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DC LaRue
A composer and writer of dance classics and a multi-disciplinary graphic designer acclaimed for his album cover work for some of the biggest names in the recording business, D.C. LaRue is a model for the renaissance man ...
by Jussi Kantonen Posted: 01.16.08
... Add to that his model looks, and you had the first bona fide male disco star of the scene. This with all respect to Mr Barry White who was the first to put fully evolved boogie prototypes into practice but did not exactly present a strapping calendar guy figure, or to commercial chart phenomenon's like K.C and Carl Douglas. D.C was not pop, he was hardcore disco.
D.C, you started as a designer of album sleeves during a time when personal visual criteria was created without a proliferation of computers. What were your fundamental principles in that dawning age of electronic media, your means to the sophisticated ends you accomplished?
DC LaRue: I firmly believe the proliferation of computers in recording studios during the mid-1970s was a creative blessing! Although I had done a lot of studio recording prior to "Cathedrals" in 1975, it wasn't until the inception of the electronic/synthesizer age that my writing/performing/producing and recording work really started to shine. And the reason is simple. All those crazy, wonderful musical things that I would hear in my head, well, with synthesizers I could translate them into actual recordings at last! Sounds that I had always wanted to create and was told couldn't be done for so many years, well, all of a sudden I could make them happen. Of course, a lot of credit belongs to my co-producers ARAM SCHEFRIN and BOB ESTY, especially Aram. He was so very important in producing the recordings. He possessed the magic of being able to translate all the things that were going on in my head into arrangements and on to tape. Believe it or not, I can't read or write music. I write everything by ear on the piano. Aram could read my mind. He was very special. He helped me made the music happen.
Any personal favorites that stand out of the lot?
DC LaRue: From my own body of work? Well, I think my very, very favorite recording is "THE TEA DANCE." The entire album, from beginning to end. When an artist/writer/producer goes into the studio they always have an end result in mind but, sadly, most of the time there is something that doesn't quite feel right, that doesn't really come together the way you had envisioned it. In the final analysis there is always one or two tracks that you're just a little unhappy with. Conceptually "THE TEA DANCE" was very elaborate and complex, a tribute to dance music thought the years. From "Going Hollywood," a Lindy, a Tap Dance with "Broadway Melody," a Samba with "O Ba Ba," a Middle Eastern belly dance with "Indiscreet," the Fox Trot with "Bad News" and so on. Specially the title cut "THE TEA DANCE" which goes from the Two Step to Disco to Rock/Dance and The Bop, all in one track. It was a real challenge, but from beginning to end the album turned out to be everything I had hoped it would be. Even after all these years I wouldn't change a thing!
Another favorite would have be the 12" re-mix of "LET THEM DANCE." I have to admit that all I did on this one was sit in the studio and watch as engineer BOB STONE did all the re-mix work. The extended break he created is amazing, breath taking to say the least. A real masterpiece in my opinion. Even though I had very little to contribute except for being able to recognize Bob's genius and let him do whatever he felt like doing it's one of my favorites. And it worked so well in the clubs.it was magic!! It really got people on their feet and kept them dancing. "Trance" inducing to say the least.
And, of course, there's the "CATHEDRALS" track. It was such a good recording that, at times, I can hardly believe that it is mine. And it was such an easy record to make. Everything just fell into place. So smooooth! I am so proud of it and it's enduring quality. The recognition it keeps receiving as time goes by is constantly amazing me. It is getting more ASCAP performance/air play credits through out the world now in 2007 than it did when it was originally a hit in 1976. Every time it is sampled it renews interest in the original recording (for example: " 3 AM"/Bobby Blanco & Miki Moto/Defected Records, UK) "3 AM" was a giant hit! Huge! And it's almost all "CATHEDRALS." So much so that I am getting a "performance" rate royalty as opposed to the usual "sample" rate royalty.
"CATHEDRALS" just goes on and on. World famous disco DJ, record producer and music publisher Johnny "Jellybean" Benitez has been quoted as saying that he feels "CATHEDRALS" is one of the most import dance records of the entire decade. It has influenced so many producers and writers. Who am I to argue with that? Over the years there have been countless people crediting "CATHEDRALS" as changing their lives, musical and otherwise. It's been a wild trip. WOW!
According to an issue of the British magazine Blues and Soul you were also a dedicated clubber during the early years of disco. What was a good night out like for you, and which venues did you like the best?
