Meanwhile Housse De Racket in the Gobi tent was dealing with Americans’ inability to pronounce French. “If we can manage to pronounce Coooochella, can you manage to pronounce Housse de Racket?” they asked, half in earnest. I hadn’t heard their brand of Strokes-esque garage before: it was two-piece jangle indie with a smirk, dressed up all in white, plus some percolating beats and keyboards from a small Korg. Good stuff, especially their unexpected Beach Boys cover!

I wish I could say the same thing about Greg Ginn’s solo project. I arrived late, and the sparse attendance warned me that something was amiss: this was clearly the same crowd who embraced fIREHOSE the day before, and you know that any guy from Black Flag should be able to draw a crowd, yet there were only 50 people at most in a tent that can hold thousands. People must have fled!

I feel bad, because the Ginn’s heart is in the right place. Rather than doing a revival of the old punk sounds, ala OFF!, he’s trying to express himself in a brand new format. But he chose the wrong genre to do haphazardly. When he started playing guitar riffs over a drum track, and occasionally waving his hand at a theremin, he immediately stepped into the realm of bands like Corridor, or Geoff Geis, or Bobb Bruno’s solo stuff, just to name a handful. Do you know how many one man bands there are in Los Angeles alone, kids three generations descended from his own music, who can beat the pants off Ginn in this department? Ginn failed, spectacularly, and it was ugly. Hopefully some day he comes to his senses and does something worthwhile, like reform Black Flag.

Wild Beasts next door at the Mojave were better, but only by degree—and unlike Greg Ginn, the audience was going apeshit. I don’t see why: at its best, these 80s imitators sounded like Bryan Ferry singing “More than This,” except with all the charm and twinkle sucked out, leaving a residue that stunk of congealed Spandau Ballet, When in Rome, Haircut 100—and before you start to think “Wow, I love those bands, and that sounds awesome,” remember that the best singles by those bands were great because they had such strong personality! Drain the personality, and you’ll have Wild Beasts. Henri Matisse wants to paint their noses red… with blood.

I should have stayed at the main stage, because Santigold was living up to every ounce of hype she’s ever gotten. It’s hard to peg a genre on Santigold aside from “awesome,” but on a fashion level, she was putting her love of the 80s into stark reality: her background singers had DEVO/Klaus Nomi outfits on, and she herself had crazy shoulder pads not seen since Tina Turner’s appearance in Beyond Thunderdome. And she wrapped up the entire thing with rim-shot rhythms that sounded quite a bit like Bow Wow Wow.

The Growlers at the Outdoor stage were dressed only as themselves, which is to say, like hipsters who live at the beach without necessarily ever going into the water. Singer Brooks Neilson was laying down his litany of lyrics like he always does, casually yet vividly, his flow a full frontal evocation of Jim Morrison. It also hearkens back to smartie-pants bands like the Smiths, though less so nowadays (his verbal pauses, like his fame, are expanding with every show). They concluded with the perfect song for the doe-eyed Coachella crowd, “Drugs Drugs Drugs,” in which Neilson told his adoring fans that “If you want to be free, you have to be a junkie.”

Whereas Thundercat didn’t need drugs to make you feel high—his outfit did the job just fine. Honestly, despite all the hype and all the amazing impromptu jams he’s done with some of my favorite Low End Theory denizens, I’m not the biggest fan of his act, just because the punk rock part of my brain can’t allow me to enjoy music with this much noodling. Seriously, even if you’re playing in the fusion/funk/R&B world, do you really need a six string bass? Actually, if you’re Thundercat, you do; and while it fits his style perfectly, it evokes a kind of proggy precision that just doesn’t move me. And I think he’s still working on getting memorable songs together.

Luckily his set segued into Gaslamp Killer’s, which was far more enjoyable despite being far less intricate. Though he did have some cool mixes, including a song that threw in a children’s record about learning the drums, this set was mostly about being a selector. He played “I Am the Walrus” by the Beatles, and had his captive audience dutifully screamed “WHOOOO!” during the chorus. Then he dug deep, and found himself some Eazy-E, and had the balls to play the diss track “Real Muthaphuckkin Gs,” with the sample “Motherfuck Dre, motherfuck Snoop, motherfuck Death Row.” Considering Dre would be playing the main stage in mere hours, it was a pretty punk rock selection, and laugh-out-loud funny.

Speaking of funny, did you know that Carrie Brownstein from Portlandia has a band? I’m kidding, of course, but only half-way: seeing Carrie Brownstein’s recent stints in her amazing comedy television show really did clue me in to a wit I’d found lacking in the work of Sleater-Kinney, her decade-long band that was always critically acclaimed but which I felt was locked into an anachronistic sound that needed to move the fuck on. Though Wild Flag still has a sound rooted in the Olympia-meets-Chapel-Hill-by-way-of-Fugazi guitar/drums method, it’s freed from the Corin Tucker vocals, and that would be refreshing even if Brownstein’s vocals weren’t far more enervating, full of energy and screaming anger and dramatic, emotional crashes. Brownstein was once in Excuse 17, one of the best bands to come out of Riot Grrrl, and I feel she brings some of that energy to Wild Flag. It’s a pity that she had to share the microphone with Mary Timony, whose vocals were only a fraction of as cool as Brownstein’s. Even she knew it.

