[Dynagroove] Rock Stars Are Not DJs but DJs are Rock Stars

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And interesting article i thought i'd share.

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the GOOD life

Celebrity Spin

Rock Stars Are Not DJs­But DJs Are Rock  Stars

by Tricia Romano, Village Voice
February 14th, 2006 11:29  AM


Madonna is not a DJ. But this didn't matter to the few hundred  people who
crowded into the West Village club Luke and Leroy for the popular  weekly
party
MisShapes a few months ago to watch her "spin." They came to  breathe her
fabulous, famous air.

Wearing a blue halter dress, she stood  in front of the turntables and smiled
coyly. Once, she picked up the mic and  asked people nicely to stop pushing
and shoving. Her producer, Stuart Price, a  commendable techno artist better
known as Jacques Lu Cont, played the tracks  they'd worked on together from
her
new album Confessions on a Dance Floor.  Occasionally, she'd put on her
headphones and pose for pictures. Madge jiggled  the volume on the mixer one
time,
but she never touched the turntables. Price  did all the work. After her set,
I
ran into an old friend.

"Dude, she  was amazing!" he shouted with absolute sincerity.

Members of local bands  like the Rapture, Calla, Interpol, !!!, and the Yeah
Yeah Yeahs have gotten  behind the decks for several years, paving the way for
Kelly Osbourne and  members of the Killers and Franz Ferdinand. You can
currently see Mattie Safer  and Gabe Andruzzi of the Rapture at their
Friday-night
party, HushHush, at Happy  Ending and members of Calla play Corner Billiards
every week. On February 13,  members of TV on the Radio spun at Yo La Tengo's
weekly Monday Party at Scenic.  Interpol's Paul Banks has a Wednesday weekly
scheduled at the Annex, and his  bandmate Carlos D. spins every Sunday at
Black
and White. Perhaps the original  rock star DJ, Carlos D. was the first
non-dance-music jock to make the cover of  genre bible Urb; on March 3, he
headlines­with members of VHS or  Beta­the prestigious Flavorpill
First Friday
series at the Guggenheim, which  has previously featured "legit" DJs like
Diplo
and Matthew Dear.

But the  trend has extended far beyond local bands. Promoters GBH (who might
want to  consider changing their name­it stands for Great British House)
book new  wave icons like Bauhaus's David J. and Depeche Mode's Martin Gore.
Weekly  favorite Tiswas relaunched last month, hosting the Stone Roses' Mani
and
New  Order's Peter Hook. Erasure's Andy Bell pairs live solo outings with DJ
sets.  Indeed, famous bygone names have become so common on flyers that it's a
miracle  local DJs still get booked at all.

In this age of celebrity obsession, a  rock star DJ set is the aural
equivalent of an autograph­as if a record were  somehow different because
Jarvis
Cocker spun it. "Most of these DJ appearances  have nothing to do with music,"
says veteran rave DJ Tommie Sunshine. "They're  PR stops on the calendar."

At the end of the '90s, superstar DJs like  Sasha, Paul Oakenfold, and Pete
Tong made absurd amounts of money from their art  form; DJs had finally
overcome the stigma that had plagued their disco and house  forebears.
Turntables
were supposedly outselling guitars at Christmastime. That  was before the
iPod,
which was instrumental in letting people effortlessly  calibrate a soundtrack
to fit every moment of their lives­which, as local  promoter and DJ Alex
English points out, translated seamlessly into clubs  "basically propelling
anybody with 300 CDs into becoming a DJ."

During  the electroclash era, clubgoers realized they didn't actually want to
hear  uninterrupted instrumental beat music at all. They wanted songs; they
wanted  familiarity. They didn't even want electro clash­ a crude
approximation of  the real thing. They wanted the actual '80s.

Detractors of the celeb-DJ  trend blame it for the current club scene
stagnating into a distant past of New  Order's "Blue Monday," Depeche Mode's
"Personal Jesus," and Blondie's "Heart of  Glass." Even new club music tends
toward
copycat bands. But English says that,  by booking a member of Erasure, he's
linking current '80s-sounding bands like  the Killers and the Bravery­"a
whole
genre of Depeche Mode wannabes"­to  their influences.

