Nightclubbing: Uncle Jamm’s Army
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This crew of young black men, led by Rodger Clayton, transformed the sound of Los Angeles forever
In the film Straight Outta Compton, there’s a short scene where the pre-N.W.A. days are depicted. The suits are shiny, the music soft. It’s all meant to be a bit cheesy, as though anything on the West Coast before gangsta rap was small-time – not worthy of your attention. Talk to anyone who was there, though, and a far more complex picture begins to emerge.
\n\nThe missing part of that puzzle, for many years, has been Uncle Jamm’s Army, a pioneering party crew that grew from humble origins to become the biggest promotion team in the United States. Led by Rodger Clayton and Gid Martin, Uncle Jamm’s Army went from holding high school dances to selling out the Los Angeles Sports Arena. Their story is one of black entrepreneurship – a group of hugely talented promoters – that placed DJs (Egyptian Lover, Bobcat and DJ Pooh among them) at the forefront of the party, homegrown talent that commanded thousands-strong crowds.
\n\nIn this oral history, we trace the origins of the crew, its rise and eventual fall. Featuring interviews with all of the major players – including an archival interview with co-founder Rodger Clayton – it paints an intimate portrait of one of the most successful crews ever to throw a party.
\n\nGROWING UP
ADRIENNE CLAYTON
\nRodger Clayton’s sister
Adrienne Clayton
\n\nWe would always say, “What can we do now?” We did a little lemonade stand, and, at that time, they had push lawnmowers, so we cut and edged our own grass. Rodger was like, “You know, we can go and cut more.” We’d walk through the neighborhood with our lawnmower and the edger, go to a house where the grass was unkempt, knock on the door and say, “Hi, me and my brother, we’ll cut your grass for $10 and if you don’t like the job, you don’t have to pay us.” We were hard workers. It was just that simple.
GID MARTIN
\nUncle Jamm’s Army co-founder
Gid Martin
\n\nWhen I turned 14, my family moved to the suburbs in Harbor City. Rodger’s father was already living there, and Rodger moved in with him, so we both went to Narbonne High School. Rodger was a grade higher than me. We became good friends. Rodger always wanted to be an artist. He loved the music industry and he gave a lot of parties out of his father’s garage.
Rodger Clayton
\n\nI was DJing garage parties in ’72, when I was 13 or 14 years old. Then when I got to 15, I started charging 50 cents. I’d end up making $60.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nWe had a little room that was added to the garage, so that’s where we originally started the dances. We had a little portable fold-up record player. We’d take it outside, we’d put a blue light up and invite all the kids in the neighborhood, and Rodger would play the 45s we had.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nThere were times when he charged a quarter or a dollar, whatever he could get. He had a passion for DJing. I mean a deep passion. He knew that’s what he wanted to do from the time he was 15 years old, maybe earlier.
RODGER CLAYTON
\nUncle Jamm’s Army co-founder
Rodger Clayton
\n\nMy father was a bus driver for the school. He used to record cassettes for different groups of kids he was driving. If he was driving Latino kids, he’d put Santana and stuff on. If it was a black student group, he’d record James Brown and Marvin Gaye. I learned all that stuff from my father, when I was eight or nine years old.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nRodger was working at Burger King around the corner from our high school. He tells the manager, “I can help you sell some burgers. What I’m going to do is I’m going to set up a soundsystem. You let me bring my soundsystem and plug it in in the parking lot, and the kids will come, because they love music, and then you can sell more Whoppers.” On Friday, he tells everybody at school... That night at Burger King, the sales went through the roof.
LONZO AND RODGER
LONZO WILLIAMS
\nWorld Class Wreckin’ Cru Founder, early DJing partner with Rodger Clayton
Lonzo Williams
\n\nRodger was promoting a couple of little parties [back then] – nothing big. He decided to do a party at Alpine Village, a local room in Carson, California, and asked me to DJ there.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nHis name was Disco Lonzo. I still call him that.
Egyptian Lover
\n\nWhen I first went to Alpine Village, I saw Lonzo and Rodger, both DJing at the same time. They were actually partners, doing parties together. I was just partying… They had a gigolo contest – I think I took second place.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nLonzo and Rodger, they have this love-hate relationship – even though they really cared about each other.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nHe was my nemesis. I was his, but I was his friend as well as he was mine. You have to understand Rodger. Rodger was narcissistic. He thought he owned Alpine Village, he thought he owned me, he thought he owned everything. When he found out I was working for another promoter, he got upset.
UNIQUE DREAMS ENTERTAINMENT
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nThere were several guys who were throwing parties back then. You had LSD Promotions, Z-Car Productions…
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nLSD and Z-Cars were the big ones.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nMe and my brothers were on the back porch at my mother’s house, asking ourselves, “Why are we broke?” We decided, “Hey, we’re popular, let’s start giving dances.” We booked Alpine Village as our first dance in December of 1978, and the logical… the only choice, was Rodger as a DJ. He was my buddy, we were close friends, and he was the DJ of the area… [The party] was hugely successful. After we paid Rodger, he said, “Listen, guys, we should do this together,” and we were like, “We agree.” Rodger saw the hustle that me and my brothers had, I mean, we made our own handmade posters – nobody does that.
EGYPTIAN LOVER
\nDJ and producer, Uncle Jamm’s Army member
Egyptian Lover
\n\nRodger used to DJ for LSD. The reason why he started Unique Dreams, was because [LSD] wrote him a bad check for one of their parties. The check bounced, and he went back, and said, “I’m going to start a dance promotion team that’s going to blow you guys out of the water,” and he did.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\n[The company was called] Martin Brothers Productions… When we hired Rodger, we had a meeting… where we discussed what we were going to name it going forward. Obviously, Rodger didn’t want to be Martin Brothers Productions, or Martin Brothers Productions Plus One. I think he came up with “Unique Dreams,” I came up with “Entertainment”, and we started Unique Dreams Entertainment. Rodger called himself the “Ace of Dreams” at the time, and he would put on these uniforms. It was a lot like Funkadelic in a way. We both loved George Clinton and his concepts. Who didn’t?
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nRodger wore this tight-ass genie outfit. It looked like he could’ve granted three wishes at any given moment. Rodger’s thing was pizzazz and flash. He would go down to Hollywood and get the magic, the flash dust and put an ashtray in his hand. “I am the Ace of Dreams!” Take an incense and light it and… pshhhh! This big-ass puff of would smoke come out… We had to put on antics back in the day. It wasn’t just about mixing, we had to put on a show.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nThere’s Rodger standing with a costume on, a hood and a cape, saying “The Ace of Dreams!” The crowd is going crazy, they’re screaming. The pyrotechnics he was doing, that was way ahead of its time.
Promoters are the cornerstone of the whole industry. Without them, you have nothing.
ALPINE VILLAGE
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nThe Alpine Village was a phenomenon, seriously. I’m going to tell you why. We got so many people. It became so packed. There was one night we did a function there… my mom drove there and we put plastic bags of money in the trunk of the car. I mean, it took us all night to count that money.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nI went to a lot of parties, all over LA, and it just seemed that they had more women going to their parties, so I started going to them more and more. Every time they gave out another flier, we knew we had to be there.
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nWhen it came to giving parties [in the late ’70s], it was us and the Wreckin’ Cru. Our first dance was at the Alpine Village in Torrance. Then Wreckin’ Cru rented the Alpine after us – Lonzo, Dre, Yella and Unknown DJ. We had serious competition [with them] back then. We used to name the parties after the hottest record at the time. “Bustin’ Out, Bustin’ Loose”; “Still In The Groove”; “Sweat ‘Til You Get Wet”. If we [ever] had a fight with a venue, we’d just call back and book it again under a different name. I was notorious for that.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nWe worked very hard. We had posters all over the city and everyone knew Alpine Village was the place to go if we were going to give a party… We would pack that place out… people knew they were going to party their ass off.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nI met a gentleman a few years ago… he said, “Yeah, you know, I didn’t eat lunch all week so that I could save my $5 for the dance on Friday.” I said “Really?” He said, “You don’t understand, you had to be there on Friday night or you were nobody, because everybody was at school talking about it on Monday.”