DC LaRue: That's right. I really was a dedicated clubber in the early 1970s! I was out almost every night dancing and partying. But there were so many "nights out" that, unfortunately, they all kind of blur together, if you know what I mean. I had my favorite clubs. Hollywood, Limelight, Gallery, Flamingo, 12 West, Studio 54, the 10th Floor, Le Jardin and the Loft at 99 Prince Street. Later in the decade I really loved Paradise Garage and Larry Levan's party. Larry was one of the sweetest man and an incredibly talented DJ. And he always treated me like I was real special. His DJ booth turned into a second home. I would arrive and he would cue up two copies of "Cathedrals" on two turntables and play them back to back for an hour!! He really loved that record.
But actually once "Cathedrals" became a big hit I didn't go out quite as much. I always felt a little uncomfortable "arriving" as a celebrity. I have never been a very "public" person. I couldn't really relax and enjoy myself after people started recognizing me. You loose a lot of freedom with the kind of success I experienced. I started to only go out on special and/or business occasions by 1977. It was kind of sad in a way. I really missed the night clubbing.
And then "Cathedrals" hit the club land and became the timeless classic it's regarded today. We all know the story behind the brilliant and not a little laconic lyrics, how you were concerned about the way we used to "march across those beds" back in the day. But what about the music, the baselines and the famed groove itself, how did those come about?
DC LaRue: I co-produced the "Cathedrals" recording with my good friend ARAM SCHEFRIN. We would always work together the same way. He would come over to my apartment with his guitar. I would sit at the piano with him sitting beside me with his guitar. I would play him the song I wanted to work on and fill him in as much as possible as to what I was thinking and how I would like the recording to sound. Then we would bounce around different ideas on the piano and guitar until we came up with some kind of groove.
Needless to say, I take all the credit for the "CATHEDRALS" lyrics and music. I don't know where I came up with the courage to actually write that stuff down and be so honest about the promiscuity of the time back in 1976.
The guitar riff on "CATHEDRALS" is all Aram. And it is brilliant! He came up with that groove all by himself and he also played it on the recording. The bass line reflects a little of both of us. We used to play around with different bass lines on the piano until we came up with something we both liked.
I always knew what I wanted to do with the strings on a track so I would sing the string lines to Aram and he would write them down for future reference, when he would be actually writing out the arrangement charts for the musicians. I had always loved the string arrangements that Gene Page (Barry White's arranger) would write for Barry's recordings. Gene was a big influence for me when it came to string lines. They were pretty and romantic and rhymitic, hot and soulful, all at the same time.
The session musicians would always turn out to be good friends of Aram. Aram's TEN WHEEL DRIVE horn/rock band had been around the block and was affiliated with some very talented guys. That's the reason the tracks sound so funky and tight. The players were used to working together, almost like a house band. It was always very relaxed making those recordings with Aram. Michael Zager, co-founder of TEN WHEEL DRIVE, was also part of the "Cathedrals" crew. Michael went on to have a solo career as a disco writer/producer/arranger with his MICHAEL ZAGER BAND and his big hit "Let's All Chant."
Was "Cathedrals" your first try as a composer?
DC LaRue: "CATHEDRALS" was far from my first try at composing, performing and producing. I had been knocking around the music business for a while before I actually found my "voice." Finding someone like Aram Schefrin didn't hurt either. (I met Aram when Polydor Records hired me as an art director/graphic designer to design the album cover for his TEN WHEEL DRIVE album "PECULIAR FRIENDS." We became friends right away and when it came to choosing a producer to work with me on "CATHEDRALS" I approached him first. And he agreed to work with me on the project.thank God!) None of it could have happened without Aram. He was the one who understood, at last, what I wanted to accomplish and he was able to translate all my wacky ideas into actual recordings. Recordings that sounded exactly like I heard them in my head. It was a very special New York City team.
Do you think the way you communicated with the grammar, vocabulary and syntax of visual language in your design work helped you compose music? Is there an interaction between the two arts?
DC LaRue :Actually, that's a very interesting question. I've never given it much thought. Maybe. I've just always followed my passion and did what I felt right about doing. Like writer Joseph Campbell has always said. "Follow your bliss." Art direction, graphic design, writing music & lyrics, singing, performing, photography, all these things come naturally to me. And on a creative level they are all pretty much inter-related, "right" side of the brain stuff. I did two years of study at an art & design school in New Haven, Connecticut shortly after graduating from high school but that's it. When I was a kid I never sat down to make any great master plan regarding my life and what I would want to accomplish. I do know what I don't like doing and I will do my best to avoid doing those things. Anything having to do with numbers, I'm the worst!
