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Matador man: former entertainment executive Joe Escalante gives legal advice on the radio but that's only one of his many talents.


JOE Escalante may not be a textbook Renaissance man Renaissance man
n.
A man who has broad intellectual interests and is accomplished in areas of both the arts and the sciences.

Noun 1.
, but as a 43-year-old who's already made three successful career transitions he may be close. The half-Mexican, half-Irish Los Alamitos Los Alamitos (lôs ăləmē`təs, lŏs), city (1990 pop. 11,676), Orange co., NE of Long Beach, S Calif., in a suburban area; inc. 1960. Los Alamitos Racetrack and U.S. military installations are nearby.  native is a former CBS (Cell Broadcast Service) See cell broadcast.  Television lawyer who left to tour with his punk band the Vandals and start an independent record label. His Kung Fu Records Kung Fu Records is an American independent record label founded in 1996 by Joe Escalante and Warren Fitzgerald of the punk rock band The Vandals. Founded in order to release a record by the Riverside, California band Assorted Jelly Beans, the label soon grew to include a roster of  features some of the biggest punk acts of the last decade; Escalante produced the first album of "Blink 182," the commercially successful alternative band. The talk radio buff also created "Barely Legal Radio, " for Indie 103.1, a show for those wanting to get in the entertainment business and need legal advice. He's now looking to expand the show, exploring cable TV and other opportunities. In between his business obligations, he continues to play his bass and is an amateur bullfighter.

Question: How did you get started in music?

Answer: I started playing drums when I was a kid. I played drums in school bands. I did play a little bit with a rockabilly band, but the first real band I was in was the Vandals. And that's when I picked up bass.

Q: And when did you get started with the band?

A: The Vandals have been together in this version since 1994, but it started as a total joke back in 1989. When we got our drummer, Josh Freese This article or section needs sources or references that appear in reliable, third-party publications. Alone, primary sources and sources affiliated with the subject of this article are not sufficient for an accurate encyclopedia article. . in the "90s, it got more serious. Basically it's more or less a men's club. We're all really good friends and have a great time.

Q: Despite your musical interests you decided to go to law school, though you didn't follow the traditional path after graduation.

A: Yeah, most people had to go to a law firm and be tortured and I got to go to a network and I wasn't even in the law department. I worked in the business affairs department so I would negotiate my deal and send it to the law department and a lawyer would draft my contract for me and send it back for my approval. The very first day I'm talking I'm Talking was a 1980s Australian funk-pop rock band, noted for launching vocalist Kate Ceberano. History
After the break-up of the Melbourne-based experimental funk band Essendon Airport in 1983, members Robert Goodge (guitar), Ian Cox (saxophone) and Barbara Hogarth
 to very powerful agents all over town and having lunch with them at fancy places on the expense account. It was great.

Q: You must have some great stories.

A: My first day at work my assignment was to contact the entire cast of the original "The Beverly Hillbillies Beverly Hillbillies

the rustication of California’s wealthy Beverly Hills. [TV: Terrace, I, 93–94]

See : Unsophistication
" and to make deals for their reunion show. None of them had agents so that was just me calling them personally and that was hilarious. I would like call Ellie May and conference in one of my friends.

Q: What were the drawbacks?

A: You're usually the enemy. When (the actor) comes in there's already been an ugly negotiation with their agent who's telling them, "This guy's a jerk, man."

Q: Why did you leave?

A: When Les Moonves took over, he transferred me out of in-house and to making deals for outside suppliers like Paramount, Warner Bros BROS Brothers
BROS Benefits and Retirement Operations Section (King County, Washington)
BROS Barnes and Richmond Operatic Society (London, UK) 
. and Disney and it became a job that was too easy. It wasn't the same job. I used to put together whole entire shows and now I was making one negotiation for one show. Like, "OK Moesha, how about $435,000 per episode?" and the guy on the other side would want $440,000. And so you'd argue about $5,000 for about a week and then your boss and his boss would just decide.

Q: Sounds miserable.

A: I had an offer from a record label to quit. They would pay the Vandals a salary for a year just to do more touring and I thought: "That will never be offered to any punk band ever, so I'm going to take it and then I'm going to start a record label."

Q: So the band had gotten pretty serious at that point?

A: I was always in the band but it was just a hobby. Around 1994 the kind of music we were playing exploded. The Offspring sold 11 million records and cited the Vandals as one of their main influences. Green Day and all these bands that we were playing with (got big, too). And all my friends had record labels and they kept telling me: "You should start a record label."

Q: So what was the idea behind Kung Fu Records?

A: There were a lot of great bands. You find one, make a great record, the band gets in a van and you tour, place a couple of ads in the fanzines and you sell the records. You take them (on tour) with your band or borrow bands from your friend's label. It was a fun little community and everyone would help each other. There were very few labels. Now there are more record labels than people.

Q: Is that why you are cutting back on the label?

A: I'm in two bands and a radio show. It got so big and so complicated that I couldn't do them all well anymore. Since the majors got involved in punk rock, kids don't care
This page is about the music single. For the meaning relating to digital logic, see Don't-care (logic)


"Don't Care" is a 1994 (see 1994 in music) single by American death metal band Obituary.
 where their punk rock comes from. There was a time when they wanted it from an indie label. So to develop punk bands 0-9
  • Air Supply
  • Hall And Oates
  • Alyssa V
  • 108
  • 4 Skins
  • 100 Demons
 now, you have to develop them exactly how the majors are developing them--and that involves among other things, bribing magazines and radio stations, and tours; and I'm not interested in that.