UNCLE JAMM’S ARMY
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nUnique Dreams Entertainment, we were recognized as a force. We weren’t on top at that time, but we were coming. We were working hard. However, a couple of things happened at our events that were negative. We did a function and a kid got shot, so other promoters used that as a “you don’t want to go there” event. Now we’re starting to see our flyers on the ground after we go through a mall. You’ve never seen that before. It scared me and Rodger.
\n\nRodger and I had a historical meeting. It just makes me emotional to even think about it. I passed by where he’s buried in Inglewood this morning. Rodger was the heart and soul of Uncle Jamm’s Army, so pardon me for a minute…
\n\nIt was a pivotal moment. We met and discussed strategy to keep going forward. We knew we had something good. We also knew we’re suffering because the competition was using this to put us down. “We don’t want our numbers to fade. We want to be the best. We want to be the biggest ever. We want to be on top. This is not good. We got to change the name and the way we do things.”
\n\nWe’re sitting there, and we look over to the left and there’s a picture, there’s an album [by Funkadelic, Uncle Jam Wants You]. Oh man! When he said, “Uncle Jamm’s Army,” we knew immediately that this was going to be bigger than anything that had ever happened in this city. We knew it immediately. We were so excited. We looked at each other, and it was [like], “It’s on… it’s on.”
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nI thought that was another way of them biting, copying somebody else. They were known for copying. We not going to go there, though…
COMPETITION
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nIt was very important to us to know what our competition was doing. Even sometimes if they were doing the same night as us. We might send somebody over, “Hey, go see what LSD’s doing.” [Then we’d be like,] “Oh, man, they only had like 400 people. Wow, we beat them!” That was a huge deal to us.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nWe were always in competition, it’s like Chevrolet coming out with GPS. “Oh, my God! We got to find out how we’re going to put GPS in these doggone Fords!” Same thing.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nWe worked hard. Nobody worked as hard as us. Nobody… We were at a function one time where LSD Promotions, one of the guys who was one of the principals, his brother walked over to me and handed me a big silver bullet. To this day, I don’t know what that meant, but I just took it home. I mean, I’m 18 years old…
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nWe had some successful dances at Queen Mary in Long Beach, and the next one I went to go do, the lady called back, and she cancelled it for no reason. We had never had a fight, never had a problem, and she cancelled my party, and I was like, “Why?” She said, “We got a call that you were expecting 2,000 people in a room that only holds 500.”
\n\n“Who told you that?”
\n\nA couple of weeks later, Rodger told me he did it. “Yeah, I called on you man, you was blowing up too big, I had to shut you down.”
EDWIN VAULTZ
\nFounder of Music People, a speaker company, and eventual business partner with Uncle Jamm’s Army
Edwin Vaultz
\n\nLet me first say that a lot of people had kind of a different relationship with Rodger. If you worked under Rodger, then you had a difficult life. If you stood up straight and decided, “I got a voice,” then it’s going to be two bulls meeting in a China shop… Lonzo decided that he was going to do his own thing, and Rodger’s like, “No, you’re not… this is my town, and if it’s Alpine Village, that’s my venue, and you don’t dare go book something at my venue. I own that venue, OK?”
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nRodger was a nice guy when he wanted something. He could be the devil after he got it… he was known for talking shit, but he was never known for fighting. He was always, “Man, I’ll kick your ass,” then, you know, “Oh, man, what you talking about? We can talk about this. Let’s talk about this. We don’t need to be fighting.” His nickname was Rodger Hatin’ Clayton.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nThere was the World Class Wreckin’ Cru – Lonzo and his whole crew – out of that came Dr. Dre and Yella and so on… LSD and Z-Cars didn’t live it… it was something they did on the side, but Rodger… that was his life.
PROMOTIONAL HUSTLE
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nOne of the things that Rodger said when we hooked up with him was, “Hey, let’s give away stuffed animals to the first ten females and let’s give away roses from stage.” Even in our early beginnings, there was always some giveaways.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nOh my goodness, Rodger’s promotion was incredible, the way he planned it out – I didn’t know at the time that it was that genius, but, say he had a plan to do this party… like the best party ever. We’ll start at “A”. “A” will be “Let’s find a neighborhood, pick the top four high schools in that area, and we’ll do lunch dances at all those high schools for free…”
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nThey brought 16 freaking Cerwin-Vega speakers to a high-school quad. They were smart: go to the school, get the kids hooked, and then we’d come at night.
ICE-T
\nRapper, eventually performed at Uncle Jamm’s Army events
Ice-T
\n\nWhat you’re doing is you’re creating a party for kids between the ages of, let’s say 15 to 20, who can’t get into a club, but they want to go out. There were clubs in LA, but that was for the adults. A lot of the guys running Uncle Jamm’s were adults, but they knew there was money in this pre-club-age bracket.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nThe [kids would] come to the lunch thing and we’d pass out flyers for the “B” party. All these kids from all these high schools at lunchtime got all these flyers. We gave the girls more flyers to give to their friends. All the pretty girls got more flyers…
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nRodger’s father worked on the bus transportation for LA City Schools. He had given me and Rodger a job at one time, $10 an hour, and I noticed he had a list of all the city schools. I sent a letter out to all [of them], saying that we were available for noon dances, proms, after parties, whatever you want us to do, and it took off. We started doing everybody’s prom.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nThose “B” parties were to promote the “C” party. The “C” party held more people, probably twice as many people. And the “C” party, that would promote the “D” party, which would hold maybe 1,500 people… like maybe the Veterans Auditorium. We kept doing the same thing over and over again. A, B, C, D. A, B, C, D.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nOur strategy was exposure. Any street you drove down that was a main street, you saw our posters. Any mall you went to or any function you attended in the city, whether it was a concert in the park or some basketball game, we had a crew there. We always started our marketing 45 days out.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nOne thing that I learned is promoters are the cornerstone of the whole industry. Without them, you have nothing.
With the commercials on the radio, Uncle Jamm’s Army became a household name.
Edwin Vaultz
\n\nRodger was a visionary who worked like crazy. Sometimes you almost had to rein him in with regard to what he wanted to do. Working with people, if it was something he didn’t like, you’d know about it. He would definitely give you a tongue-lashing. Everybody on the street crew walked on eggshells a little bit, not wanting to get ripped by him. I call it the University of UJA. I do a lot of business meetings now, and teach salespeople. They talk about their work ethic and what they’re doing and stuff. I’m like, “You have no clue.”
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nWe worked hard. I mean, we were out to four in the morning. An Uncle Jamm’s Army day was sometimes 14, 15 hours. But it was fun, because you’re at the mall, you’re talking to the girls, you know what I’m saying?
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nThey’d be up at midnight to, jeepers, five o’clock in the morning to hang posters.
