Okay, so I'm a really clever guy. And as a really clever guy, I get to thinking that the best way to score hot tracks that will blow everybody's minds is to hit the east end for my records. I'm envisioning huge stores filled with amazing records for dirt cheap because they're east of Yonge Street (unfit for human habitation, btw).Well, it turns out that Leslieville is ground zero for bullshit hippie capitalists. And also: Starbucks' gentrification rays are bona fide 5real. Proof positive = the record stores out there no longer have dollar bins. No, they've replaced them with "two buck bins". I feel dirty just typing that. STRIKE OUT.
So a couple of hours before DJ on a Dime, I end up at She Said Boom on College Street. And they've got a tonne of dollar bins, so we're good. Maybe a little too good - trying to pull together a cohesive set with so many options is a bit daunting. Latin instrumental set? Country crooner set? Misinformed 60s neo-conservative pop set? Naive 80s carpet sample new wave set?
Part of me is really tempted to fly by the seat of my pants and blindly pick a bunch of the 12" house singles. But I lose my nerve and decide to play it safe with known quantities.
So I spend about an hour combing through the bins and I pull out maybe 40 records that I can work with and then just start whittling them down into some sort of unified collection. The first "in" was this double-record called "The Hit Singles" which featured all of the singles that CBS would release in 1987. We're talking Kenny Loggins, Miami Sound Machine, The Stranglers, Boston (yes, "More Than a Feeling" was on it), and oh yeah a little someone called Eddie Money. Shit. This thing is going to be EASY STREET.
Once I had The Hit Singles locked down, I had a tonne of room to play around. I went to the ACTUAL record bins and blew half my budget - FIVE BUCKS! - on one record. A one-sided 12" single (apparently they exist). None other than "I Was Made For Loving You" by KISS. So I throw in a Bryan Adams record, a 12" extenda-mix of "Boom Boom Boom (let's go back to my room)", and I'm ready. I still have a couple of selections left, so I take a couple of chances. On a wing and a prayer, I pick up a Zamfir record - just crossing my fingers that it has the song featured in "Kill Bill". The last record is a toss-up between two aerobics records. I LOVE AEROBICS RECORDS. They're always catchy and upbeat ("and one, and two, and one, and two!") to get you into your fat-burning zone. So I've gotta choose between one by this guy named Joe Stallone (!) and then one just called Dance Aerobics. I opt for the Dance Aerobics because it has a song by Mary Wells and the cover is awesome.When I got to the counter, the cashier informed me that somebody had already combed over the collection for DJ on a Dime a couple of days earlier. (Fuck man. I'll get you, MATT!!!)
So it turns out that $10 can buy you a decent 45-minute set. My set went off pretty much as I had planned, but there were some amazing discoveries - scrambling to mix something between Hit Singles, I ended up milking Dance Aerobics for a bunch of songs. Most notably was a song entitled "Stars on 45" - which was, inexplicably, a medley of one-minute snippets of Beatles songs covered by a disco band. BIG HIT. Oh, and a quick internet scan revealed that I lucked out with the Zamfir record - KILL BILL lovingly sampled the plaintiff pan-flute sounds of "The Lonely Shepherd".
Bonus: After I played "I Was Made For Loving You", somebody offered me $10 for that record alone. But I couldn't part with it.
Oh, and it turns out that the second DJ of the night - Matt - had made some WICKED scores at She Said Boom before me. He managed to pick up some fantastic K-Tel funk compilations. One smooth set, that dude.
ANYWAY COME OUT NEXT TIME.