The Hives, on the main stage, had no reservations at all about their ability to rock. Visually, their gig was all class and energy. They started in top hat and tails, gradually shedding components of their outfits as they played, their backdrop of a crazed man with strings coming from his fingers making them look like marionettes. I’d interviewed some of them earlier in the day, and the difference between their private conversational tone and their public persona was pretty vast—it seems unfathomable that the quiet Swedes I cornered in the back of the press tent could be the same guys ending their set with the explosive “Tick Tick Boom!”

At the Drive-In, by comparison, were actually less frenetic and energetic. That may come as quite a surprise if you’ve heard both bands’ recordings, and it’s not as though At the Drive-In was just going through the motions—they were putting as much energy into things as they ever had, fully regressing from the prog of Mars Volta back into their hard-edged punk rock youngster selves. But maybe the venue was just too big for a band of their stature. The only folks who really got the full brunt of the show were the poor photographers, as singer Cedric Bixler-Zavala dived straight into them, nearly breaking a camera or three and causing quite a few “don’t quote me” conversations in the press tent later.

And it was there in the press tent that I started sensing people all around me saddling up, preparing for the closing headliner of Dr. Dre and Snoop Dog. And suddenly I became aware that a phenomenon was about to transpire, something that would be talked about by millions, and yet which we all knew was going to be a bit silly, the way anything surrounding Snoop Dog has always been and will always be.

We had to wait a bit first for Florence & the Machine to finish—from the VIP section, I could see them at the Outdoor stage, way off in the distance, doing everything in their power to keep their audience from wandering off to the main stage early: fireworks, explosions, shimmering lights, confetti… I would have sauntered over to check it out, but the lines both in and out of the VIP section’s fenced-in internment camp were longer than the list of atrocities committed by the Turks in 1915. And so I was with my white brethren (really, the VIP section was more Caucasian than the Ural mountains), stage right, when Dr. Dre and Snoop Dog stepped onto the stage.

And immediately it was 20 years ago, and we were transported to a time when our minds were on our money and our money was on our minds. Laid back? Not really—these two cats were in top form, with tons of energy, and, oddly, a couple of live drummers in back of them to help bring the beats home.

And it was kind of like a Vegas review, a showcase of the last 20 years of the careers of these two pivotal gangsta artists. They ran through so many hits, hitting up a great verse and chorus before promptly moving on to the next, and constantly shouting out praises to L.A., the LBC, and Death Row records, which was a tiny bit odd to me considering that last I checked, Snoop Dogg still blames Suge Knight for the death of Tupac Shakur.

And oh, Tupac… yes, as the world knows already knows by now, there was a holographic image of Tupac Shakur on the main Coachella stage, sparring with Snoop and giving a shout-out to the actual “Coachella” crowd, that word no doubt compiled together from 100% Shakur phonemes of the past. It may be 50 year old technology (you’ve seen the Haunted Mansion Ride, right?), but I will say that the image actually fooled me: I thought the person on stage was a real guy who had been CGI’d for the big screens, until I finally realized there was a slight 2-D slant to the stage Tupac from my angle—“oh, I see, he’s being projected onto glass.” On the big screen, they introduced him with a close-up of his “Thug Life” tattooed chest, then zoomed out to reveal his shirtless, do-ragged body wearing khakis and boots and moving carefully, like one of the CGI monsters in an Ice Cube movie (really, wouldn’t that real-life reconciliation have been far more impressive than this CGI behemoth?). He did a couple songs, I believe “California Love” being one of them, and then disintegrated into the ether, like the mummy turning into sand to go attack Brendan Fraser at a future concert.

And who can say this was a misplaced move on Dre’s part? Though Dre’s imprint on hip hop was major, and indelible, his moment is over, and this whole concert was a nostalgia trip from the first recycled beat to the last. And even Shakur’s legacy has already been yanked and stretched across  8 posthumous albums (one where he even raps with the actor who played Biggie Smalls in a biopic), so at this point, there’s no integrity left for this holographic perversion to violate. Even if Shakur’s family had been upset by the resurrection of their dead child (and according to the press, they LOVED it), Shakur was a convicted, unrepentant rapist, so fuck him—I’m glad his image will live on in the pantheon of reanimated brands alongside Colonel Sanders and John Lennon in Forrest Gump.

But I was far more impressed with the real guest stars, who filtered in and out like a This Was Your Life montage the Rat Pack might have put together, so fast I couldn’t identify all of them: Wiz Khalifa, who shared a comically giant fake joint with Snoop on stage, then Kendrick Lamar, and 50 Cent, who appeared on stage in a hail of sonic gunfire the way Buffalo Bill Cody might have 130 years ago—though his biggest hit was “In Da Club,” not exactly a G Thang. Warren G showed up too, and Eminem, who laid down some of the tightest rhymes all night on “Forgot about Dre”—though Dre made that come out hokey, too, by scripting a fake “Hey, I’m leaving,” “Whoa, you can’t leave yet!” “I gotta go,” “No stay!” conversation with Eminem to lead into “Till I Collapse,” with a tribute to Nate Dogg.

