‘Play us a tune’ #1
September 6th, 2002 by freddie96
I
Jumping pumpin, the crowd is in a good mood. Twist a little vocal lick in there - hallelujah, while the stomping bass-line keeps it all together. Arena is pleased with herself. Marlene, who will take over in half an hour, compliments her mix: ‘Great tunes, Arena!’ she yells over the noise of the monitor.
Arena stretches her tall back, takes a swig from the nearest liquid at hand and smiles back over her shoulder. Then her attention returns to the set. She dives into the record box. Quick quick quick, where was that belter of a tune? Yeah, got it. She bungs it on the deck and synchronises the speed. She then cues the record and waits for the right moment to release it. Zigue zigue, goes the bass drum in her headphone. Yup, here we go. She swings along, her head bouncing as the two rhythms hug and enhance each other. Another one in the mix. Let it roll, let it roll.
With all the smoke and flickering lights, only outlines of bodies are visible, swaying in and out of the beat. Oh, and there comes Carl, weaving his way across the dance space. What’s up? Arena wonders; he doesn’t look half as happy as the people around him. In fact he’s wildly gesticulating, with flaying arms and shaking head. Slightly out of breath, he reaches the swaying platform on which the decks and other DJ equipment have been installed. Marlene, a short compact-built woman, gives him a hand to clamber on top.
‘Stop stop!’ he shouts. Really now, Arena thinks; that’s no way to speak to someone who needs to focus on the flow of good times.
‘You what?!’ She shouts at Carl with frowned surprise. ‘That last record and this one too,’ Carl replies, ‘they’re played in the main room. You can’t play the same records as the main room; play something different!’
Fuck me with a rubber duck, Arena almost thinks aloud, this attitude is a bit of an surprise. Marlene, being sympathetic to the fact that Arena is too busy with work to get involved in an argument, worms her way in between them and gives Carl a piece of her mouth. Putting her hands in her sides and placing one foot in front of the other in fourth ballet position, moving her head rhythmically from side to side as she speaks, she proclaims: ‘Really now, why don’t you ask the guys in the main room to take it somewhere else? Why bother us? Can’t you see we’re having a goooood time? Mate.’
Carl looks perplexed. He is the promoter. This is his party, his club, his brain child; Big Boys’ Main Room and Little Girls’ Back Room. With an ironic wink to post-feminism of course; we are civilised after all, aren’t we? He gives female DJs a chance to play a room full of over a thousand people, doesn’t he? Besides, it’s the thing to do, to have a complete collection of capable women behind the decks at your party these days. So, why not try it? But now the female DJs in the Little Girls’ Back Room play the same tunes as the DJs in the Big Boys’ Main Room! The main hall accommodates 4000 thousand people who, Carl’s train-of-thought becomes audible now: ‘… are supposed to have a choice to relax in a different, more, shall we say…’ he lowers his face to Marlene’s ear and puckers his thin lips, ‘fe-mi-nine space.’ Straightening his body, Carl states: ‘This is confusing people. This has to be stopped. Right now!’
Carl half thinks and half rants these ideas without any sense of self-awareness or reflection. Marlene’s mouth is wide open with … what? Inarticulated disgust? Truth is, she doesn’t know where to start. What does he mean by a difference between DJs and female DJs? Aren’t they all DJs? We all know it’s nonsense, this being fashionable having some female DJs in a separate room. It’s a sad state of affairs having to go along with those pervert fantasies, just to get a DJ job. Sad sad sad. Did Carl really think that ‘his’ female DJs came from another planet with different record shops and different crowds, different DJ magazines, different marketing campaigns, different cultures, the lot? You just wait, she thinks, I’ll make you jump when my set comes in. With a calmer voice now, she turns to Carl and repeats her suggestion: ‘Perhaps you could ask the guys in the main room to play something else.’
On hearing this a second time, Carl jumps up and down in frustration, hands flat on his head, showing a contorted face, looking like a cartoon character. The platform starts to shake and, as a result, the record needle jumps. Unfortunately, Arena is just at that crucial moment where she is about to fade in a new mix. Bang, scratch, bumpbump and back into the tune. The dance floor momentarily wakes from its dreams…
‘Female DJs! They just can’t mix,’ shouts a snotty boy’s voice in the audience. Arena can only just about hear it, but in her line of work you learn to put your feelers out in all directions to pick up moods and vibes. And this, this is too much to take for a DJ’s ego disrupted in the middle of the flow by some silly little men with gender problems. She turns around and, in full swing, without stopping, punches Carl in the cheek bone. Whaff…crra! Above the noise of monitor she can hear a crackling sound which reminds her of an overused phrase in a macho pulp novel she once read: ‘the satisfying crunch of splintering bone’. What those novels don’t talk about, is that your knuckles hurt in a burning sort of way, afterwards. Yaow.
Carl, oblivious to Arena’s deeper thoughts on the subject, collapses in a little bundle, holding his cheek. When he finally looks up, the women can see tears of pain and pure frustration in his eyes. ‘Out out out!!’ He screams hysterically to Arena. ‘You’re banned! And you, you…’ he points a shaking finger at Marlene, then withdraws it quickly, as though someone might bite it off. Marlene smirks with just one side of her mouth: ‘Yeah, I’ll take over, it was nearly time for my set anyway; she’s off to Madam Froo’s place. Arena is popular with some, you know.’
Carl disappears, and five minutes later a bouncer turns up to ‘help’ Arena pack her things. Marlene is in full swing and the sounds are getting tougher, harder, faster. She has a bit of anger to work off, Arena thinks. ‘Great tunes, Marlene!’ Arena yells over the noise of the monitor. Marlene takes a swig from the nearest liquid at hand and smiles back over her shoulder. ‘Have a good gig at the Frilly Frock!’ she shouts. They blow kisses and Arena’s escort helps her from the platform.
In the main room, DJ Turbo is in full swing and the sounds are getting tougher, harder, faster. Hm, thinks Arena, someone else with a bit of anger to work off. High above the dance floor in the DJ box, she sees a glimpse of a bruised Carl, who is trying to get the attention of DJ Turbo. The big shouldered DJ ignores him; he seems very busy with mixing. Carl shrugs and vanishes into the crowd.
Carl is in no mood to pay Arena her fee, but then, he is no mood either to see her ever again. So, when they are confronted with each other in the office, he slips her the small brown envelope. ‘Please sign on the dotted line,’ he demands, without looking her in the eye. Arena opens the envelope, counts the contents, yes it’s all there, and signs the receipt. ‘Ta,’ she says with a rehearsed professional smile.
Carl interprets it differently; she’s being sarcastic, rages his head. Glad to see her leave. He waves sardonically: ‘Adieu, madam.’
Out of the stifling atmosphere of the office, through a long dark corridor with staggering people and into the fresh night air. The huge security man carries both of her record boxes like they are made of feathers. Must remember that, Arena thinks, full escort is fun.
A row of taxis is waiting outside. Arena’s boxes are placed in the booth and she sits herself down next to the driver. She smiles sweetly to the bouncer and he winks at her in a moment of conspirational transparency.
‘Good night out, love?’ asks the driver, trying to gage his client.
‘Yeah… up and down, I guess.’
‘Where to then?’
‘The Frilly Frock in the centre of town.’
Hillegonda Rietveld, July 2002
Photo: Lisa Croasdale
