channel HOGSTYLE

Lotus Plaza plays at Wooly's in Des Moines' East Village.

So I DJed again on Saturday night at Vaudeville Mews' outdoor PBR Bar. Or at least, played records -- someday I really ought to figure out the whole beat-matching/mixing thing, but at this point I still have enough trouble remembering which discs are 45 RPM and which are 33 RPM. And that's even after I've cued my records up with my headphones. Go figure.

We're in the midst of what officials say is the hottest July in this state since the Dust Bowl, so it wasn't my most crowded DJing gig ever. For most of the night, then, I basically just played what I wanted to play. No matter how soggy-muggy it is out there, though, after midnight you get random drunk people wandering over to dance, so you play what you think might keep them moving.

Thank you so much to Ladd for booking me (under the hey-Marc-you-should-really-think-up-a-DJ-name name of DJ Hogstyle, hence my Frank Ocean-inspired post title), to Kyler for helping me get set up and keeping me from getting too thirsty and just generally putting up with me, to Derek for getting me squared away sound-wise, and to Patrick and Ashley for helping me haul my turntables and crate of records home again.

Once again, I tried to keep a running notepad entry on my phone with the names of the tracks I was playing. I did pretty well until the end, when I have one line that says "Wgotne" (did I play Whitney Houston again? I think I'd remember that) and another line that says, simply, "Bwy" (Sade's "By Your Side"? SWV? More TLC? LCD Soundsystem?). Without further stupid ado: