Nice Fade #4: Boyz n the hood; Satan not guilty

The dancing season is now well under way and, like Verdi, we have celebrated in four movements. Sleeveful of Slight's latest "movement" is a big one. Those watching will have noticed it's been percolating for two weeks. Thus we lay rest to our celebration of the indie disco DJ with an in-depth look at an enigma (who looks vaguely like the other dude from Dollar Bar?) and the devil himself. Readers: we hope this series has given you a new appreciation for the arcane craft of making people dance. DJs: cheers. Ric's: how about a slot?

Hoodie Guy

Who is this guy? Goatee, greasy hair, worn out grey sweater. I’ve seen him countless times, hunched over the decks downstairs, smiling wryly and nodding his head while some fantastic chart pop sets glittering bodies to move. The music is always good, the floor is heaving more often not but still, I know nothing about him. It’s not just that I haven’t done my research. There is something very enigmatic about this DJ. He is what Winston Churchill might have called a riddle wrapped in a mystery wrapped in a hoodie.

If the records were ever taken and the charts ever tabled, I believe that Hoodie Guy would be shown to be the most consistent Ric’s DJ of the post-Heinz era. He only plays good songs. As he makes his journey from Madonna to indie rock each track on the way seems to be the perfect pick to engage the dancefloor as a whole. This isn’t rank populism. It’s that precious intuition that allows great DJs to guide the night using their taste without scuttling the dance floor through some misjudged personal indulgence. Each song has to be known to enough people to keep the floor full while being unexpected enough to be exciting. Our hoodied mysterio negotiates this course masterfully. He can make you miss your last train – the mark of any great DJ. Yet for all this, I feel that he is the DJ that I know the least. I caught him playing The Rolling Stones’ ‘Hey You Get Off My Cloud’ very early one Saturday night. It sounded brilliant but other than that, I couldn’t tell you where his personal tastes lie. If he didn’t think that his favourite song was a surefire floor filler, I suspect that he wouldn’t play it.

There's almost a wryness in the way he keeps his personality in the shadows. One Saturday night I caught him DJing downstairs while Trigger was on upstairs. Being in frequent need of fresh air, I was swapping between the two dance floors via the back stairs and as I did, I observed that Hoodie Guy was absolutely killing it. Patrons were drawn to him like iron filings to a magnet. Each time I arrived upstairs it was a little lonelier while downstairs grew more crowded and euphoric. By the time of lockout, upstairs was all but abandoned while downstairs was an ebullient swarm of dancing humanity. Just as the night peaked Hoodie Guy dropped ‘Don't Look Back in Anger’ – Dave from Trigger’s signature song. Maybe it was pure coincidence but it seemed a terrifically dry piece of humour. As if to say, “I can steal your patrons and do what you do too.” Good humour, of course.

Still, I can’t help but feel a little disappointed by Hoodie Guy. Though the music is close to impeccable, I feel that he’s holding something in reserve and we’re poorer for it. He’s a cool guy and if he gave his own tastes a freer rein, the dancefloor might be a bit emptier and people might make a few more trips to the bar but I think at the end of the night, those who were still around would go home having experienced something special.

All this speculation may be a moot point. I have it from a good source that Hoodie Guy is moving to Melbourne in the next few months. That’s a loss for us but we wish him luck all the same. Godspeed Hoodie Guy, we hardly knew you.

