Fans
might consider the constantly gigging Steve Aoki the Elvis Presley or Sammy
Davis, Jr. of Electronic Dance Music. Given his shtick throwing wedding cakes
into the crowd, he could also be called the Gallagher of EDM. Regardless, he is
certainly not lazy or shy. Clearly, that is the partial influence of his
entrepreneur-daredevil father, Hiroaki “Rocky” Aoki, the founder of Benihana’s.
Aoki takes stock of his life and career in Justin Krook’s documentary, I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead: The Loud Life of
Steve Aoki (trailer
here),
which premieres as a Netflix original this Friday.
You
can tell how big Aoki is, by the frequent sellout charges leveled at him.
However, he seems to just keep doing his thing. Clearly Krook suggests Aoki’s
problematic history with his late father still drives him today. Since his
parents divorced when he was young, Aoki saw very little of his larger than
life father, a prominent wrestler in Japan, who built the Benihana restaurant chain
from scratch. Despite his speed boat racing and hot air balloon flying, the
elder Aoki was considerably more conservative than Steve. Needless to say, he
did not immediately get the DJing thing.
Obviously
Aoki would catch on, becoming one of the few EDM recording artists non-fans
might have heard of. He really spearheaded the DIY scene before it was a
recognized phenomenon and was one of the few to use it as an effective
springboard. We certainly hear a good deal of his music in Sleep, but it is the father-son dynamic that really interests
Krook.
Yet,
rather strangely, the film never even briefly mentions the whirlwinds of litigation surrounding Rocky Aoki’s estate (which could be the basis of a
fascinating, epic documentary, if there were an end in sight). There seems to
be some massive ill will between some of the Aoki children and his surviving
widow (wife #3). Perhaps tellingly, only one brother and half-sister Devon Aoki
(the actress-model) appear in Sleep,
leaving four siblings unheard from. Granted, Steve and Devon Aoki might not
want to talk about the controversy and they have their own sources of income,
but it is a widely-reported drama that is conspicuous in its absence.