Your second album "The Tea Dance" was an even bigger Billboard disco chart hit than "Cathedrals". It contained a more underground but equally effective groove in the cult fave "Indiscreet". Did you find these rhythmically more complex tracks more interesting to work on than the subsequent steadily thumping sounds that became en vogue during the disco heyday in a few years time?
DC LaRue: Both, I enjoyed working with both kinds of dance music. That "steadily thumping" formula type disco/dance track that was everywhere by 1978 proved to be quite a challenge. Aram would never "give in" to using that "formula" bottom. If you listen to my first two albums on Pyramid Records you'll see it's almost never there. The dance-ability of the track was always in the funky, tight groove and not in a constant high hat. Everything that was disco/dance that was being released at that time really did start sounding alike because of it.
When I moved to Los Angeles and Casablanca Records and started working with Bob Esty as co-producer, we tried to incorporate that kick drum/high hat rhythm thing that all the dance jocks were expecting in the late 1970s into our recordings ( i.e. That "steady thumping" made the DJ's job easier, they didn't have to think about mixing different tracks and keeping the flow.) and still have something that sounded original and exciting and not just a "formula" attempt at a disco/dance track. Marc Simon, who at the time was Vice President of Special Projects and Disco Promotion at Casablanca, insisted that it be there, it made his job easier getting the records played in the clubs. Bob and I took a great deal of pride in knowing our recordings jumped out at the listener/dancer as being new and fresh and exciting. At times it took a lot of talent and imagination on the part of a Disco DJ to be able to play one of my Casablanca Records cuts and not loose the dance floor.
"The Tea Dance" also contains a tune that I personally consider one of the greatest disco tracks ever recorded, an ultra glamorous version of the samba standard "O Ba Ba." Was it your idea to include that particular tune in the album?
DC LaRue: Yes.that was all my idea!
I'm glad you like it so much. It happens to be one of my favorites as well. I had just arrived back in New York City from my first trip to Rio for Carnival and Aram and I were going into the studio to finish up work on "THE TEA DANCE" recording. "O Ba Ba" was the big Carnival samba hit that year and you couldn't go anywhere in Brazil without hearing it to death. I fell in love with the song. I just couldn't get it out of my head. So I decided to incorporate it into the album. It was a perfect choice because the album was a homage to the dance genre (Aram and I used to call the album "A dance to the music of time!") and it was another kind of dance track, a samba. I did the English lyric translation. The lyric is simply the story of what it was like to fly down to Rio for Carnival, have a love affair, enjoy the night life/discos and the excitement of the beach and the food and the party and return home with the living memory in your heart and head. A memory that returns "big time" each time you hear that "special" song. In this case, for me, it's "O Ba Ba."
As a production note I would also like to add that Aram and I were very careful about keeping all the dance music authentic on "THE TEA DANCE" album. When we chose to work on "Indiscreet" we went to the Arab neighborhood around Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, New York and employed real Arab musicians to play on the recording. Same goes for the "O Ba Ba" track. We hired Brazilian Samba musicians from one of the popular Brazilian night clubs in the "Little Brazil" section of mid-town Manhattan.
I once saw Grace Jones lounge at Bond's International club in Times Square. She reclined there on a sofa in what looked like a sequined Issay Miyake dress, nursed a drink, chatted with her entourage and totally ignored the music. Suddenly "Do or Die" erupted thru the speakers. To everybody's amazement she immediately jumped up and started to dance to her own record, spinning madly with her arms high in the air. Hand on your heart D.C, did you get down to "Cathedrals" yourself?
DC LaRue: Yes, but not quite the way Grace would get down to one of her tracks! No disrespect to Grace (who I adore. She recorded one of my compositions "ON YOUR KNEES". She referred to it as her "come back record",( but I don't remember her ever being away, do you?) but when I went clubbing I tried to be a little less obvious. The scenario would be something like this: I would be out dancing with friends and the DJ would mix into one of my tracks while I was on the dance floor and I would continue dancing. And why not? In the final analysis D.C. LaRue recordings were quite danceable! Right?
The next in line was your "Confessions" album. This presented a post-"Valley Of The Dolls," pre-"Sex In The City" urban concept, perfectly in tune with the zeitgeist, from the then celebrated quotations of columnist Fran Lebowitz to Andy Warhol's "Interview" magazine. How much were you a part of that particular party scene in Manhattan? Or were you just a sly observer?
