Darryl "DMC" McDaniels Finds Therapy More Helpful Than Olde English 800

This is a story about fame, isolation, depression, alcohol, wanting to die and wanting to live. Do I call you dear? Do I call you Darryl? What's best? You could call me Darryl, you could call me D, you could call me Darryl, Mac, you could call me DMC, whatever you want to call me. I'm so glad you answered that way. That was my secret hope. It's the hilarious world of depression. I'm John Moe. My guest on this episode is a recovering alcoholic. He's dealt with depression and anxiety, he's been suicidal, and he's part of one of the most successful and influential hip-hop groups of all time. Yo, what's up? This is DMC in the place to be coming at you from Quad Studios in the NYC, New York City, baby. Darryl McDaniels is the DMC in Run DMC. D and Joseph Run Simmons rapping, Jam Master J on the Turntables. They started in Queens in 1983 and went on to make platinum records, cover of Rolling Stone, played live aid. They're in the rock and roll hall of fame. Their sound wasn't flashy, sparse, driving beats, powerful, literate vocals with the two rappers overlapping relentlessly. Sounded a lot like hard rock. The video for their collaboration with Aerosmith features a literal wall between rock and rap being smashed through. They're even heavy when rapping about shoes. My up is walked through by the doors and broke all over. Or Christmas. It's Christmas time in Highlands, Queens. Moms cook at chicken and college grease. Or about people who just talk to you. But being rich in famous is not a prevention or cure for mental health problems. And looking and sounding powerful is not a guarantee that someone feels that way. Before he was DMC, he was a quiet kid named Darryl in a middle-class section of Queens, raised by Biford and Banna McDaniels. Young Darryl was a good student, liked music, but loved comic books. Saw himself in them. You went think Peter Parker, Spider-Man. You went think Clark Kent was Superman. We all awkward. And that was something that I could relate to because when I was a kid growing up in Queens, it seemed like if he wasn't in the gang, if he wasn't selling drugs, if he wasn't a thug. And if he wasn't playing hooky, he wasn't cool. So for me, I saw in those comic books people that were like me that didn't exist in this real world, although they didn't exist, but they were afraid to expose themselves. So hip-hop and rock and roll allowed me to use my weaknesses as a superpower. I'm DMC in a place to be. I wear these glasses so I can see. You know what I'm saying? I got teased, bullied, and picked on because I wore glasses. And when I was a kid, you know, I'm saying, "Hey, for us, hey, specter, hey Banna." So mentally and emotionally growing up was fucking traumatic. It was crazy for me. The music he liked? Well, it had more acoustic guitars than you might expect. I cared nothing about black music because soul music at the time was about girls. I didn't care about no girls. And then, you know, outside of Marvin Game doing what's going on, it was the folk rock and the rock singers singing about politics and presidents and society and liberation. Stuff that I could relate to because I was a kid. I was a straight-A student. So, when I heard Fogarty and Dylan and Neil Young, it was like being in social studies class. He also loved, and this comes up in a lot of interviews, Harry Chapin. You know, this guy. This was a different world that his childhood friend Joe Simmons lived in. Run. His brother was Russell Simmons, so Run saw hip-hop growing in his living room. I'm talking about before Rap is the light. Run saw the hip-hop business in his living room. Russell was a party promoter. He was managing Curtis Blow. He was hiring Flash Bambada. He was hiring all the DJs and MCs at that time to come play at his parties and he would pay them at the end of the night. So Run saw the business of it in his living room. Russell Simmons would go on to be run DMC's manager and one of the biggest moguls in the hip-hop business. And from the start, his brother Joe wanted into that business. Darryl agreed to help Joe perform the rap they'd been writing and he called upon his comic book influences because it was fun that way. If I do this, I'm going to pretend to be the most powerful entity in the hip-hop universe. So I transform my old man at school kid Darryl McDaniels. There's no longer Darryl McDaniels when he get on the mic. When he gets on the mic, he transforms into the devastating mic controlling king of rock. So it was all make believe for me in my room and my basement that I didn't let that go when I got on records. And so they join up with their friend Jason Myzel Darryl becomes DMC Joe becomes run Jason is jam master J. But to D at this point wraps a hobby, not a career. Run had been bugging Russell for years to help him put out a record and when Russell finally said OK Darryl's phone rang. Yo, do you remember four years ago when I said if I ever make a record I'm putting I was like yeah well grab your own book we go into studio so we went and we laid on succum season is like that in August of 82. I get in school. He's calling me every day Russell shopping Russell shopping. Then he calls me says Russell got us a