Clearly, it was Nate Dogg, not Shakur, whose death was mourned the most by concert goers, even in my Aryan VIP area. Nate did get a tribute in the form of some yearbook-esque memorial photos on the big screens of Nate with a super-young looking Snoop, and a rendition of Snoop’s raunchy “Ain’t No Fun (If the Homies Can’t Have None)” somehow felt poignant, even during the lyrics about ball sucking.

Really, the show reminded me how much Dre had turned the gangsta genre on its head, taking the violent, grittier-than-real-life lyrics of N.W.A. and morphing them into party jams, of which there were plenty this evening: “Gin and Juice,” “What’s My Name,” “Nuthin’ but a ‘G’ Thang,” and “Drop It Like It’s Hot,” which was accompanied by video footage of an amazingly big-assed woman (with her head out of frame, ala R. Crumb) squatting and shaking her boobs. Actually, my favorite song may have been Wiz Khalifa’s “Young, Wild and Free”: “So what if we get drunk? So what if we smoke weed? We’re just having fun…”

It was the perfect sentiment for Coachella. And no shabby ghost could spoil the fun, not even after I stayed too late at the press tent and had to walk through the shambling, actively deconstructing Coachella grounds on my own, a ghoul in the dark, as monstrous trash trucks vacuumed yakisoba noodle dishes and $11 drink cups into their giant hoses.

The party was crumbling around me, and I would have a whole hour of traffic just to get to the 10 freeway. But the walk back to the car gave me some time to reflect over the weekend. And do you want my vote? Despite the exhaustion, and the rain, and the heat and the cold, and the expensive drinks, and Greg Ginn’s horrible performance, and the increasing nasty security measures, and the lines, I would still come back and do it again. I envision myself doing whatever it takes to cover Coachella again next year, even if it means stepping on some ghosts.

-D. M. Collins

Download: Telepathe “Chrome’s On It”

(from Chrome’s On it out now on IAMSOUND)

It’s good to admire Kate Bush—probably the holiest female producer of all time. Telepathe knows what’s up, and while they’re not ‘Wuthering Heights’ anywhere, the girls throw down a dance number in their ‘So Fine’ music video. Cross-breed Bush with Dre and a little David Byrne and chop and loop until you’ve got a whole new mutant, and that moody avant-garde hip-hop will make Melissa Livaudais and Busy Gangnes a pair of happy mother fuckers. This interview by Daiana Feuer.

