Bill Brewster is Here to Play
The DJHistory.com co-founder is in Australia for the first time ever.
Bill Brewster and Frank Broughton should be donated to the National Trust. The music historians published Last Night a DJ Saved My Life in 1999, launching DJhistory.com to accompany it. Since then they have been tirelessly documenting the history of dance music and its people — and if they hadn't, the stories (and even some of the music) might have been lost forever. In 2005 they wrote the brilliantly titled How to DJ (Properly) (hint: choose good songs), followed up by 2010's The Record Players: DJ Revolutionaries, which contained many of the interviews they conducted for Last Night, along with newer, unpublished transcripts. Their writing is funny, unbelievably well-researched, and can be read by anyone, regardless of whether they're interested in how to DJ or not (just ask my mum). It also just makes you feel good inside.
DJhistory.com also sells CD and books (including my all-time favourite, Jane Bussmann's Once In A Lifetime: The Crazy Days of Acid House and Afterwards), contains a forum full of music obsessives (I once saw someone post the stems to Stevie Wonder's 'Superstition' and a week later Todd Terje released his incredible edit), and posts regular features on dance music history. I'll never forget the article I read on Larry Levan's NYC nightclub Paradise Garage:
"This is the Paradise Garage in a nutshell," says New York DJ Johnny Dynell. "One night, Chi Chi, my wife, was bartending at the Garage. And, having worked at Danceteria doing the same, she couldn’t believe it when she saw these boys making everything so clean. They would take the garbage out and then wash and scrub the garbage can, then dry it, and put a new garbage bag in. She was in awe at the love these kids showed that garbage can. Because to these kids, it’s the temple. It’s sacred. This isn’t just a garbage can, this is a garbage can at the Garage. It’s very Old Testament. And for everyone there, it really was the temple. It was sacred ground."
The moral of all this is that Bill Brewster is in Australia this weekend — for the first time ever — to play two very special shows:
Friday 18 May (tonight!) at New Guernica for an Inside Out party, with local support from Otologic, Andee Frost and Simon TK. Level 2/322 Little Collins St Melbourne. $15 + BF presale, $20 door. Tickets via RA.
Saturday 19 May (tomorrow) at One22 in Sydney for CO-OP's third birthday celebration, with Belgian house producer San Soda. Entrance via Lees Crt, Rear of 122 Pitt St, Sydney. $20 + BF (first release), $25 + BF (second release) & $30 + BF (final release). Tickets via RA.
As a final special treat, here's a Valentine's Day mix that Bill put together for Low Life, the warehouse party that he and Frank have been running for a mind-bottling 17 years.
Ariane Halls
