My name is D.M.C., the all-time great, bust the most rhymes.’ I want to go, ‘It’s cold gangsta hard-rock, nonstop hip-hop.’ ‘No, D, we just need you to say, ‘I’m D.M.C. in the place to be.’”
McDaniels felt that his creativity, the very behavior that made him love to draw, DJ and rap was being stifled. “Before Biggie [Smalls] had ‘Mo Money Mo Problems,’ I had this rhyme, I went to Run and Jay — Erick and Parrish of EPMD said, ‘Yo, D, that was the deffest shit we ever heard.’ It was over ‘Walk This Way.’ It was: ‘Chill with a mil, Somebody still got beef.’ I went to Run and Jay, and they said, ‘Nah, that ain’t gonna work, D.”
To McDaniels, a change in style didn’t make sense, especially in light of the group’s success and stature within the hip hop community. “Because we built this industry that’s so great — all we have to do is be — and nobody would ever touch us. No one ever said to Mick [Jagger] and them, ‘You need to make records like Nirvana because they’re killing it right now.’”
“And I started drinking.”
For McDaniels, alcohol use started innocently enough with his wanting to relax before going onstage. “I didn’t know if we had a hit record. We had to go on stage and perform it live. I don’t want to be on stage. I want to do this in my basement. So the 40s at first were casual, like the jazz player that takes a hit of bourbon before he goes on stage. I was at the Roxy, and I was like, ‘Oh, shit, all of fucking New York is out there.’ I mean all the B boys. I’m drinking this 40.”
The drinking quickly became a “need” rather than a “want.” “At first, the alcohol was my courage. Then it became my carrier. By ‘Back From Hell,’ I was drinking a case of Olde English a day. And the reason why I was drinking a case of Olde English a day was my whole day was me doing shit I didn’t want to do. I’d just drink a quart, or a whole 40 myself and just go out there. Then it went from drinking at night or during the tours to drinking all day before the tour,” he explained.
His cycle of emotional suppression, anger and alcohol abuse worsened. “I wouldn’t speak up. For instance, ‘Back From Hell’ – I hated every fucking record on it. But I would come and just do what they wanted me to do, and I would go suppress that with alcohol. Just to be a nice player. And they knew D could just show up and do stuff. They were telling me how to be. And instead of me saying, ‘Fuck y’all, I quit,’ I would say, ‘I don’t want to hurt Jay.’ That was my problem. But instead I went and I drank my liquor.”
McDaniels started to feel worse as he felt more alienated from his original creative process. “My last hit record to the commercial world was ‘Walk This Way.’ After ‘Raising Hell,’ the Easy D guy died because then the success-business people took over my existence. So while they were trying to wring out what they could, I was dying inside. That’s why I was drinking. My voice was going. I don’t think I would have gone into a depression and asked those questions if I was outputting. Because it was the only outlet for me,” he said.
McDaniels actually discovered that there were others in his industry who struggled with similar issues of how to manage the conflicted feelings that can arise from being in the music business. One was L.L. Cool J. “ L.L. would always come to me and talk about life. When he was with Run, they would talk show business. He would always ask me, ‘How do you feel about how these people look at you?’ So when L.L. wasn’t on tour, he would always just come and get me and talk about stuff.”
He also saw that there were others who also felt that their creativity was not being appreciated and took action. “That’s why I always respected the Beastie Boys. The Beastie Boys were coming to New York, selling out [Madison Square] Garden twice. They left Def Jam when nothing was wrong. I always wondered why they did that. Because they saw the labels became bottom line. They didn’t want to be stuck in ‘Brass Monkey.’ They did ‘Paul’s Boutique’ when everybody said it sucked. And then a year later, ‘It’s groundbreaking!’ They grew musically into a band. Run D.M.C. should have evolved.”
McDaniels felt that there was one bright spot creatively for him during that time; namely, the Pete Rock-produced record, “Down with the King.” And he felt this way because he felt able to express himself freely.
“The reality of those records was actually me. When I was going through the beginning of my depression, this was after ‘Down with the King.’ If you listen to that album, that’s the only record on that album that’s Run-D.M.C. at that time. Pete Rock said, ‘D, I want to know what you’re doing right now.’ Pete Rock said that was the best rhyme of the year. If we’d done a whole album like that, we’d have been doing us.”
But this victory was short-lived. McDaniels had been slowly losing his voice with a condition called spasmodic dysphonia. Then tragedy strikes and his friend, Jam Master Jay, was murdered. McDaniels was spiraling. “I have spasmodic dysphonia. Now this is crazy. I’m an alcoholic. I find out that I’m adopted. Jay’s died. Byford, my father, dies.”