Melissa Livaudais (percussion/keys/more): So no cuss words?
You can totally say cuss words.
ML: Oh, good—fuck yeah!
What’s your favorite cuss word?
ML: My name’s Melissa and my favorite cuss word is ‘motherfucker.’ I’ve always loved it. I love to throw it around whenever I can, you know. It just sounds good. I wore it on a t-shirt once, which said, ‘Dance Mother Fucker.’ Which is actually the title of our record, but then we made the ‘fucker’ part silent and invisible on the title. But it’s there. It’s our little secret we like to fill people in on when we can.
And you—what’s your favorite cuss word?
Busy Gangnes (percussion/keys/more): My name is Busy and I say ‘fucking’ a lot. Like, ‘That fucking person!’ or something. I like emphasizing my sentences—whatever I’m talking about—with that word.
It’s a good—is it an adverb? An adjective?
ML: I think it’s both! You can use it both ways. They’ll have to invent a new grammatical term for it.
Can you recall the last time ‘fucking’ came out of your mouth?
BG: In that fucking way?
ML: You probably said it this morning.
BG: Oh yeah—‘This fucking taco sucks!’ Our breakfast tacos were horrible.
Bad eggs?
ML: Busy got so sick from eating them. They were from the health food store. They had sprouts in them and stuff.
Actually, I had a dream of talking to you about this.
ML: Wow, really? And it’s happening!
How do you like to make eggs?
BG: I like omelettes and frittatas—making them. My favorite style of egg is over-easy. It’s pretty basic. You make a sunny-side up egg and flip it over for two seconds, and it’s done. When I was a kid I used to eat them soft-boiled a lot in those little cups. I’m Norwegian and that’s how they eat them every single day.
How do you say egg in Norwegian?
BG: Oh, fuck…Oh! It’s just ‘eg,’ E-G. ‘Eg.’
ML: You should ask her what blueberry is.
How do you say blueberry?
BG: ‘Blobar.’
ML: ‘Can I have a blobar?’
You’re not both from there, right?
ML: No, I just went there. It was awesome. I went there twice. Once we went there for fun and stayed with Busy’s family and once we went there this past summer and played a music festival.
BG: We were there in August and the sun is up practically 24 hours a day. It goes down for like four or five hours a night. We got to see—
ML: We saw Clipse and My Bloody Valentine in Norway in the same day in less than two hours.
What’s cool about playing different types of venues? Or what’s the worst?
ML: It took us a lifetime to figure out our sound on stage. Busy needs a good snare and hi-hat. Ideally we like to have two bass amps, two big cabinets behind us with heads for monitoring that we run all of our tracks out of and have the monitors from the PA of where we’re playing for vocals—so that it’s loud as shit. And you can feel the bass and hear all the stuff on top of whatever’s in the house. We used to rely on a venue’s sound system, which is never reliable! Usually monitors at a venue don’t have all frequencies—they’re only for vocals, so there’s no bass or low end. It would sound really tinny and we would be like, ugh, why does it sound so weird!
BG: We’ve completely revamped our set since last fall. This mainly came from spending more time with Ableton Live as a live tool. We’d always used it to record but we wrapped our head around it more and took all our electronic tracks and filled them out and separated them and re-sequenced them and made different live arrangements. Before we were trying to make it sound too much like the record, but then realized if we stripped it down and rearranged some things, we would have way more fun with it live.
So you are remixing your own songs?
ML: It was a very tedious process. We spent three months working eight-hour days—trying things out and reworking material and treating our sounds so they would be really loud, really punchy and compressed. Since we already played our live set in a handful of clubs, we finally figured out what we would need to do in order to make our setup the best it could possibly be, depending on the sound engineer and how much control we needed to have on stage, and what we could give over to someone who never heard our music before when we show up in a new city.
Does taking this producer approach change the way you conceive music?
BG: In our old band, having that more traditional setup—playing music was about each member of the band knowing their parts and playing them at the same time with everybody else. Ever since we started getting more into electronic music and producing, we ended up seeing ‘the song’ as a whole made of different ways it can be arranged or composed. I think we already listened to music in that way and that’s why we wanted to make music the way we do now, and have our hands in more aspects of the song-writing process. The stuff that we sample, we’ve chopped it up and slowed it down or reversed it and added effects to it so it’s completely indecipherable. We’ll take an obscure piece of a song and loop it with another piece of a song in such a way that you can’t tell where any of it came from. Mainly that’s a cool way of getting an idea for a beat or melody or tempo, or a key signature, and we’ll build all around that.
What’s a difference between male and female brains?
BG: I could talk about this for hours, and usually get myself in trouble. Let me give an example. I came into the idea of being in a band later in life. Even though I was technically trained on piano, I didn’t know drums, but I was a drummer in our old band. In teaching myself how to play that instrument, I just relied on my own intuition—how I respond to music—I wasn’t really worried if people would think that I was really good or could tell if I was technical. I feel like guys have more of a hang-up with that from what I’ve noticed. They feel like they need to play the right way, and excel at the rules. They’re stuck in this right way of doing things. I always wanted to play well. I didn’t want to be a sloppy musician but I was fine with the idea of making up my own version of how I play that instrument. It seems like guys, the way they play, the way they act, they have something to prove. A woman’s approach is more intuitive. We do what feels right.

TELEPATHE WITH ABE VIGODA, BLUE JUNGLE AND NITE JEWEL ON SAT., JUNE 13, AT THE SMELL, 247 S. MAIN ST., DOWNTOWN. 9 PM / $5 / ALL AGES. THESMELL.ORG. AND ON TUE., JUNE 16, AT DETROIT BAR, 843 W. 19TH ST., COSTA MESA. 9 PM / $10 / 21+. DETROITBAR.COM. TELEPATHE’S DANCE MOTHER IS OUT NOW ON IAMSOUND. VISIT TELEPATHE AT TELEPATHEMUSIC.COM OR MYSPACE.COM/TELEPATHE.

Download: Nosaj Thing “Coat Of Arms”

(from Drift out Tue., June 9, on Alpha Pup)

Nosaj Thing was in 40 Bands 80 Minutes with Wives, HEALTH and Abe Vigoda and then followed madman visionaries like Flying Lotus and Gaslamp Killer to Low End Theory. He now joins half the next generation of L.A. beatmakers on Daddy Kev’s Alpha Pup Records with his debut full-length Drift. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

