Ed LeBrun owned the music store Spins in Greensboro, NC (USA) and promoted parties in Greensboro, NC (USA)and the surrounding region until August of 1999. He was murdered, on 16 August 1999, in his home for something tasteless and tactless: money.


What his murderers failed to understand , apart from the sanctity of life, was Ed's impact on the people living and raving in the region, and the people who traveled to the region to attend parties and buy records and dj equipment at his store.

LeBrun began promoting parties in the very early 90s. Some of his parties took place in an automobile trim shop and are fondly referred to as The Trim Shop Parties by old school ravers now. He also instigated the Masquerave parties which were held at Halloween time. The first two, Masquerave I and II, were held at the trim shop, subsequent Masqueraves were held at Babylon.

Under his promotion company UNITY, his parties grew to be an ongoing event called First Friday, which was a collaboration with Babylon, a local nightclub in Greensboro, which shut its doors in May 2000.
The first First Friday was in June 1994, the last First Friday was held May 2000. Ed had many faithful friends, and they continued the parties in his honor as long as they could.

So what did Ed leave as his legacy? Well, probably thousands of close friendships were forged at his events. I met my spouse at the August 1994 First Friday.

Aside from all the individual human relationships he touched, he fostered many a budding dj struggling to figure out the music, the equipment, the scene, and the lust for mixing wax.


Ed's family was Jewish and he is burried in a Jewish cemetery here in Greensboro.
Spins, his store, is still open and he is still fostering budding djs, in a way. The same people work there and continue to promote the music ideals he strived to bring to our area. It's an uphill battle, the scene effectively died when he did. It just took a little longer to fade away.
Edit: Spins is closed now. 12-25-2007

Any loss of human life is terrible, but somehow, it just seems worse when its someone like Ed.
Here in Greensboro, on October 4, 2000, Robert Reid, age 19, was convicted of one count first degree murder, as well as kidnapping, burglary, conspiracy to commit robbery with a dangerous weapon, and robbery with a dangerous weapon in the murder trial of Ed LeBrun.

The sentence hearing now begins, Reid will either receive life in jail plus 100 years or the death penalty.

The account is quite grisly. Reid, who believed that he was Shinobi, was accompanied by two others at the home of Ed LeBrun. Reid injected Ed with wood cleaner, isopropyl alcohol, and Windex, believing this to be a sort of truth serum. Reid stabbed Ed a few times, then drug Ed around the house, forcing Ed to show him where the valuables were kept. The culprits retrieved an ATM card from Ed, and then tortured the PIN out of him.

Ed was stabbed a total of 13 times with, from what I understand, a very long dagger. He was found dead the next day by my friends Andi and William.

-------------- Robert Reid was sentenced to life in prison plus 100 years.

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