record deal profile records and I'm like OK cool. So we had to go to we had to take the train in the city to go to the lawyers office and sign papers whatever whatever. That's it wasn't something that I remembered because my main concern is I'm starting St. John's you know in September it's semester. So he's calling me telling me everything going on with the record and he tells me we got a record deal I'm sitting in the raft skeller. The raft skeller was bar on the St. John's University campus drinking age was 18. Over the intercom and inside the lunchroom at St. John's University the DJ throws on succum seeds and a whole lunchroom gets up and starts to dance to it. And they saw him saying yo who are these guys with these guys from you know whatever it is just the best hip hop that we ever heard whatever whatever. So I look up and I just look at them and I say to myself I didn't going to last not knowing what was about to happen. So that was the first semester second semester Joe call Joe we got to show enough North Carolina packet bags we going on a road. I took a leave of absence from St. John's and been absent ever since. But remember young Darryl is a bookish introvert. He would have been fine just writing and recording wraps and not performing but his extroverted friends run in J were really excited about hitting the stage. To support their needs. I thought outside of myself I need something else I don't need just to pretend to be son of bifred brother of Al. Ben as my mother and runs my pal. It's Mick Daniels not Mick Donnells. These rhymes are Darryl's don't give a fuck about Ronald's. I ran down my family tree my mother my father my brother and me all I had to do was be Darryl Mick Daniels and represent the Mick Daniels family. When it came to yo you got to get on billboard yo you got to get on a radio to please other people I thought I needed assistance. So all English became my my power I forsake my imagination for the old English alcohol which led to me needing Jack Daniels and Jim beam to be my best friend instead of Darryl. That's when I lost it. Darryl would grow to enjoy performing but not right away the band's music however was blowing up and shows were necessary. I didn't want to do I didn't want to do this in front of you this was just me in my basement and after I did it my enjoyment I went upstairs in my homework and went to sleep now run is telling me do you need to get up in the front with me. So the first time I have a performer run a drunk a fucking half a fifth of southern comfort and I said by the speaker and I did my rhyme. And when I finish run said two things to me said D next time stand on the fucking stage in front of the audience when you say your rhyme and don't drink so much. Because I'm scared to death. Darryl kept drinking because it felt good and he says because he wanted to keep pleasing people. I'm DMC in a place to be I go my whole thing is when I come to approach a record I don't care it could be about politics it could be about love. I'ma tell it from where. Darryl is that. I got out of that. I got that. I got to tell it from where Jay's at or where runs that from Russell's at oh from where the radio station is at. No, I got us come from where I'm at to be ordered to in order to Dominate my Surrounding in my universe, but I forgot about that when I started using that alcohol because I was scared I was nervous. I was at anxiety. I just want to be in my basement right in my rhymes and going to bed I don't want to be on fucking stage and fucking Harlem world. I don't want to be on stage and fucking up. I'll When run DMC performed they had a particular look black denim black tracksuits or black leather they wore black wide-brimmed hats Darryl also wore these big chunky black glasses So if you wanted to really look in his eyes, you had to get past the big hat and the big glasses the clothes were a statement That's how the young people of the hip-hop culture dress When they got in show business because a rapper is the light our idol see the first rappers grandma's a flash Africa bambad and a fur is five treacherous three Fearless four co-crushed four funky four plus one the front. I'm not a pioneer the true pioneers It's everybody that was doing it before this recorded hip-hop bullshit But when they got in the show business the first rappers had no rappers to look up to So their idols was rolling stones Rick James and parliament funcadelic So because they're thinking they're different now wearing show business We used to wrap in the streets now I'm wrapping for a record company We got to change our parents who we are so they were dressed like parliament funcadelic in the rolling stones My idols was grandma's to flash number 40 made records My idols was the graffiti artist my idols was the breakdances who wore a deed of suits Puma's and a deed is so when I got a chance when run DMC got a chance to be in show business We just dressed like the people we idolized growing up Which was the breakdances DJ's MC's and graffiti writers? So when we did that on a video our album cover the whole world thought it was something that we created that we own No, we was just dressing like all of the young people in it and it didn't make me it made me more visible Without