Dolemite. Rudy Ray Moore. Millions of people have laughed and maybe even cried while listening to his numerous comedy records. "Dolemite for President", "Eat Out More Often", and "I Can't Believe I Ate the Whole Thing" are but a fraction of the titles. He's been sampled by Easy E, Dr. Dre, 2 Live Crew and whole whack of others we will probably never know about. Dolemite has also starred in a wad of classic flicks such as "Petey Wheatstraw, the Devil's Son-In-Law" and my personal favorite "The Human Tornado". But there happens to be more matey! Norton Records is about to expose the world to another side of Dolemite, via "Hulley Gully Fever", a compilation of Rudy's 50's and early 60's R&B recordings! Dolemite was a rock n roll pioneer too! Not to be outdone, Lookout Records has unleashed "XXX Party", an adult comedy record by San Francisco's masked madmen, the Phantom Surfers, featuring contributions from, Neil Hamburger, Blowfly, and, none other than, Dolemite! This deserves further investigation, and so...

Nardwuar: Who are you?
Dolemite: I am Rudy Ray Moore, is Dolemite!

Rudy, is there going to be some Dolemite franchising soon?
Yes. I am now featured with Altoids mints. Instead of them calling them Altoids mints, they are calling them Dolemints. They're for breathe, to clean the breath.

That's kind of interesting, isn't it? I bet a lot of people wanted to clean your breath in the '60s, didn't they? Probably with soap?!
Well, don't you know it! (laughs)

And, Rudy Ray Moore, in the very beginning, at the very very beginning, you were a dancer? Like going way back, you were a dancer?
I was a dancer. They called me Prince Basil Dumarr.

What groups did you work with back then, Rudy?
I worked with a group called the Prince Dumarr, uh, African Dancers. We did afro dances, and my dances were called the Drama of the Hindu Dance, the Drama of the African Dance, the drama of the Chinese Dance, and it was my own operation, my own organization that did them. It was African dancing. Jungle dancing. You know, like, you saw jungle films when you see afro dancing done by natives in the jungle? It was an interpretation of that.

What year was this approximately, and where?
This was in 1952, in Cleveland, Ohio.

When you were dancing, Rudy Ray Moore, did you ever throw any lyrics in there as well?
When I danced, I did chants. Before when I'd hit the floor, I'd go "Ahhhh ahhhh. Semilooooo. Jungoooooo." And then the drums would start playing and we'd start dancing. So I did do a little singing in the dancing.

As rock 'n' roll started coming in, did you get into that with the routines of dancing? Like, did you ever end up doing "The Chicken" or "The Mashed Potato" or "The Fly"? Were you dancing for any rock 'n' roll groups?
No, in the rock 'n' roll era I came out as a singer. I did rock 'n' roll tunes like "Robbie Dobbie" and one of the biggest I had was called "Step It Up And Go."

Did you have any hits that 'hit' Billboard, Rudy Ray Moore, with your early days, rockin' out.
The closest I got to it was the tune I did on World Pacific Records called "Easy Easy Baby." It was called a, not a bullet, but it was reaching for the chart but it never made it.

Do you remember who you played with back then? What was the circuit that you were on? Do you remember your first gig, like your first big show you played? Where was this? When was this?
Mm, yes. the first big show I did was many years ago I worked with the late Big Joe Turner in Cleveland at the Paradise Auditorium.

Whereabouts did you play? Did you play all across the country? What was the circuit that you were on?
Uh, during those years, I did take out groups like -- you've heard of Ray Charles, have you?

I have indeed!
I took Ray Charles out on tour where we played Louisville, Kentucky. We played, um, Cincinatti. We played all up and down Ohio and Kentucky. Then I come back with that show, and I carried Chuck Willis out. He's the one that had "CC Rider".

Now when you say you carried these guys out like Chuck Willis or Ray Charles, were they in the house band?
They were the stars of the show and I was the manager of the operation, with my own act with them too.

I think it's totally fascinating that you were there, right from the early days of rock 'n' roll, and even before that. Did you do any gigs with James Brown at all?
Yes. Many of them. I worked with James Brown in the Sports Arena here in Los Angeles some five times. James Brown was my very dear friend at one time, because I had control of programming records in Los Angeles, and when a new record would come out, he'd ask me to program it. I would program it and he'd treated me so royal, he'd put me on the show for at least ten minutes, on stage, but when I lost that radio program, uh, he hasn't spoke to me but once since. So I think I had something to offer him at that time, and when I lost that, James Brown and myself would not associate any longer.