What did it feel like on the first day after you got laid off?
I was scared, man! I worked five years straight—since I graduated high school, I had to get a job to help my parents out. I was working in a music store—I don’t wanna say their name because I kind of hate them!
You first learned music in public school—how important is that kind of education?
I didn’t take any extra-special classes. I was just kind of in the school music room, playing clarinet. And in high school, I joined drum line. It’s just developing your ear and a general understanding of basic music theory—being able to figure out melodies by hearing them. Learning about chord progressions. That helped a great deal. After high school, I took as many music classes as I could at a community college—East L.A. College. I grew up in Montebello.
Where would you have gone if you hadn’t started with music?
I remember in middle school and high school I was also into art. It seems kind of lame now, but I wanted to go into graphic design. But I got into hip-hop early. Third grade—kind of crazy! My parents enrolled me in a YMCA after-school program and the bus driver that picked us up always had on Power 106. I had no choice but to listen to that every day, and that’s when all the Beat Junkies were DJs on Power. I was really into it and fascinated by it. I didn’t understand how they made those sounds, being so young. When I got home, I used to record the mixes off the air on to tape. I didn’t understand the lyrics or anything, but I just liked the beats so much. And when they had electro nights on Friday, I really liked that, too. I really liked how the Beat Junkies did beat juggling. They don’t really do that at Power anymore. The first time I got into DJing I was in eighth grade and one of my best friends was a tomboy girl, and her older brother had the set-up. I’d go over every day and just scratch and mix.
What else were you into in third grade besides the fundamentals of hip-hop? Like Saturday morning cartoons and cheap candy?
I was really into rollerskating! There was a roller rink next to my house called Skate Depot, and they always played really good music. Songs like ‘All Night Long,’ ‘You Dropped The Bomb On Me.’ I used to go listen to the music and roller skate. I went there the first time for a birthday party and I always wanted to go after that. In eighth grade and my freshman year of high school, I was also introduced to the rave scene. As I got more and more into it, I was wondering how people make this stuff. In the late ‘90s and early 2000s, it was when a lot of hip-hop was giving props to the producers in the song—guys would talk about Dre a lot or the Neptunes and they’d be in the videos—‘Oh wow, these are the guys making these beats?’ I was going to Guitar Center or something and messing around with gear and I was really inspired and just wanted to do it! When I was a freshman, an older friend hooked me up with a bootleg of Reason. I installed it on my dad’s computer.
Next to like Microsoft Word and QuickBooks?
Yeah, boring programs! I was pretty much on the computer all the time—I was an internet geek at an early age. I wasn’t into anything else. I wasn’t really good at sports. I was in little league!
What was your most shocking rave experience?
I had to pretty much lie to my parents to go, so that was scary already! I was scared of getting in trouble. I was like 13. I’d tell them I was going to a friend’s house.
What do you think about Low End Theory’s Unreleased Beat Invitationals?
To me it’s not about showcasing your music—it’s about sharing with everyone. Everyone knows that at showcases, they’re there to showcase the latest thing they’ve made that no one else has ever heard. It’s exciting. We’re all there to learn and progress, and that’s what Low End is about.
Where did you feel most at home before?
Before that, at experimental noise venues like the Smell and Il Corral. I played 40 Bands 80 Minutes. That actually really influenced me for live performance—just by seeing all these bands and artists, I was really motivated and inspired to do stuff on my own. A good friend of mine always took me to the Smell in high school. That influenced my sound. I liked to check out bands not from L.A., so just seeing different acts using different instruments—every time I went there, there were always new ideas everywhere. Even local bands like Abe Vigoda and HEALTH. I think mainly noise bands were a cool idea for me. At first it was really odd to see someone just perform with a guitar pedal, but then I thought that was really cool and another way to express things. With my music and electronic music in general, I pretty much do the same thing.
Do you find that noise offers a purer experience? Or purer expression?