my glasses in my run DMC hat motherfuckers don't know who I am But I put that shit on his over But when it came to me getting on stage it was like it was perfect Bruce Wayne puts on his bat suit Steve Rogers puts on his captain Tony stalks puts on his eye man suit So when it was time for me to to become the most powerful entity in the hip-hop universe I put my glasses on my hat my deed is suit on my lover suit in my deed is so that's my crime fighting for me You know it was my crime for it wasn't my rhyme writing outfit It was my crime fighting out for crashed through walls come to my my whole thing with what I do in hip-hop is beat down Creativity and all the bad guys so in 1984 we did we did the run DMC self-titled album when a picture of me on it So now everybody in St. John's who didn't know who the fuck I was and didn't know it's me now So it made it worse, but I didn't care because my own the only time I felt good was when I was on the stage Doing the things I felt good creating I didn't ask for all this other bullshit Celebrity and this and being special and giving free shit that shit upset me, but I didn't say nothing about it I just drunk it away His drink old English 800 malt liquor and lots of it and as the fame grew did you drink more and more? Yes, of course and not only that the bad thing about it had more money to get more shit I said if so much coke I smoked so much dust, but I drinking was meant to think that made me Pandle shit, so I thought Now hold on though because in its tricky you say they offer coke and lots of dope, but we just leave it alone. We was lying And that just that came from a sensor responsibility on tricky You know even the rappers before me grandma's the cast said in an interview one day I can't believe how we used to fucking celebrate fucking drugs everybody say blow Blow say cocaine Okay, like we used to celebrate that shit, but then when we saw that our music was appealing to motherfuckers We said we can't promote that shit. You know, I'm saying we can do it Because I said damn if I say adidas and we fucking got the whole world one when the deed is if I told I had a rhyme about Old English I was so fucking alcoholic. I had rhymes about it, but I knew not to put that shit on record I had a whole rhyme about um the B.C. Boys had a song called brass monkey Which was something they took from me and flipped into brass monkey got this rhyme that's more than real when you drink at brass Monkey is how you feel that became in the early years. We was helping them write stuff So I had a whole rhyme about old English 800 more liquor the worst that you could drink like it was some good shit I got this rhyme that's more than real when you drink old English This is how you feel you're reaching a freezer for 40 hours or 32 hours, which ever counts You feel each bottle for the one that's cold you got to get a cold when you're drinking old gold But you might take the one that's hot you got to get it hot. That's only got a dollar 55 that is the price That's not too much if you want to get nice you pay your money walk out the door then you say to yourself I remember that store you look around for a place to stand with a quarter old English inside your hand You cracked the court you put it to your lip you tilt it slightly and you take a sip now By now you should know the deal because that one sip you already feel I had whole fucking alcoholic rhymes I got my son is wearing my old English ring. I fucking put old English all on my tire covers Like motherfuckers that wear Gucci and Louis Vuitton. I was wearing old English. I was worshipping worshipping that shit That shit was my god. Did you think you were making it work that it was that you were just doing the right thing to feel as good as you could as and the band was going great Did you think you had a doubt? I thought it was normal behavior because Everybody drunk old English motherfuckers just wasn't drinking a case of 40 ounces See that's I didn't see. I didn't know there's a fucking mental problem with that shit motherfuckers drunk some motherfuckers drunk a 40 a day half of it some motherfuckers drink Mike drink three a day You know, I'm saying it was known as the motherfuckers that drink old English I had to be the king of the old English drinkers Because I have a very addictive personality a pleasing personality. I don't want to be the guy There's gonna cause any trouble. I want people to like me. I want to be accepted There are 12 40 ounce bottles in a case of old English So D was drinking 480 ounces a day. That's like 40 12 ounce cans of beer a day and Yeah, that will catch up with you. Not sustainable In 91 because I was drinking a case of old English a day 40 ounces at that a day then going out at night drinking rum and coke Screwdrivers and fuzzy nables. I got a cute pancreatitis And 91 I went to the doctor to the doctor said admit this motherfucker You can only have any nourishment Intrubaniously for a month and a half you ain't taking nothing down your fucking throat because we got a save your fucking pancreas So I was a diagnosed with acute pancreatitis 93 I get out I get a minute from the hospital the doctor looks at me and says son You have two choices in life as of this day. You could drink and