Troostfest . . . a 10-hour blur.
The day started off for us early, arriving at the Infoshop around 10am to unload the gear and then heading to You Say Tomato for breakfast - veggie bierock for Stephanie, Greek salad for me - not to mention too much coffee.
Set-up went pretty smoothly as usual, which always makes me content that I’ve put in the time best analogous to the military practice of breaking down your weapon, cleaning it, and rebuilding it in the dark. As much of an amateur as I am, it’s one small feat of professionalism I always like to pat myself on the back for.
Got the jams started around noon, and from there it was a beatconductor rollercoaster for the next 9 or so hours. One highlight was the Animal Collective remix of Ratatat’s “Mirando” into a 1-Speed Bike track off of Someone Told Me Life Gets Easier in Your 50’s into Squarepusher’s “Vic Acid” . . . which then of course devolved into a rough 45 minutes of mid-90’s Metalheadz/V/etc bangers that the traveller kids ate up.
Somewhere around here, some of the nuns from the ministry on the corner came in. I could see them perusing our Crimethinc and Bitch zines, so I figured I’d play something a little missionary for ‘em . . . deeper drum-oriented house (think Jephte Guillaume’s “6/8 Drumz”) was just the order for the order - I swear, those habits hide hip shaking better than you’d think.
As the afternoon progressed, we had an influx of parents and children mixing with art school kids, most of whom were taking advantage of Stephanie’s “Make your own Protest Sign” arts & crafts station. What better time to start the new-age hip-hop right? Dorian Concept, Nosaj Thing (I always give credit to New Kingdom’s Nosaj for this), Ras G, et al were dropped forthrightly. I don’t really know about “wonky” but I’d say it’s safe to say the placed was wonked. The (little) kids loved it, and that’s what matters.
From there, we eased on down the road into your love, my love, our love, the deep house portion of the programming. The beauty of the digital age is exemplified in moments of mixing almost the entirety of Moodymann’s Mahagony Brown and Silent Introduction albums while young mothers and children make “Take back my Life” signs on recovered cardboard.
There’s only one place to go deeper than deep house, and as with the setting sun, we moved on to modern dubbed Detroit - reference the Echospace camp - which of course leads to all things Von Oswalt. If ever there was a music made for four-deck mixing, it was this. It was this 2.5 hours that I’ll refer to as my current-state Mecca. The folks who hung for this period of time were of a caliber I appreciated to an unmeasureable extent.
This was a timespan in which I felt absolutely at-one with my silicone simpaticos, a ghost in the shell via time immemorial. The remixes of Model 500’s “Starlight” rushing in on each other, bvDub crushing it, Pendle Coven ghosting it, and the over-and-over-and-over-and-over dubbing of both the proper and version mixes of Intrusion and Paul St. Hilaire’s “Little Angel” were just outstanding.
There came a point where the white folk kids needed a moment as well - tracks from Boduf Songs, Ryan Francesconi, a classic Modest Mouse mega-mix, and tracks from the Downtown 81 soundtrack were played.
And finally, I was through. An hour afterwards, I was several deep into a 2×6 of blue moon and a conversation stemming from hierarchal positions of medicine men in indigenous societies, waiting to head back up to the Church for Adrian Orange.
We made it up there to catch Francie in late set, then another local act, which I hate to say, I can’t remember the name of beyond “Floyd” . . .something. I had a good time during both and surprisingly found myself in my front room at 11:30pm.
Adrian Orange needed the day off, and didn’t show - and it was alright. It was the local day in the sun we al needed.
Images forthcoming.