Eventually McDaniels considered suicide. “Now, Jay gets shot. So now not only is there a void in me, losing my voice, the whole Run-D.M.C. thing is really over now. So I came to this conclusion: ‘I’m the King of Rock. I’ve accomplished what I came to do here in this realm. I’m not waiting until I’m 80 to die. I’m going to die tomorrow, so I can go to my next plane today.’”
Then McDaniels met Sarah McLachlan.
“In ’96, I was touring, I heard the record ‘Angel.’ I heard the words “from this dark, cold hotel room.’ And I’m thinking, ‘That’s me!’ Because I’d get offstage, go to my hotel room, lay in my bed and say something’s wrong. For one whole year, all I listened to was Sarah McLachlan. My manager, Eric, says, ‘Yo, we’re going to the [record producer] Clive Davis Grammy party. I’m like, ‘Fuck that.’ I didn’t want to do nothing except listen to Sarah McLachlan. But Eric worked hard to get the tickets so we go to the party. I’m depressed. I tell my manager I’m only staying an hour at this party.”
“Right when I’m ready to leave, Sarah McLachlan walks in. I knew of her, but I didn’t know her. That’s that lady — she made that record. I say, ‘Ms. McLachlan, the name of the record is Angel. You sound like an angel. But you’re not an angel to me; you’re a god to me. I listen to your record everyday. It’s the crutch I stand on every day. I don’t leave home without it.’”
Heartened by this experience, McDaniels sets out to write his autobiography to learn more about himself. And it was through that process that he discovered another challenge to his sense of self – he was adopted.
McDaniels explained: “I found out that I was adopted because I called my mother in ’97. Sarah McLachlan had that record ‘Angel’ out. I called my mother, wanted to know when I was born, how much I weighed, what hospital. She hung up the phone. An hour later, she calls up with my father. They said: ‘We have something else to tell you. You were a month old when we brought you home, and you’re adopted, but we love you.’”
For McDaniels, this revelation started him on a path towards recovery. “When I found out that I was adopted, then everything started to make sense. When I found out I was adopted, I had to go to therapy. I think when I thought I was going to kill myself the gods said, ‘Oh, we gotta tell him,’ so they made the revelation that I was adopted.’ So when I got the news, it didn’t make me feel better, but it filled the void. So I’m Darryl McDaniels, D.M.C. from Hollis, Queens. First to go gold, first to platinum. Run and Jay are my friends. Son of Byford, brother of Al. The missing part of my existence was, I was adopted. Now when I found that out, it gave me another thing for living.”
And he decided to handle his feelings as he always had – by creating. McDaniels thought: “If I die tomorrow, people know the D.M.C. story. Nobody knows about the little kid Darryl. I’m going to make a record about how I’m feeling about being adopted. So I’m going to call that lady Sarah McLachlan. And I’m thinking Cold Crush. I’m going to take the Harry Chapin song [‘The Cat’s in the Cradle’], which is a sad song about a family that had no time for the son. Even though my family loves me, I’m going to put my story with that record, and I’ll have Sarah McLachlan sing the chorus,” he said.
The result was the song “Just Like Me.” But having a finalized song wasn’t the only outcome of the recording. McDaniels learned something about McLachlan. “At the end of the session, Sarah says, ‘I’ve got to tell you something. I’m adopted too and I did not know that.’ So there’s something, the feeling in her music.”
This was the beginning of McDaniels reclaiming his “voice.”
McDaniels began to become involved in charity work for adopted children. “After I did the Sarah McLachlan album, all the foster kids were like, ‘D.M.C.’s just like us.’ So I started getting calls. So I started going to adoption agencies, meeting the foster kids, going to the group homes. Talking to the kids. I’d get a call three weeks later, ‘Yo, D, don’t you know that girl who came up to you and spoke to you, she didn’t speak to nobody for three months, but when you left here she couldn’t stop talking.’”
McDaniels felt that he was on the path to recovery, but felt that there was still more to do. “After I did the Sarah McLachlan record, I still had all these emotions. Because my whole life after the revelation and the Sarah McLachlan stuff was like, ‘Everywhere, that could be my mother; that could be my father. I could have a brother.’”
And as always, he found purpose in exploring a way to examine, express and heal his emotions creatively. But this time it was through a new medium – documentary film. “So, I’m sitting in this meeting, and the agent turns to me and says, ‘What’s up with you? How you doin’? Where you at?’ ‘Oh, motherfucker, you want to know where I’m at? Well, I just found out that I was adopted at age 35, and everybody knew. How would you feel?’ He was like, ‘Whoa.’ But prior to that, Sheila Jaffe, the casting director for ‘The Sopranos,’ ‘Entourage,’ she was in his office.”