Yet you have to wonder what link to the past the  audience supposedly gleaned
when Depeche Mode's Martin Gore showed up last  summer and spun minimal
German techno to a roomful of people expecting to hear  New Order's
"Temptation."
"They didn't care," says Sunshine. "If he would've  played a bunch of '80s
hits, the place would've been unhinged. But that isn't  what he did. And by
the
time he was done, half the people were gone."

Many local musicians started moonlighting as DJs for practical reasons.  It
was the easiest way to have a decent after-party when touring, says Yeah Yeah
Yeahs guitarist Nick Zinner. "Being on the road can be monotonous, so that
gives  you something to do with yourself other than indulging in mountains of
cocaine  and hookers," he jokes. In the interim between touring and recording,
musicians  could make some extra cash. And spinning provided a way to test
their
music on  an unsuspecting public. "I used to play Yeah Yeah Yeah songs and
demos all the  time in bars before we were signed, to see if anyone reacted or
to get people to  come to our shows," says Zinner. "Now I think it's totally
gauche for people in  bands to DJ their own music. It's worse than wearing
your
own band T-shirt on  the L train."

Or they spin simply because they like it. Says Carlos D.,  who DJ'd at Lit
and 85A long before Interpol became big: "Anyone who makes fun  of me for
being
a celebrity DJ or gives me crap for trying to cash in on some  persona or
something, I swear to God, like, on my mother's future grave, that  for me at
the
time, I just wanted to spin because I missed it so much. I missed  the
excitement of DJ'ing for people who were dancing."

Four years ago,  Princess Superstar­whose new concept album My Machine is
about the cult of  celebrity­was booked at a bar as a fluke, before she
could mix. Unlike the  rock DJs who play various forms of dance rock, she
spins
music that lends itself  to beatmatching. In a satisfying twist, her DJ
career has helped along her  recording career­she makes music with the
dance-floor in mind, and as she  tours around the world meeting world-class
spinners,
they ask for her records.

Back when she formed the duo DJs Are Not Rockstars with Alex Technique,  the
name referred to superstar techno DJs who pulled diva behavior; looking  back,
it seems particularly prescient. And originally, Princess Superstar took
umbrage at the fact that she could get paid more for spinning than for
performing live. "As a musician, I was like, This is bullshit. They wanna pay
me  like
three grand to play other people's records?' But I'm not conflicted about
that anymore, because I really see the art of DJ'ing and that it is a form of
making music."

DJ purists scoff at the rock star DJs. The "real" DJs  argue that the rock
stars can't mix and don't respect the art of DJ'ing. They're  just, as Tommie
Sunshine says, an "iPod with legs." And some of the rock star  DJs agree. "If
I'm a techno DJ, and I don't know how to beatmatch," says Carlos  D., "I'm not
a
techno DJ."

Not beatmatching, says Sunshine, "keeps it a  level playing field. If people
don't beatmatch, then everyone is untalented  playing turntables. As long as
you take the skill out of it, then nobody's  better than anybody else."
Suddenly serious, he says, "I have a question for  you­would you want to
see me
play guitar?" "No." "Then why would I want to  see James Iha play records?"

A few months ago, Sunshine was at Happy  Ending when he saw Alexander
Technique wearing a T-shirt that said "No  Beatmatching." Alexander explained
that
Princess Superstar was asked to play the  MisShapes party, but with a caveat:
There was to be no beatmatching and no  playing of electronic dance music.
Both
requests seemed pretty incredible given  MisShapes' numerous guest DJs who do
both quite proficiently.

More than  any party in New York, the MisShapes (Greg K., Leigh Lezark, and
Geo) have  capitalized on the fad of celebrity DJs. They've had ex?Smashing
Pumpkin Iha,  Hedwig actor-director John Cameron Mitchell, Dior fashion
designer
Hedi Slimane,  the Rapture's Mattie and Vito, members of Les Savy Fav, the
Killers, Kelly  Osbourne, Hilary Duff, and Carlos D. (Full disclosure: This
writer even spun  there once herself, for fun.) Greg K. makes no excuses about
his
party's focus  on celeb DJs over skilled mixers. "It's not a DJ-focused
party," he says. "Our  crowd is not about who is the best DJ. It's more about
having
their presence  than their music."