DC LaRue: I ended up being both. Someone like me can't be present as a participant and not be an observer as well.
In 1979 you released your "Forces of the Night" album, in which every existing element of disco came together in a slick and perfectly formed package, from photographer Albert Watson's fashion shoot front cover imagery to the list of musician's credits on the back cover. Luminaries like singers Julia & Maxine Waters and Michele Aller, percussionist Paulinho de Costa, guitar player Wah Wah Watson and keyboard wizard Richard Tee. Famed disco producer Bob Esty was involved, too. But the one name that really made an impression was the legendary Broadway/Hollywood actress/dancer/diva Rita Moreno. What was she like to work with?
DC LaRue: The "Forces Of The Night" album took a lot of work and a great deal of time, over a year. That's why there was so much time between the album releases on Casablanca Records. It turned out to be the ultimate Hollywood Spectacular production. And you're right.the credits do read like a "who's who" of the most important recording industry talent on the West Coast.
The "Have A Good Time" track (that turned out to be one of the duets.the other was "On With The Dance" with Michele Aller) tells the story of a white boy who is having an affair and is being "kept" by a Hispanic prostitute. He wants to hang with her but she wants him to get lost so she can make some money. Money she will eventually use to take care of him. So she offers him a few bucks and orders him to disappear and "Have a good time" on her while she goes to work on the street corner. Bob Esty felt that the story would have more of an impact if it were presented as a duet with a important Hispanic female movie star.
On Bob's suggestion Neil Bogart, president of Casablanca Records, approached both Chita Rivera and Rita Moreno to consider doing the duet with me. Chita was performing in England at the time and didn't respond right away but Rita was already in Hollywood working on her "9 to 5" project with Jane Fonda and agreed to do it immediately. She was great to work with. She did the Spanish language translation of my English lyric and helped me out with the pronunciation by coaching me with my Spanish.
When the album was released Rita gave a copy to Fonda and it became one of Fonda's favorites. So much so that she recommended the "Hot Jungle Drums & Voo Doo Rhythm" track as perfect exercise music in her first "Jane Fonda Workout Book." Needless to say, I was thrilled.
And now, of course, real underground hardcore disco like yours is finally getting respect from influential DJs like Bob Sinclair. Are you surprised at the reaction tracks like "Let Them Dance" get from the hip audiences of today?
DC LaRue: Please don't interpret this the wrong way. But no! I'm not surprised at all. It's something that I have believed in my heart would happen eventually. The only thing I was worried about is that somehow I wouldn't live to see it happen. "Let Them Dance" is a great record.specially the 12" remix. I have always been proud of it. But it's not only a new respect and recognition of tracks from my past body of work that's happening but there is a long list of work from other producers, writers and performers that were associated with the disco music of the 70s and early 80s that is finally being acknowledged. Please let me elaborate.
When the "disco is dead" movement (inspired by top 40 radio jocks in 1979 and 1980) finally took hold almost all the music that was considered "disco", the trash and the treasures, was dumped without mercy. With rare exception all the dance/disco music that had been created during that era was considered mindless, worthless and totally without merit. But in reality that simply was not the case! It was a heartbreaking experience. For myself and many others that were considered and/or labeled "disco." I can remember Gloria Gaynor in 1983 in my arms in tears because she had just been declared a "no talent" by an important music critic in one of his critiques of 1970s disco/dance music.
Through the years (it's been 35 years.but who's counting?) I would often go through my record collection and play this track or that track and be overwhelmed with how flawless and inspired some of those dance recordings were. And I would always end up feeling the same way about the future of the music. That some day, some way, people are going to go back and really listen and finally acknowledge how brilliant some of those productions actually were and not be ashamed to admit that the totally negative "over view" of 70s disco/dance music was simply not the reality. That some of it was really GREAT stuff and that it had been sadly overlooked.
It looks like that time has finally arrived. Thank God! Copyright 2008 Jussi Kantonen/DiscoStyle.com Photo credits: Dc LaRue, Miss Fernando, DCLarue.org,
MY COMMENT: What D.C. didn't mention, because it wouldn't have occurred to him, and what impressed me most about myself on the Tea Dance album was this: D.C. wanted to do the Fanfare from King Kong, as well as Going Hollywood and Broadway Melody, with the original sound and orchestrations. I had no idea where to find the written arrangements for those, if they even existed. What I had to do was pull them, instrument by instrument, off the records by ear - and that included horns, strings, keyboards, tuba and banjo. Listening to those tracks now, I amaze myself.
