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Wednesday, 19 October 2005
Always pee before DJing in front of 16,000 people – our 15 minutes of fame at the Download Festival
It's been over a week since D and I DJed at the Download Festival, and I'm just now getting around to blogging about this. It was kinda weird and I had to, uh ... process.
Anyway, me and the Mysterious D got booked to DJ at the Download Festival, at Shoreline Amphitheatre – our biggest gig ever, if you go by the number of people we DJed in front of. Basically, this was the U.S. version of the U.K.'s big all-day, multi-band show, sponsored by GameTap ... who we were corporate shills for, unwittingly. More on that in a minute.
We were scheduled to spin two sets – an hour-long set in the "GameTap dome," an oasis of videogaming; and an 18-minute set on the main stage at Shoreline, in-between The Arcade Fire and Modest Mouse. Whoa! No pressure, okay?
We weren't scheduled to start until 5:30, so we actually got to drink some beers and enjoy some of the show. Mostly, we just wanted to see Mindless Self Indulgence, whom we LOVE. Jimmy Urine is such a captivating frontman, berating the audience with ironic jabs that probably went over the heads of most of the teenage audience. And even though they didn't do our favorite song, "Two Hookers and an Eightball," it was still a great set (albeit with horrible outdoor stage sound ... nature of the beast with shows like this). We'd been working on an MSI mash-up, which we were hoping to debut that day, but it just didn't come together in time. Anyway...
Our DJ set in the GameTap dome went over just fine. We were hired for the mash-up thing, so that's what we gave 'em, tearing people away from the videogames and the comfy cushions to generate a bit of dance floor – the only time anyone danced in there, actually. It was a total "Bootie greatest hits" set, but it worked. Then we had to get our asses over to the main stage in time for our "big set."
From what we were told, we were supposed to DJ in-between The Arcade Fire and Modest Mouse, while GameTap projected stuff on the screens. We figured we were simply the time-filler between two bands – and that's what it should have been. Instead, it was a total clusterfuck of misinformation, slow-ass sound technicians, and disappointed music fans. In other words, it was kinda weird.
We were supposed to start our 18-minute set around 8 PM, after The Extra Action Marching Band made their way through the crowd. D and I both had to pee like crazy (all that free beer we drank) but since we were going on "any minute now," we had to hold it ... and hold it ... and hold it ... Meanwhile, the sound techs for Modest Mouse took their sweet old time sound checking. Seven guitars, four keyboards, a banjo, two different kinds of basses, gear I didn't even recognize. How many instruments does one shitty indie band need, for fuck's sake? I used to not really care about Modest Mouse one way or the other – but now I fucking hate them. The change-over between bands should have been 15 minutes, tops. Instead, Modest Mouse took 45 excruciating minutes to soundcheck. WTF? The crowd was getting antsy...
And all this time, besides having to pee my pants, I'm wondering: "Why aren't we DJing while they do this? What the fuck is going on?" Finally, around 8:45, the lights go down. Naturally, everyone thinks Modest Mouse is going on ... but noooooooo ... it's time for DJs Adrian and the Mysterious D! And apparently, a very long GameTap commercial. Yes, we were simply the corporate shill DJs, providing the soundtrack. We couldn't see anything from stage, because of the lights, so it was really hard to gauge the crowd's reaction, but I'm sure it was "mixed," to say the least. But with no dance floor, who knows? We jumped around a bit (mostly because we had to PEE so bad!), fiddled with the EQs, cued up our songs, and did the best mash-up set we could in 18 minutes. It was definitely one of the weirdest gigs ever.
Unbeknownst to us, we were being videotaped. Apparently, we were shown on the big screen monitors around the venue. WTF? Oh yeah, watching two DJs twiddle knobs is SOOO exciting. We were told there were going to be GameTap visuals on the screens, so we had no idea we would be on camera! Anyway, here's what we looked like:
Our playlist? Not much you can cram into a set that short, but here it is: Go Home Productions' "Rapture Riders"; Party Ben's "Clash Killers"; a double whammy of our own A+D tracks "An Honest M.I.A." and "Decepta-Freak-On"; and then we closed with Sam Flanagan's "Beastie Cut-Up," which I totally fixed up the night before, because I couldn't stand the ending. About a minute before the end, some guy comes up to us on stage and yells at us to stop our set. Uh, hello? Dude, we have one minute left, and besides, GameTap paid for these 18 minutes! It's not OUR fault Modest Mouse took 45 minutes to sound check! Later, we found out that the Shoreline staff were severely freaking out, because apparently, the show was supposed to end at 11 PM ... and due to Modest Mouse's long-ass soundcheck, they were already 15 minutes behind schedule. The city of Mountain View fines Shoreline tons of money for EVERY MINUTE they go past the 11 PM curfew.
Anyway, we finished up with the big Nirvana "Smell Like" ending, tossed out a few CDs to the people up front, then ran (yes, RAN) to the nearest bathroom. Peeing never felt so good. Then we had to blow out of there, because we were already late for own club, Bootie!
At least we'll always have Bootie
Racing back to San Francisco, D was screaming at me to pull over so she could get a beer – we were that stressed! We didn't get to Bootie too late, and the rest of the night went great, with a really good crowd.
Who ARE all these people? I love them!
And DJ Freddy, King of Pants was down from Seattle to do a DJ set, and we had an intimate little after-party at our house, mostly gossiping about the bootleg scene and the trials and tribulations of DJing and promoting a mash-up club. (Freddy does Frankenboot, Seattle's first mash-up club ... and it's quite similar in concept as Bootie ... that's him wearing "The Grey Album Is Boring" t-shirt above).
Smash-Up Derby is not a Burning Man band
For my second weird gig of the weekend, Smash-Up Derby played in the early afternoon of the Burning Man Decompression party. Inspired by Jimmy Urine's between-song quips, I was quite snarky on stage: "Sorry, we gave our tribal drummers the day off." "We'll be better after your E kicks in." "How many of you read Piss Clear? You know, that's the only reason we got booked." We are so NOT a Burning Man band. But we played an extra-long set because the DJ scheduled after us was late, and I got to enjoy the rest of the day without being worried or stressed about doing a show later. So I dropped and drank and hung out and it was quite lovely.
Chilling out is hard to do
Last week was actually pretty chill. Only two DJ gigs, which were both a total blast to do – a fun corporate at Fluid, and our triumphant return to The Cinch, filling in for Anna Conda at her night, Charlie Horse. We got to spin a bunch of rock tunes, which we hadn't done in a while. It's almost always mash-ups or (if I'm lucky) electro, which is what I got to play at Faggot the week before (and LOVED it ... it had been too long ... sometimes I miss my old club Guilty).
I managed to design the new Pansy Division "greatest hits" CD too ... it came together rather quickly, a parody of Sony's "Essential Collection" series. Fun project to put together.
Other than that, D and I have mostly been taking it easy, especially over the weekend. It was our first free weekend in FOREVER ... so we spent most of it watching seven hours' worth of Season 4 of Six Feet Under! I love series television on DVD! I also "pretend shopped" for a PowerBook ... or an iBook ... I really need to get one, especially before we go to Europe at the end of November. I can't decide which one to get. Obviously, the silver-shiny PowerBook is better ... but is it $1000 better? Maybe I should check CraigsList...
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