Too Sexy For Your Party

Well, it must be inevitable. A 90s revival seems be beginning, and I thought there was at least a ten year waiting period for these things. I guess as cultural consumption goes up, nostalgia for the past has less time to simmer...

This Saturday I attended U.N.I.T.Y (or UNIT-AY if ya nasty), a 90s dance party being hosted for three weekends at Hugs in Williamsburg. Personally I was jazzed to jam for this one. Most of the 90s for me was about sitting in darkened bedrooms, brooding over posters of The Smashing Pumpkins and being unpopular. After the year 2000 I finally learned to dance and I regretted having missed the opportunity in the decade before. U.N.I.T.Y. would hopefully be my salvation, providing me with the smooth piano riffs and tight snare beats I had missed out on the first time. I don't care what F. Scott Fitzgerald says, this is going to be MY second act! I wanted something to get out of my head the soundtrack to endless middle school bus rides. 

I'll preface my summation of the evening with this: my biggest fear of a 90s revival is a repeat of what I saw with the 80s revival. I was big into the 80s at one point, probably starting in the late 90s if I remember. What always stuck with me however, is how people-teachers, siblings-who had come of age during the 80s would always raise an eyebrow when seeing me and my friends bouncing to Kajagogo, like some post-Soviet youths finally getting legal copies of previously-banned music. "That's not how it was" is what they would always say. While comments like these actually lead me to discover some great bands from that decade I wouldn't have otherwise known, I also worried about becoming that person. 

I arrived at Hugs around 12:00am or so, and to my delight the first song I heard playing was "Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)" by C+C Music Factory. Yes! This is what I had come for! I dispensed of my coat and hit the floor. Hugs is a pleasant enough little dive with a full bar and 50 cent skeeball, though its only drawback is having tragically low ceilings-making it difficult to throw your hands in the air with true abandon. 

My real reason for attending this party was less a nostalgia trip but to see the local DJ collective, Finger On The Pulse, two brothers who produced one of my favorite mixtapes of 2007. DJ Never Forget put this together, and it's one to hold onto until next summer. They have a solid ear for what makes a good time, so I trusted I was in capable hands.  

About thirty minutes in, the crowd in the bar had become tightly packed, but everyone seemed to be having fun-nobody seemed too self-conscious to dance or rub up against someone sweaty. However at this point, the music switched from early-90s grooves to post-Nevermind grunge rock. With the first tune, I wasn't so upset, I expected to hear some songs that would bring back that old awkward feeling. However this set continued for about two hours or so. I suddenly found myself not the person I had feared becoming but rather the opposite. "Thats exactly how it was" I said to myself as I stepped outside for my fifth cigarette after my third beer. The next few hours I sat at the bar, played skeeball, and kept tabs on the crowd. The dance floor had come to emulate one of my many middle-school socials, with most people jumping in place or perhaps a mild mosh pit breaking out, but little grooving going on. I was disappointed, not to say slightly embarrassed when a cardinal sin was committed. I also would have gladly taken "Basket Case" over "Jeremy". Granted, I was surprised how danceable a lot of mainstream rock in the 90s was, especially compared to today's bland tattooed thirty-somethings making music for fifteen year-olds. Some decent tracks got thrown in here-Beastie Boys, EMF (now THAT is the 90s I want to remember).

I was about to pack it up and head home when over the speakers came a small glimmer of hope-is that "Wannabe"? Ok, maybe not the best moment of 90s pop but it was a start. We quickly moved to some of the tunes I had come for-Haddaway, Milli Vanilli, Kriss Kross and the eponymous Right Said Fred. This change in mood got me back on the floor and I stayed until about ten minutes before closing (I didn't want to make the same mistake I did in middle school and be the last one still dancing). Once the good club beats started going, I was sated, and I rarely stepped off the stage except to refill my drink. 

As for FOTP, the brothers definitely captured the 90s I remembered, though by the time the good grooves started toward at end of the evening, they were strangely absent from turntables, leaving duties to a third DJ and some cool chick with a KMFDM shirt. The choice of dance tracks was solid, though I would have liked to see them reach a bit further into their collections for some less obvious numbers. Very solid dance and rock tunes emerged from the UK and Europe during the 90s, and some of that should have trickled down during the evening (Happy Mondays, Blur, anyone? Where the hell was Daft Punk by the way?). Also, the whole night I did not hear one ditty from Madonna or any member of the Jackson family. I know I arrived a little late, but there's enough gold there to fill an entire Mini-Disc cassette! I'm not mad, just a little underwhelmed. I think the boys could make amends by releasing a really solid mixtape of all the goody goods (DJ Never Forget also has a new, excellent tape available here). 

One final observation-I wanted to see the girls on the flyer, or at least facsimiles thereof at this party. I guess Urban Outfitters needs some time to update their stock.

U.N.I.T.Y. is a free bi-weekly party and still has two more nights to go, though I'm sure with its popularity it will either be extended or continue at another bar. I'll definitely end up at it again, just to see how other DJs interpret the decade of anti-fashion.

