How To Make A Billion, with Rocky Leon
We hear about the movements of billionaires every day. Their opinions, their political leanings, their social media whims. I’m old enough to remember when billionaires were a rarity. It was an unachievable, unimaginable amount of wealth. Technically, it still should be, so why has the number of billionaires drastically risen especially since the pandemic?
No, this is not a piece for The Economist, this is still a musical universe. Rocky Leon has put together a handy track to describe to you the sheer scale of the numbers behind making yourself a ‘Billionaire’ – let me tell you about it.
Image Credit: Leo Neves.
Watch any video of Rocky Leon and you’ll be taken by his infectious enthusiasm for life. The performer based in Vienna is a workhorse spreading joy wherever he goes, having played in over a hundred cities in more than a dozen countries since 2012 – as a one-man band. His 2013 album ‘Quit Your Whining’ follows a viral video of the title track shot on a boat journey, which gave traction to his music career and a strong following particularly in Eastern Europe.
In 2015, Rocky collaborated with his touring assistant Fabu to release ‘In The Flow’. Where Rocky usually performs all the music heard on his releases, this EP features Fabu’s keyboard playing and backing vocals. Collaborations with multiple musicians also enhance his 2019 album ‘Lighting Fires’. In 2025, Leon has begun releasing new music from his forthcoming album ‘Little Troll’. ‘Turning 40’ combats physical change in middle-age while ‘I Feel Like Shit’ practices gratitude in spite of your own feelings.
Rocky Leon’s music is a balance of genres which on paper seem unlikely to blend – ska, hip-hop, reggae and rock. But there is nothing forced about the music of Rocky Leon, his voice bends and shifts to keep you guessing and deliver his message in a fun and carefree way. This is exactly how it goes down with his recent single ‘Billionaire’.
‘If you wanna be a billionaire, you gotta make a million every year, and then do it for a thousand years without spending a dime.’
You best believe this was the algorithm doing its work when it hit me with this opening line. In September, Rocky put out a reel on Instagram of him lip-syncing ‘Billionaire’ while skating and I was hooked by his voice, the way his skating physically embodied the song’s sunny pacing and how it was all tied together by his message.
The opening lyric also serves as the song’s chorus. Rocky’s skilful move to make this the song’s hook is a handy way to drive the point home of just how insanely massive this amount of wealth is. With each successive chorus, Leon puts the second half to you in different ways, each just as mind-blowing as the last. For example, the first chorus ends with:
‘And if you make a million every year for a hundred thousand years, you’ll still have less than the top five at this time.’
But what if you’re born a billionaire? Spending it all in eighty years would be, ‘thirty-four grand a day, twelve million a year.’ And if you were to check the comment section of his videos on this track, there’ll be some naysayers or those arguing in favour of the richest 1%. Rocky even thought to write a verse for those people, ‘But compounding interest and bla bla bla, sound investments and bla bla bla, risk assessment and bla bla bla, bla - bla - fuck your bla bla!’ His overriding message with this song is, ‘You don’t make a billion with work.’ Because to work for this kind of money as the working class would is quite literally impossible.
But wait! This song isn’t all about the working class. A couple of verses take it from the perspective of the billionaires themselves, one on their impact to the environment, ‘Fuck environmental protection laws, my toxic spills will still kill the animals.’ The second is more reflective on capitalism as a whole, ‘Why innovate or optimize when I can bribe a senator and get subsidized? You’re gonna buy and replace every year cos I got the market monopolized.’ I can think of one certain top-earning billionaire who has begun meddling with UK politics despite holding no citizenship here, so nobody can really argue billionaires aren’t equally represented in this song.
‘And in 2025 the richest dudes alive can spend seven million every day for 80 years.’
A sobering thought indeed. Of all the arguments, the panellists on talk shows, all the discussions raging around this subject, and I’ve never had it put to me more clearly than by Rocky Leon and his ukulele. And yet, he’s not beating you over the head with it. It’s not downbeat and doesn’t play into doomscrolling. Rocky Leon says it all with a smile and a shrug as if to say, ‘Grab your skateboard, let’s go be happy someplace else.’ Let’s have some more of that.
Continue reading for our Q&A with Rocky Leon. We talk about the trigger-point for writing ‘Billionaire’, the naysayers, and the theoretical ethical billionaire. Rocky also talks about his viral performance of ‘Quit Your Whining’, practicing gratitude and his forthcoming single ‘I’m Not Well (If You Are Not Alright).’ All this and more below!
