thought i'd report some impressions from the field . . . .
dj dinesh and mr. poole had their first friday night gig at white rabbit last night ----- greg had been playing old-school funk at white rabbit on wednesdays, but now looks like he and dinesh will be playing there regularly on fridays . . . .
a word on white rabbit -- a very tough place to gig!!! -- i'd call the crowd young twenty somethings of the yuppie persuasion -- but not a white monochrome crowd, as are so many downtown rock n roll joints that pretend to offer adventure -- the crowd at white rabbit is racially diverse -- and yet it is a yuppie bar, a tough crowd to engage with music, and quite a bit of "asian cool" to overcome as well -- several people i know have played this place on weekends, and none could ever make the place jump (and all eventually lost the gig)
now i'm the sort of person who's tough to please when it comes to crowds ----- i think the composition of the crowd is just as important as choice of music to make a night right (call me superficial, but i speak the truth) ----- take me to subtonic and i'll start to moan and groan about how everybody looks like they've got a degree in some kind of graduate studies, how they look like they all read wire magazine, etc etc ------take me to rothko and i'll start to complain about the guy/girl ratio, about would-be hipsters and mcbars taking over the les----take me to nublu and i'll turn xenophobic and start to complain about europeans living high on the cheap dollar-----take me anywhere and i do nothing but complain about the crowd -----and i exempt myself from all complaints b/c i'm the invisible observer-----and no, i don't complain constantly----and yes, i try to keep the complaints locked inside my head
but it doesn't take a genius to figure out that it'd be easier to make white rabbit a socially dynamic place than it would subtonic ------ b/c there's only kind of person who will go to subtonic, but with the lure of music you can get many kinds to go to white rabbit ----- or at the very least, dinesh ought to draw in the dissensus massive, who would then bring along their friends w/ phds-----and so now you have (let's face it) white people dressed like grad students sharing the same space w/ black, white, and asian yuppies-----it'd be a good start------and you can call me preoccupied w/ questions of class and race and style, but i think the issue comes with the territory of going out at night (you can ignore the issue, but it's always there)-----that is, it's beyond our power (under the current order) to socially engineer our work environments, but we have quite a bit of power to engineer our nightlife environments
now getting back to the music . . . . greg poole & dinesh represent the marriage of a cosmopolitan pop-ist sensibility and a uk hardcore continuum sensibility ----- greg is the popist, and if it's "catchy" he'll play it, and depending on the night where he's playing he'll even play franz ferdinand -- this is perhaps b/c greg actually makes a living as a dj (or perhaps it explains why he can make a living) (most other djs i know don't do it for a living -- they either have day jobs at magazines or in video/sound/image production, are independent artists or jewelry makers, or are relatively-to-completely dysfunctional) -- not that he's loaded with money or anything, but he makes a living -- he plays parties at big clubs like the canal room, he plays corporate parties, he gets flown out to the sundance festival to play parties for hollywood types, he plays gigs in dublin and belgium -- so he's got a very open ear, to say the least-----------dinesh is much more the underground soldier -- he's a black american (btw greg is also black) who has long made uk-style dance music, from jungle through 2-step and now grime -- he's worked with shut up and dance, ray keith, zed bias, stanton warriors, horsepower, menta, ron from london something, and others (fuck it -- i just listed these people verbatim from dinesh's webpage -- here's the link: www.goldspotmusic.com)
i'm not sure how long dinesh has been in the music game, but greg's involvement goes back to 1988, when he got swept up in house music -- he was in college at the time, somewhere in upstate new york, and he basically focused on the soulful paradise garage/shelter house sound -- but then ragga jungle caught his ear, and he made the leap into jungle, then 2-step garage, then a move to crunk coupled with a retreat back to old skool funk, now a grab bag of crunk, bhangra, dancehall, reggaton, uk garage, grime -- but what i find most interesting about greg's trajectory is the jump from shelter-style house to jungle -- of course his background in shelter-style house perhaps explains why he then followed the uk continuum into speed garage and 2-step -- that is, greg poole more than any other nyc dj tried to make 2-step happen here -- the only other black american djs that i know who were into jungle are of carribean background (so no great leap), and then they moved into organic sounds by late 90s and today are quite eclectic and, as it were, "tasteful," i.e., reggae, dfa, metro area, and so forth