“She did three searches for her birth mother and kept having dead ends. She was depressed. So he heard me say that, and to make a long story short, he lets me meet Sheila. We talk about our feelings. It was cool. And then she goes, ‘Oh, by the way, once a month, Mark Wahlberg gives us his office, and we have an Adoptions Anonymous discussion. So I was sitting in this room with all of these different people reverting back to little kids.”
“So, after about the third meeting, I start thinking about doing a search. So I tell Eric, ‘Call Viacom, tell them I want to do a show with them.’ So I get them on the phone, and they’re like cool, ‘D.M.C. Goes to Vegas. D.M.C. in Miami.’ All these things. ‘No, I want you all to take the cameras and follow me while I do a search for my birth mother.’ And they get real quiet on the other end of the phone. And they go, ‘You sure you want to do that?’ And I go, ‘Yeah, why wouldn’t I?’”
“They go, ’Because that’s real.’
McDaniels eventually found his birth mother. “I found my birth mother. It took about two weeks to find her. She was living in Staten Island. I was living in Queens my whole life. She was living right next door to me. When I opened the door, it was the first time in my life I saw somebody who said they were related to me, who looked exactly like me. Then I found two brothers and a sister I didn’t know I had. My brother was born three years before me. He wears glasses, and he’s got a goatee. And he could draw. His whole life when Run-D.M.C. would come out — ‘That guy, D.M.C., could be your brother!’ My brother Damon, who’s three years younger than me — Mark looked like me with Run-D.M.C.; Damon looked like me now — and he’s a personal trainer.”
“When I met my birth mother, she said,‘I know you’re dying to know why I gave you up. I said, ‘Lady, that’s an understatement.’ She said, ‘I gave you up to give you a chance.’ I was like, ‘Lady, you gave me one hell of a chance.’”
“So, now the D.M.C. thing has purpose. I did one show with a purpose — ‘D.M.C.: My Adoption Journey’ on VH1. It won an Emmy. And when I got the call from VH1, I didn’t celebrate. The purpose for what I did it for is working. Because now when I walk the streets, the kids from this generation come up to me and say, “Mr. D.M.C thank you for doing that show that you did. I’m a foster kid, too, but that was real to me. I could relate to that.’”
Completing the documentary was critical to McDaniel’s ongoing recovery. “When I did the [documentary], just by seeing it touch other people, it made me OK. That’s when everything started making sense. Even Eminem said, ‘Yo, D, don’t you know that it was your destiny to be the third member of that group, so it could happen the way it did? It would’ve been totally different if it was Run, Jay and somebody else.’ So I’m like, ‘OK, it all makes sense.’”
And just as McDaniels had learned to channel perceived weaknesses into strengths as D.M.C., he began to understand how his being adopted was not a shortcoming. He described a story that brought this issue into focus for him. “A woman walked up at that event and said, “Moses, Jesus, they were adopted. Foster kids, too. And she said, ‘You’re a deliverer.’ She walks away.”
This resonated with McDaniels. “Think about it. Moses was born by his mother, but they were killing babies. Put him in the river, Pharoah’s daughter found him, took him out the river and into the palace and said, ‘Daddy, I’m keeping this one.’ Why did that happen? Because he had a mission. And I tell kids, ‘Don’t feel bad if you get fucked up in life. Moses was a murderer. Read the Bible. He killed a man. Moses had a speech impediment. He needed Adam to dictate when it was time for him to leave. So Moses is chillin’ in a fucking palace in a kingdom. He has no idea how the hell he got there. Like me. And he hears, ‘Yo, Moses. Yeah, it’s me, G-d. I want you to tell Pharoah, ‘Let my people go.’ Moses is thinking, ‘Hold up. I can’t speak. I’m not Egyptian. And I’m a murderer.’ The same thing with Jesus. Mary comes home. Joseph is working in the carpenter thing. She comes home pregnant. He’s thinking, ‘How the fuck did that happen?’ He could’ve kicked her out. We’ll take care of the kid. This baby has a purpose.’”
Eventually, McDaniels also received help from various professionals. “It wasn’t until I got out of rehab that I started getting my voice back. My therapist asked me ‘Was there anytime in Run-D.M.C. where things happened that you were disturbed by? And I said, ‘No.’ The guy looked at me, and he said, “Motherfucker, you’re a motherfucking G-d damn liar.’ And I just let out, ‘Yo, you’re right!’ ’Cause I discovered in rehab I have suppressed emotions. Meaning, I hold shit in because I have a fear of hurting people. When I was leaving, they said, ‘From now on, always tell the truth, no matter what people think. You’re the most important person in the room.’ So now, artistically, if I want to do something, I’m doing it because I want to do it if it’s something I want to express.”
