Rating: NNNNN
Shit happens
Last time I checked out the monthly Expensive Shit party was in the summer. Though the vibes were good, it wasn’t exactly packed with partiers. Now that school’s back in, though, it’s drawing good numbers of college-age indie rockers looking for a place to dance. Resident DJs Captain Easychord and Lil’ McKimm play a wide range of music, encompassing post-disco experiments, mash-up bootleg medleys, post-punk funk, Afrobeat and whatever else they happen to feel like putting on.
Last Saturday at Club 56 they had a special guest performance by Just Like the Movies , a ridiculous one-man-band take on hiphop, metal, punk and dime-store electro. Maybe a little too close to novelty, it was nevertheless something different for a DJ night.
The old guard in the DJ scene are constantly wondering what the new generation of partiers want to hear these days. Though many clubbers seem content dancing to top 40 at mainstream clubs, it looks like the cool kids are getting into hyper-eclectic indie rock disco parties.
Within this context, DJs can play obscure underground music but also engage with more mainstream sounds. Expensive Shit and the many other new nights like it are the sound of hipster kids finally learning to dance and have a good time.
The mood is captured by what was one of the big anthems of the night, LCD Soundsystem ‘s Losing My Edge, which tears apart the culture of indie record nerds in a hilarious self-loathing critique of the name-dropping, competitive mentality common to those who spend too much time in record stores and not enough dancing.
Glasgow goes deep
A few weeks back, a new Thursday night started up at Revival called Cabaret that features weekly burlesque and cabaret performances along with the sounds of DJs Kenny Glasgow and Nick Holder . Last week Holder was DJing across town, so it was up to Glasgow to provide the evening’s tunes.
If you’ve been following Glasgow for a while, you’ll know that he’s most recently been playing a lot of electro-inspired house and techno records. So it was surprising to hear him spin deep soulful house and broken beat. And he does a very good job of it, mixing smoothly and adding some of the less obvious tunes.
benjamin.boles@sympatico.ca