as far as last night went, greg and dinesh played all varieties of shanty house, and then a third dj (who I assume was Edwin Stats) played mainly commercial hip hop ------ around 1 am dinesh began to drop the uk garage and, much to my surprised excitement, the dance floor (if you'd call it a dance floor) became instantly jam packed, i.e., nyc yuppies getting down to sub low sounds and clearly enjoying the music ----- i couldn't help but wonder how many of these people had heard music like this before ----- again, the crowd was a young crowd, mostly 20s, and racially diverse, but still yuppies ---- and, frankly, showing a lot more energy on the dancefloor than you'd ever see at a place like subtonic or rothko ----- the whole scene was very pleasure-principled, no counter-culture aspirations or fantasies or anything, and no underground vibe ----- most guys were there to pick-up girls, and vice versa ----- but still i was very impressed for about thirty minutes ------ and then dinesh began to play tribal house, the first couple of tracks of which were quite good, but then it began to sound like pretty god awful boring nyc tribal house (though he continued to mix in uk garage), and the crowd maintained its level of enthusiasm, not caring what they were hearing or dancing to----and then the person that i imagined to be edwin stats took over and played commercial hip hop, most of which i rather liked, and the place kept jumping----and at this point i left b/c i'm suffering from conjunctivitis ("pink eye") at the moment, and thought i should go home and get some rest, but instead took a detour, which is another matter
i expect that in two weeks' time, when greg and dinesh bring the black ops crew over to crash mansion, that the music will be more hardcore ------ at white rabbit their primary concern is likely to keep the crowd happy and make the place jump ----- and though i was disappointed not to hear more sub low sounds, i was impressed by their success w/ a crowd that is usually impervious to music ----- and, crucially, it was the sub low sounds that got the crowd jumping in the first place ----- i should add that i think it likely that dinesh played more uk garage and dub step toward the end of the night, but that i didn't stick around and so cannot say
again, it'd be nice to see rothko and subtonic types over at white rabbit, as it'd be a more diverse crowd (in terms of their views of the good and choices of style), and each crowd could show the other a thing or two about nightlife ----- though in the end the nature of the space at white rabbit, very clean & modern & loungey, invites a yuppie crowd, just as the dank space at subtonic attracts an intellectual crowd ---- perhaps there's no getting around the intentions of interior designers
dj dinesh and mr. poole had their first friday night gig at white rabbit last night ----- greg had been playing old-school funk at white rabbit on wednesdays, but now looks like he and dinesh will be playing there regularly on fridays . . . .
a word on white rabbit -- a very tough place to gig!!! -- i'd call the crowd young twenty somethings of the yuppie persuasion -- but not a white monochrome crowd, as are so many downtown rock n roll joints that pretend to offer adventure -- the crowd at white rabbit is racially diverse -- and yet it is a yuppie bar, a tough crowd to engage with music, and quite a bit of "asian cool" to overcome as well -- several people i know have played this place on weekends, and none could ever make the place jump (and all eventually lost the gig)
now i'm the sort of person who's tough to please when it comes to crowds ----- i think the composition of the crowd is just as important as choice of music to make a night right (call me superficial, but i speak the truth) ----- take me to subtonic and i'll start to moan and groan about how everybody looks like they've got a degree in some kind of graduate studies, how they look like they all read wire magazine, etc etc ------take me to rothko and i'll start to complain about the guy/girl ratio, about would-be hipsters and mcbars taking over the les----take me to nublu and i'll turn xenophobic and start to complain about europeans living high on the cheap dollar-----take me anywhere and i do nothing but complain about the crowd -----and i exempt myself from all complaints b/c i'm the invisible observer-----and no, i don't complain constantly----and yes, i try to keep the complaints locked inside my head
but it doesn't take a genius to figure out that it'd be easier to make white rabbit a socially dynamic place than it would subtonic ------ b/c there's only kind of person who will go to subtonic, but with the lure of music you can get many kinds to go to white rabbit ----- or at the very least, dinesh ought to draw in the dissensus massive, who would then bring along their friends w/ phds-----and so now you have (let's face it) white people dressed like grad students sharing the same space w/ black, white, and asian yuppies-----it'd be a good start------and you can call me preoccupied w/ questions of class and race and style, but i think the issue comes with the territory of going out at night (you can ignore the issue, but it's always there)-----that is, it's beyond our power (under the current order) to socially engineer our work environments, but we have quite a bit of power to engineer our nightlife environments