I think so. It’s more related to creating the sounds. When I start a song, I’m just messing with sound design to fit the mood I’m in. That definitely relates to artists at the Smell as far as noise. It feels like you’re not as limited with just musical notes. When I first start a song, I don’t really think about what type of song I’m gonna do first. It’s just improv—messing around. To me, it’s therapeutic. Most of the time it’s an 8-bar loop to get out what I need to get out and I’ll call it done. And if it sounds good later, I’ll build it out—make it complete. It’s done when—I can just tell. I try to find all gaps within the skeleton to complete it. I try to stay away from making it too complex—I try to use the least amount of sounds as possible but still make that point or feel. Sometimes I don’t even remember what the initial emotion was, but if I come back, I’ll add to it based on how I feel at that time. There’s no lyrics or anything, so it’s not specific to one emotion. What I hope to do is reach out to whoever’s listening to take it their own way.
What do you relate to most that’s on the radio now?
On a straight-up pop station? I haven’t been listening to radio much but interestingly enough, whenever I do, I always go back to listening to Power. That’s where I started! I listen just to see what’s going on—just to be up to date. It seems over the years, the song selection is getting smaller and smaller. For the past month, they’ve been playing the same four songs over and over. I don’t know what’s going on. They can’t really take any risks in this economy.
How do you feel about Daddy Kev calling you one of the next generation of L.A. beatmakers?
I feel like I’m the newer guy in whatever you wanna call it—a scene or whatever. The age difference and the music growing up—I don’t have the knowledge that all the other guys from Low End Theory have, and I’m just kind of the more video-game Internet generation, you know? After a while I was able to save enough to buy an MPC and when I first got it—after I glorified that thing so much!—I was disappointed because of how slow it was! I was working with software and everything was instant. Going to an MPC felt like a step back. Through time I learned—I appreciate those guys and love what they do and love the sound, but I wanna utilize what’s new. The new tools. Most of my stuff is software-based. I have a few synths. Everything is more accessible easily now. That changes the whole writing process—everything is right there. If I didn’t have this stuff, the sound would be more dated. With software, you can have such a huge palette and such a cheap price. Almost every synth ever made is now in a software-emulation version. All sampled in, every single note. You can just call them up. You have every single sound you could ever imagine on a laptop. There’s nothing to hold you back—you could do this anywhere! It should make music that much more interesting—it’s supposed to!
We’ve talked to other L.A. beatmakers and they do what they do without any thought to including future vocals. The music is done as it is.
I’m the same way. I was always into the beats all the time—Dre beats, Timbaland, Premier, Neptunes—and I really enjoyed just the groove and feel in the production. That’s what got me most into it. When I bought Regulate and Doggy Style, I didn’t understand the lyrics—and those weren’t lyrics for a third-grader to listen to!—so I just listened to the flow percussively. It was more of an instrument. That went into my head. It was just another instrument. From listening to Dre’s songs, I’m sure he has a say in how Snoop and Nate Dogg deliver their lines. All that stuff is really simple. There’s no bullshit. Every part is there for a reason. That’s why it works. A lot of people say hip-hop is too repetitive and so simple—that’s what makes it great to me! House music is the same way. It’s so hard to make something so simple and good. I learned from all those productions and songs. I’m not trying to make it too busy. It’s more just to write a song—I’m still learning.
Nobody said that now we’re the children of hip-hop the way a lot of British bands were the children of rhythm and blues. What do you think? Is that what Low End is about?
That’s really cool. I was really excited to hear about Low End when it was announced. When I was growing up DJing, I was really into scratching—the Beat Junkies, the Skratch Piklz—and also into the whole rave scene, and after starting production and releasing something on my own, seeing these artists and DJs come around into the hybrid night was very exciting for me. The thing that draws me—it’s all about kind of progressing. Doing new stuff. It’s open for everybody—it’s not just one type of music! They have bands there. What really excites me is it creates a platform for anyone to just step up and showcase their music. With all this Internet and social networking, it’s a place you can showcase your music in reality—not virtually, you know?
What instrument are you best at playing?
I’m not really good at any instrument. I’m OK on guitar. I’d like to get better on piano. I can hear a song and figure it out, but I can’t play a crazy classical masterpiece.
What video game are you best at then?
I’m not really good at video games either!

