So last night was one of my regular DJ SuperCub nights at the solo, local gay bar. As I write that previous sentence, the use of “solo” and “gay bar” together like that brings up an interesting image in my mind, but I digress. Anyway, last night it was just a regular night at the bar; no special theme nights, no dance contests highlighting music older than the average age of the customers, no video accompaniment necessary. Since I had some Vicodin in my system, I was feeling a little loopy and looking back at the playlist, it’s a little obvious. After all, how many mixes of Donna Summer’s “Stamp Your Feet” can a DJ play in three hours? Apparently four.
You see, I’ve got this thing about taking requests. I don’t like to. I think my aversion to requests hearkens back to my radio days when young rugrats would figure out how to let their fingers do the walking and they would call and request the Beavis and Butthead duet with Cher while the song was playing on the radio, whilst doing their best to imitate said lead singers (not referring to Cher, there). I know that the DJ is there to entertain the crowd and set the tempo for a good time but speaking as a professional audiologist, you can rest assured that I’m going to play some really good music that’s going to, at the very least, give you something to tap your foot to. If I’m doing really well you can bust a move on the dance floor to your favorite track and seal the deal of not getting laid when you do it alone and your moves involve thumbs swinging in a myriad of directions with googly eyes on your face and your mouth agape.
How I love drunk lesbians.1
So last night I was in the middle of mixing excellent song A to excellent song B (which, by the way, doesn’t involve just pressing ‘PLAY’) when this rather large woman came bursting into my rather small DJ booth and immediately started yammering about a song she wanted to hear. Then she committed a mortal sin; she ignored my “one moment please” finger.
You must hold when you’re told to “please hold”. Strike One.
After I slid from the second Donna Summer mix of “Stamp Your Feet” to Leona Lewis’ “Bleeding Love” I turned to her, herded her out of the DJ booth and back down among the commoners and said, “now what did you want to hear?”
“What are you playing? What is this song?”, she asked as if I had asked her to lick a dead minnow. I think she had just dissed LaDonna. Strike Two.
“It’s Leona Lewis’ ‘Bleeding Love'”, I replied. Sidenote: it’s a really good remix that hasn’t killed the sound of the original track while keeping it very danceable.
“You need to play Mariah Carey’s ‘Touch My Body’ right now. I want to hear it tonight and I need to leave.”
Strike Three.
Now if she had some sort of whimsy in her voice I would have considered what she was saying to me. But there wasn’t a bit of whimsy to be found. She had a demanding tone in her voice. She sounded huffy. Plus, she had dissed LaDonna. Now, let’s stop the story for a moment and consider what is happening.
1. I’m a little loopy on Vicodin. My mood is swinging from giddy to growly with a prescription assist.
2. The tempo is currently moving along around the center of a gay man’s midnight tempo. It’s not racing with said man’s heart yet (from drugs or the latest bit of hotness that he has spotted, your choice) but he’s moving quickly and starting to get sweaty.
2. My leather wrist band is on my left wrist.
3. She did not have a drink in her hand nor had I seen her anywhere near the bar the entire night.
4. She wanted to hear the song so she could leave the bar afterward.
Perhaps I’m just a cranky ol’ club DJ but part of the gig is making sure people are staying at the bar and consuming drinks. No people+no drink(*a few nights)=no gig. Asking me to go from twinky time music to bump and grind music immediately so you can leave the bar is not going to get your song played. Ever. It’s also going to deflate the tempo of the aforementioned typical gay man that is sweaty. So I responded reasonably well.
I slammed the door shut in her face.
She didn’t come back for Round 2. Instead, she sent one of her friends up. With a LIST. That’s when the door remained closed for the next hour or so.
The dance floor was populated. People at the bar were bopping their heads. The vibe of the crowd was good. As her minion banged on the door wanting access I slid from a Pussycat Dolls remix to my personal favorite track, “10.000 Nights of Thunder” by Alphabeat.
It’s good to have the power.
I am a DJ. I am not a furry iPod.
1This twitter entry from last night should give you an idea of what else was occurring in the bar.