Yo man lets get outta here. Word to your mother. 

HARD for '08

So begins a new year, and hopefully a new direction in an increasingly stale music scene. While many fantastic rock albums appeared this year from well-known artists-Radiohead's In Rainbows, The Shins' Wincing the Night Away, and Wilco's Sky Blue Sky, the most elegant release of '07 was the much-anticipated Cross from the French duo Justice. After bubbling beneath the surface of mainstream success with their Simian remix of "We Are Your Friends" in 2003, and a slew of catchy singles, their full-length LP has won them much-deserved praise and attention. How perfect then, that the new year should be brought in by 2007's golden boys. If you were lucky enough to see one of the two sold-out shows in NYC at Terminal 5, or any other of their appearances this year, you already know that the kinetic energy of their music pulses out from their turntables and through their audience. No place was a better example of that than their appearance at the HARD New Years Eve party in downtown Los Angeles. Eschewing their normal stage set, the two appeared behind an even larger, brighter and taller illuminated cross for a fantastic DJ set.

Wait, I've gotten ahead of myself.

After a last minute decision, I accompanied some of my best friends to LA for HARD NYE, an outdoor festival that advertised three stages, performance art, and sets from some of the more notable names in electronica. I braved the ticket prices, and the 900 mile drive to LA (not so pleasant with 5 in a Subaru station wagon-though I think it was a nice little bonding experience) to dance till it hurt. How did it measure up? Well, like the year that ended, it was a mixed bag. First the lines to enter were extremely long. This was to be expected and actually turned into a positive experience as while I waited for my pat-down, none other than Busy P walked right past me into the festival (I don't normally get all gushy, but it was BUSY P!). Upon entering, however, I found to my dismay that the festival organizers provided no schedule for their line-up, so we ended up walking towards one of the smaller stages just in time to catch A-Track's set. The promised "third stage" proved to be nothing more than a local radio station playing what sounded like an iPod on shuffle (there was another stage within the VIP area, though it did not look worth the extra $100 for a VIP ticket). Because we had waited in line for so long, however, we got precious little opportunity to really explore the venue before we moseyed on over to the mainstage area for the midnight countdown from Peaches. Her performance, however was marred by sound problems which continually cut out half of the sound system. As for Peaches, she was, well, Peaches. Nothing unexpected from her, though her gyrating dancers proved to be a welcome distraction from an otherwise mild set-maybe I was too anxious for Justice. After her vulgar and expletive-filled countdown, it was time for the real show.

A fifteen minute interval of silence brought most people to a stop, as nobody wanted to leave their space, and the crowd began to swell in numbers, eager in anticipation. As Justice began, their natural connection with the audience was more than apparent. Their choice of records relied heavily on their own album, and many songs seemed to be picked simply for the purpose of transitioning into their material. This was perfectly fine with me, as myself and most people in attendance wanted simply to hear Justice. I for one was still suffering from withdrawal after witnessing their set in October. As a DJ duo, Justice proved themselves to be both seriously involved (well, Xavier at least. As usual, Gaspar was working the crowd) and playful at the same time. The end of their set moved smoothly from Ed Banger-type electronica to a simple, unmolested playing of the Ronettes "Be My Baby", which also served as the transition from Justice to Busy P. 

Ah, Busy P...I don't know where to start. If you haven't yet picked up his Rainbow Man EP, what the hell is wrong with you? The manager and owner of Ed Banger proved he deserves all that he is earned. His near-flawless set seemed to almost transcend the boundary between the audience and himself. Like Justice, he would tease the audience, throwing in snippets of dance classics like "Thriller" or more recent favorites such as "I Want Your Soul" by Armand Van Helden, while then boldly playing older tunes such as "Video Killed the Radio Star" in their entirety. Furthermore, Busy obeys the most basic rule of being a good DJ-have as much if not more fun than your audience. He was by far the most rewarding of any of the sets. 

Alcohol service ended around the same time as Busy, and within an hour the venue looked like a ghost town, with only the hardcore fanatics and people too E'd out to care remaining. This brought to light the worst offense of the event coordinators, which I mentioned before-the failure to provide any kind of schedule. I expected the better performances to begin then, only to find out after speaking to some other people in the small crowd that most of the main acts had been playing simultaneously. 2 Live Crew, Whitey, and Steve Aoki had apparently all been playing at the same time as Justice and Busy P (though I later heard a visibly intoxicated Aoki played about the time I was getting in line). This annoyed me, as I would have gladly broken away from either for fifteen minutes to see the other headliners, thus getting the most for my ticket price. Additionally, some wonderful new acts played towards the end, though without a schedule it was near impossible to tell who they were. If anyone who was there knows who the fantastic duo with the computer and electric drums playing on the main stage were, please leave a comment!

All in all, HARD did prove worth the price. Nobody half-assed their set, and the only problems seemed to be related to a lack of organization and technical problems which can only be blamed on the promoters.  Hopefully, they have learned from their mistakes and next year the party will keep raging, but the audience given the opportunity to be slightly more informed, and thus enjoy themselves to an even greater degree.