LA Style

Back in those hallowed days when I first moved to LA and when my beloved electronica radio station was still on the air, the remarkable MARS-FM, I used to hear LA Style all the time. In fact, their hit, James Brown is Dead, was seemingly the theme song for MARS and you could hear it several times a day. Partly because of that and partly because of the texture and tempo of that track, James Brown is Dead became the archetypal techno track for me. There isn’t a whisper of anything authentic (as opposed to synthetic) on the track; the beats pummel you like a jackhammer, and the whole production screams technology. And there’s the matter of the name of the track as well. In the versions of the song that have words (most dance tracks are released with several different versions to facilitate remixing on the fly), some guy raps about waking up in the morning to hear on the radio that James Brown is dead. Later, he finds out it’s not true (which is correct), but that first discovery on the radio becomes the basis for the entire song, the phrase “James Brown is dead” repeating throughout the track. It’s a strange thing to write a song about, unless you take it strictly metaphorically. James Brown, the “hardest working man in showbiz” is the undisputed king of funk. And his booty-energizing brand of funkiness is based on lots and lots of soul spread out over a very sparse and syncopated beat (less is more). If he represents soul, then techno takes a position on the other end of the continuum. Techno is also made to make you move, but the beats are strictly synthetic and omnipresent and show a devoted lack of syncopation. So, the rise of techno does, in some metaphorical way, mean that James Brown is dead. But clever social underpinnings aside, James Brown is Dead is an exhilarating collection of sound effects laid over a relentless synthetic beat and it quickly became one of the more popular tracks on MARS-FM’s playlist.

The group LA Style is from Belgium, I believe, and like a lot of early techno artists, only produced this one anonymous track to add to the vibrant, growing tapestry of mixable beats that formed the foundation of the whole rave culture. But their undeniable success with James Brown is Dead led them to quickly produce an entire album in hopes of capitalizing on their early success. Predictably, the album isn’t very good, and I only bought it because I found a used copy for $2. The songs, such as they are, are built on the same formula as JB is D, and celebrate the rave scene (they have a track called Balloony that commemorates the dubious practice of inhaling nitrous oxide from a balloon – a practice that has killed several people, including one of my wife’s best friends in college). Their sound is good, but it wears thin quickly and an entire album’s worth seems like a bit too much. Of course, this isn’t music you’re actually supposed to listen to, you’re supposed to gobble a bunch of drugs and dance like a crazed baboon all night long to it, and suck down enough drugs and a power saw starts sounding like the best music imaginable.

One of the more successful clones of James Brown is Dead is this one, called LA Style Theme (where do they think up these titles?). It’s got the same relentless beat as James Brown is Dead and a lot of the same noises, but it also includes a wonderfully anachronistic bridge that sounds Slavic – like a czardas cranked up on speed. Roll over, Tchaikovsky and give James Brown the news.