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nYou staple them up on telephone poles and stuff like that. LSD and Z-Cars would come around and snatch them down.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nNobody really had exclusivity when it came to individual shops, but we did have exclusivity when it came to poles. These are my poles, and you see my poster, you got to go around. If you want to start a fight, snatch one of them posters down.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nDon’t let the event be on the same night, it’s really coming down.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nWe’d hang on Wednesdays, and my job was to get up Thursday morning and double-check. If I look up and your posters ain’t up, you can’t get paid. A lot of times, guys were lazy and stupid, they would snatch our posters down, put them in the garbage can right there, and put their posters up. But we knew who did it. That’s when the problems would start. It may have been crazy, but nobody ever got killed doing it.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nIt wasn’t a crowded flier. We understood. We would see some of the competition’s fliers and be like, “Who is going to stop and read this?” When you hand somebody a flyer, they want to see where [the party] is at, and they’re still going to still ask you when it is, even if the date’s on there. We tried to be consistent with the radio commercial and the poster throughout the whole promotion. That was our thing.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nThen, with the commercials on the radio, Uncle Jamm’s Army became a household name.
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ON THE AIRWAVES
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nRodger Clayton was a master of making commercials… if you ever heard an Uncle Jamm’s Army commercial, you wanted to go to that party, because his commercial was the party… The way he talked about the party, who was going to be there and the music playing in the background, there was like this story… Everybody [was like], “Ah man, did you hear that? They’re playing tonight, I got to be there”… They weren’t just like “Oh, come see us DJ.” It was like this spectacle. It was… Ringling Brothers, that’s what it was.
\n\nThe commercials that Rodger would do, they were either 30- or 60-second spots… The music was playing in the background, and he would go “Bobcat – meow! – and Egyptian Lover…” He would go through all the names and stuff… It was a really early form of marketing, and I think no one had done it that way.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nRodger would go in the studio and make commercials as if they were records…
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nMe and Rodger would set the bedding first. We’d maybe get three or four very popular records, and lay the bed. Then, we’d sit there and write copy, and once we got the copy, we’d put the headphones on and get into the flow of that music. We’d get into the hype of it, we’d edit it, and then we’d get a final product. 90% of the time we hit the nail on the head.
\n\nWe’d try to get it in as much rotation as possible. Late night we found was very cheap and our people are up late nights. On Saturday night, Friday night, you’d hear it all the time because those spots were sometimes as low as 15 bucks. We’d stack on those, but we also had to go into what they call the heavy rotation, which would be morning and afternoon. Those spots were a little bit more, but you’d hear us all throughout the week.
\n\nRodger and I both had great voices for commercials, you know? I mean, Rodger was hype. He’d probably been an MC all his life. It was second nature for him.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nRodger had a very deep voice. He was also an aspiring radio DJ, so that was his thing. We both were… I was trained in radio. He never went to broadcast school, but I did. In fact, he had a little time on… I think it was either KDAY or KJLH for a while.
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nI was at KDAY before I was on KGFJ. Greg Mack got to town and hooked up with Uncle Jamm’s, because we were doing all the [biggest] parties. Greg got us a mix show on Saturdays called Saturday Night Fresh… me, Egypt and Bobcat. It was the first mix show in the history of LA radio, before Dre. This is the fall of 1983. Our mix show had a fuckin’ 11 share in LA. We were beating Rick Dees on KIIS.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nI remember it was Greg Mack, Russ Parr, JJ Johnson. Those were the main three [DJs on KDAY]… Greg Mack came from… I think it was, Texas. He came out here and he got so many requests…
\n\nHe’d ask people, “Where did you hear this song from?”
\n\n“Uncle Jamm’s Army…”
\n\nHe actually came to Uncle Jamm’s Army. We knew who he was. He was new on KDAY, and we did commercials there. We were always there doing stuff. He said, “Would you mind if I copy down some of the names of the songs that you guys are playing?” I didn’t care. Rodger didn’t want him to do it, but I didn’t know that.
\n\nSo, he’s sitting back and he started writing down all the songs. Then he went to KDAY and started playing all of the songs we were playing at the party. Rodger didn’t like that, so him and Rodger had a rocky beginning. Then one weekend, Rodger bought a bunch of commercials for the party coming up the next weekend. He always planned them out so when people got out of the parties to come home at 2 AM, those commercials started hitting.
\n\nGreg Mack and them didn’t play the commercials. Greg blamed it on another person. Another person blamed it on Greg. Rodger went up there and started choking Greg Mack out. They really fell out after that. It was like, “OK, now we can’t drop mix shows on KDAY no more.”
When Prince has his guitar, it becomes a part of him. When Egypt has the 808, it’s a part of him. He knows that machine. He’s making love to it.
EGYPTIAN LOVER
\n\nIce-T
\n\nI always was cool with Egyptian Lover. Egypt’s an interesting person. Everybody don’t have a relationship with Egyptian Lover. He won’t fuck with everybody.
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nIn 1979, Uncle Jamm’s was me, a DJ named Dr. Funkenstein and another DJ named Bleebs. Bleebs was one of the best funk DJs out there, he never got his due. He got into drugs. He was with us from 1979 to about 1982. Back then, Egypt [came to] our parties. Around 1981, I needed some more DJs, so I had a DJ contest at the Long Beach Holiday Inn. Egypt won, so he was in the crew.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nI was in the Fox Hills Mall [in Culver City], with a friend named Snakepuppy, who eventually joined LA Dream Team. Him and I used to make mixtapes together at our high school. We saw Rodger passing out fliers. I was already DJing high school parties and house parties, and trying to do my own party, but everybody went to Uncle Jamm’s instead.
\n\nMy father always said, “If you can’t beat them, join them,” so I had the thought, “If only I could join Uncle Jamm’s Army.” My friend Snake said, “You can…” He was like, “Hey Rodger, you guys got the best dance promotion team in all of LA, but you don’t have the best DJ. My boy right here is the best DJ.” Rodger knew me from the dances… he was like, “You’re a DJ?” I was like, “Yeah.” He said, “Come with me.”
\n\nI went with him to make a commercial for the next party. I was amazed. “Wow, I’m in a studio!” I was playing with the turntable, doing cueing out loud, and started [the first] record… Rodger was like, “What are you doing?” “Just cueing the record, they call this scratching.” He put it in the commercial. In the commercial, he said, “We’re having a DJ contest, to find a new DJ for Uncle Jamm’s Army,” and I was like, “OK, I guess I’m going to be in the contest.”
\n\nIt was in Long Beach. It was five guys… I was the youngest one there, and they said, “OK, you go first,” and I was like, “Alright! No problem.”
They gave me Aretha Franklin’s “Jump to It.” I never heard this record before in my life. They set me up for failure. I put the record on in my headphones… It was like “Jump, jump, jump to it.” Then the beat came in. It went “Jump, jump, jump-chicka-jump.” I put the beat in. Then, “Jump, jump, jump, whip-jigga-jigga, jump…” All the DJs were looking at me like “What is he doing?” I’m like “Whoah, man, they’re not dancing.” I don’t know what to do. I just kept doing the bassline, breaking it down to the drums. Putting the bassline back in. Breaking it down to the drums. Just working that first eight bars.
\n\nI saw Rodger coming. Then I saw people standing up on chairs and tables looking at me like, “Is this good or bad?” Rodger made a beeline from the front door straight to the DJ booth. I’m trying to look at him and scratch and mix at the same time. He says, “Man, what record you want?” I’m like, “Oh, I get to pick what record I want now?” I asked for Grandmaster Flash “It’s Nasty,” Jonzun Crew and all these records that sound like that. I really start getting down, putting on different records. Everybody was clapping and cheering. I’m scratching “two turntables… two-two-two turntables,” then just getting it, “dun, dun, du-dun…”
\n\nAll the DJs were like, “I quit. I quit.” They didn’t even get on the turntables yet. Four of them walked away. One guy stayed. His name was Iceberg. He saw me do this and he’s like, “Man, this is amazing. I want to learn how to do what you’re doing.”
