Blog: Got Any Vampire Weekend?

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After work on Friday i HIKED across Old London Town to Clerkenwell, where I was due to do some DISC JOCKEYING at Scared To Dance, in The Slaughtered Lamb pub. I'd read a bit about the pub before setting off and was slightly NERVOUS - all the reviews said it was slightly nasty with arsey bar staff and Trendy Clientele. The people who review PUBS online tend to be a bit GRUMPY, especially when faced with a BAR, but they did seem to have a point when I arrived as it was RAMMED with people Being A Bit Fashionable with THUMPINGLY LOUD music playing.

I SQUEEZED through the throng to find the stairs downstairs to the room the DISCO was in... where everything was MUCH more relaxed. Here I found Tom and Paul setting things up ready, cunningly playing KRAFTWERK while nobody was there in order to minimise changeover times. There was a bar with a perfectly pleasant person serving, which was a RELIEF as I didn't really want to face the SCRUM upstairs, and I was pleased to see that they were following the previously noted trend to supply A Bottled Ale for the more... MATURE gentleman who might occasionally stray into such places. They also followed the trend of charging A LOT for the pleasure, but I couldn't really complain in the circumstances.

A very very pleasant couple of hours followed during which i chatted to the organisers and then discovered that I was finally FORMALLY INTRODUCED to a chap called Ian, who I've met and spoken to on many occasions but whose name I didn't know. He's a really nice chap too, there should be more FORMAL INTRODUCTIONS made!

Following lengthy discussion of some of the many many many gigs we'd both been to it was time for ME to hit the DECKS... and this is what I played:

Art Brut - Good Weekend
Madness - My Girl
Elvis Presley - Tutti Frutti
The Beatles - Bad Boy
Oasis - Supersonic
Kenickie - Punka
Charlotte Hatherley - Bastardo
Huggy Bear - Her Jazz
Billy Bragg - Greetings To The New Brunette
The Smiths - This Charming Man
David Bowie - Queen Bitch
Stevie Wonder - For Once In My Life
Carole King - I Feel The Earth Move
Neil Diamond - Cracklin' Rosie
The Lemonheads - Rockin Stroll
Paul McCartney & Wings - Jet
DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince - Boom! Shake the Room
Camera Obscura - French Navy
Daphne & Celeste - Ooh Stick You

Some might call it "eclectic"... some might call it DESPERATE, for LO! about halfway through I started THINKING LIKE A DJ. The room had gradually filled up and I became OBSESSED with getting people dancing - I'd had a request for "Greetings To The New Brunette" and when that failed to get anyone up and about I thought "OK then. It is time to Drop The Bomb, as we Disc Jockeys say". Hence: THE SMITHS.

I'm pretty sure there has NEVER been an Indie Disco where people have failed to dance to The Smiths, and this was no exception. HOORAY! But what on earth was I going to do now? I'd burnt myself 8 CDs of songs, choosing Songs I Would Definitely Get Up And Dance To If I Heard Them At A Disco. HOWEVER in doing so I had been BIASED in my analysis, expecting this to be a Very Indie Crowd i.e. the sort of people who'd go to Indietracks. It WASN'T - it was the sort of people who like Vampire Weekend, in fact, as I found out when SEVERAL people came up and asked for it. They seemed AGHAST that I didn't have any, which was an Interesting Lesson For The Future for me. The only time I go disco dancing these days is when it's attached to a) a gig b) a wedding, so I'd no idea what goes on at ACTUAL disco nights, but clearly Vampire Weekend are CLEANING UP there.

But anyway, i thought LOGICALLY and went for Old Stuff Everyone Definitely Knows and REASONED that Slighty Kitsch would work well, HENCE the little run of SUCCESFUL DANCEFLOOR FILLERS that ended suddenly, and much to my surprise, when I put The Lemonheads on. The Lemonheads! Everyone loves The Lemonheads don't they?

There was no more dancing and soon my hour was up - Paul came on and, much to my GALL, IMMEDIATELY got pretty much the whole room jigging about with his DJ SKILLZ, leaving me to finish my beer and, suddenly seeing how LATE it was, get together with my coat and FLY off home.

I really enjoyed it, I must say, and it was GRATE getting people dancing, but it was also INTERESTING and SOBERING to be reminded that, actually, there's a bit more to being a DJ than meets the eye.

Only a LITTLE bit, mind you, but a bit none the less!

posted 28/11/2009 by MJ Hibbett

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