Topsy turvy Friday

December 1, 2006

This week certainly is turning out to be a rather strange one. Because of Theodore’s Salsa party with a live band (Robert Pla and his Salsa ensemble), I expected a quieter than normal night. However, if I were to believe what Vishal heard from someone who apparently went first to the concert only to leave fairly early, not many people went to it. Who knows? Maybe some people opted not to go to either event because they figured that neither event would be well attended. I’m just speculating here with no solid information.

Playlist

La Llave – Grupo Latin Vibe (1)
Amame – El Gran Combo*
Sientate Ahi – Oscar D’Leon
Sin Sentimientos – Grupo Niche (2)
Como Lo Hacen – Frankie Ruiz
Soledad – La 33
Miye Na We – Africando (3)
Amor De Una Noche – N’Klabe
Pa’ Los Bravos – Grupo Latin Vibe (4)*
Suavemente – Elvis Crespo (5)
Te Extrano – Toke De Keda
Crisis De Identidad – Jimmy Bosch (6)*
Viva Puente – El Gran Combo (7)
El Cuarto Del Tula – Grupo Latin Vibe (+4%) (8)*
Descarga Cachao – Cachao (9)*
El Abaniquito – Pucho and His Latin Soul Brothers (10)*
Asia Mood – Tito Puente (11)

break

Senora – Dominc Marte (12)
Tocate – Toke De Keda (13)
Que Buena Baila Usted – Oscar D’Leon (14)
Temba, Tumba Y Timba – Los Van Van
El Preso – Fruko Y Sus Tesos
Me Libere – El Gran Combo (15)
Idilio – Wille Colon
Lindo Yambu – Cheo Feliciano
Etnia – Grupo Niche
Lloraras – Oscar D’Leon
Me Voy Pa Cali – Oscar D’Leon (16)*
Bailando – Frankie Ruiz
Ojos Chinos – El Gran Combo
La Fruta Bomba – Fruko Y Sus Tesos
Arinanara – Joe Cuba Sextet (-4%) (17)*