die or Not drinking live. So cold turkey because every time I saw a rum and coke or a screwdriver 40 if I drink that shit I'd die D stops drinking at least for a while because addiction can be messy Rundy MC had started in 1983 and by 1993 they had been on a real roller coaster Their 1984 debut album had gone gold a year later the king of rock album went platinum raising hell in 1985 Triple platinum critics love them. They're playing stadiums live aid Madison Square Garden then sales start to slip So what happened with your mental health when the band started to become less popular when when it was a little more Nothing I was fine. I was going home right in rhymes. I would just sitting around saying why are you making no records? And that's because we was that's because Russell was fighting the record company over all teased and all that other bullshit I was fine. I care none. I was hanging around with Chuck D I was hang I was hanging around with big daddy Kane and cool G rap everybody that was successful You know, I'm saying I didn't have to be the popular one. I just wanted to get on stage and rhyme You don't have to give me money. So did none of that bother me and That down period was good for me because then when we came back in 93 You know after 88 we was just run DMC. Okay 89 we survived a little bit, but then you know 90 91 from 80 from 90 to like 93 we were the kings though Let me make this straight. Let me get this clear. Ain't nobody was fucking with us Look, we ain't on MTV Wayne selling records, but no, but not even Pock and Biggie wanted to go on stage after us because we would bust They asked so that was understood, but as the business thing didn't hot we wasn't generating a crack No more, we wasn't getting the money. I was fine with that because I didn't do it for that I was just happy to get on stage and say my new rhyme, you know what I'm saying whatever But then in 1993 was a big comeback in 1993 Pete rock one of the greatest producers in hip-hop Produced a song for us called down with the king So this was 93 hip-hop at change pop biggie I'm fucking Cypress Hill q-tip naughty like hip-hop was generating Killin, you know, I'm saying money shows arenas everything but prior to that we was respected But we wasn't participating anymore. So Pete rock producers record called down with the king for us That did for run DMC what arrow smith what what walked this way did for arrow smith in 86 Pete rock and CL smooth did for run DMC in 93 with the down with the king record So that record put us back on the road put us back on a chart. We was opening for naughty by nature Marilyn Manson limpiscate like we were back But we were opening that but we was so good at what we was doing everybody kicked us off their tours and said go do your own tour because we can't fuck with you Down with the king hit number seven on billboard number one on the R&B and hip-hop chart it went gold money was coming in fame and Respect right when that started happen is when when when down with the king video dropped in 93 in an album drop I woke up the next day saying I don't want to live no more. I Want to kill myself Here where he goes from there in a moment The hilarious world of depression is supported by health partners and by make it okay dot org Make it okay as a campaign to start conversations and stop the stigma surrounding mental illnesses not just depression all kinds of mental illnesses We enjoy having a lot of laughs on this program It's a way of dealing with depression maybe demystifying it a little bit make it not so scary But let's not kid ourselves it's serious the good news is that people can and do get better they get help And that's why we need to make it okay to talk openly that could be an awkward conversation But make it okay dot org is full of information you can use like what to say and what not to say Stories from people who tell you what it's like to live with depression anxiety and other mental illnesses Go to make it okay dot org where you can take the pledge to make it okay Thank you so much to health partners and to make it okay for joining us in fighting stigma so we can all get better Back with Darryl McDaniel's bookish nerdy kid from Queens becomes rap superstar Drinks like crazy uses drugs the group's fame peaks drops off then comes storming back and Right when that started happen is when when when down with the king video dropped in 93 in the album drop I woke up the next day saying I don't want to live no more I want to kill myself and I had no idea why Just caught up with you do you think I? Guess so because in 91 I had to stop drinking see now from 91 to 93 I was dealing with my real feelings Now down with the king comes back out we back on the road we back on the charts and now here's the killer thing We get in 90s pay days You know, I'm saying in the 80s we was getting the 80s pay days now these motherfuckers getting 150 to 200,000 a show so we getting that cuz we got a hit record and people know how bad we are So when all of that material monetary success comes again something inside me because I'm not drinking anymore Just said we can't do something's going on which and I know what it was so now I want to kill myself You have this feeling and then do you keep