dancefloorlandmine

Having been required through force of circumstances to find a new venue and, as a result of Whitby's shortage of venues, a new day, too, Kat, Jaye, and I were running the night on a Monday for the first time. And also on the other side of the river for the first time, in the welcoming embrace of the Friendship Amateur Rowing Club (one of Whitby's two ARCs, which are confusingly close to each other). Some way up the cobbles of Church Street, and through a subtle doorway. A combination of April, Monday, and the new venue conspired to result in lower numbers, but those there seemed to have a good time.

The playlist is below ...

( The 80s Night (1900-2300) )

Next event is Monday 3rd November, again at the Friendship ARC on Church Street.

Possibly the most imposing venue I've ever DJ'd, the wedding and reception took place in the Great Hall of Warwick Castle, where the lights reflected off the polished stone floor and the arms and armour all around the walls. Lee Chaos (Judder, Doof Wagon, etc., etc., etc.) and I were sharing the DJ duties.

We did have our own Spinal Tap moment trying to find the access road to the courtyard, as we'd accidentally been sent the directions from about a year ago, which referred to 'the building works'. Those works are now a fully completed hotel in which several of the wedding party were staying ... After a couple of confused phone calls, and a lot of driving back and forth (discovering, among other things, the overflow parking field) we eventually found our way to the courtyard. It was 'helpfully' pointed out that castles are supposed to be hard to get into, but with help from some designated ushers, we got inside and Lee set everything up.

After the meal, some of the tables were cleared away, the artisan cheeses were cut, and the bride's 'bouquet' (replaced with a cuddly toy to minimise the chance of damage) was thrown, the music was started. There was no first dance, so it was straight into the sets, with a scattering of the couple's requests among them (marked below with an [R]).

( The sets )

The second time for The 80s Night on the high-quality dancefloor of the Royal Hotel, again running the event as promoters rather than just the DJs and, as is the pattern for Hallowe'en events, with me flying solo behind the decks (which was, as ever, somewhat nerve-racking).

(And somehow, I didn't post up this list until now.)

( The 80s Night (1900-2300) )

Back in Whitby for the first Tomorrow's Ghosts festival run by Ghostwriter, and back in RAW again for The 80s Night. It felt more like a 'normal' Whitby than the previous one, possibly partly with the greater numbers and the fact that there were more things going on over the weekend.

Anyway, back in the booth up in RAW, and we had five hours of The 80s Night in person, and then a bit under two hours of The After Party, all unfortunately DJing solo, as one of the team was unable to make it up this time, although that did mean sneaking in a few songs they would usually veto (and not having to be quite as careful dancing in the booth). Unusually, even threw in a couple of requests, but I'll put that down to being unsupervised, so don't count on it becoming a regular thing ...

(For those who don't know, The After Party is the name for the after-midnight alternative set, where we try to recapture the eclectic nature of alternative clubbing in the 90s, but with even more music to choose from.)

Thank you, again, for everyone who came along and had a good time.

( The 80s Night (1900-2400) )

( The After Party (0000-0145) )

Last night I ventured to a private club in a crypt beneath a functioning Roman Catholic church to DJ a birthday party among surreal surroundings, assisting DJ Skintight SJ (who you may see DJing at any of a wide number of events around London). We split the night between us, doing a couple of sets each through the night, and playing music from 7pm to just before 2am as guests arrived, chatted, danced, ate (rather good) cake, drank cocktails, and danced. The surroundings are uniquely (and surreally) decorated, and the club has its own art gallery.

Vix had provided a short list of requests (and an even shorter list of songs to avoid), along with some stars to steer our ship by. This may have influenced the inclusion of a few tracks that I've not played before (or owned before Thursday). They seemed to go down well, but I'll leave identifying which they were as an exercise to the reader, as well as the name of the online club which I suspect prompted several of those requests. (And, to prove that it wasn't The 80s Night, I even played at least one request by one of the guests.)

( Here are the sets we played... )

(One advantage of the demise of my previous car and its replacement by something rather newer and more efficient - being able to DJ events in London without the added expense of the ULEZ.)

Last night I braved the challenges of the congestion charge (hours now extended) and the ULEZ (area recently expanded) to go to a pub that my satnav didn't believe existed, by way of roads that, until halfway through the journey, were closed. A pub which turned out to have been sheathed in scaffolding for ages (to some irration for the manager) and thus didn't have a sign that was easy to see, either.

On the upside, I got to experience the curved cobbled ramp of the car park under Smithfield, which from memory appears in a Bond movie and, more importantly, as the location for a major encounter in one of the Rivers of London books.

Anyway, once there I did some DJing. Or at least, I played some tunes at people, which is as close as I usually get. Quite a large number of the songs were from an extensive list of requests/suggestions by the couple, so feel free to assume that the good choices were theirs.

( What I played ... )

It turns out that there was a need for a third online version of The 80s Night. So we put one together. Another three and a half hours of The 80s Night, with, once again, an hour of The After Party as a chaser.

Here are the setlists, and the sets can still be streamed or downloaded from here.

( The 80s Night )

( The After Party )

For the second rendition of The 80s Night in the pandemic, we recorded a longer set than in April, running to three-and-a-half hours, and also added an hour of The After Party to follow up.

And here are the setlists (with a link to the streaming/download site at the bottom of the page) ...

( The 80s Night )

( The After Party )

The recorded sets can be found (either as a single combined set, or as two separate sets), along with other of my sets (including April's 80s night, and The After Party from last November), for streaming or download, HERE.

Due to popular (?) appeal, I'm working on a possible design for a commemorative t-shirt - more details will be forthcoming once I've worked out pricing, printing, posting costs, etc.

On Saturday night I was again the The Old Nick in Holborn with my decks and Alex's borrowed PA, for Andy Ravensable's 40th birthday, with a sandwich set (two sets of something faintly chewy on either side of some tasty tunes) - with Psyche providing the latter, and coping smoothly with a mid-set technical issue.

And then another rapid load-out in the pouring rain (which seems to be a trend with The Old Nick - I wonder if they lay it on specially to ensure that people didn't linger outside talking loudly?), and out of the ULEZ before the pumpkin hour.

( And here's the setlist ...  )

There's the slightest possibility that some of my track selections might have been mildly inspired by recent political events. Possibly.

Thanks again to Andy for asking me to DJ, and to Psyche for playing the good stuff in the middle.

Due to a certain amount of calendar congestion towards the end of this month, the Gothic Valley branch (wing? regiment?) of the Women's Institute held their Halloween Party this weekend. Returning to the redecorated Old Nick in Holborn (where I had previously DJ'd for the GVWI in 2017), I set up my gear and the borrowed PA, as the venue staff added cobwebs to every available location, and the WI team added a variety of spookily-themed items. (This may be the first time that I've shared my 'booth' with a large neon-green spider as well as another DJ.)

Musically, it was mostly a case of providing some spooky atmosphere for the first part, with some intermittent dancing, and then following the raffle and auction with more in the way of dancing music, alternating with Adam (DJ traumahound) on a half-hourly basis.

( Here's the setlist ... )
Adam's set can also be found here - www.amodelofcontrol.com/dj/6672/ (as can the rest of his informative and entertaining music blog - have a look around it!) - as he mentions, it was a hideously wet night, which meant that numbers were slightly lower than hoped, even if enthusiasm wasn't.

And then it was a quick rush to de-rig, pack the car, and get out of Denver central London before midnight, to avoid turning into a pumpkin being charged twice for the ULEZ.

(As a bonus, the tables we were using as a booth were a perfect height - no back-ache this morning!)