Lanai Tabura

Lanai Tabura (1969-????) is a multifaceted entertainer, entrepreneur, and cultural ambassador from Hawai‘i. Born and raised on the island of Lana‘i, he began his career as a radio DJ in Honolulu. Tabura has made significant contributions to television and food culture. He co-hosts the long-running show Cooking Hawaiian Style, which showcases local chefs and recipes . In 2013, he and his brother Adam won Season 4 of The Great Food Truck Race on the Food Network with their food truck, Aloha Plate. Tabura also founded Lanai’s Travel Club, offering guided tours to destinations where there is a mixture of freedom-to-roam as well as private-reserved experiences at secret in-the-know places that has top quality food and experiences. Through his diverse ventures, Lanai Tabura continues to celebrate and share Hawai‘i’s rich culture with a global audience and shares those global experiences to those who live in Hawaii.

Three Local Boys "Redefining Island Parody" (1989), it all started on the airwaves with a group of friends  —  Lanai Tabura "Lanai Boyee", James Bender "Jimmy Da Geek", and Ryan Matsumoto "Hawaiian Ryan". It started out as Alan Oda "Da Kruzah" introduced a segment on his show called YO I-94 Raps that incorporated pidgin, island humor, and inside jokes that only listeners would know with popular radio hits that could be rap parodies. So many teenagers were hooked on it with comedy parody-songs like "Rice Rice Baby" and it got popular enough where it caught the attention of Hip Jam Records, which was a independent label in the 1990s at the time. Matt Young, Freddie Von Parez, and more produced the first album of the group which featured popular tracks like: “Shaka Shaka Baby,” “Da Moke,” and “Soul Bradda". 

At a time when national airwaves offered few spaces for Pacific Islander voices in mainstream entertainment, Three Local Boys stood out as distinctly local creators, speaking directly to Hawai‘i’s identity, humor, and lived experience. Their debut album left fans eagerly anticipating more, as many hoped this trio would continue releasing new tracks that spoke to the realities of local life with the same cleverness and heart. Though their recording output was limited at the time the demand for more content never faded. Their single album remains a cultural touchstone, often remembered as a playful yet groundbreaking example of how Hawai‘i artists could be competitors in the genre of the music genre comedy-parody that has inspired others to just sing their own lyrics to song. The group is often compared to Island-Style Weird Al. The reason for this is even on the mainland the album was able to traction.

I-94, 

“Chiggy chiggy check if your school is in effect represent!” -Lanai Tabura

The audience 12,13, or 14 songs per hour. When measuring how long people are listening it is called "Listener Turn Over", so people can only spend about 15-20 minutes and that would be called "Time Spent Listening", so figuring out a radio program or even a "Music Playlist" would involve time management and considerations at the Radio Station.

Eric Koapaka use to bring singers to him for interviews at I-94

Transition from Radio to Television (1991),  

"I do a lot of these interviews. Your like a David Letterman with your tempo, your interviews are awesome like letterman, you always have something witty to say. No really you should think of doing TV." -Queen Latifah

Lanai Tabura went to pursue Television

Cooking Hawaiian Style (), Channel OC16, Lanai Tabura really loves food 

Love for Food: When Lanai was young he use to follow his grandpa to his family's favorite place and that was called Tanigawa's on the island of Lanai. It was known for their plate lunches, ice cream sodas, cheese burgers, after school snacks, and they had a Juke box and pinball machine. This would be where Lanai would consider his number one burger and is part of the start of how he came to love food and connect it to family.  

Food through Sumo: Lanai use to hang out with Musashi Maru (Fiamalu Penitani) and Akebono Tarō (Chadwick Haheo Rowan) was Lanai Tabura's classmate. He got to experience the sumo stables and experience the practices, the lifestyle, the fragrances of the bintsuke is the sumo hair wax (Sweet Eucalyptus, Anise, Violet, Heliotrope flowers, Sandalwood), and of course the the Foodie places they went and also the experience of "Chanko Nabe" (Sumo Hot Pot).