touring? Yeah, yeah, but I had to keep touring because here comes those feelings again I know I couldn't drink but I got to keep touring because if I don't keep touring running, they're going to be mad at me There's that yeah, it's true. All those times Um, I needed help. I didn't know that I can help myself. I always looked for it somewhere else You don't understand how bad I felt when you feeling like that there's only three things that you could do You could hurt others You know, I'm saying so you know you got all these kids and these people yeah, it's very violent motherfucker No, he's acting out because there's something y'all ain't fucking allow him to express It's something that's bothering him and it's dealing with it that y'all ain't used you got to push the therapy book to the side You got to push the goddamn Bible to the side and you got to sit down and say what's wrong with you tell me I won't judge you But when you're feeling a certain way and nobody seems to understand you and they all think you're weird and you're bugged out and still You can't tell a person. Don't be depressed. That's like me telling you don't be hungry when you're hungry It's the way I fucking feel so there's nothing wrong with a person saying I feel like killing myself because that's how they I felt like killing myself You're feeling a certain way so you act out and you want to hurt others because they don't understand how you feel if you don't want to hurt Others you hurt yourself your bruise drugs. I know a lot of young girls and a lot of young dudes I speak to they cut themselves so you heard others No, I don't want to hurt nobody you hurt yourself if you don't want to hurt yourself Your only other alternative is to get out of here. So that's where I was at I didn't want to hurt myself. I didn't want to hurt anybody else So let me just kill myself and get this fucking feeling over it because at the time Even though I'm the mighty DMC the king of rock the most powerful entity Not just in hip hop and fucking music. I didn't know at the time. It's okay to go get help Just people out of help you. Don't be ashamed to talk about how you feel I didn't know none of that so I was just fucking leave this fucking earth That's where I was at and were you trying to find a way in a time to do that that wouldn't make people mad at you Yeah, yeah, I thought about shoot myself. We was in Austria or fucking Venice I talked about this in my book. We was in we's in Austria or Yugoslavia somewhere I was gonna go jump off to roof at the hotel roof When we's in Japan one time I went to the fucking hard work still by myself But I didn't go with a translator so the man behind accounting and know what the fuck up. I need rat poisoning I want to kill her so I tried but then This is what happened it I'm walking through with all these fucking feelings. I want to kill myself I don't understand why I'm feeling like this is so uncomfortable with the fuck did I do I can't drink because if I drink I want to kill myself, but then I could use that later because what happened after that first of all I found out Well, I'm depressed, but I don't know it, but something's wrong and people know something wrong But I'm still going on and stuff like that so then When I say I'm really gonna kill myself. This what happens. That's okay if I kill myself People gonna know the run DMC story They're gonna know what me running Jay did first to go gold first to go platinum first on a cover Rolling stone everything that hip hop is doing It's because of me running Jay and what we did to represent this beautiful culture But they don't know about Darryl the little boy who's no different from any of the little boy girl on the face of the earth At this point Darryl doesn't know how much longer he will be alive and he decides to try one more creative project So I said okay, just in case I die tomorrow, let me write a book And then the book I wanted to put yo, this is Darryl McDaniels I was born May 31st 1964 and I realized that's all I know about my birthday So call my mom's up, and I'm like your mom. I'm writing this book. I just want to know a couple of Details to make it more interesting for the reader. How much did I weigh what time I was born on my hospital? She told me hung up the phone. Our hour goes by. She calls back with my father They call back and say we have something else to tell you. I go, what is it? They go You was a month old when we brought you home and you're adopted, but we love you by any hang up So I'm a depressed work that just found out that he was adopted at age 35 what makes me realize oh my god I'm not even bifurnt in band of son everything that I was living with alive So I didn't know what to do with that information. I didn't know you could get help get therapy Go sit down when people is okay to talk about your feelings I'm not supposed to be drinking, but I didn't pick up forties I pick up fifths of Jack Daniels and Jim Beam When I got told I was adopted I started drinking again. I told my wife to fucking validate I'm not addressing my true feelings. I'm drinking this way to celebrate the new found Part of my missing identity my wife. She looked at me and said mother fucker You you're drinking because you can't emotionally handle