NOSAJ THING’S RECORD RELEASE PARTY WITH GUESTS TBA PLUS DADDY KEV, NOBODY, GASLAMP KILLER, D-STYLES AND NOCANDO ON WED., JUNE 10, AT LOW END THEORY AT THE AIRLINER, 2419 N. BROADWAY, LOS ANGELES. 10 PM / $5-$10 / 18+. MYSPACE.COM/LOWENDTHEORYCLUB. NOSAJ THING’S DRIFT RELEASES TUE., JUNE 9, ON ALPHA PUP. VISIT NOSAJ THING AT NOSAJTHING.COM OR MYSPACE.COM/NOSAJTHING.

Who was the first person who ever said the words ‘hip-hop’ to you?
I’m so damn old—ain’t like nobody ever said it to me! I was there before it started—totally honest. My father had a radio show at KACE, and I’d go while he was doing his talk show and sit in the control room with carts and cassettes—do mixes. No rap—just funk, soul, pop and new wave. And the first turntables—there was no such thing as Technics 1200s. I had turntables with the tone arm on the track—linear tracking. I learned mixes on those first! The first time I ever heard hip-hop was probably one of the early cats from New York. I wanna say Spoonie G or something? I was at KACE and it was a promo but they didn’t play rap, so they’d just give it to me—‘What the hell is this stuff?’ And we started rapping at school and battling each other—we didn’t know it was something groundbreaking. ‘This is better than just hanging out!’
What was the first battle you won?
On the bleachers at my school—all my influences were from Parliament Funkadelic, so I was rapping about parties and girls and P Funk and he was just rapping about crazy stuff. I blew him away. You listen to P Funk at 12 or 13 years old and your brain is just messed up!
What was L.A. like then?
If you can imagine—growing up in a city where there’s no such thing as DJ. Nothing like that til we made the scene happen. We had Uncle Jamm’s Army here, World Class Wreckin’ Cru here, Z Cars—everybody doing parties and dances in L.A. and poster battles! You’d press up 5,000 posters and post them all over, and the next crew would come tear them down! We went from school parties to skating rinks to convention centers for 5,000 people and the sports arena for 10,000 people. When I first started DJing, I went to Radio Shack and built my own speakers! Me and my homeboy DJ Termite. Bought some wood and went to Radio Shack and got speakers and made a coffin and just put the speakers in the box, and it sounded like crap! We didn’t know airholes or any kind of insulation! So we bought more speakers from Radio Shack and opened them up and looked inside—like, ‘Ohhhhhh.’ Then sealed them up and took them back! With the DJ stuff, it was surprisingly more advanced that it is today! There was a company that would do big concerts and they were really getting into the mobile DJ thing—when they weren’t doing big concerts, the speakers would just sit around. So we could rent 100 speakers for Uncle Jamm’s Army. 30 speakers on one side, 30 on the other—that’s 60—and then 10 and 10 in the middle—that’s 70 and 80—and 10 in back and 10 in front. I wish we had documented it. If you walked up from the parking lot, you could just hear a low hum—it was crazy! There’s nothing like it today. I’ve never been anywhere in the past 15 years that even came close.
How nasty were the clubs then?
There was a cubbyhole behind the speakers and it got buckwild! People literally having sex on the floor—it was that nasty! The time of freaky mad soul hippie sex! So hot in there—there’d be like 5,000 or 10,000 people with the humidity at 100 percent and so much sweat the walls and floor would have two or three inches of sweat! Ask anyone who was there—it was nasty! And the girls back then were nasty and freaks! And we didn’t help—all we talked about was women and partying and freaks.
‘Freak City’—just like the song?
That’s what it was back then! Everywhere we went were like sold-out packed-out parties. Everybody was into that stuff back then—uptempo music—especially like down south Texas and Miami where parties were off the chain! Never gang problems or fights—but when the ‘90s rolled around it died off because the violence. There was no such thing like, ‘Oh, I’m going to a party.’ ‘What kind of music?’ “They play house.’ Or ‘They play hip-hop.’ ‘They play electro.’ No such thing—top 40 was top 40 and you played whatever it was. New wavers, punk rockers, hip-hop heads, soul heads, funk heads—everybody in the same club partying to the same music. It was beautiful! My early stuff was influenced by a lot of that—new wave and Prince and funk and Kraftwerk. So many different styles—I still got ghost-produced hits on the radio!
Like what?
Yeah, go ahead and get me sued! Expose all those people who don’t do their own stuff!
What was it like DJing school dances?
Elementary school dances! I went to Catholic school—rougher than public, don’t let ‘em fool you! I’d do all-girls schools, and the nuns would walk around with signs saying ‘NO FREAKING ON THE DANCE FLOOR.’ And we couldn’t play certain songs, but I’d sneak them in because I knew the nuns didn’t know anyway. One time I played ‘I Need A Freak’ and they clamped down real quick—I had been trying to lower the volume on the word ‘freak’ but all the kids were singing it! I was like, ‘No! I’m trying to help you out!’
Did you ever see Kraftwerk?
Not when I was younger, but in the past ten years. Last week me and Egyptian Lover got back from shows in Germany—we were mad tourists there! In Nuremberg, they had a train museum with the actual Trans-Europe Express. We were hanging off that train like little kids!
How much creativity did you inherit from your dad?
My mother says I’m just like him—crazy like him! My mother is an actual classical pianist and music teacher. She tried to drill music in my head but I never wanted to learn, and now I’m kicking myself. But in a way I’m glad—I could know too much. Instead of, ‘Oh, you mean to tell me I can’t play those two notes together? Well, I just did and it sounds good!’ My father had written over fifty books—I think I followed the same suit.
He did Black Exorcist, right?
And Black Gestapo and the Iceman series—a lot of stuff on Holloway House. And he had tons of comic books—that’s all he was into! And my grandfather worked at Disney, so there was that influence. He knew Walt and Roy Disney. My father met him—and I wanted to kick my father when he was alive—my grandfather took him to meet Walt and Roy and they’d send him stuff they’d drawn. Like hand-drawn with their name on it. And send him the first Mickey Mouse watch. And I asked him—‘Ah, I don’t know what I did with it.’
What’s something you used to play that was always a no-fail hit?
