Geoffrey P. Cooper - 1946-2011

TFT alumnus Geoffrey P. Cooper '69 passed away on November 28 at his home in Burbank, after a brief illness. Cooper was a Hollywood sound engineer and avid record collector who from 1992 to 2004 owned DB Cooper's Wholesale Music Exchange in Burbank, “Burbank's Most Necessary Record Shop.”

Born on October 19, 1946, in Los Angeles, Cooper was a proud member of the UCLA marching band while a student at TFT in the late 1960s. Known as “Engineer Geoff,” he was the head cheerleader at UCLA during the 1968-69 season.

After several years in New York City working as a recording engineer, Cooper returned to Southern California and with several former UCLA bandmates formed the Roto Rooter Good Time Christmas Band, in which he performed under the stage name Dr. Mabuse.

The band specialized in bouncy satiric novelty songs with titles such as “The Martian March,” “Martha My Deer” and “The Buick LaSabre Dance.” The band became a fixture on the radio show of personality and DJ Dr Demento, who was a customer at the Burbank store.

After Cooper arranged an introduction for Demento with singer Napoleon XIV (Jerry Samuels), creator of the all-time novelty hit “They’re Coming To Take Me Away, Ha-haaa!,” the DJ began playing Roto Rooter numbers on his show, beginning in 1973 with what he calls their “brilliant rendition of ‘March of the Cuckoos,’ the Laurel & Hardy theme.”

The RRGTCB recorded an album for Vanguard Records in 1974 that included their version of the 1947 novelty song “Pico and Sepulveda,” the recording that became Dr. Demento’s theme song. At the peak of its popularity the band shared the stage at the Hollywood Palladium with Danny Elfman’s Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo.

Cooper worked a day job for NBC in the sound effects department for 13 years, ringing the buzzers and bells on the great game shows. He amassed a huge collection of vinyl LPs, CDs and videos, which he loved sharing with his friends and family. Cooper was an avid fan of reggae music and all things Jamaican and attended the Sunsplash Music Festival seven years in a row in the 1980's.

Geoffrey Cooper is survived by his sisters Virginia Cooper Latham of Culver City (class of '73) and Susan Cooper Clobucker of Reno (class of '76).

The Cooper family asks that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the Theater Department Scholarship Fund. Gifts can be made online at https://giving.ucla.edu/Standard/NetDonate.aspx?SiteNum=20 (choose Theater Scholarship Fund) or by sending a check made out to UCLA Foundation, with "In memory of Geoffrey Cooper" in the memo section, to:

Office of Development and Industry Relations
UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television
Box 951622
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1622

Keywords

"geoffrey cooper" "db cooper's wholesale music exchange" "dr.demento" "roto rooter good time christmas band" "pico and sepulveda" 

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