LMFAO

• Genre: Alt Dance

About

LMFAO's M.O. is encoded in the Los Angeles duo's very name, and its music is made to match: loud, brash and cheerfully irreverent. Dirty South-derived hip-hop forms the core of their sound, with its booming 808 bass drums and ravey synth stabs, but if these guys are O.G., it's more like Original Goofball, gleefully tweaking convention with a cartoonish fusion of crunk and nu-electro. Members Sky Blu and Redfoo (Sky's uncle) got their start DJing a mixture of commercial hip-hop and club music, and soon were producing their own beats to play out. After soaking up the sun at the South Beach dance-music festival Winter Music Conference, they returned to L.A. and banged out "I'm in Miami Bitch," a tongue-in-cheek ode to the good life that racked up 19 million MySpace plays (and counting). In 2009, Interscope released their debut album, the self-explanatory Party Rock.

- Philip Sherburne