The History Of Brad X and Doggy Style

At this point if you've been reading DCXX, you've no doubt come across a Joe Nelson contribution. The guy simply knows how to tell a great story. This time around is no exception, as Joe fills us all in on the history of Orange County, California's Doggy Style and their frontman, Brad X. So gather the family, light up the fire place, grab yourself a cup of hot chocolate, get comfortable with your lap top and lay into another classic Nelson told tale. -Tim DCXX

Brad X and Doggy Style could only have come to be during the mid 1980s and in a place such as Orange County, California. In many ways they ARE the quessiential O.C. band for that period in time; incorporating skate thrash, comedy, funk, sex, and straight edge into one unit. Their shows were never the typical gig like the ones with 4 young dudes banging on their instruments while 1000+ other young dudes ran around in a big circle...they were events.

From the comedic stylings of their charismatic leader, Brad Xavier aka Brad X, to the random costumes, to the 500+ donuts hurled into the crowd during their semi-local hit “Donut Shop Rock”, to their “Green Period”, to the Doggy Hop, to the Go Go dancers, to the Mohawk helmets, to the “X” on the hand, you never knew what to expect. Some 10 years later, bands like Green Day and Blink 182 used the comedic punk thing along with some Descendents styled riffs to sell tens of millions of records. In 1985 Doggy Style used the same gimmick to sell tens of thousands...well, allegedly.

Their first release was 1984’s “Work As One” 7 inch which was pressed on the infamous Doug Moody’s Mystic Records. I remember picking it up and thinking, “what the fuck is this”? “Is it Straight Edge”? “Are they a Skate Band”? “What’s with this weird Congo line dance called the “Doggy Hop”? A couple months later I got to witness them for the first time, and left that show even more confused as to the true nature of their identity. At that show Brad X sported a day glo outfit, including the standard painter cap with flipped up bill, and hopped around stage singing to a combination of thrash and funk. At the time only the Red Hot Chili Peppers were known around L.A. for playing that type of music. Nobody considered the Peppers a punk band so watching Doggy Style kick out that same stuff in front of a the punk crowd, and get a great response in return was unique.

Watching them that night was like if Ian MacKaye, Weird Al Yankovick, and Flea decided to form a band under the management of P.T. Barnum. Then when “Donut Shop Rock” came on, the D.S. cronies threw garbage bag after garbage bag of donuts onto the “hard” L.A. crowd, effectively turning the pit into a glazed ice rink. The show deteriorated into a 10-minute food fight between the punks and skins, the L.A.D.S. and Suicidals. I was sold!



The next record to come from the quartet was the “Side By Side” record, released by the all mighty Flipside. Now there is no disputing Flipside was a classic zine, probably the best ever for that time period, but it was also no secret that the people who ran it were the self proclaimed “scene cool patrol”. They were also quite dismissive, almost to the point of mockery towards the new straight edge kids that had started to pepper the L.A. scene. Aligning themselves with somebody as overtly straight edge as Brad X only added another weird variable into the Doggy Style equation. Never the less, “Side By Side” was released in 1985, and is still a pretty fair record. The songs are style-wise and topically all over the proverbial map, especially when it comes to stuff like “Do It Doggy Style”, “Nympho”, and “Ladies of Neptune”. I would challenge anybody though to find melodic straight edge songs for that era better than “Be Strong”, “Straight”, “Enough”, and “Still Hope”. It’s classic O.C. musicianship; from the Rikk Agnew octave chords, to the forbidden beat, to the Kevin Seconds-esque melodies. Those songs are exactly what O.C. punk/hardcore was all about in the mid 80s.

The band also was able to release a pretty professional video for the song “Donut Shop Rock”. MTV even played it a few times during their program “Basement Tapes” which at the time was a major coo for any band, let alone a local punk band. The band also became the first O.C. straight edge type band to tour the United States, another seemingly impossible feat. Of course it was also around this time that Brad X decided to paint everybody in the band from head to toe the color green. I guess it was his punk rock answer to Picasso's “Blue Period". NOW...it was finally going to start getting weird. The shows started to feature Go Go dancers, as well as some sax wielding, bongo playing black dude painted up like The Great Kamala.

