Jimmy Iovine

In the early 1970s, Iovine became a recording Engineer, working with John Lennon and Bruce Springsteen, among others. By 1973, Iovine was on staff at the New York studio the Record Plant, where he worked on Springsteen's Born to Run and Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell albums. He came to prominence via his work on the 1978 Patti Smith album Easter, which included her Top 40 hit "Because the Night". He teamed with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers on Damn the Torpedoes and U2 on Rattle and Hum. Iovine also produced Bella Donna (the first solo album for Stevie Nicks), Making Movies for Dire Straits, and Get Close for The Pretenders.

Iovine served as sound Engineer for the Voyager Golden Records, a pair of phonograph records which were launched aboard the Voyager space probes in 1977.

Iovine was also responsible for supervising the music used in the 1984 romance film Sixteen Candles and the 1988 comedy film Scrooged.

James Iovine was born in Brooklyn, New York to an Italian working-class family. His mother was a secretary and his father, Vincent "Jimmy" Iovine, worked in the docks as a longshoreman. His father's passing and his love for Christmas inspired Jimmy to record A Very Special Christmas in 1985. Iovine attended Catholic school in Brooklyn and went on to attend New York's John Jay College of Criminal Justice. At 19, he was a college dropout. He was introduced to music production after he met a Songwriter who got him a job cleaning a recording studio. He began working as a studio professional around 1972. Since the start of his career, Iovine has been involved in the production of more than 250 albums.

Iovine was also responsible for providing distribution, initial funding and financial oversight for the highly successful Death Row Records hip-hop label in the 1990s. Death Row operated as a subsidiary of his company Interscope, and was largely responsible for Interscope's initial platinum selling chart successes throughout the 1990s, which later launched the company into greater success in the 2000s with platinum artists like Eminem and Lady Gaga.

Iovine signed Tupac Shakur to a recording contract as one of the first hip-hop acts on the Interscope label in 1991.

In 2002, Iovine co-produced the Academy Award-winning Eminem movie, 8 Mile, which opened at #1 at the box office and went on to gross more than $240 million worldwide. Additionally, Iovine executive produced the 2009 LeBron James documentary More than a Game and 50 Cent's Get Rich or Die Tryin'.

In 2005, Iovine made a guest appearance as himself on "Don't Make Me Over", an episode of Seth MacFarlane's Family Guy.

In 2008, Iovine teamed up with Dr. Dre to co-found Beats By Dr. Dre, a headphones brand. Due in part to the design of its headphones and an expansion into smartphones and Automotive audio systems, the company has captured 40 percent market share of the headphones industry.

In 2011, Iovine was honored by The Producers & Engineers Wing of the Grammy Awards. "This year we pay tribute to an industry leader, Jimmy Iovine, who has made an indelible impact as a recording Engineer, Producer, founder of Interscope Records, and now, Entrepreneur focused on audio quality," Neil Portnow, President of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, the governing body of the Grammy Awards, said in presenting the award.

On May 17, 2013, Iovine received an honorary Doctor of Music degree from the University of Southern California and gave the 2013 USC commencement address.

On May 28, 2014, Apple Inc. announced the acquisition of Beats Electronics. Iovine was hired to assume an undisclosed position at Apple where he helped in the creation of Apple Music.

In July 2017, HBO ran a four-part documentary about Jimmy Iovine's relationship with Dr. Dre and other Musicians titled The Defiant Ones.