(1) I talked about doing this last week. Chances are high that I will play something different as the opening number next week – assuming I will DJ that event. One never knows what will happen. It is dependent upon Vishal’s whim.
(2) I am having serious reservations about tonight’s crowd already. I could feel that I am going to end up in a rut.
(3) It’s still going poorly. I am more and more convinced that Africando is passé. It’s probably a little better when someone else like Vishal plays it because I am as likely to dance to Africando as any song Vishal is likely to play.
(4) Vishal offers to make me a Merengue CD as he suggests that I play Merengue next. I don’t have a good feeling about it, but I don’t really have any other bright ideas.
(5) Vishal’s Merengue. Not an instant hit although it looked like it might be popular for the last 30 seconds or so, which wasn’t good enough for me to keep going with it.
(6) I had a lot of difficulty picking something at this spot. I doubt that I would have been happy with anything I chose at this point. I think it would have helped if I felt free to play a classic old track or something jazzy somewhat earlier in the evening. I felt that I needed to escape generally too sugary songs up to this point, but I couldn’t find a good way with the music I had and the crowd I had.
(7) This was better even if the dance floor stayed fairly quiet.
(8) This probably wasn’t good despite the fact that it got the dance floor fairly busy. Essentially this was in response to a request. Some random guy asked for a song by someone named Roberto Torres – I never heard that name in Salsa before (or if I did, I didn't remember it). He then named a song (I’m guessing by this Torres guy). I told him I never heard of the song either (I don't think there is a single song title I know without knowing the artist's name or album title as well), and he somehow got the impression that I didn’t know any of the songs by their name in my CD collection. Anyhow, I told him to make another suggestion, and he came up with Buena Vista Social Club (which in my opinion simply demonstrates that he really didn’t know very much about Latin music or Salsa songs or that he thought I knew next to nothing). As I got ready to play this song, I told the guy that I am playing it as something of an experiment even though some people might kill me for playing it. Still it gave me an excuse to play this song for better or worse. In the middle of the song I thought (or imagined) I overheard Gordon say, “This is terrible!” The request guy left shortly thereafter.
(9) The last song gave me another conundrum – what to play next? My thought was to keep it somewhat Cuban yet danceable for … hopefully anyone. The reaction from Vishal was something like, “Please no Mambo.” Sometimes I wonder if Vishal pigeonholes everything he doesn’t like into the category of Mambo. I also wonder if he dislikes the idea of more people learning to like what he considers Mambo as much as he dislikes hearing “Mambo” being played. Another possibility is that Vishal may be bored of playing Salsa (because he has been listening to it for so long practically every day) – perhaps he’s happier playing R & B, various fusions involving Reggaeton including Salsathon (and perhaps hoping for a someone to invent a new genre which he might call Cubathon or Cubanthon). More than anything else he’s probably bored of sitting still while the song is played from the beginning to the end. This song by the way is categorized as Descarga to the best of my knowledge.
(10) This on the other hand probably is Mambo – originally from the 40’s or 50’s and re-recorded in this decade. It was very popular by tonight’s standard. Then again, in my opinion many things can be considered Mambo –Vitamina by Sonora Carruseles, Brujeria and Me Libere by El Gran Combo or El Preso by Fruko Y Sus Tesos, but I don’t know if Vishal would consider them Mambo.
(11) I think this also could be called Mambo. This too was popular. I had another Tito Puente cued, but Vishal took over to play … yes you’ve guessed it – Playa No More.
(12) It just never got very popular tonight. I came back to the DJ booth after couple of dances with Serap and couple of other dances besides. One of the other dances was with a minor (who was accompanied by her mother presumably). Earlier in the evening I saw her and thought she could spin reasonably well, but I soon found out that she wasn’t a natural at following. Oh well. In any case, the club was getting quieter rather than more crowded. Sally, Lindsey and Nicola were sighted briefly during my first set but they did not stay long. Also the mystery guy from last Friday was back, and I had a good look at him on the dance floor. At initial glance, I thought he looked poised and was leading large repertoire of moves comfortably and with good control. However upon closer look (about third or fourth time around), I realized that he had a critical flaw – he wasn’t stay on time even when dancing with followers who are perfectly capable of doing so. Oh well. I was a bit disappointed. Sorry if I raised anyone’s expectations high without good reason. Of course not everyone insists on staying on time. Also people do learn to dance on time if they make an effort.
(13) There was a girl who asked for Reggaeton. She had made a request like this once before without me being able to accommodate her. Because I now have some Reggaeton and because there were not many Salsa dancers (or just people in general), I decided to play one. However, playing a Bachata followed by a Reggaeton was a perfect way to cause another mass exodus from the dance floor and the premise as whole. She seemed pretty appreciative that I played this Reggaeton and said that she liked the variety of songs today as she left shortly thereafter. Who knows if she was being frank but there’s no real point to overanalyze it. It’s also possible she was referring to the variety provided by combined work of Vishal and me rather than only me.
(14) There’s hardly anyone left. I think it's going to be the worst Friday ever.
(15) Vishal makes a request to keep playing music like this. That’s easy especially if you are willing to play the same songs every week. I think I will do it anyway to keep Vishal’s ears happy. Also there’s little point in wasting new interesting song if it looks like no one will enjoy it.
(16) Hey! A perfect opportunity to play this song! I still can count it as a new song! Some time during this stretch, there was a guy who asked about bunch of Merengue artists and songs (Wyando or some such was mentioned). Ashrafi also came by to ask for some Merengue later but not now.
(17) Another useful testing opportunity! Because Vishal came to take over with less than 30 seconds, I was able to play this and test it out to see how it works for dancing. I think it worked okay at this speed – still fast but many people should be able to cope with it. Sound (volume and balance) for this song is a tricky issue though.

Total 33 songs. 2 Bachata. 1 Merengue. 1 Reggaeton. 29 Salsa. 8 new (*) songs. Best new song in my opinion was El Abaniquito. Although many people danced to El Cuarto Del Tula, I have my doubts about it working as anything but a rare novelty. Arinanara might be worth playing again to a bigger crowd.

When I finished with DJing, I didn't think I was going to stay long. In fact after midnight or so, I was expecting Vishal to call it a night at any moment. Somehow things went on without anyone leaving after El Preso or thereabout to Arinanara. Interestingly there was fairly large influx of people after ~1 AM (or shortly after I finished DJing) so that by 2 AM, there were twice as many people in the premises compared to shortly after midnight. That was really weird. One of the people who arrived late was Zern, who came with some of his pals after a birthday party. Cristian also made an appearance twice (very early and very late) in the course of the evening.

As for me, I was ready to leave when someone I knew (a housemate of a colleague from work as well as a friend of a friend and a friend of a friend of another colleague) stopped for a late practice. She like many others arrived around 1 AM. She has had only 5 lessons under her belt and knows only the basic steps, simple turns on the spot and cross body lead. I ended up dancing with her and giving her practice until after 2 AM.

[note added later: I did a little research on Roberto Torres. Indeed he sang an old Club Salsa favorite, Caballo Viejo. I think it has been a while since it was played. Also it might be the only Roberto Torres song in anyone's regular rotation of songs - correct me if I am wrong.]