BATTLECAT
\nDJ and member of Uncle Jamm’s Army
Battlecat
\n\nThe first time I ever laid eyes on Egyptian Lover was in 1985 at Crenshaw High School, at a lunch dance with Bobcat and Rodger Clayton. He had this electrifying sense of control and speed…
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nEgyptian Lover was probably one of the luckiest cats on the West Coast. He went from high school, to superstar. Did you ever see Friday with Ice Cube? Egypt was the original Pinky. Had the Mercedes, wore suits every day, jheri curl moist, kept a pocketful of money. Arrogant as hell. Always talking shit. He was just that dude. You can’t get mad at him, but you can get mad at him.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nI learned from other celebrities that when you act like a celebrity, they treat you like a celebrity. If you walk in through the back door and don’t mingle with the audience, they kind of see you as this different kind of person… it’s like a mystery.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nWe did a function at the Long Beach Holiday Inn. Egypt came out and we knew he could help us go where we wanted to go. The way he blended music, the way he mixed, the trickery that he did… He would scratch with his elbow, he might do a 360-degree turn and catch it on the beat. One of the things that impressed me the most with Egypt was his ability to grab a beat and keep that going. “Bam! Bam! Bam!” He was really a phenomenal DJ.
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nBobcat started coming [our parties] when he was about 15… He would just watch Egypt mix and learn his mixes at home. Egypt was getting big-headed, he was blowing up, and eventually he went out on his own. I brought Bobcat in, and he and Egypt started competing. They’d hide records from each other.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nWhen Prince has his guitar, it becomes a part of him. When Egypt has the 808, it’s a part of him. He knows that machine. He’s making love to it.
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nI remember when Egypt got the 808. I was at his house and he was sitting over there, learning how to program it. We were like, “Man, this sounds just like ‘Planet Rock.’” I remember at the Uncle Jamm’s Army parties, they would start playing the 808. Rodger would always say, “Uncle Jamm’s Army, live in concert.” Then they would start chanting, “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,” and doing all the response stuff. I went, “Wait a minute, people are now dancing to a beat that’s not on a record…” They were going for like 10, 15, 20 minutes. It’s like, “We need to put this on the vinyl, on a record, and sell this.” And that’s what happened.
THE TUNES
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nOnce we bought an 808, Egypt became a master on it. I was OK, but he was a master. We did it live at the shows and finally we went into the studio and made “Dial-A-Freak.” It took us six months because we didn’t know any better and the engineer was a crook. He told us it would take 10 hours to EQ, we just didn’t know. And we put too much bass in there, because we was DJs… We made that in 1982 and released it in 1983 as Uncle Jamm’s Army. That was me and Egypt on vocals, he did drums and Rich Cason [who passed away in 2007] did keyboards. I did “Yes Yes Yes” [the B-side of “Dial-A-Freak”] with Egypt, and I did “The Roach Is on the Wall” after Egypt left, with Bobcat [in 1985].
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nWhen we first saw Uncle Jamm’s Army’s “Freak Beat (Yes Yes Yes),” we was pissed because we were doing the underground records already. Understand, whatever they did, we followed, and vice-versa… [Rodger] beat us before we jumped above ground.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nIt was just cool to do these records to see the name on a wax. That was like a kid’s dream for me growing up. I wanted to take it a step further from being in Uncle Jamm’s Army, to just being Egyptian Lover. “Egypt, Egypt” was more like an ego song for a DJ. All DJs have big egos, and I had a huge ego. I wanted people to know my name. That’s why I did the record, not knowing that it was going to be a hit.
\n\nOne day, Greg Mack called me. He said “I need you to come down to the radio station.” I’m like, “Man, I don’t have a car. I can’t get down.” He said, “You need to come down here.” I called one of my friends and said, “He said it was an emergency. I need to come down to the radio station.”
\n\nI went down and they said, “I want you to answer the phones.” I’m like, “You called me down here to answer the phones?” He was like, “No, just trust me. Answer the phone.” I answered the phone, and it was a request for “Egypt, Egypt.” Second call, request for “Egypt, Egypt.” Third call, “Can I hear some Egyptian Lover?” Fourth call, “And My Beat Goes Boom.” Fifth call, “Egypt, Egypt.” Sixth ... Nine straight calls, it was for Egyptian Lover. The tenth call, “Can I hear some Prince?” Eleventh call, “Can I hear some Egyptian Lover?” I’m like, “Dang.” Maybe the first 40 calls I took, only four said “Prince,” and all the rest was Egyptian Lover. I was blown away. He said, “It’s been like that all week.”
Ice-T
\n\nI used to call it aerobic music. All that breathing and shit that Egypt would do, I used to tease him. I’m like, “You going to pass out. How are you going to perform that? You’re going to hyperventilate.”
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nLike I tell everybody – and I don’t think anybody would disagree with me – the West Coast sound is a mixture of Prince, funk, which was like Parliament/Funkadelic and Cameo, Bar Kays, Zapp, all of that kind of stuff… those things together with Kraftwerk. That made the West Coast sound… on the East Coast they were talking about drugs and poverty and gang-banging and street stuff. We were talking about sex, women and partying. Then, it flipped on the West Coast. When gangsta rap came out, we start talking about the streets, [but] early on it was all about parties and sex.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nWe always wanted a record label, so Freak Beat Records became the label and Uncle Jamm’s Army was the first artist.… Once we started doing the concerts and having other artists and stuff like that, Egypt comes out with this record, “Egypt, Egypt,” which was phenomenal. I think it sold a half a million at least. So, he goes to another level, he’s traveling now, he’s getting requests all over the country, and he begins to do his own thing, with his own label, and his own people…
\n\nMany people believed that we were supposed to be the West Coast Def Jam… but as time went on, things began to change. As money starts to pour in, it happens with everybody… People wanted to be independent and started to do their own things. DJ Pooh started doing a production company with King Tee… I think he got signed to do production with Capitol Records, but he went on to do movies and stuff like that. We were happy for him… Uncle Jamm’s Army was like a school where you could come and learn.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nWe all used vocoders. We all used everything with 124 BPM or faster, a lot of repetition, a lot of theme music. Egyptian Lover had “Egypt, Egypt.” Dr. Dre had “Surgery.” It was that type of thing. LA Dream Team had “LA Dream Team’s in the House.” That’s how we competed. Everybody had their own theme.
I think that [the sound] propelled a lot of the DJs and producers to make the type of music we made on the West Coast. It was like this muffled explosion over and over and over.
MUSIC PEOPLE
\n\nIce-T
\n\nUncle Jamm’s had a huge concert system. If you’ve never really been out and heard those records played through [a] big system, it was something else. It was amazing. I was glad to live through it.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nIt sounded like a rolling earthquake, it was huge. Edwin [Vaultz]’s was like a Jamaican system – a wall of speakers. That was probably the biggest thing we envied Uncle Jamm’s Army for.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nEdwin became involved in Uncle Jamm’s Army, I believe in late 1982, early 1983… Rodger and I always talked about the need to have our own equipment, but we didn’t have storage, and stuff would come up missing, so we almost exclusively started working with Edwin [at his company, Music People]. He had the lights, he had a great operation that was local, right in the hood… You’re talking about quality equipment… It wasn’t like, well, let’s sacrifice and just go with Edwin. It was always professional and the sound was just great – that was something that we demanded.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nWhen I ran into Rodger, I was kind of like, “OK, I got more speakers than anybody in town; they do a lot of parties.” I was trying to get more contracts with people who did regular parties. I was like, “Nobody can give you more than I can, at a price that you can deal with.”
\n\nIt would have been the late ’70s. It just looked like the perfect marriage. The biggest thing they were doing was the Alpine Village, or the Long Beach Holiday Inn, or stuff by colleges. I just saw it as something that could be consistent and grow much larger. We just developed this strategic relationship. Nothing on paper, everything just on a handshake. “You know what you do. I know what I do. We’ll come together.” It worked.
