George Semper :: Themes for Television, Sports & Aerobics
The San Diego-based Trinidadian American multi-instrumentalist, composer, label head, and producer, among other things, George Harley Semper, didn’t just emerge from the melodic mist or sonic swamps out of nowhere. His intense and illustrious career spans over half a century, touching upon every creative corner one could think of when reflecting on some of the greatest years in American music history. While eagerly establishing a career as the leader of the southern California rock and soul group The Kinsmen's, just one of several outfits he participated in, his early days as a Hammond organ innovator, whose iconic influence earned him the tonal title as the Godfather of Bay Area Funk, to his talent agency booking giants like Miles Davis, Jimi Hendrix, Little Richard, John Coltrane, and Frank Zappa during some of his earliest shows at Semper’s legendary clubs, Jazzville, and Semper’s Market Street East, the musician truly transcended our planet with his melodic motivation, and trailblazing temptation into the unknown. As we travel back to the early to mid-1980s, where the liberating landscape of digital culture meets the earth-shattering originality of pop culture, a truly athletic album appears in the distance that will absolutely blow your mind upon its first listen. While Semper’s 1984 masterpiece “Themes For Television, Sports & Aerobics” continues to captivate the masses with its cultural impact and delightful dedication to the madness of its overall meditation on life, the late musician’s spirit soars above the sonic soundscapes, casting a spiritual shadow below on its vibrating victims, whose expectations are met with concrete evidence of a genius at play. Cosmically conceived during the production of The Perfect Circle’s classic self-titled 1977 album, and just a year before Command Performance’s 1985 fundamental funk single “I Still Love You / Breakdance,” the album’s overall atmospheric ability to coexist in so many different elements simultaneously is simply a tonal testament to Semper’s tenacious talent.
“This album is dedicated to world peace; The 1984 Olympics; Sports fans, physical fitness enthusiasts, and music lovers, the world over. Long live the planet Earth: E.T. and the L.A. Raiders.”
Though Semper played several instruments throughout the album’s prolific production, he summoned the talents of lifelong collaborators comprising of the Semper Fidelis band: Irene “Rini” Kramer, George "Bobby" Farrell, who was a photographer for the legendary Australian progressive rock group Kahvas Jute, Tony "1 take" Drake, and Nathaniel "Basey" Johnson, to name a few, to help bring to life, the majestic melodies, and freestyle attitude of the legend’s visceral vision to the sonic surface with sophisticated style. Originally released in commemoration of the 1984 LA Olympics (Games of the XXIII Olympiad), the first since 1932, the cultural event would later come with a price, while 14 different countries, including the Soviet Union and East Germany, boycotted the games in quick response to the US-led boycott that had taken place just a few years prior during the 1980 Summer Olympics. The album is steeped in harmonious history across its 12 tracks of extraterritorial excitement and sonic sportsmanship, but something else lurks beneath its soundful skin. Featuring numbers like “Universe,” “Themes For Television/Aerobics,” “ET Where RU ?,” and “Classical Boogie,” Semper lays it all out during a special time in culture where hip hop was beginning to take over, and a young person was dying to find this album hidden in the tonal threshold of their local record store for future sampling, and epic engagement in the confines of a community basement. “Themes For Television, Sports & Aerobics” may not be the first thing that comes to mind when you reflect on the year 1984, but it could be now. There’s something in there for everyone if you press your ear close enough to its poetic pulse.
