The crossover of soccer fans and music fans might be asking one question. Is that Rick Rubin in those ads?
Your eyes aren’t tricking you. The man sitting in a meditative pose with the wild, white mane while shilling for Polymarket, the prediction betting platform, in those commercials played during FIFA World Cup matches is the eight-time Grammy winner and genius musical producer behind foundational hip-hop, metal, rock, and chart topping pop.
Rubin also narrates the commercial, beginning the narration by saying, “If you could ask one question, what would you ask?” while the intro from Kanye West’s song “Runaway” from his 2010 album My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy plays, proving that despite Ye’s history of antisemitism, adoration for genocidal Adolf Hitler and other events and organizations cutting ties with him West isn’t too risky for Polymarket. West published a letter in the Wall Street Journal in January apologizing for his antisemitism and discussing his experience with bipolar disorder.
Rubin almost undoubtedly received a hefty financial incentive to be part of an ad that tries to philosophize gambling while giving it an illusion of an artful act. Despite using his image and talking skills for purely commercial purposes in the ad, Rubin is still working on some great art. He has produced more than a dozen album in the 2020s by artists like Imagine Dragons, Lil Uzi Vert, Neil Young, and Tyler Childers. Rubin most recently worked with The Strokes on their forthcoming album Reality Awaits. The producer has also directed an eight-part documentary series on JAY-Z set for release this fall on HBO.