\n\nWe used 100% Cerwin-Vega. The amount of speakers we’d have, we didn’t need that many, but we liked the people standing in front of them. They’d just stand and let the bass blow their clothes.
\n\nBattlecat
\n\nThe Music People were the foundation for providing sound equipment for all the events that Uncle Jamm’s Army put together in Los Angeles and outside… [Edwin] was an uncle and a father figure for me. That kept me out of trouble because, to be a part of his organization, you had to have your grades. He wanted very intelligent people to give responsibility to.
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nThe hundred speakers, I used to think that was overkill, but as you walked up, you could hear the music from three blocks away. All you could hear was this low-frequency, boom sound. They would make people stand outside, and the line would get really long. Everyone’s outside, the music’s inside playing, the people were freaking out. There’s nobody inside yet, but you could just hear the freaking bass.
\n\nI think that was another thing that really propelled a lot of the DJs and producers to make the type of music we made on the West Coast. That sound. It was like this muffled explosion over and over and over.
\n\nEdwin had all the amps, the speakers, the turntables. I remember when Edwin first saw me scratching… he was like, “What are you doing?” He took his needles off the turntable, like, “Bring your own needles if you going to be doing stuff like that.” The next party he brought the needles back and said, “Don’t tear them up.” I’m doing my thing and he saw how the crowd reacted to us and was like, “OK, that’s cool.”
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nI never went to sound training. I never worked for another sound company. Never went to school for it. If you asked me, “What is an ohm?” I don’t really know… I’m not trying to get on stage and DJ. I don’t want to DJ, but I want to make sure that shit don’t cut off when you’re DJing.
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nThe amps would blow before the speakers would ever blow. That’s how good those things were. You could push them and push them and push them – it was unlimited bass.
\n\nBattlecat
\n\nWe had an extra set of amps on standby… They started buying personal house fans and tying them to the back of the amp because they didn’t have a high-end fan system to cool it off.
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nIt was just like you were surrounded by freaking sound. It was crazy.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nTruth be told, some of the speakers weren’t even plugged up, it just looked good.
THE STYLE
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nTheir look was kind of military. Sometimes they would wear fatigues. It was never uniformed. Gid might have a little something. Rodger may have a little something… The Wreckin’ Cru was different… We walked into a venue, and we’d have 15 cats wearing satin jackets, and black pants, or whatever. That was our thing. We had a little more time to organize.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nHere’s what I told Rodger. I said, “Rodger. I’m going to have everybody who works with us from now on at our functions, they’re going to wear the sunglasses and army attire.” When people come to our dance, myself, anybody collecting the money, if you’re bringing a crate of albums in, it was mandatory that you wear some military. I had army boots, army pants, the hat, the whole nine. We became Uncle Jamm’s Army.
![](\"https://media.redbullmusicacademy.com/assets/EDWIN_0081.911ede2d.jpg?auto=format&w=700\")
Edwin Vaultz
\n\nMost of the crew that I had, they’d have on either jeans, they’d have a Music People satin jacket, but not any fashionable things. Most of the time, I would be in a suit with shirt and tie or a tux… I had enough guys on the team where I didn’t literally have to touch any speakers…
\n\nBattlecat
\n\nWe could identify everybody because of the clothes they were wearing. When you see khakis, when you see some people with golf hats, fishnets over their hair for pressing curls or braids, you can identify them as the gang-bangers. When you see girls dressed in Cross Courts and Filas and Sergio Tacchini and skirts and tennis outfits, you can identify them as the hot mommas or the pretty girls. The hip-hoppers, they’d have parachute pants and Adidas… They would wear neutral rags – either black-and-white, white or grey bandanas that they’d tie around their neck like cowboys – with windbreakers from Nike.
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nThe fashion at the parties was crazy. Even me, I started out as a pop-locker… White suspenders, black khakis, with some checkered Vans, white gloves, that kind of look. As soon as the freak came in, everybody flipped up and started dressing crazy. It’s funny, it coincided with Uncle Jamm’s Army too. There was a clothing store called Flip of Hollywood back then. Everybody was wearing Flip… You had these girls, they wore tank tops mostly with no bras, holes cut in them, and looking all freaky and stuff.
\n\nIt was a wild, wild time. Either you looked like a pop-locker or breakdancer, Prince, or Michael Jackson. I chose Prince. I started dressing like Prince, and so did Egypt. We did a big concert at the Santa Ana Bowl or something, and we dressed up like Prince. It was wild, wild… It almost looked like Purple Rain. That scene in the club, where everybody was looking all crazy. That was Uncle Jamm’s Army.
THE PLAYPEN
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nWe had the freakiest club ever in the history of LA and it was called The Playpen. This is in 1982. That’s where the freak dance started in LA. The ladies had no panties on in there.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nThe Playpen was on the corner of Stocker and Crenshaw. It was an old restaurant. They opened one of the first regular clubs there, and a lot of stuff went on wasn’t cool… I mean it wasn’t legal. It was crazy. It was a den of debauchery.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nThere were a couple of times during the run of Uncle Jamm’s Army where we would get a spot that became a regular night. The Playpen was one. I’d never seen that environment before or since then. It just got wild, it’s like you’d turn music on and you’d get one girl that does something and then another one says I can top that. It was nothing pre-planned. It was just a party atmosphere… What they did have, which was different, was a stage, it was like a runway. It was just an interesting experience.
\n\nThere were a number of times that somebody’s momma was at the door. You know, because either they’re not supposed to be there at all, or they’re there and they’re staying longer than they were supposed to. It wasn’t uncommon for somebody’s momma to be there and, you know, “Get your butt outta here…”
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nHype. As soon as you walk in, hype. I mean, just people going bananas. Dancing and having a good time, and it was clean fun. Sometimes people would go too far. We used to have contests, and I didn’t really like us doing that. Rodger and Egypt used to love it. I’m blaming it on them.
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nWhoo… We couldn’t even talk about what happened at The Playpen. There was so much nastiness going on in that place. It was just a dark club with no light and loud music and just sweat and naked people.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nIt became a mosque and now it’s a mall. I’ll never forget, one day the guy at the front of the mosque told me, “They were in here… the Devil was in here… the Uncle Jamm’s people were in here!”
One time, I was on the mic, and I hear a voice say, “Talk that sh*t, boy!” I turned around, and it’s my father standing on the side of the stage. I’m like, “Aw, naw!”
THE FREAK
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nThe whole of Uncle Jamm’s Army, for a while, became the big freak. I mean, listen to some Egypt’s records. “I’m a big freak.” They had a dance back then called “freaking”… The guys would be behind the girls and they’d be grinding on their butts or whatever, and that was the dance. The nastier you could make this dance look, the more intriguing [it was] to the crowd. Sometimes people get caught up in the moment, and they would do things that just wasn’t cool.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nI was the nasty guy. I was always talking nasty to the audience… One time, I was on the mic, and I was just talking nasty. All of a sudden I hear a voice say, “Talk that shit, boy!” I turned around, and it’s my father standing on the side of the stage. I’m like, “Aw, naw! What is he doing here?” I look over and my brother-in-law is standing there, and one of my best friends named Duane. I looked at them like, “Why’d you bring them here?” He’s like, “They wanted to see what you were doing.” I just turned the mic off like, “Click. No more talking tonight.”
Arabian Prince
\n\nIt started late ’70s, early ’80s, this whole freak scene… I remember being at school and teachers were walking around the dances with signs saying, “No Freaking…” We just loved it. Every chance we got to play something that was a song that people did it to, we would do it. It was this phenomenon, and it got worse and worse and worse and nastier. I saw people actually having sex on the dancefloor at a lot of the shows…
\n\nHeatwave’s “Groove Line,” [Sexual Harrasment’s] “I Need a Freak,” definitely “Planet Rock,” all of the Cybotron and early Uncle Jamm’s Army stuff. That was the stuff that got people to freak. Rick James, Prince… you play some Prince, it’s over.