As for the "no beatmatching and no electronic dance  music" dictate, Greg
says he and his partners mostly just wanted to keep the  night from turning
into
a rave. He says MisShapes didn't start out intending to  be a celebrity DJ
event. "It's not calculated!" he insists. The celebs "have fun  doing it,
especially if they're musicians."


Even if most fans are  just happy to be in the same room, some moonlighting
musicians take DJ'ing just  as seriously as they do making music. Martin Gore,
for one, learned to beatmatch  and spends hours preparing his sets. "I work
out everything to a fine point," he  says. "I make a whole list of extensive
notes."

Paul Thomson of Franz  Ferdinand beatmatches, even though the crowd probably
couldn't care less. "There  are people who are good at DJ'ing, and people who
are bad at it," says Zinner.  "But nobody seems to give a fuck except people
who are good at it. I always say  I'm not really a DJ, I just play records."

"There's an art to just  playing records without beatmatching," allows
Sunshine. "I always know when  someone's saying something and when they're
not. You
can always tell," he says,  tipping his hat to Carlos D., Zinner, and others.

"DJ'ing doesn't have  any meaning to me unless I'm taking a piece of plastic
out of a paper sleeve and  plopping it down on a turntable and manually
putting it on," says Carlos D.,  explaining why he refuses to spin anything
but
vinyl. "The fact that I have it  on vinyl means that I spent a lot of time
cultivating it over the years. When  you start DJ'ing from an iPod, the only
story
that you're telling is that you  may have gotten this in the past 24 hours
from
iTunes. When you have vinyl,  you're telling a much, much more epic story."

It's a no-brainer for any  promoter that Carlos D. would draw more of a crowd
than an anonymous local  spinner. But just a few years ago, Interpol's
instantly recognizable bassist was  an anonymous local spinner himself, happy
simply
to get a gig. "I had a very  unpopular night on Tuesday at 85A, ages and ages
ago," he says, and he recalls  his radio show on WNYU when he was in
college­which featured "gothic, dark,  ambient" soundscapes. "Dead Can
Dance was
as light as it got."

Before  Interpol blew up, he had a taste for '80s sounds, spinning Adult.,
Fischerspooner, and Love and Rockets at Lit with Justine D when parties like
Shout were still stuck on Britpop and rock 'n' soul. "People didn't look at me
as a person that they should go see spin, which I totally understood. I'm
that  guy. No one was listening to the '80s. And then electroclash exploded."

And so did his band. Suddenly he had the audience he always hoped for,  and
he could play whatever he wanted. "I was able to throw these after-parties
where people would show up no matter what. Even if I was saying, 'I'm only
spinning classical music tonight,' they would still come because it was me. It
wasn't about the music, it was about who was DJ'ing. It took me a while to
realize that."

Spinning at the band's after-parties was a practical way  for him to unwind
after a show. But it also became for a way for fans to get as  close to their
idols as possible.

"There have been times when I've  hidden behind the DJ booth on purpose just
because I can't take the staring  anymore," he says. "It's like Children of
the Corn. It's like, 'What are you  looking at? Seriously, what is so
interesting?' "

Still, you have to  wonder: How can a promoter top Madonna, the ultimate
"get" in celebrity "gets"?  It's a downhill slide to Paris Hilton from here.
In
fact, both Kimberly Stewart  and Brittny Gastineau have guest DJ'd recently.
"I've pretty much stopped DJ'ing  regularly because it's gotten to be too much
of
a cliché," says Zinner. "Not  only is everyone in a band, but everyone's a
DJ. I'm just a little sick of the  whole phenomenon. I would, however, totally
throw down 10 bucks to watch DJ  Glenn Danzig any day."

"I don't know when it's gonna end," says Princess  Superstar. "I feel like,
more and more, everyone's gonna do it. And soon, like,  Bono will be the guest
DJ. I think it's fun for the celebrities themselves,  actually. Who doesn't
like to be in charge of the music at the party?" She  laughs. "That's
essentially what it is, isn't it?"


Additional  reporting by Sandy Kofler and Debbie Maron