drink em up, it's time to go...

yes really, that's my last song for the night. yes really, i will not play one more song. why?? because the state of colorado says we must have everyone out of the bar by 2, and if i play another song it makes it that much more difficult to kick your drunk ass out by 2. when choosing between keeping the bar from being shut down due to a liquor violation and keeping you happy with one more song, i'm going to choose the former. "but i've paid good money to be in this bar." did you just say you paid "good money" to be in here?? really?? did you pay a cover charge to get in here? i said, did you pay a cover charge to get in here??? no? oh, but you say you've paid a lot for your drink. you realize you are drinking coors lite don't you? you realize you paid 2 dollars for that beer don't you? so because you paid 2 dollars for your beer you want me to endanger the liquor license of this bar? no. no, i'm not going to play you one more song. go home.

ahhhh, the end of the night can be so fun some nights, but some nights it can be soooo annoying. some nights it ends with cheers, hand slaps and shoulder bumps, and some nights it ends with people being mad at me because they aren't ready to stop drinking. if the state's liquor laws are not conducive to your drinking habits at 1:45 on a thursday morning, please don't get mad a me, i just work here.

well wednesday night was 80s night, which means that all week i've had a random mix of 80s jams stuck on repeat in my head. good god, what a crazy decade!! full of crazy music, crazy denim, crazy colors, crazy hair, and crazy words. er, radical words. and how crazy to have lived through it as a hormonal youth!! how did i ever survive??

well here's a few pics from wednesday night. thanks to everyone who came out and thanks to akinz boardwear for the shades! the outfits were awesome!!

RIP Guru...

well shit. i think there are many ways to approach an autobieulogy, but i've personally noticed two dominant approaches. one is to talk about the life of the recently departed. the positive impact the person had on life in general. the good things the person did. basically, the happy times.

the other approach is to recognize and verbalize that the fact that the recently departed has in fact recently departed, in fact sucks. no nostalgia. no reflection on the happy times. just a simple recognition that it simply sucks to lose someone who was good people.

i guess i gravitate towards the later approach. i think it's a family trait. at my uncle's funeral (who also succumbed to cancer early in life) , one of his (5) brothers got up to the podium and the only thing he could say was, "well (long pause) this sucks".

well, this sucks.

if you know me well, you know I gravitate towards the jazzy side of hip-hop, to which Gang Starr pioneered. R.I.P. Guru.

I know Gang Starr has been defunct for a while now, but dag, these are a few of my favorite tracks...

gang starr - mass appeal

gang starr - full clip

gang starr - jazz thing

spirit of apollo yo...

what do over 40 different artists ranging from Tom Waits to Ol' Dirty Bastard have in common? specifically what do Kanye West, Ol’ Dirty Bastard, Karen O (Yeah Yeah Yeahs), David Byrne (Talking Heads), RZA, Lykke Li, George Clinton, Method Man, Tom Waits, M.I.A., Chuck D, E-40, KRS-One, Sizzla, Lovefoxxx (CSS), Del tha Funkee Homosapien, Fatlip (Pharcyde), Slim Kid Tre (Pharcyde), Chali 2na (Jurassic 5), John Frusciante, Nina Persson (Cardigans), Gift of Gab (Blackalicious), Spank Rock, DJ AM, The Cool Kids, Seu Jorge, Kool Keith, Ghostface Killah, Scarface, Z-Trip, DJ Swamp, Barbie Hatch, Amanda Blank, Santogold, Nick Zinner (Yeah Yeah Yeahs), Kool Kojak, DJ Babão, DJ Qbert, Ras Congo among a few others have in common?

A crazy musical collaboration project called N.A.S.A. that's what.

N.A.S.A.'s spirit of apollo album released a little over a year ago, so it's nothing super new. however, it's definitely worth bumping to the top of your playlist if you haven't listened to it recently, or acquiring it if you're a slacker.