1. The algorithm gods provided the day I saw your video for 'Billionaire' on Instagram! The inspiration for this is obvious, we can hardly escape reading about billionaires every day, but was there a specific trigger for writing this track? What tipped you over the edge?
I had the idea for the chorus quite a number of years ago. It had just been floating around in the back of my mind. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment, but over the years I’ve had numerous conversations where it became clear that the person I was talking to just wasn’t grasping the magnitude of the difference between a million and a billion. One million is a fortune. 50 million is an unimaginable fortune. but 50 million is still 950 million away from a billion. I felt there needs to be a song that is so simple and catchy that the scale can somehow be pounded into people’s brains. Like the ABCs.
2. Tell us about the production of this track, are you playing everything we're hearing?
I play all the instruments myself, yeah. I didn’t record the drum sounds directly, but used sampled sounds that I play with an electronic drum pad. But everything else I recorded in my studio in Vienna. The song is part of an album titled Little Troll that I am releasing one song at a time as I finish them. Three are out so far and 10 or 11 are in the pipeline.
3. There have been a lot of comments around this song that can be summed up by people saying 'Yeah, but-', arguing for the existence of billionaires. What do you say to those people?
I am a bit overwhelmed by the amount of attention the song is getting on social media. Fortunately for the most part my message is resonating with the majority of people, so I’m not finding myself too tempted to get sucked into any discussions with the capitalists’ foot soldiers. Haha. At the end of the day, I’m a musician, not a politician or an economist. I think it’s absurd for any individual to be allowed to hoard that much money.
Recently I thought of another fun analogy. Let’s assume there are 3 pillars that humans can stand on for making money. Physical strength, IQ, and time. Let’s say that a prime human specimen can lift 100kg, has an IQ of 140 and works 40 hours a week and that leads them to become a millionaire with work. If we were to use that reasoning to get to a billion with work, that person would need to be able to lift 1000kg, have an IQ of 1400 and work 400 hours a week. Obviously it is an oversimplification, but it helps to make it clear that you can't make a billion with work.
4. Can you have an ethical billionaire? Is that notion at all possible?
An ethical billionaire is a hypothetical. It might be possible in theory. But in a world where people are starving to death I don’t see a scenario where it is justifiable to keep so much more than you need. Also consider it’s not just about taking more than you need. It’s also about taking more than makes you happy. There have been numerous studies that show that money can in fact buy happiness. But only up to a certain point. As income increases, happiness increases. But at an income of about 250k per year happiness plateaus. There is then no more correlation between income increase and quality of life increase. 250k per year over an 80 year life span is 20 million. That’s the maximum happiness increase money can get you. That is 980 million less than a billion. An ethical billionaire would instantly stop existing because they would donate all that extra money to stop being a billionaire.
5. The version of 'Billionaire' I saw featured you skateboarding for almost the whole song, have you always been a skater? Where did you learn to skate?
When I was 8 years old I started skateboarding, playing guitar, growing my hair and changed my name to Rocky. 1993 was a pivotal year for me. :D
6. Your music has taken you to some awesome places, particularly in Europe. What's been your favourite place to visit and why?
I actually live in central Europe. In Vienna, Austria to be precise. But yeah, I got very lucky with a viral video on YouTube back in 2011. After finishing my bachelor’s degree in Salzburg I felt I owed it to myself to find out whether making a living off of music was really as unrealistic as everyone said it was, before allowing myself to settle into a boring life with a normal job.
I wanted to travel and I wanted to play music for people but I had no budget. I realized however, that traveling doesn’t have to cost much and humans can survive on surprisingly little. I busked in the old town of Salzburg till I had 2000€ saved up. With that I bought a plane ticket to Vancouver Canada with a return flight from San Francisco about a year later. That left me with a budget of around 1000$ for that trip. Little more than a safety net for emergencies.
I was forcing myself to make all the money I needed for food by busking along the way. I could travel for free by hitchhiking and sleep for free at couch surfing hosts. Couch surfing was still a thing in 2010. The viral video I mentioned was shot during this adventure and it was only by sheer coincidence that I even got my hands on it and thought of uploading it to YouTube. It was a clip of me playing the ukulele and singing my song Quit Your Whining, filmed by a young woman I met on the ferry from Vancouver Island over to Washington state.