the fact that your parents just told you you was adopted So when I found out that I was adopted I started drinking again in 2000 for four years straight Jack Daniels and Jim beam were my best friends Did you think you were celebrating? Yeah, well, I tried to rationalize that, but did you believe it? That was a lie. No, no I didn't I was drinking to not deal with what my true feeling was But for my delight of myself. That's why you know, I had to tell my wife something at any point Did you consider hey? This is trauma. This is depression. This is a mental disorder. No, I didn't know what that shit was yet You didn't know I just knew I'm drinking again, and then his was bad about to drink it I felt good when I was drunk, but when I shit war off I felt worse than I felt the day before and it just kept you It works, it works, it works, it works, it works, it works, it works, it works, it works, it works. and worse and worse. Darryl was still doing the shows with Run DMC. Didn't want to make anyone mad. He'd been told if he drank, he would die. He found out he was adopted, which messed him up further. Drinking again, death seems imminent. One of the things that made me some definitely going to kill myself because at the time I was living in Jersey, and it's easier to fly out of Newark. So the travel agent flies me into JFK. So I'm already feeling like a piece of shit. And that one little thing just angered me so much. And it's fucking, fucking Jada. This is proof I don't need to be here. So I get in the car. And the driver, you know, he comes, he's polite to him, Mr. DMC. I'm taking you to Wayne New Jersey. That's cool. So I get in the car and as we driving out of JFK, I noticed the guy keep looking at me in his rearview mirror. And every time I would look up at him, he'd turn his head. So we played that game for about three lights. And on the final light, I said, I said, I'm going to say something. I was like, yo, man, what's up with you? And he just turns around to me and he says, Mr. DMC, please don't tell my boss, I'm not supposed to do this. But then he says this, your music got me through some of the worst times in my life. I had a fucked up childhood. But I was okay when I would go in my room and listen to your raising hell album. That shit got me through some of the roughest days. I just said, can I please get an autograph? And I'm like, oh, you know, I get asked that all the time. I'm like, oh, sure. I say, not only that, you could get a picture. So he's open now. So because I'm a rapper, he says, yo, can I turn a radio on? And I'm like, yeah, you can turn it on. He turns it to hot 97. Now, at that time in my life, I'm trying to kill my fucking self. The last thing I want to hear is fucking hip hop. I'm losing my voice. I'm fucking depressed. But I don't know it. That's the last thing I want to hear. Because I'm not going to be here to do that shit. Turn it to any other station cut than that one. He turns it to light FM here in New York City. And on the radio was that piano sound. And that voice going, spend all your time waiting for that second chance. For a break that would make it okay. There's always some reason to feel not good enough. And it's hard after the end of the day. The song was angel by Canadian singer-songwriter Sarah McLaughlin. Oh, beautiful release. When I heard Sarah's voice in that fucking piano, some of me say, yo, DMC, it may be fucked up to be alive. But the long is something this beautiful exists is okay to be living for right now. So all I did for one year was listen to Sarah McLaughlin's song, right? Over and over and over and over and over and over. For one whole year, what did it do to you? Like what was so powerful about it that you needed about it? It made me feel better than rapping. It made me feel better than fucking drinking. I can't describe it. It just made me feel better and it made me happy. It made me feel good. Was it the content of the lyrics, like what she was saying? Or was it a voice? Yeah, but just certain shape when she says in the dark old hotel room, 'cause at that time I alienated. One of the worst things that I did when I first went into my depression, even though I didn't know I was depression, was I thought I'm the only one in the world that feels like this. And running J can't understand nobody around me can understand what a revelation of finding out that you're adopted at 35 is like. 'Cause all they could say is suck it up motherfucker, bifurren and banner. All your parents, you had a good fucking life. Yes, I know that. But don't you know how that revelation. So when we would travel during all of this time, when my group would go to the hill end, I'd go to the Marriott. If they would go to the Marriott, I would go to the hill end. So the worst thing that I did, I didn't notice until I went to therapy and rehab, the worst thing that I did was isolate myself. But I didn't know any better. The worst thing I now, I'm in a hotel all by myself, about to do a fucking show. I don't wanna fucking do, but these fucking feelings that I don't understand is going on. And these motherfuckers don't know how I feel, because motherfuckers, they just told me I was adopted at 35. He listened to Angel over and over, wherever he went, every