\n\nBattlecat
\n\nThe freak ... Man, at 10,000 watts at about 50-60 dBs… oh my God, you’re going to gyrate. Something is going to happen… It was crazy, man, how music would incite and motivate and push the envelope of freakiness, man. Records like “Knee Deep,” “Ants In My Pants,” “1999”… all these sexual gestures and lyrics, it did something.
\n\nIce-T
\n\nUncle Jamm had a nice fertile ground of freaks. There used to be freak sessions and freak circles. It was wild up in there…
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nEverybody was freaking. If you would have put a condom machine in there, you probably would have made a lot of money.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nI’m a father, at the time I had a daughter, so I look at that entirely different... You’ve got these guys on a dancefloor, and the only thing I’m thinking, “That is somebody’s daughter.” It was literally anything goes. At any given moment, you might have walked into the bathroom or the back of somewhere and there’s just no telling what you’re gonna walk up on...
PROGRAMMING
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nWe became the pulse of LA. KDAY wasn’t even playing the stuff that we was playing at our parties. People would come to our parties to hear the newest grooves. We had great ears.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nThere’d be a lot of DJs who’d want to play the most popular record right away and throughout the night. That wasn’t Rodger. Rodger understood how to program and taught a lot of DJs how to program.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nBobcat was my protégé at DJing… I taught him a thing called “quality mixing.” You do this for a little bit and then you stop. Then you do the mixing. Then you do this for a little bit and you stop. You’ve got to control it. I said, “Next time you play, watch…” Rodger actually taught me how to program and I kind of taught Bobcat. Then Rodger and me taught Bobcat how to be less of a show DJ and more of a keep-the-party-rocking DJ.
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nUncle Jamm’s Army were the best programmers in the history of parties. We would program a crowd for five or six hours. I’m not a great mixer, but I can kill any DJ at a party because I can out-program them. That’s the key. Egypt was an incredible raw talent, and then I taught him how to program. Then he became a complete DJ.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nRodger had an ear for music. I’ve never known anybody like him before. Like Prince… I would put Rodger in the same category with regard to his love to music, his understanding of it…
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nUncle Jamm’s Army, it was a stage show, it was a spectacle… Rodger Clayton was an artist. He was like the conductor. He was like the Quincy Jones, who kind of moved everything along. Gid, Egypt and Bobcat and everybody had their own little persona and just egged the crowd on. It was always crowd participation. That’s one thing that I’ve always said that sets Uncle Jamm’s Army apart from the DJs today – the crowd participation, being able to interact with the audience. A lot of DJs sit in their house and they practIce their set and when they go to the club or go to the party, they play that set, but they don’t interact with the audience. They don’t take time to get the audience involved in what they’re doing or feel out the flow.
Egyptian Lover
\n\nWe knew we had four hours to rock the party. We can’t play the same record twice, so of course, you save the best records for the last hour. Let’s say we’re going from ten to two – from ten to 11, we’ll play all the brand-new hip-hop and R&B stuff. When Run-DMC came out with “It’s Like That,” that would be played first – before anybody had heard it, we had it first. “I Need a Freak” by Sexual Harassment, we had it first, and it would be played the first hour. We’re actually testing the records by watching the crowd’s reactions.
\n\nFrom 11 to 12, we’d play more of the hot hip-hop stuff, whatever was on the radio at the time, or whatever we knew already tested positive for a good jam. Something you could freak to. Then, from 12 to one, it was our freak-Prince style. We played a lot of Prince music, a lot of stuff that had “freak” in it, like “Super-Freak” by Rick James, or anything that Prince was involved with… Sheila E, “Nasty Girl” by Vanity 6. By that time, everybody is partying and just being freaky and wild.
\n\nThen, for the last hour, we’d play all the high-energy, “Planet Rock”-type stuff, Kraftwerk, [Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five’s] “Scorpio,” [Melle Mel & Duke Bootee’s] “Survival”… The stuff that I play today was what we played the last hour, and that’s when I DJed for Uncle Jamm’s, that last hour. I just got on there and turned it out.
\n\nArabian Prince
\n\nYeah, I think that Uncle Jamm’s ability to bring and break new records that no one had heard, or remix a song, or take a song that you hear every day on the radio and mix it… there were a lot of DJs, but there weren’t a lot of DJs cutting and mixing. I’m not talking about scratching, I’m talking about taking two records, putting them on a turntables and mixing them into something else. After a lot of the parties, people were like, “Hey, where can I get that?” “Well, you can’t get that, we made that on stage.”
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nThere were times when it was just call and response, where we would get on the mic, and the crowd became one entity, man. It was phenomenal to watch them get to the level – a frantic stage, where they were just into it all the way.
AMBITION
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nReally, Uncle Jamm’s Army made it because of a couple of things coming together. Rodger’s work ethic and his vision of what he wanted to do… My contribution, a part of the vision, was that we collectively got together all the local promoters for a party called The Big One – everybody got together and did one dance…
\n\nAfter we did that night, I just remember looking at [Rodger] and saying, “Dude, we don’t need them to do this. We can do this on our own.” Then that’s what we did… We had the DJs. We had the street crew, we had the soundsystem, we had the money to do it all. It’s like, “What do we need them for?”
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nI noticed a story [in the Los Angeles Times] on the Sports Arena – that they were losing money, that they were losing accounts. Ice Capades, Barnum & Bailey, I think USC (University of Southern California) or somebody in basketball. They were going through a change where huge accounts that they depended on were moving.
\n\nWe were [also] in turmoil again. It’s another pivotal time for us, because places like the Long Beach Arena and the Convention Center are saying, “You guys can’t come back. I love you and Rodger, but you can’t come back here... Your crowd is too huge for these [venues],”
\n\nTwo years before, I’d told my crew, “Someday we’ll do the Sports Arena,” and we all believed it. [So, I called the arena and asked who was in charge.] They say it’s a guy named George Gonzalez, the event coordinator. He said, “Come on in and talk to me.” I sit down with George, and I tell him, “Look, our crowd is getting really big. We need a bigger venue, and I know you guys are having some challenges right now.” He’s like, “First of all, what do you mean your crowd?” I said, “We’re promoters.” He said, “Who are you promoting?” I said, “We’ve got in-house DJs.”
\n\nHe said, “You’re getting all these big crowds with in-house talent? What are you talking about?” He’s basically like, “Come on, man. I’ve been doing this for a minute.” I’m like, “Look, it’s a phenomenon. I can’t explain it to you. We’ve got a couple of DJs. They’re popular. We’ve been doing this for a long time. We’ve worked very hard. Our crowd is bigger than the Long Beach Arena. It’s bigger than the Coliseum.”
\n\nHe said, “Listen. I’ll tell you what, man. I’m going to call you back. Let me check out some things, and I’ll call you back.” He called me back a day later, and he said, “Come on back in and let’s talk.”
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THE BUSINESS
\n\nIce-T
\n\nThese guys were kids from the hood who made a legitimate business, making more money than most hustlers in the streets.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nOne time we counted 50 grand. Just piles and piles of dollars.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nOnce you start doing the parties, you can’t just do one party and live for that. You’ve got to already have your next party going, which means you’ve got to have deposits, posters, flyers, and be ready to start advertising. Then we started doing multiple markets. We’d do LA. We’d do San Diego. We’d do Riverside or San Bernardino… I mean even back in the day, in the early ’80s, it would take us about 25 grand to do the Sports Arena.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nEdwin is my other brother. He’s the business guru guy. He was always the finance guy… When anything didn’t seem like it was going right, “It’s OK, I’m going to call Edwin.” That was it. He was just a tad older than us, but he was more or less like our big brother. He still is.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nWhen I first met Edwin, I go to his house and he has a business card folder – holders full of credit cards in a three-ring binder. He has like 75, maybe 100 credit cards. Visa, MasterCard, JC Penney, everything, American Express. I’m like, “Dude…” I thought he was bullshitting. He’s like, “All these cards are great, all of them are good.” I’m like, “How in the hell do you manage that many cards?”
