A Sweet Little Puff Piece

For nearly three decades, no one has lived larger than SEAN COMBS – the world builder, the maximalist style guru, the impeccable spotter of talent. JOHN JEREMIAH SULLIVAN spent some time inside the beautiful bubble created by a hip-hop icon

- John Jeremiah Sullivan

Love was getting a haircut, they said, and could talk to me again. I was ushered upstairs. By then I had been inside the Combs compound in Beverly Hills since morning, and it seemed unremarkable that the house would include a home barbershop. He sat in the chair with his back to me. The barber was moving around his head like a big bee, sometimes with scissors, sometimes with little tiny brushes, sometimes with a looking glass. Love’s hair was already quite short and to my eyes perfectly trimmed, but there is perfect in our world and perfect in Love’s, and if the two meet it will be by chance.

He is called Love now, or Brother Love. Not Diddy or Puffy or Sean or any of those. He will still answer to them, though. He is not a snob about names. But he would prefer now that people call him Love, because that is what matters. ‘Even people like me?’ I asked, meaning God knows what. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘I like re-inventing. That’s probably why I have so many name changes. It’s why I follow David Bowie and Madonna.’

Dictating what others call you is an expression of power, and the control Love exerts over his world helps explain the longevity of his career. Think of how many celebrities start clothing lines. Now think of how many of those are operating five years after they appear, forget about the 20 that Sean John has been around. Love also gets paid every time they play a Bad Boy Entertainment song on the radio or in a commercial. He is making money by the minute. He is worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Get this: he was the highest-paid American musician of 2017, and he did not release any original music last year.