day, that one song. And after a full year of that, he went to a party at Music Executive Clive Davis's house in LA. Everybody's showing me love, buster rhymes, Alicia Keys, Stevie Wonder, everybody. Who walks in? The lady that made this record that I've been listening to for the last, oh yeah, Sarah McLaughlin. So I get my wits together, walk over to, and as I'm coming over to, she's like, "Yo, Wendy MC, I love you guys." She starts going, "It's tricky to rock a run, walk this way." And she has to be boy stands. I love some Wendy MC. So in my mind, I'm like, "Yo CD, even Sarah McLaughlin likes your record." That's a good reason not to kill yourself. And I just look at her and say, "Miss McLaughlin, I just wanna tell y'all been listening to this song for the last year." The name of the song is Angel. You sound like an Angel. People say you're an Angel. But you're not an Angel to me, your God. This is the only thing that keeps me going every day. This record kept me alive. I think about killing myself and all of that. And I went through the whole thing and she looked at me and she was like, "Thank you for telling me that, Darryl. That's what music is supposed to do. Shakes my hand and walk away." A while after that, he calls Sarah, asks her to sing on a new track he's putting together. She says, "Sure. Invites him to come to her home recording studio in Vancouver. On the way from the airport to the house." I turn to my manager and say, "You're Eric. If I die tomorrow, your men stop talking like that. I don't wanna hear that." I said, "No, no, no, listen to me, man. If I die tomorrow, you'll stop talking." I don't hear you. We playing that game. He's grabbing his ears. And I snatch his hand. Now, motherfucker, listen to me. If motherfuckers ask me, what was the greatest thing that ever happened to DMC during this career? It's that I went to make a record with Sarah McLaughlin. You got that motherfucker. Yeah, I got it. I just love imagining DMC calling his manager a motherfucker as they drive through Vancouver on the way to Sarah McLaughlin's house. D and Sarah record just like me. It's a reworking of cats in the cradle retold about adoption. Afterwards, Sarah tells D that she, too, was adoptive. ♪ I got to pay away to a broad day ♪ ♪ 'Cause it's really pen and simple when it came to me ♪ ♪ There's a lot of people just like me ♪ ♪ Yeah ♪ ♪ There's a hole I just like me ♪ ♪ Yeah ♪ ♪ I'm a cats in the cradle and suits me ♪ ♪ Ooh ♪ ♪ In the morning ♪ ♪ In the night ♪ ♪ Ooh ♪ ♪ Will you call it my life? ♪ In 2002, Jam Master J, Jason Maisel, was shot to death in a Queen's Recording Studio. A murder that remains unsolved. A couple years later, Darryl McDangles finally got help. The rehab place I went. It was a place called Sierra Tucson in Arizona. It wasn't one of those places where they just sobered you up and throw you back out. I remember sitting in a rec room and it was talking about when Britney Spears went the rehab. But then she went shopping. We was all in there. We couldn't leave. We was like, "How the hell she do that?" I want to be in that place. What the fuck? Like, yo. But it was in there when I learned about depression, suppressed emotions, anxiety, low self-esteem, and all of that stuff. So it was rehab. When I went to get help, it's when I found out something that I do that. Like I said, when I went in the intake room, when they bring you in, actually, when the last time you drank this and that, they give you the physical this and that. And then they take you to the next room and they sit down and the person comes in. It was like a school class. And up on the board was the 10 characteristics of an addictive personality. And I was like, "Oh shit, I'm all of those." And the lady was like, "Well, that's the first role to success to admit." You know what I'm saying? And I just started admitting. And I do that. Oh, I do that all the time. Oh, yeah, that's why I drank too. Yeah. So it was when I went to rehab in therapy when I realized, "Oh, shoot. I was depressed all this time." And with a lot of life experience behind him, professional help with him, and a real drive to figure things out, Darryl started to unlock his own mind. Well, when I went to therapy, my therapist said there were certain things that she would doing, the drinking, the quietness, you know, not speaking up. You know, I probably had anxiety and low self-esteem and all of that stuff. But oh, English kept me from feeling like that. His therapist explained that the drinking was connected to emotions he was suppressing. He was making himself numb, trying to feel nothing. He was denying that he had opinions, devaluing who he was as a person. One of the first questions my therapist asked me in therapy was like Darryl. During your career at Run DMC, did run DJ Russell or anybody at the record company ever do anything to make you mad? And I said to you, I was like nah. My therapist looked at me and said, "Motherfucker, he used those words. You a goddamn motherfucking lie." And he looked me in the eye and right in the near. Man, in 1985, and everything came pouring out. So yeah, I had the depression or the sleep. seed was planted way back when, but I would never learn that because I was suppressing those emotions in true