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nYou’ve got to remember now, I’ve got a couple of hundred Cerwin-Vega speakers… Cerwin-Vega speakers at the time were running about $1,500 a pair. You’re probably saying, “How does some little nappy-head boy from the east side of town get a couple of hundred speakers?” I developed ways to acquire, if you will, speakers, amplifiers, stuff like that… I had several different avenues to put my hands on money right away.
\n\nI might get a call from Rodger. See, our dances… the way you set them up is that you put on as minimal a down payment as you can, a deposit on the venue. Then, you promote strong, get people to go to the venue and buy tickets. The more tickets they buy, the less money to have to come and put up. Let’s say, hypothetically, the Sports Arena is renting for, say, $12,000. You put up the $2,000, and they need 50% of the money before the event, or they’re going to cancel, and they need it four days out, or three days out. You put up two, so if it’s 12, that means six total… Now, we got another $4,000 we’ve got to come up with. We say, “OK, we’ll promote strong, and then let ticket sales generate the other $4,000 revenue.”
\n\nWell, our group of people didn’t buy tickets ahead of time, a lot of times. All of a sudden now, it’s Wednesday morning of a dance on Saturday, and the Sports Arena gives you a call and says, “Hey, I need another five grand in here. It’s nine in the morning, and I need it by noon, or we’re pulling the plug on your event.” I’ve got to pull a rabbit out of my ass, and show up with certified funds… You’ve either got to bring cash or a cashier’s check. I had to put systems in place, so that I could get money right now… where I could make a phone call, “I need five grand, and I need it in 20 minutes. OK?”
\n\nIf you have a credit card, with cash-advance availability on it, there’s no questions asked… Credit card companies would mail you checks, and if you ever wanted to use the cash advance, you just write a check, and go to the bank and cash your check. They call and verify, check is good, you’ve got a credit card with a $10,000 limit with maybe a $7,500 cash advance. You just keep your folders with all of them, and, “OK, I’ll go pull that one out.” Just take it to the bank, write a check, and you’ve got money, instant. Boo-ya.
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ROCKING THE ARENA
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nThe Sports Arena at the time was one of the largest venues in LA… It’s right next to the Coliseum, which is right next to USC, which was the center of everything going on… I think the capacity there for a game was about 15,000 to 17,000… As a kid, and even now, you look at some places and you’re like, “This place is huge.” You go inside the Sports Arena you still say, “Wow!” There were no chairs or anything, no court, just a center floor. It’s a circle, and the stage would be on one end of the stadium… You’d come through the front doors, then you’d take the escalator or the stairs down, you’re seeing all of these people and they’re selling sodas and popcorn, and you’re hearing the music. You’re like, “Wow, I’m here.”
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nThe LA Times dropped a big issue in the Sunday edition. Me and Rodger were like, “Whoa! Our picture’s in there, they’re talking about us, they’re naming us in the LA Times.” We used to read the LA Times every day. We never thought we’d… that was the thing that made my mom proud.”
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nWe gave one dance and Cara Lewis and Russell Simmons got involved. Run-D.M.C. played and we broke “It’s Like That” at the show that night. This was their first time in LA, 1983, and it was the second or third time we had done the LA Sports Arena. We didn’t need Run-D.M.C. – we already had 6,000 people coming to see us play – we added Run-D.M.C.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nI remember when Run-D.M.C. first came to the Sports Arena to do a party [with us]. Jam Master Jay said to me, “This is how you guys do it in LA?” He’d never seen so many beautiful women in the same place, and just a sea of people partying from the beginning of the stage, all the way to the back of the Sports Arena.
GANGS
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nThat first event, the Sports Arena, we were all so excited. It was packed, just like we thought it would be, and the people had a great time. It’s hard to contain over 8,000 kids and not have some trouble. There was some trouble in the parking lot. During that time, there was a huge gang problem in Los Angeles.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nSome of Uncle Jamm’s Army’s biggest clientele were Crips, and usually somebody would get beat or stabbed… Sometimes events didn’t even take place [because of it]… We always had different management philosophies. I didn’t go for big numbers… I went for clientele that was a little bit older, not just anybody that had ten bucks. We had dress codes and things like that.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nOne of the most popular gangs really loved coming to our events – the Rollin’ 60s, they were on top at that time. They would come out to our events, all of the gangsters. You got different gangs at the peak. When we’re playing [George Clinton’s] “Atomic Dog” [an anthem for the Crips], or some DJ Quik or whatever, you start to see different rags. Blue over there and red over here, and people run all of a sudden because somebody maybe pulled a gun or whatever.
\n\nThese are some of the things we had to deal with, and 90% of the time we were able to stay on top of it.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nRodger always had, in the very back of every crate of records, an emergency song. If they start fighting, [he’d] go to the back of the crate, pull this record out, put it on, and gangsters would actually stop fighting, quit walking, and throw their signs in the air. We'd put on [Parliament / Funkadelic] “Flashlight,” and gangsters would be like, “that's my jam” and start throwing up their gang signs and crip walking and just having fun. I'm like, “Rodger, how’d you figure this out?” “House parties. When they start acting up, I put on this and they will stop fighting and they would start dancing.”
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nWe got big, we couldn’t say, “Listen,” on the commercial, “we don’t want anybody that’s gonna come with trouble.”
\n\nIce-T
\n\nI was deeply connected to all the different gangs. I never jumped into a gang. I’m not a gang member so to speak, but I’m a gang affiliate. I know cats from Rollin’ 60s, Harlem Crips, 8 Tray Gangsters, Hoover. I knew more Crips than Bloods, but I knew the NS Boys, Bounty Hunters.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nThe Rollin’ 60s were a group of young men that pretty much lived in the Crenshaw area, around the 60th street, and they were huge. They were a force to be reckoned with. I had the Bloods to worry about. Rodger had the Crips – the 60s, they were Crips. They pretty much ran on the west side of town and they were very mobile. A lot of time they were good for revenue, because they come 50, 60, 100 deep.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\n[The security] didn’t need to be armed. When you walked up to the door and you saw these big guys, everybody got really nice – even the ones that were trying to act ugly, because they didn’t want to have to deal with them. They were martial arts experts. A lot of people don’t know it, but yeah, I saw them choke a couple of people out.
\n\nThere weren’t a lot of incidents at the Uncle Jamm’s Army functions. I remember one little girl got shot in the ankle. That was at the Sports Arena actually. I was standing on the stage and I heard somebody say, “Gun!” This was right before the gang stuff started… I said, “You want this?” That’s when they kind of slowed down, because the gangs kind of started coming in. They wanted to party too, but they didn’t know how to act.
There were certain songs that you did not play at Uncle Jamm’s Army dances, or any other dance, unless you wanted a gang fight.
Arabian Prince
\n\nThere were two things that happened that kind of killed the DJ scene on the West Coast, and I would say it all happened around the same time… Everybody was making records, so it was kind of like, “We’re touring now. We’re doing concerts as opposed to just having to promote a party. We got other people promoting us now… and we’re making more money without having to do all of the work.” I think that was one thing… but at the same time the gang-affiliation thing just went crazy.