now getting back to the music . . . . greg poole & dinesh represent the marriage of a cosmopolitan pop-ist sensibility and a uk hardcore continuum sensibility ----- greg is the popist, and if it's "catchy" he'll play it, and depending on the night where he's playing he'll even play franz ferdinand -- this is perhaps b/c greg actually makes a living as a dj (or perhaps it explains why he can make a living) (most other djs i know don't do it for a living -- they either have day jobs at magazines or in video/sound/image production, are independent artists or jewelry makers, or are relatively-to-completely dysfunctional) -- not that he's loaded with money or anything, but he makes a living -- he plays parties at big clubs like the canal room, he plays corporate parties, he gets flown out to the sundance festival to play parties for hollywood types, he plays gigs in dublin and belgium -- so he's got a very open ear, to say the least-----------dinesh is much more the underground soldier -- he's a black american (btw greg is also black) who has long made uk-style dance music, from jungle through 2-step and now grime -- he's worked with shut up and dance, ray keith, zed bias, stanton warriors, horsepower, menta, ron from london something, and others (fuck it -- i just listed these people verbatim from dinesh's webpage -- here's the link: www.goldspotmusic.com)
i'm not sure how long dinesh has been in the music game, but greg's involvement goes back to 1988, when he got swept up in house music -- he was in college at the time, somewhere in upstate new york, and he basically focused on the soulful paradise garage/shelter house sound -- but then ragga jungle caught his ear, and he made the leap into jungle, then 2-step garage, then a move to crunk coupled with a retreat back to old skool funk, now a grab bag of crunk, bhangra, dancehall, reggaton, uk garage, grime -- but what i find most interesting about greg's trajectory is the jump from shelter-style house to jungle -- of course his background in shelter-style house perhaps explains why he then followed the uk continuum into speed garage and 2-step -- that is, greg poole more than any other nyc dj tried to make 2-step happen here -- the only other black american djs that i know who were into jungle are of carribean background (so no great leap), and then they moved into organic sounds by late 90s and today are quite eclectic and, as it were, "tasteful," i.e., reggae, dfa, metro area, and so forth
as far as last night went, greg and dinesh played all varieties of shanty house, and then a third dj (who I assume was Edwin Stats) played mainly commercial hip hop ------ around 1 am dinesh began to drop the uk garage and, much to my surprised excitement, the dance floor (if you'd call it a dance floor) became instantly jam packed, i.e., nyc yuppies getting down to sub low sounds and clearly enjoying the music ----- i couldn't help but wonder how many of these people had heard music like this before ----- again, the crowd was a young crowd, mostly 20s, and racially diverse, but still yuppies ---- and, frankly, showing a lot more energy on the dancefloor than you'd ever see at a place like subtonic or rothko ----- the whole scene was very pleasure-principled, no counter-culture aspirations or fantasies or anything, and no underground vibe ----- most guys were there to pick-up girls, and vice versa ----- but still i was very impressed for about thirty minutes ------ and then dinesh began to play tribal house, the first couple of tracks of which were quite good, but then it began to sound like pretty god awful boring nyc tribal house (though he continued to mix in uk garage), and the crowd maintained its level of enthusiasm, not caring what they were hearing or dancing to----and then the person that i imagined to be edwin stats took over and played commercial hip hop, most of which i rather liked, and the place kept jumping----and at this point i left b/c i'm suffering from conjunctivitis ("pink eye") at the moment, and thought i should go home and get some rest, but instead took a detour, which is another matter
i expect that in two weeks' time, when greg and dinesh bring the black ops crew over to crash mansion, that the music will be more hardcore ------ at white rabbit their primary concern is likely to keep the crowd happy and make the place jump ----- and though i was disappointed not to hear more sub low sounds, i was impressed by their success w/ a crowd that is usually impervious to music ----- and, crucially, it was the sub low sounds that got the crowd jumping in the first place ----- i should add that i think it likely that dinesh played more uk garage and dub step toward the end of the night, but that i didn't stick around and so cannot say
again, it'd be nice to see rothko and subtonic types over at white rabbit, as it'd be a more diverse crowd (in terms of their views of the good and choices of style), and each crowd could show the other a thing or two about nightlife ----- though in the end the nature of the space at white rabbit, very clean & modern & loungey, invites a yuppie crowd, just as the dank space at subtonic attracts an intellectual crowd ---- perhaps there's no getting around the intentions of interior designers
Last edited: