Weekend Warriors

As a DJ, my office is the booth. My tools are the turntables and the mixer. In my office, there is work to do, deadlines to meet, and I have to reach a level of customer satisfaction that makes my bosses happy. My work week is from Wednesday to Sunday. I don't get the chance to party, I am the party and the people that wish to be a part of it will come to me for my services.

Because the DJ works on the weekend, he misses out on most of the nightlife. The nightlife that the DJ should know like the back of his hand, he cannot experience first hand.

I have three jobs. One during the week, one on the weekends, and one that pops up once a month, also on a weekend. During the week I live in a cubicle, behind a computer, answering the phone, working on paperwork. It's your regular everyday 9-5. Or, 8:30-5 in my case. I wear business casual and I wear jeans on Friday. This is my life, Monday through Friday.

Then the weekend comes. Many believe the weekend was developed by religion, because of Sunday, the day of rest, was a sacred day. To most, it remains this way. To others, however, Sunday is just the day of getting rid of hangovers and watching football eating junk food. I think Saturday, long ago was very much apart of the work week. If you think about it, crops still had to grow, cattle still had to be attended to, the mail had to travel a little bit farther via wells fargo wagons. It must have been the business world, the big conglomerates that noticed that Saturday was also necessary for the employees to be truly happy.

That's when the term "thank god it's Friday" came about. Friday became quickly the day that everyone celebrated. 5:00 roles in and the whistle blows, sounds of "yeeeeabadabadoooo!" echo across the land, and the weekend begins.

It usually starts with happy hour. While happy hour is available most work days, it is normally featured on Fridays. The end of the week is here, and there's three nights of sleeping and fun before waking up Monday morning. People like happy hour because they can get started right away, with friends and coworkers, lighting up cigars and cigarettes, stuck behind bars holding large glasses of beer or cocktails for only 2 bucks. Its here that you will see all the business of the world getting sloppy: Half un-done ties and button down shirts, women's business suits opened to expose the low-cut blouses. Pocket protectors still hang, cell phones and ID cards still display proudly on the belt line. Men smell intensely of over-applied colonge and desk chair swampass, not too mention their feet that reek of 9 hour worn in socks. Women have different makeup on, reapplying after the workday but now with lip gloss, some new eyeliner, perhaps a little glitter on the eyes and chest. The quick fix-up of the happy hour is almost like art.

At happy hour, there is no DJ. It is not until later that night that the DJ will come about in the big clubs, or the local dancehalls. The happy hour bars normally don't care about music, just what is next on the jukebox, and the bar tab. These sloppy half-drunken business yuppies will be the feature of the night, because 9pm will be here soon. Some will go to the club or the next bar as-is, still toting the badge and cell phone, and smelly socks. Others will go home first, shower, nap, and prepare for the night ahead. These young club-goers won't get there until 10:30, now fresh and ready for action.

Friday night feels like a whole new night, as if they took the day off and slept all day before hitting the clubs. They expect to be entertained, taking the girls or boys they met from the happy hour, leaving the kids or the wives behind for a little flirty fling that evening. Here at the clubs women come in packs, men come in pairs, and while women stay together in groups, the men scatter and look for prey. It is here that the bartenders are the suppliers, the bouncers are the PR reps, the partiers are the employees, and the DJ is the manager of all things on the floor.

The DJ is higher than the rest of the club so he/she can oversee the entire floorspace. They are usually placed in a point where they can see all angles, so they can do their job the best. The DJ has to be aware of all aspects of the club: the bar take, the line outside, current median drunkedness, and of course time of night. The DJ uses these tools to entertain to the maximum value, while making the club or bar the maximum amount of money. The DJs job goes much deeper than playing music, it's about playing the right music at the right time. Sometimes the DJ will play a crappy song on purpose so everyone will go drink some more, and then two songs later play a massive hit to bring everyone back again. The DJ plans the night according to the crowd and builds the energy all the way till the end so people, even the drunk people dance their ass off and sweat all the alcohol away. It is up to the DJ to play the songs that will make the newly created couples get closer, to share a first kiss, to share a moment together that will only progress throughout the night until they get to either of their homes later. It is up to the DJ to order out commands that people on the dancefloor will gladly follow such as, "put your hands up," or "jump around."

It is here that everyone is the same. Now the people from the office or the VIPs or the daddies little girls, or the college fakers all become one. They all mesh into one common task which is fun. The cell phones disappear only to be replaced by beer spills. The cell phones only come out to obtain new phone numbers that will never be called. The ID badges get left behind and lost forever, there is no IDs in the club, no faces... Just bodies.

It is up to the DJ to bring all these groups together. At first in the club they separate, only sticking by their own kind. This segregation shouldn't last long because soon the beer will cloud everyone's vision and the integration begins. Soon the men begin doing laps and the women begin throwing eyes across the room. The magical art of mating season begins. Much like animals in nature, the men get on the prowl looking for the right female to approach, all with a set of rules different from everyone else's on how to make the first move. Each man has a line, or a phrase, or a trick that will get the woman's attention. Some flash their money or their gadgets around to impress them, some flex their muscles to woo them, some come with comedy to make them smile. One of these tactics will work, but most men still go home with eachother, alone as always. Mating season begins somewhere about 11:00, ending at 1am, by then the women are all taken or just too drunk to be of any fun. After a little liquid confidence men always try to start from the top and work their way back, trying to find the cutest women possible with the lowest standards. It's art, it's a symphony of love and attraction, it's a celebration of sex.

The DJ knows all of this, the DJ is the king, the shaman, the wise man of the weekend. These club-goers are the weekend warriors that the DJ is in command of. The DJ is the unspoken center of the nightlife universe - sometimes unknown or unseen. This is my weekend job. This is what I am alive to do. I do not party, I am the party, I am the DJ.