\n\nThere were certain songs that you did not play at Uncle Jamm’s Army dances, or any other dance, unless you wanted a gang fight. That was anything by Parliament-Funkadelic, or anything by Zapp… You don’t play “Grapevine,” because there was like a Grape Street gang. You don’t play “More Bounce,” or “So Ruff So Tuff,” any of these songs, because all of a sudden the gang signs would go up… Those were the anthems of the hood.
\n\nI remember at this one concert, there was a bunch of dudes over there with red rollers in their head, and red suits on, sweatsuits, and there’s a bunch of dudes over there with blue on and blue rollers in their head, and I’m like, “You know what?” You could just see them in the crowd, like, “This is about to go down,” and sure enough, it went down. It was this big riot, and that was pretty much the end of it.
\n\nI think Egypt can attest to this, we were at the Veterans Auditorium one night, messing around outside. They’d kicked out some gang-bangers, [because] somebody had been stabbed or something. We were all standing outside, and some dudes pulled up in a car and stuck a shotgun out the window and pulled the trigger, but it didn’t go off… I’m blessed to be here because that could have been it right then.
\n\nIt was just, “Can’t do it no more. It’s just too crazy.” Nobody would even insure us after that.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nI think the LA police department told the Sports Arena, “We cannot have the Uncle Jamm’s Army shows anymore.” It was starting to get a little too violent.
THE END
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nNobody ever got killed in the party, but we had people get shot outside the auditorium. My vision was to get a record label. It just didn’t happen… A lot of things happened. Our personal demons started to catch up with us a little bit. The womanizing, the sex, drugs, and rock & roll… All the greats have gone through it, you know? We were great, and then I think we hit a point where I remember having a conversation with Edwin and saying, “The ship is sinking.” He said, “Kid, the ship has already sunk.” It was sad. I can laugh now, but it wasn’t funny then.
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nAt that point, I had a slow time in my life. In the mid-’80s, the parties got real bad, because of crack and gangs. I had started the DJ’s Booth record store in 1984, but that was run into the ground, because I was never there.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nThis is why I left Uncle Jamm’s Army. We did the “Freak Beat” green label, with a serial code UJA001. I started Freak Beat Gold, which was Egyptian Lover’s label. That serial number was DMSR661. So we had UJA and DMSR – [they stood for] Uncle Jamm’s Army and Dance Music Sex Romance – totally separate accounts. Rodger would go to the pressing plant, and get [copies of] “Egypt, Egypt”’ and not pay for them. I would have to pay for them.
\n\nWe had a record store and one time he took 5,000 “Egypt Egypt”s, and traded them for 5,000 records to put in the store. It would have been fine with me, but he didn’t let me know that. Now, I have to pay for these 5,000 records.
\n\nI walk into the record store, and I’m like, “Wow. So actually these are my records, because Rodger traded mine for them.” He was in the back, and I start picking up two brand new this, two brand new that. I had about 20 records. I brought them to the counter, and I asked the girl at the counter, who was Rodger’s girlfriend, to put them in a bag for me. She started ringing them up, I said, “No, don’t ring them up, put them in a bag.” Rodger came and said, “It’s OK, he can have them,” She said, “No, you can’t have free records.” I just looked at him like, “Tell her.”
\n\nLater, the pressing plant calls me saying, “He’s here picking up another 2,000.” I’m like, “OK, he can have those 2,000. After that, cut it off. I’m changing the label to Egyptian Empire Records, so he can never pick them up again.” That’s how we fell out.
\n\nThen I was in the studio working on two new records. Rodger went to the studio when I went on tour and stole the tapes, put the vocals on there that I told him I was going to do, made it his style, and changed it up. I called him up and said, “This is the last straw. I’m never going to make another beat for Uncle Jamm’s Army.”
\n\nYears later, we started talking again. I brushed everything under the table. We did a party in August 2010... That was the last time we DJed together. Me, him, and Battlecat. We were really close friends. We talked the day before he passed away.
Looking back now, one [of us] should have been the Russell Simmons of the West Coast.
Ice-T
\n\nYou just can’t keep doing the same thing. I think Rodger and them knew that. That’s why they started making records. They knew they weren’t going to be able to promote forever. You have to move. You have to be ready to change your game.
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nAfter about five or six years of promotions, and being out in the middle of the night all the time, being at every event, covering all these poles all over the city with posters, it got to a point when I didn’t want to do that stuff anymore… I got to a point where it was like, “I’m done.”
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nLooking back now, shit… one [of us] should have been the Russell Simmons of the West Coast.
THE LEGACY
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nLonzo really misses [Rodger]. He called me one day, he’s like, “I don’t have anybody to compete with now.” He was really heartbroken.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\nA few years ago, there was a picture taken in [New York] of all the guys from hip-hop, from Kool Herc down to the latest guy. They decided to do the same thing here on the West Coast. They got us all together. It took about a year-and-a-half to plan this picture out. They rented out this big, old football field. [Me and Rodger] got there about 11 o’clock in the morning and it came to time for the picture to be taken. Everybody is going up the bleachers, and me and Rodger are up at the top almost, just sitting there talking, getting along. The photographer is getting into position to take the picture, and somebody, I don’t know who it was, says, “Where’s Lonzo and Rodger? If it wasn’t for them two motherfuckers, wouldn’t none of us be here.”
\n\nRodger Clayton
\n\nI’m proudest of the fact that we broke more East and West Coast records out here than anybody. We were the pioneers of the West Coast rap scene. People still come up to me and tell me how much our parties changed them when they were younger. Sometimes I walk down the street and get treated like Michael Jackson.
\n\nLonzo Williams
\n\n[Me and Rodger] were the nucleus of West Coast hip-hop. We were the nitro and the glycerin, we were the Adam and the Eve. Our feud fueled the whole West Coast.
\n\nIce-T
\n\nUncle Jamm’s took club parties to arena levels. Now, the big DJs are playing for thousands and thousands of people. [Uncle Jamm’s] started that. They gave young kids in South Central a place to go and… they gave me my start. They gave me the first place I was ever able to perform to such a large audience.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nEven today, 30 years later, [I have people saying to me], “Man, you came to my high school and ever since then, I’ve been wanting to do this for a living… now I’m an engineer for CBS.” It’s like, “When I saw you do this, I wanted to do it.” I understand. That was me. When I saw it, I wanted to do it, too.
\n\nAdrienne Clayton
\n\nI hear stories of husbands and wives that met at the dances. I get a lot of those.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nWe didn’t really understand ... back then, it was just something you did. Later on, you look back and say, “Whoa, we were the shit.”
\n\nGid Martin
\n\nI think it impacted people’s lives in a real positive way… Uncle Jamm’s Army touched people on a deep level. It was some of the greatest partying this city has known. It just became part of people’s history.
\n\nBattlecat
\n\nWhatever Afrika Bambaataa and Grandmaster Flash are to New York, Uncle Jamm’s Army and the members were that on the West Coast.
\n\nEdwin Vaultz
\n\nWe didn’t have a mission statement, you know? They wanted to be the absolute best DJs, period. Rodger, [as a] promoter, wanted to be the absolute best. When it comes to the sound, nobody would have better sound than us. We weren’t playing to win, we were playing to kill.
\n\nEgyptian Lover
\n\nEvery time I go to a party and I get ready to DJ, I visualize myself back at an Uncle Jamm’s. I’ll close my eyes, think [about that] and just get on the turntables and do my thing.
As part of our celebration of Uncle Jamms Army during the inaugural Red Bull Music Academy Festival Los Angeles, we produced the above documentary as part of our ongoing series, The Note. Reporting on this oral history was done by Todd L. Burns and Frosty. Dave Stelfox put together the oral history from their quotes. Special thanks to Brian Coleman for the use of his archival interview with Rodger Clayton, conducted in 2005.
Header image © Edwin Vaultz