Harvey Satan’s Fightclub

I hate Guilty Pleasures[1]. In fact, to borrow a line from a far greater writer, I don’t believe in the death penalty but if the inventor of Guilty Pleasures was being shot tomorrow, I would turn up to watch. Irony has its place in modern culture but I don’t think that the concept Guilty Pleasures has anything to do with irony. It’s about style over substance. Songs are either good or they’re not. It’s often difficult to tell at first. One tends to notice style and feel the visceral impact of a song first and then shape this into an opinion later. When something is stylistically different from the traditional lay of one’s tastes, it’s tempting to recoil in horror from the impact that it makes but one shouldn’t. These moments of doubt are the budding edges of one’s character. If one can dwell in them open-mindedly, it can lead to revelations, the growth of the self. You might just end up deciding the song is shit but still, it’s something worth doing. To deny these moments and simply dismiss these songs as guilty pleasures is to neuter the parts of your personality worth sticking around for. This is how people deteriorate. You give into Guilty Pleasures. Pretty soon you stop putting in the effort required to get the difficult stuff and just buy records that sound like things you liked when you were still cool. You’ll end up as some sad fuck granting your husband “his own time” on Saturdays, claiming him for things you want to do on Sundays and compulsively reading bad vampire novels.

One of the things I like best about the Ric’s DJs is the way they play R&B, chart pop and indie music alongside one another. It celebrates how good music is simply good music and by trusting that everyone is smart enough to realize this, it creates a winning atmosphere. It wasn’t always this way. Legend has it that back in 2004, the first time that DJ Heinz played Britney Spears ‘Toxic,’ half of the dancefloor sat on the ground in protest. Thankfully, the sitters have either lightened up or fucked off to some darkened alley where they’re still sitting cross-legged awaiting the revolution. What is clear is that when Harvey Satan is presiding over his Fightclub of a Friday night, this attitude is happily absent.

Harvey Satan’s personal tastes seemed to be skewed towards scuzz rock. If it’s slightly dark, slightly distorted and slightly danceable, chances are he’ll play it. But he mixes it deftly with the more danceable hip-hop, the more innovative R&B, liberal doses of indie classics, the odd well-placed Prince song and the songs which will be cluttering the year-end top 10s. His Satanic majesty is even liable to play the odd request. Through this he creates vast tapestries of songs whose one common thread is that they’re terrifically enjoyable. No other Ric’s DJ who is currently spinning has quite as much craft as Harvey. His sets seem to be structured as complete pieces and more often than not, he does it well. When he does, it doesn’t matter if you don’t know or like a particular song. You’re likely to be dragged along by the momentum he’s built – a good thing. I haven’t figured out how he does it. Playing a lot of Santogold seems to be a characteristic of late (another good thing). Further, he exploits the one indispensable record of Ric’s DJing - The Rapture’s ‘Pieces of the People We Love’ – better than any of his counterparts. The Rapture should really be taking a cut from the Ric’s DJs. One hears them about four times a night but it always sets the floor alight and I can’t say that I’ve grown sick of them. But where other DJs seem to toss “Whoo! Alright Yeah...Uh Huh” out there as a get out of jail free card or more slops for the braying idiots, the Beast with the Beats uses the Rapture as the axis along which the rest of his night runs – the impossibly danceable mix of pop shine and punk noise that links ‘Date With The Night’ and ‘Milkshake’. It ties his diverse nights together and highlights what a special band the Rapture are. This is what DJs can do.

‘Red Right Hand’ is Harvey’s recessional hymn and I’ve been amazed to look about the dancefloor when it gets played at the end of the good set. It’s not exactly a dance number so instead, people stand exactly where they are and talk to one another. There are smiles, there is lots of nodding and laughing and lots of gesticulation that suggests outpourings of feeling, if not meaning. Harvey Satan is not the new Heinz, he’s his own man. But as long as Harvey is on the decks, the legacy of that visionary DJ who had the audacity and belief to play ‘Toxic’ alongside ‘Take Me Out’ will be in safe hands.

[1] Is everyone familiar with the concept of Guilty Pleasures? They are club nights which apparently “took the world by storm” a couple of years ago at which the DJ plays a whole heap of songs from the past which you’ve always had a secret, embarrassing affection for. At Guilty Pleasures nights you can let your hair down and indulge these feelings without shame. It sounds a bit tacky but everyone has so much fun. I just went along with some people from work but etc. etc.