The video blew up particularly in eastern Europe. I was getting comments and messages every day from people asking me to come to Russia. At some point I posted on Facebook which was the main social media platform at the time, that I would love to come to Russia, but that I am a poor street musician and can’t afford to. But I had looked up the cost of a visa and a flight and told my followers that I would need about 500€ to be able to come. I suggested if anyone wants to organize a show and they can get 100 people to come and pay 5€ each, then I would be delighted to come.
Several people then got in touch and within 2 weeks I went from playing on the streets of San Francisco being treated like a gutter punk by the silicon valley tech bros who had gentrified the city to playing for 800 people in a sold out club in Moscow. From 2012 up until the pandemic hit I was going on tour several times a year all over eastern Europe. I can’t say I have one specific favorite place, but the eastern Europeans in my experience are the people the most motivated to have fun, to jump and to sing along. In western Europe it often feels like people just kinda watch you with their arms folded and if they really really like it they might bob their heads ever so slightly. In eastern Europe people are jumping from the first song.
7. By the time I finished listening to your latest track, 'I Feel Like Shit', I had the biggest smile on my face. Is it easy to get bogged down in the little things or can you brush it all off?
Aw I’m so happy to hear that! :) So in general I have always been fairly good at focussing on the positive. I was fortunate to have read Eckart Tolle’s The Power of Now when I was 17 and internalized a lot of the wisdom in not taking my brain’s occasional negativity spirals too seriously. When you don’t feed your demons they disappear pretty quickly.
But when I wrote I feel like shit I had I guess become a little complacent. I had been so good at living in the moment and not worrying about things for so long that I never had to make an effort or think about it consciously. But that meant that when the external circumstances in my life went through a period of being less than optimal I had fallen out of practice of actively directing my mind. Like I say in the song, “Just like a muscle, it’s a thing you gotta train”.
Practicing gratitude is possibly the most important key to maintaining mental health. I’m not religious, but when I observe overlaps between numerous religions and psychology I do then suspect there must be something there. And in most religions being grateful is absolutely central. Whether we are grateful to a deity or to the universe or to each other makes no difference to the subconscious. When we are actively feeling grateful and appreciating what is we are automatically in a better head space. And without needing any supernatural elements it is easy to observe that the world, the people around us, reacts more positively to us when we’re happy and more negatively to us when we’re mopey.
There is a sweet spot between recognizing our ability to cheer ourselves up while at the same time not guilt tripping ourselves for feeling bad. It’s not always easy, so it’s good to remind ourselves from time to time.
8. What does the rest of your year look like creatively? What can fans expect in 2026?
I’m putting all my focus into making my new album Little Troll. I have 14 songs written. The next song is called I’m Not Well (If You Are Not Alright). I’m just working on a promo text. Here’s what I got :D
“The reason Humans survived and Neanderthals vanished is simple: we cooperate, we share and we take care of each other. Being social isn’t political - it’s the thing that makes us human.
I’m Not Well is a protest song for an age where showing basic human empathy has become an act of defiance. It’s a dark, high-energy anthem that blends a One-Love reggae spirit with ska-punk aggression and hip-hop fire. Rocky Leon channels rage into universal love like only a punk raised by hippies can do.
Now go help that old lady cross the street before you put on this song and burn the system to the ground.”
The remaining songs on the album are about 50% revolution soundtrack and 50% silly nonsense. My approach to music has always been from the perspective of a live performer. And my view of live music is very purposeful. My feeling is that the purpose of music is to help people have a good time. The world is really heavy. The news sucks, work sucks, aging sucks, capitalism sucks … people need a break. I don’t want to preach at people. At the same time there are important messages that I feel a certain responsibility to spread. But I’m not gonna spread an important message with music that isn’t fun to listen to. And I’m not going to reach people whose opinions I want to change if I present overtly politically. My strategy has always been to present as harmless and apolitically as possible and then sneak my revolutionary messages in without the conservatives immediately noticing what they’re singing along to. As I get older however my patience for subtlety seems to be getting thinner and so a number of the songs on this album are going to be a bit more in your face message wise than I allowed myself to be on previous albums. Expect more fuck the police, fuck the patriots and the patriarchy, fuck nazis, fuck capitalism but also a lot of like I said, silly nonsense. :D
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Listen to and download the music of Rocky Leon from his Bandcamp page.
For more information about Rocky Leon, including upcoming tour dates and his merch store, visit his official website.
Follow Rocky Leon on Facebook and Instagram @rockyleonmusic.
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