As time passed, and McDaniels continued to find creative outlets, including returning to the place where it all began for him — making comic books. “Everybody’s flipping now that I’m doing these comic books. But they’re like, ‘Oh, that’s right. On ‘King of Rock,’ it was ‘Crash through walls, come through floors, bust through ceilings and knock down doors!’ That’s all comic book because I was so into this make-believe world. Amazing Spider-Man. Incredible Hulk. Devastating Mic Controller. Devastating Master. All these descriptions —D.M.C.”
“I go to meet with Riggs Morales, who’s [head of artists and repertoire] for Shady Records. The guy who inducted me into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, this is his right-hand man. And I said I used to go to Catholic school my whole life, and I used to read comic books. He just gave me this look. He’s like ‘Really?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I used to do drawing, read comic books, whatever.’ At the end of the meeting he said, ‘You ever thought about putting out a comic book?’”
For McDaniels, the reason he hadn’t was clear – he wanted it to feel real and authentic. McDaniels explained: “I was like, ‘No.’ Because from Day One in this business, when I traveled the world, everywhere I go, ‘Yo, D.M.C., I got this hip-hop comic book.’ The reason why hip-hop comic books don’t work is, you don’t make a hip-hop comic book. You make a comic book. I don’t want to be another rapper, just because they’re successful, they think they can do other stuff like that. But Riggs said, ‘But it’s different with you, though. What happened when you with your two boys put rock with hip-hop? Something good, right? What happened when you and your two boys talked about a sneaker (Adidas)? Something good, right? … But don’t do it as D.M.C., the celebrity. Do it as Darryl, the little boy who was into comic books.’”
“So, then he said, ‘Next week, I’ll introduce you to my buddy, Edgardo Miranda Rodriguez. They said the same way you were that entity with Run and Jay, to make that work, people will respect it if you do it.’ And I was like, ‘Let’s do it.’”
“I was like, ‘The only way I’ll do it, though, is if it’s done with integrity as a celebration and tribute to comic-book culture.’ Because geeks take it seriously. They don’t give a fuck if it’s D.M.C. But now I got an advantage, because it was comic books first. That was my artistic world. Just drawing.”
And McDaniels continues to make music, including his recent rock/metal record with Generation Kill. For McDaniels, the transition to rock and metal was a natural one. He explains: “When you look at Run-D.M.C., we were successful as rock stars and as hip-hop stars. Our big records — ‘Walk This Way,’ ‘King of Rock,’ ‘Rock Box’ — are all rock songs.”
“The Generation Kill project originally was just collaborating on a song for my new LP. It turned into a full-length project. It is a great project because Rob Dukes has a lot in common with me. We’ve both been sober for years, but I think why it’s going so well is because we have no boundaries or rules on creativity. With topics like hookers, substance abuse, suicide and politics, we both are free to say and write what we feel. No one is telling who I should be or how to be me. That’s when magnificent things happen. We go in, and it’s so fun. We just start creating, composing and recording.”
As time went on, McDaniels began to reflect on what he learned from his experience and realized that he needs to stay connected to his creative side in order for his life to work personally and professionally. And he frequently shares this message with kids. “You kids, regardless of your situation, you’re foster kids, homeless, you’re adopted, can’t be with your original birth mother. Mine turned out fortunately. I got adopted. Yours may be hell. But this situation doesn’t define who you are. You have a talent, you have a gift for you to share with the world. And if you have that one thing that is you — nothing in this world can stop you.”
And people listen to McDaniels in part because of what he personally has been through, but also because he is D.M.C. “I get called to this adoption event in D.C., Baltimore Angels in Adoption. So I just go, I get the Angel Adoption Award. And the funny thing is, they truly want to give me the award. But now all the people from my generation, and all the people right under it — it was like, by the way, could you perform for us? Can you do the Angel Adoption Award record?”
“And can you do ‘It’s Tricky’?”
And despite their differences over the years, McDaniels still appreciates the role Joseph Simmons — D.J. Run — played in his life. “I tell kids if there’s something in you, someone’s going to discover that. That’s all that happened to me. He (Run) discovered that. So it was a gift for me. And Run knew that. When I came along, I was different. So he liked that.”
“Me and Run have no beef. Shit ended. Jay died. He went where he went. That’s what happened.”
Ultimately, McDaniels recognizes that his creative gift has always been a true expression of himself – even when it was pretend. And he is grateful for how his gift has helped him connect to himself and overcome adversity.
“I think everything I wanted to do as a person in Darryl’s life, D.M.C. did in this artistic realm.”