feelings with alcohol. You were using a depressant to address your depression. Yeah, which is the worst thing that you could ever do. Daryl McDaniels has come to believe that his mental problems can be traced to his adoption. There's a book called The Primal Wound that argues adoption is traumatic for the baby because a bond between mother and child has been broken, and that can lead to depression, anxiety, and other problems later on. Primal Wound theory has its critics who say it's speculative and lacks scientific evidence, and of course our show neither endorses nor rejects it. For Daryl, it explained a lot. I'm with my birth mother for nine months, with you two fucking young to decipher what the fuck is going on, but mentally, spiritually, physically, and emotionally, something happens when those babies are given away. So when I got in the rehab, they put the ten characteristics of an addictive personality on a wall. I was all of them shits. So that comes from the need to people, please, I don't want to be given away. Deep down subconsciously, you know what I'm saying? So instead of, you know, if I speak up in this fucking meeting, Jay and Ron might not like me. I don't want to be given away again. So let me just drink and not say, I don't want to cause no trouble. There's so many fucking mental things that made me have to do what I did. And when I got in the rehab and therapy, I learned about dopamine, I learned about the way your brain functions, I learned about anxiety and what, what, what, you know, I'm no different from the sex addict or the gambling addict and you know, all of those rushes and stuff like that. Me, I wanted to keep that shit going to master uncomfortable, true feeling instead of cursing everybody out and shooting motherfuckers. Daryl told that story about that Sarah McLaughlin song as part of the Moth storytelling series back in 2011 and back then his voice sounded different. He had been diagnosed with spasmodic dysphonia, a condition that causes involuntary movements in the vocal cords. I was laying there in a sum of everything that was mean I was unhappy to the point where I was so depressed and out of that, I became very suicidal. I told Daryl that he sounds different now, his voice sounds under control. But all of those doctors looked at me and said, yo, there's nothing physically fucking wrong which I don't, we don't know what to tell you. But the worst that we could say spasmodic dysphonia is involuntary reflexes of the vocal cords, so there's abduction and adduction. They said I had both, when nothing could come out and it felt like I was choking, but that's because I wasn't letting my real truth out. So what happens mentally and emotionally will manifest itself physically, I went through that. But now I'm talking my truth and not ashamed of it. If anything that anybody's going to, whoever's going to listen to this may be in DMC, whether you believe in or not, the greatest rapper MC in the world universe and in history. If you remove guilt and shame, you remove the pain. Thank you so much for your time, sir. Thank you, man. Thank you for even being courageous enough to do something like this so that other people can feel that they are not alone and it's okay to be people like us. You and me together, my friend, we're doing it. Thank you. DMC publishes comics under the imprint of Darryl Makes Comics, DMC, get it? He's the author of a 2016 memoir, also 10 Ways Not to Commit Suicide. My memoir is coming out in May, it's called The Hilarious World of Depression. It doesn't have anything about my rap career because I've never had one. It does tell about my past and what led to my mission to pry open the conversation about mental health. Also stories about a suicide survivor group that met in a funeral home, which was grim and darkly funny. You can pre-order that at hilariousworld.org. The Hilarious World of Depression is a production of American public media. Our producer is Chrissy Peas, our digital producer is Christina Lopez. Phyllis Fletcher is our editor, she had a huge career in hip-hop under the name Queen Latifa. Our intern is Ariana Wilson, recording engineer in New York, Danny D.J. K. Kaiser, the recording engineer in St. Paul and technical director for this episode John Miller. Big thank you to Jackson Muscare for booking help this season. Our theme song was written and performed by Rhett Miller. If you need help, confidential help is available at the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-8255. It's free 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 1-800-273-8255. The Hilarious World of Depression is supported by health partners and make it okay.org. Make it okay as a campaign to start conversations and stop the stigma around mental illnesses. Make it okay.org has information that can help you and your loved ones. Recording the conversation can be awkward, but make it okay has tips on what to say or not to say, as stories of hope from people who have been there. You can take the pledge to make it okay at makeitok.org. Hilariousworld.org is our web home. We're also on Twitter and come visit us on Facebook too. A lot of great conversation happening over there with your fellow thwad balls. I'm John Moe. Bye now. [Music] [Music]