Q: What does that leave for Kung Fu kung fu
 Pinyin gongfu

Chinese martial art that is simultaneously a spiritual and a physical discipline. It has been practiced at least since the Zhou dynasty (1111–255 BC).
?

A: We've still got the catalog, about 120 releases, and occasional DVDs, one full-time and one part-time employee in the U.S. We're also selling the catalog in Europe. It's more efficient and profitable than we are here. It's a very strong label and distribution system, a licensor. We license stuff for labels here that don't want to hassle with all those territories over there.

Q: Where did the idea of a radio show come from?

A: I had been thinking about it for a long time and then I had some business with Indie because they're the only station that would play stuff from Kung Fu Records. So I had meetings almost two years ago regarding the Vandals and other Kung Fu stuff. I got along with Michael Steele Michael Steele may refer to
  • Michael Steele (musician), an American musician formerly of The Bangles
  • Michael D. Steele, commander of the United States Army Rangers during the Battle of Mogadishu
  • Michael S.
, the program director, at the meetings and I kind of threw it out. He pretty much said 'When can you start?'

Q: What's involved in putting a radio show together?

A: On Thursdays all day long I prepare for the show. Preparing for one stupid hour can be a whole day and that can be a problem. Sometimes I'm over-prepared and have too much stuff for my little hour. I'm just learning and since I only do it once a week it's like starting over every week. I've got to record promos, think of promos, write promos and go through shows and pull out calls that are good to make a "best of" episodes for when I'm not here. I'm cutting up songs, picking out songs to play as bumper music Bumper music is a term used in the radio broadcasting industry to refer to short clips of music used to buffer transitions between programming elements. Bumper music is commonly employed when a syndicated program takes a break for local station identification or "goes to commercial.  and cutting up calls to make promos of the calls.

Q: What do you do in your spare time?

A: I play bass one to three hours a day. And I have a bizarre bullfighting bullfighting, national sport and spectacle of Spain. Called the corrida de toros in Spanish, the bullfight takes place in a large outdoor arena known as the plaza de toros.  hobby. I train with these guys in Griffith Park Griffith Park is a large public park at the eastern end of the Santa Monica Mountains. It is situated in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. The park covers 4,210 acres (17 km²) of land, making it one of the largest urban parks in North America.  every Saturday mostly, Mexicans and Ecuadorians, and they get together and practice bullfighting. It's called de salon. One guy holds the horns, pretends he's a bull and the other guy is the matador matador

In bullfighting, the principal performer, who works the capes and attempts to dispatch the bull with a sword thrust between the shoulder blades. Most of the techniques used by modern matadors were established in the 1910s by Juan Belmonte (b. 1894–d.
. Then I give you the horns and you pretend to be the bull and I'm the matador. That's how you practice bullfighting.

Q: Do you fight real bulls?

A: Every once in awhile if you get enough money you can pay to go fight some calves or young bulls at a ranch somewhere. Next weekend I'll go to San Diego San Diego (săn dēā`gō), city (1990 pop. 1,110,549), seat of San Diego co., S Calif., on San Diego Bay; inc. 1850. San Diego includes the unincorporated communities of La Jolla and Spring Valley. Coronado is across the bay.  and train with a couple of guys down there and then go to Mexico to Tecate and I will do what's called the tienta. We will test animals for a rancher and he marks down whether they are good or not and whether they should kill them or they should be saved for breeding for the real bull rings.

Q: How did this start?

A: My family's been into bullfighting since way before I was born, so my dad took us every Sunday during the season to Tijuana. My mother got into it, too. Sometimes she would go even when my dad wasn't there.

Q: Have you killed any bulls?

A: I've killed seven bulls in the ring. But this is amateur bullfighting. These are 600 pound bulls, not the 1,000 pound bulls you see in the big fights. They're still bigger than lions you'd see at the zoo. They'll toss you.

Joe Escalante

Title: Founder

Company: Kung Fu Records

Birth: 1963

Education: B.A. with emphasis on Old Norse Old Norse
n.
1. The North Germanic languages until the middle of the 14th century.

2.
a. Old Icelandic.

b. Old Norwegian.

Noun 1.
, UCLA UCLA University of California at Los Angeles
UCLA University Center for Learning Assistance (Illinois State University)
UCLA University of Carrollton, TX and Lower Addison, TX
; J.D., Loyola Law School Loyola Law School is the law school of Loyola Marymount University, a private Jesuit school in Los Angeles, California. Loyola was established in 1920. Like Loyola University Chicago School of Law and Loyola University New Orleans College of Law (separate and unaffiliated  

Career Turning Point: Was offered a salary to tour with his punk band in 1996. He left his job at CBS Television, toured for a year and started his own record label when he got back.

Personal: Plays bass in two bands, the Vandals and the tribute band Sweet-n-Tender Hooligans; hosts Indic 103A program providing entertainment legal advice

Hobbies: Bullfighting, movies with his wife, Sandra, at the Mann Chinese Theater
COPYRIGHT 2006 CBJ, L.P.
No portion of this article can be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.
Copyright 2006, Gale Group. All rights reserved. Gale Group is a Thomson Corporation Company.

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Article Details
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Title Annotation:People
Author:York, Emily Bryson
Publication:Los Angeles Business Journal
Article Type:Interview
Geographic Code:1USA
Date:Mar 27, 2006
Words:1546
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