Definitely a song I produced—‘Supersonic’—anytime! I’m surprised at the longevity of that song. It cost me $400 to produce. In fact, I did two songs for $400. The first single was supposed to be ‘Another Ho Bites The Dust,’ but I did ‘Supersonic’ as a B-side for the girls because they needed a dance song. Me and Dre used to mess with two of them in the group. One girl was a professional skater and the other girls did nothing and none of them rapped at all. But they decided they wanted to because they knew us. I was like, ‘Ah, I don’t think so.’ But we went in the studio—see what happens, have some fun. $400. And the rest is history!
Didn’t you get a Grammy for that?
Nominated. I never did get a Grammy, dammit! I did get an American Music Award for ‘Fergalicious’ because it was a remake of ‘Supersonic.’ I got an award twenty years later!
You said the early N.W.A. records you did are 75% live music—who was doing the sessions? How did that work?
Me and Dre personally were really into not sampling. We’d throw in effects or scratches or sirens or whatever, but if it came to a guitar sound or something, we’d rather play it. So we’d get someone to come in—try to recreate it before we ripped it. That’s why N.W.A. sonically sounded better than a lot of other records. It’d be Stan the Guitar Man, a homie from the hood—or another guy—what’s his name? We just had some people we’d hire to come in and play. Live we’d put everything on a DAT and play to that—or like a drum machine and stuff. I don’t think we ever had a live drummer—there were too many people in the group?
Where did you do the cover for N.W.A. And The Posse?
Around the corner from Macola—we had to do a photo shoot and found the alley somewhere. We didn’t tag it up—it was already there! And we invited a bunch of buddies to come hang with us. Straight Outta Compton was a more professional shoot. We ended up in an alley running to do different photos. ‘Why are you guys always in the alley?’ But it turned out to be classic.
What was N.W.A. like when you left? What did you think it was and what did you think it would be?
I knew it was gonna be big. But what I tell people is this. Two things—I was a solo artist before the group. The only solo artist. Dre and Yella were in a group and Cube, Ren and Eazy hadn’t done anything before. I was the only one doing it solo and getting money, and I knew how much we were supposed to be getting. I made it known how much we were supposed to be getting paid. I made more money solo! What about fame? Well, I was there for Straight Outta Compton, and after that there wasn’t much anyway. If it’s fame and no money or money and no fame—I’d rather take the money. I’m a businessman. A lot of people think I wasn’t in the group—I’m on the album cover! And if you look at the first N.W.A.—the EP. N.W.A. And The Posse is a bootleg by Macola after they left for Priority. The first N.W.A.—there’s pictures on the back of only four people. Me, Dre, Eazy and Ice Cube. That’s it. There you go.
You seem like you’re barely in Jerry Heller’s Ruthless book.
Yeah—because I was the first one to leave and to blow the whistle in general! But I’m cool with Jerry now. I don’t think he knew much about me. I’ve been a private person anyway. I’m a producer first—a DJ—a studio whore! I’d rather produce and be creative than be out in the limelight. Maybe that’s why my name hasn’t got out as big as everybody else’s.
What do you think of people saying you’re the Pete Best of N.W.A.?
If they wanna call it that, it’s all good. But the difference between me and Pete Best is I’m still grinding!
You said N.W.A. killed electro. Since you helped invent electro, what was it like to be there at both ends?
It was crazy. But me and Dre had talked about it. That’s why ‘Panic Zone’ and ‘Something 2 Dance 2’ are on the record—we needed a song for radio and the club. But the sound had to change. It was just—growing up, in a sense. And now that I’m getting older, electro has come full circle. All you hear on the radio is uptempo electro beats!
What do you think is your own place in L.A. music history?
How can I put it? I worked with a lot of different people on the west coast—I think I’m one of the only people had a big hand in things early on. And I think the album cover we’re recreating—Maggot Brain—is perfect. With the anthology coming out and me still doing music and traveling—it’s almost like the waking of the dead! I’m back 100% now—y’all never should have brought me back! I know where all the skeletons in the closets on everybody is. I know the formula for making hits! Should have left me over with my videogame company and special effects. I’m about to change the game again! It’s crazy—for me, I got four in a row this year. The twentieth anniversary of N.W.A. this year, twentieth of ‘Supersonic,’ I got my anthology and on top of that—besides the whole different style of music I did after ‘89—I got Professor X. I’ll be doing the first-ever album I’ve done as that in two months.
So just what was going on in 1988?
It was just the vibe! Even though there were like little battles with DJs and that—the party was family! I was friends with everybody—Egyptian, Ice T, Dre—we were all family. East coast was all different hoods and battling—if you were from Brooklyn, you weren’t down with fools from Queens. On the west coast it was all love.
Are the 65 interviews you’re doing now more than you’ve ever done?
Back in the day I used to do a lot—but not all at once like this! I’m loving it. I always said—I do a lot of shows with a lot of different artists, and it disheartens me to see a recording artist with ego and attitude problems. Dude, you just got a job—if somebody hires you and they’re paying you to have fun, you’re disrespecting everybody out there! If you see me at any concert, after I’m off stage I’m out there partying with people and cheering the other groups on! I used to live in Brentwood—really upper high class!—and at two in the morning, I’m at Ralph’s buying—I don’t know. And some random girl comes up to me—‘Excuse me, are you Arabian Prince?’ I signed something—I really don’t care about the fame but I just wanna see people partying down. All the stuff I’ve done in my life—music to video games and now I’m trying to be a pro golfer! I got a golf tournament tomorrow. If I ever have kids, they’ll be like, ‘This fool—my pops was crazy!’

—Chris Ziegler

ARABIAN PRINCE’S INNOVATIVE LIFE: THE ANTHOLOGY 1984-1989 IS OUT TUE., AUG. 19, ON STONES THROW. ARABIAN PRINCE ON TUE., AUG. 19, AT AMOEBA RECORDS, 6400 SUNSET BLVD., HOLLYWOOD. 7 PM / FREE / ALL AGES. AND WITH PEANUT BUTTER WOLF, J. ROCC, DAM FUNK AND HAIRCUT ON SUN., AUG. 25, AT THE SUNSET JUNCTION AFTERPARTY AT THE ECHOPLEX, 1154 GLENDALE BLVD., ECHO PARK. 10 PM / FREE IF 21+ / $10 IF UNDER / 18+. ATTHEECHO.COM. VISIT ARABIAN PRINCE AT STONESTHROW.COM OR MYSPACE.COM/ARABIANPRINCE.