Ariel Rechtshaid: ‘What I’ve learned, and I’m not saying I’ve practiced it well, is you get what you demand.’ The question ‘What would you be doing if you hadn’t made it in music?’ is a common and obvious one. The answer ‘snake wrangler’ is not. And, to be fair, in the case of Ariel Rechtshaid, it might not be entirely true. But snakes certainly did form one slippery side of a sliding doors moment that eventually led to him being one of the most respected and requested songwriter/producers in the world today, having worked with, amongst others, Haim, Usher, Adele, Madonna, Beyoncé, Sky Ferreira and Vampire Weekend – whose recent Billboard 200 No.1
at that idea that she got me a guitar instead, basically to try and distract me from the snakes.” It worked. Rechtshaid started learning, playing – and, crucially, listening. To everything. From the biggest riffers of the day, AC/DC and Guns N Roses, to singer-songwriters like Bob Dylan and Cat Stevens, to rap music, to punk and to what he recalls (accurately) as “subversive pop” from artists like The Pet Shop Boys and Madonna. And, perhaps most of all, he listened to The Beastie Boys, who basically did all of the above. Towards the end of his time at high school, two things
“I HAD A TEACHER WHO HAD A BUNCH OF SNAKES IN HER ROOM, AND I FELL IN LOVE WITH THEM. MY MOM WAS SO HORRIFIED, SHE GOT ME A GUITAR INSTEAD...” album, Father Of The Bride, he co-produced. Rechtshaid was born to working class, incredibly encouraging immigrant parents in Los Angeles. He remembers: “My mom, as a lot of mothers do, really pushed music on me, basically from birth. She got me piano lessons very early; that didn’t take. Then she tried violin; that didn’t work either. “Then, weirdly, I had a teacher who had a bunch of snakes in her room, and of course I fell in love with them and wanted one at home. My mom was so horrified
happened that set him on the path to a career as a genreagnostic musical polymath. “I became really good friends with this guy who wanted to be a rapper [and who became, in fact, Murs]. We skated together, and at the weekend we would mess around with four-tracks and turntables and listen to who had sampled what, learning how to do that. “Just after high school, he got a record deal with an independent hip-hop label; Nick came over to my house and we made this album together [F’real, 1997]. It 105