I play at least one track off of it on any given friday night FUNK'd and happened to give the whole album another play through today while working away. dag. nearly every track is crazy good. i think spacious thoughts (with Tom Waits and Kook Keith) is the only track i don't like. i'm not a big Tom Waits fan, but it is interesting to hear him growl over Kool Keith.

in case you are in fact a slacker, N.A.S.A. stands for North America South America and is the creation of Sam "Squeak E. Clean" Spiegel of North America and Ze "DJ Zegon" Gonzales' of South America. as Sam Spiegel is the brother of this movie maker guy named Spike Jonze (born Adam Spiegel), you can imagine the videos were pretty creative. here's a few of my favs...

gifted - N.A.S.A. (featuring Kanye West, Santogold, & Lykke Li)

money - N.A.S.A. (featuring. David Byrne, Chuck D, Ras Congo, Seu Jorge, & Z-Trip)

hip-hop - N.A.S.A. (featuring KRS-One, Fatlip, & Slim Kid Tre)

way down - N.A.S.A. (featuring RZA, Barbie Hatch, & John Frusciante)

maybe the hokey pokey isn't what it's all about...

but popin and lockin is. maybe? i think so.

ahhh. what is it about a deliciously funky hip-hop beat that gets a b-boy to bop and wiggle as he crosses his feet? or her feet? with fuzzy white boots on. gettin her groove on. movin to a beat cuz i got the roots on.

dag. what a night.

big ups, palm slaps and nuckle bumps to all the b-boys and b-girls that came out last night. sometimes I get burnt out, fried out, and forget what it's all about, but watchin you all movin on the floor reminds me what i do this for. thanks. really. thanks yall.

here's a jam by one of the most real skool rap acts around that sums friday night up better than I can.

b-boy - crown city rockers

and as an encore, here's raashan battling max, words vs. drums.

do you take requests...

requests? uh, no. no i don't. you can make a suggestion, and if i have it, and if it would work with what i'm currently doing, or if it will work into something i may be doing later, then i'll do my best to work it in. but no. no. i won't play just anything that is requested. briteny spears? toxic? no. no i'm not going to play that. why? because i don't own it. yes, really. why don't i own it? because it sux. and no. i don't have a list or book of music you can look through. i'm not that kind of dj. and no. no. i'm not having a bad night. i'm not trying to be an a-hole. i'm not trying to offend you by refusing to play what you request. i'm just not that type of dj. oh, so you want me to "play something good"? so i guess that means what i've been playing isn't good. but all the people dancing right now seem to think what i'm playing is good. and didn't you just request that i play britney spears. have you heard the expression "it's all relative"? obviously what i think is good, and what all the people dancing think is good, is not the same as what you think is good. because if i play your request right now everyone dancing will stop and look at me with an expression like i just dropped the worst ass gas ever. I'd probably make a smelly fart face myself. so to recap, no, i don't take requests; no, i won't play briteny spears; and aside from this conversation i'm having an excellent night.

so usually i get a couple people a night who want to make a request. usually it's a request for something i intend to play later or already played. however, sometimes it's a request for something i have no intention of playing, because i can't, because i don't own it, because i think it's crap. usually the requester takes the request rejection with a smile. but this friday i had a couple girls get really bitchy with me when i rejected their request. or maybe i got bitchy with them. whatever. their shock at me refusing to play their song combined with my shock at the stinky request they made resulted in a bitchy conversation.

aside from a couple bitchy conversations, this friday was killer. i found myself playing a lot of dancehall, house and mashups instead of the usual collection of hip-hop-etc. it apparently went over pretty well as, just like last week, the dance floor was packed from about 9:30 on.

so the following blubeat collection includes some of the new and old tracks i've been digging this week, and i believe all of them were played this friday. enjoy, and if you come down next week, be sure to come down early as i heard the line to get in was pretty long this last friday.

i know kanye = a-hole drama, but damn, homeboy can make some good music. here's a couple older kanye tracks i've been diggin' lately.

heard 'em say - kanye west featuring adam levine

touch the sky - kanye west featuring lupe fiasco

this next track is by nextmen et al. good stuff and prolly influenced my tendency towards a dancehall vibe this last friday.

blood fire - nextmen featuring dynamite mc

how 'bout some dj spinna? ok. cool. this guy has produced some of my favorite tracks. this one is classic spinna. super smooth.

Intergalactic – dj spinna featuring phonte of little brother

and this last track has a bizarre/bad video, but i dig the track. seems like i've been digging everything from santigold, but all the vids are weird/bad. anyway. enjoy.

creator - santigold

oh, what a night...

well that was another one for the books. the dance floor was packed last night from the word go, and by the word go i mean about 9:30. four hours later the nectarites were still going crazy. what a great crowd. and not a single hater in the bunch. thanks to all who came out last night. epic!

i started the night off with some new People Under the Stairs, and by People Under the Stairs i mean the LA based hip-hop people, not the Wes Craven scary movie people. i've been a big fan of this duo for many years now (and have a stack of records to prove it). their style is 100% about the party at hand. missing from their raps are any mention of their cars, money, guns, girls, etc. their dedication to the vibe of the music as well as the raps make nearly every track they put out capable of moving the dance floor masses.