The best part of “the expanded” roster was Brad used it to get all the straight edge kids into his shows. He’d spot me and my crew in that pre-pre sale 2000 person line and come pull us out. “Ok you’re the kazoo player, you’re on triangle, you play the French horn, and you are our resident break dance team.” Their fake band roster alone was like 18 people deep per show. Next to Pat Dubar of Uniform Choice, Brad was the king of sneaking edge kids into shows.



Sometime in 1987 another Bizzaro World move happened and the band split into 2 warring factions. The guitar player Ed Caudill, and bass player Ray Jimmenez formed the band Doggy Style II, while Brad X, and his musical soul mate drummer Lou Gaez created...ummmmm...Doggy Rock. DS2 actually released a fairly decent record more known for its Led Zeppelin II cover parody. Doggy Rock, which was filled out by Dag Nasty’s Brian Baker and Doug Carrion, took a swing for the fences with the release of “The Last Laugh” only to realize that The Beastie Boys had rounded those bases a year ago. The record was at most, remembered for having...well...Brian Baker on guitar...and for containing a free condom. Both bands fizzled pretty quickly with DS2 lasting long enough to squeeze out another record so forgettable I can't even remember its name.

Both Doggy Styles were officially dead and buried by the end of the 80s. Brad X, however, survived and thrived. He went on to become L.A.’s most successful club promoter forming something coined The Artist Groove Network. His most famous club was the Roxbury, and yes, it’s THAT Roxbury. At one time or another Brad made sure to employee most of the straight edge kids from back in he day. It was as if he was sneaking us into shows again, but shows of a whole different nature. He gave us weird jobs like handing out VIP cards to the hottest girls we could find, or by making sure Alyssa Millanos party was completely taken care of for the evening. “Just be her personal valet for the night and I’ll give you an extra $100” was the order. Ok Brad…ummm do I say “yes” or "thank you?”

We all worked either there, The Boogie Lounge, or his SICK 6 story club called Orbit which was located in the then crack infested downtown L.A. area. A club where one could always find Janet Jackson and sometimes even Madonna dancing it up on one of the 4 dance floors with 5000 other people. It sure was a surreal moment in my 23-year-old life to work the VIP list for a Brad club, which of course always featured the entire cast of 90210 in it. He was absolutely the “guy” to know for L.A. at the time. It would take an entire book to recap those days, and one that only he could write to do it any sort of justice.

To cliff note it just a little, when the movie “Swingers” came out - which was the autobiographical look at then unknown actor Vince Vaughn’s life, Brad's comments to me more or less were “That movie was boring...those dudes are soooooo weak...they shouldn’t have made a movie about Vince and his friends, they should have made one about me and mine.” He was 10,000% right!



Another thing Brad became known for was the talk show circuit cult hero Johnny Bravo. From Jerry Springer, to Rikki Lake, to Montell Williams. Equipped with his fake mustache, dark sunglasses, and surrounded by a harem of slutty girls, Brad went on more then 10 day time talk shows pretending to be the lead advocate of something he called “Anarchy Sex”. He and Lou also still played music throughout the years mainly in the very average punk band “Humble Gods”. Created mainly to take advantage of the major label punk rock buying frenzy in the 90s, Brad was able to secure the band a reported mid six figure advance just by being, well, Brad.

Then at the end of that decade in another stroke of marketing savvy, the still straight edge Brad (Daddy) X formed a white, suburban, tribal tattoo sporting, backward baseball hat wearing, monster truck driving, rap, rock, stoner group named The Kottonmouth Kings. Google them! The rest now I guess is just history, well a history of course as being scripted by Brad X.