When the DJ Hates You

you just need to make your own music.

Or, if you are totally lacking in any musical talent, make your own remix.

Corazon

I emailed the link out a few days ago to friends who I know like dance music ... but my $2 bought a lot of bandwidth and I think I still have something like 120 downloads left on this account - so I'm going public, and tossing this one out into the ether.

It's basic circuit music, which means - this season, at least - vocal and tribal house. I put it together after returning from Palm Springs. I do a couple mixes a year, when the mood hits. If the mood doesn't hit I can't do it; when I'm in the zone I'll stay up all night tweaking it. I'll post more over the coming weeks.

DJ's that hate me all play at wedding parties, and seem to be concentrated in the Midwest. I don't know that I've ever heard a good DJ at a wedding; they're just varying levels of mundane. I was out 2 weeks ago with a guy I met from California, Dave (another frakkin' Dave!); we went to the beach to grind on Thai take-out and could here a wedding party over at the Hale Koa. This guy was spinning the standard wedding set: The Village People, YMCA; Madonna, Holiday; Kool & the Gang, Celebration.

The DJ for Jeff and Anne had different ideas: booty. We got our one token Irish jig, and one token swing. He played some songs that Jeff and Anne must have requested - Bob Dylan was a nice surprise. And then he took a look at this predominately Irish & Nordic crowd and thought: hip-hop. Bad hip-hop, at that.

Oh it hurt. I'm dancing with my aunt and listening to Nelly tell me he wants to explode all over her body. It was so wrong for the context. Does no one listen to the lyrics? Then, of course, the inescapable Baby Got Back. It must be the new White Girl national anthem - all the Alpha Phis rushed the dance floor for that one. I tried to talk to the DJ, to point out that we were an Irish family and maybe he could back off all the hip hop (he was, for the record, a fat white guy himself). He said ok.

The next song was Vanilla Ice. And after that, it's 9 Inch Nails and I'm dancing with my sister-in-law and cousins to I want to fuck you like an animal. I couldn't even make eye contact with anyone, and spent that song staring at the ceiling.

That's when I knew the DJ hated us.

I went over and tried to spell it out for him: it's a wedding. Play happy dance music. Christina Aguilera, how about her? Fat boy makes a face, and he doesn't have anything by her. He should be shot. How about Shakira? Maybe, he thinks, he has one song of hers.

Sometimes it's so lonely being the only gay in the village.

I got home and knew that I needed to start the above mix off with Shakira, ¿Dondé Estás Corazon?. I had been a bit stuck before then; I knew the songs I wanted, but couldn't get them to flow. Now they were flowing.

Most of the songs were ones that I associate with this past White Party. Alexander played my favorite set, so it's heavy on tunes from his after-hours, Ultra Nate's Love's The Only Drug in particular. I can still see Dan singing along to Tamia's Me, so that one had to go in. Taylor Dayne performed, and she made the cut. Manny Lehman played Donna Summer's MacArthur Park during the fireworks, so that had to go in. And so on.