this first track was the lead off batter last night and is from their new album, Carried Away

down in LA

this next one is also from their latest album and features a pretty goofy video. don't think i played this last night, but pretty sure it's going to end up in steady rotation soon.

trippin' at the disco

lastly these next few are some of my favs from their second album, O.S.T.

suite for beaver part 1

suite for beaver part 2

Intro

gettin crazy with the cheeze wiz…

it’s about that time. about 10 weeks after the awesome, old, very small luscious nectar closed its doors to move across the street, we are days away from the more awesome, less old and much less small new nectar. thursday at 12am the first drinks will be poured, and thus, luscious nectar 2.0 will be launched. the new and dramatically improved LN 2.0 will include three levels, two bars, 1 dance floor and many, many more square feet of extra space. i spent a good part of the weekend working on the sound setup and it’s certifiably ready to rock. are you? i think you are. if not i challenge you to find an excuse not to rock. it better be a good one.

well aside from the nectar re-launch prep, it’s been a hectic and hazy week. but what week hasn’t been hectic and hazy lately? thank god for music. and thankfully there is a holiday break coming up so i can, well, catch up on more work.

well here’s some of the old and new music i’ve been leaning on this week…

my wife and i have known each other for over 10 years now. a few years after we started dating we broke up for a short spell. it was a terribly difficult time, and i’m thankful we pulled through it intact. about two years prior i had purchased this track by Phoenix (in 2000), but really didn’t know why. i never played it in any of my gigs but was still intrigued by it. most of the time i’m drawn to music based on the sound and not the lyrics. to me the vocal element of a song is more like another instrument, like the guitar, bass or drums. with this track it was the opposite as i was drawn to the lyrics. the music, though good, wasn’t really my style. as i mentioned, a few years after purchasing it my wife and i (girlfriend at the time) broke up and i dug this track out and made it the leadoff batter in a mix CD i made for her.

i had completely forgotten about Phoenix until i recently caught my local college radio station rockin their new stuff. so first here’s “if i ever feel better” from 2000, and then “1901” from 2009.

if i ever feel better

1901

and a live version of 1901 on letterman

having grown up in an evangelical christian home, i learned to fear the rapture. even to this day, when i can’t find someone who was just there a moment ago, my first thought is that i missed it. actually the true monologue goes something like, “aw godamnit!!! [insert missing persons name] where are you? this better not be the [insert colorful adjective of your choice] rapture.” eventually the missing person shows up, and i am again reminded that i need to seek therapy for my christian upbringing. the point of this story is that i feel conflicted about the fact that i both fear the christian rapture, and enjoy the rock rapture. the next time you see me please feel free to donate to my therapy fund.

don gon do it - the rapture

house of jealous lovers – the rapture

these next two vids are not actually songs, but demonstrations of the next version of the software i use along with some wizard hardware. i’ve really worked hard at being a good boy this year, so hopefully santa brings me some wizard hardware for christmas.

traktor scratch demo 1 - dj rafik

traktor scratch demo 2 - dj rafik

The wait is almost over…

Lush Nectar closed its doors at the end of September and here we are at the end of November, with an opening date planned for mid December. can you stand it? do you have nails left to bite? anxious? well trust me when i say the wait will be well worth it. the new space is jam packed with schwank and you will soon be holding a tasty awesome drank. we’re about two weeks from opening and a little less than three weeks from the first blubeat in the new space. I’m well past excited for the new digs, but still a little hung up in that rock and roll, so here’s a few more of my rocky faves before we get into the beats.

metric - police and the private cuz it's been a while since i've listened to metric and this is a pretty rad track (thanks lindsey)

fiest – my moon, my man a cool song. i especially dig the vid as i’m often on moving walkways in airports, with headphones and a bumping track playing, and well, who wouldn’t want to bust into a moving walkway dance scene? right?

a couple TV on the Radio tracks next. though “young liars” is prolly my favorite i couldn’t find a decent version to post, so here’s a few close secondsees.

TVOTR – love dog – these guys simply must be experienced live

TVOTR – staring at the sun – an oldie (relatively), but damn. one of my favorite TVOTR songs.

LCD soundsystem – north american scum – another relative oldie, but that doesn’t diminish its radness. oh and here’s a live version that i like better.

LCD Soundsystem – big ideas – cause this track just gets you moving

spoon – I turn my Camera on dig pretty much everything these guys do, but especially dig the beat in this one