It’s true, I was so happy listening to Mixmaster Mike spin. He has the true battle D.J. attitude, and such a great sense of humor and a collection of wild stuff to play. I greeted him warmly, even though I do not own his records. I certainly know of his work with the Invisible Skratch Picklz and the Beastie Boys. MMM is a turntablist, he is a true artist on the wheels of steel

I am a fan of Fat Boy Slim, but he does not do what Mike does, constantly cutting it up, making collages, scratching on the beat, really “talking” with the turntables.

Sidefill crossover and amp

Oh yeah, I forgot, everybody on the LAB hates D.J.’s, I’ll stop now. Mike and I discussed Bjork, as he waited to go on, and he described her as “captivating.” Good adjective. Mike’s gear was set up on a table that was carried onstage to replace Vinroc’s, and be attached to the same XLR’s and d.i.’s. If I ran the world, he would have had his own channels, been on a rolling platform, as befits an actual artist, line-checked, and then we would have orchestrated Vinroc ending a tune, waving to the crowd, and then wham!

Mike would have dropped his first beat. Hey, if it’s a fantasy, I forgot to add me out there with an RF mic as his hype man, whipping up the crowd before Mike goes on. With my wrestling mask!

Saves the Day

Saves The Day - The singer in this band is quite polite, he stepped out to do their set and looked over at me, and commented “My monitors aren’t on.” I looked down and indeed, some unidentified invisible saboteur had turned off the lead vocal channel. (That’s a joke, by the way.) The main crew guy for Saves The Day is really good at setting mixes for the players, before they come out to play. The drummer hits pretty hard and needed more of everything, the guitarists wanted to hear more of each other, and none of them were unpleasant in how they made their requests. Slamming songs, reminded me of Naked Raygun.

Mos Def – A very nutty man, in front of some very heavy-duty veteran musicians. I have done monitors for Bad Brains before, so I greeted guitarist Dr. Know, as we are both products of the Nation’s Capital. There was a delay in a loops-producing device arriving, and so I asked him, “Doc, will you do the show without the loops or not?” He asked around, and the consensus was we would wait. Bassist Doug Wimbish announced, panic-stricken, that he had forgotten his earplugs, so I gave him a set from the stash I keep in my tool bag. Eventually the extra gear showed up, and they went on only a few minutes late.

The Strokes – Straightforward rock band. Movie star women showed up to watch from the far side of the stage. Our side was overwhelmed with posers, due to an inexplicable temporary failure of security; one got the sense that the Strokes had given out 100 all-access passes. I vowed that this would not happen while Steve was working for the Foo Fighters.

Foo Fighters/Tenacious D. – As soon as we cleared the wankers out after The Strokes, I took a long Oasis case and swivelled it sideways and blocked the area where our desks were. I stood there scowling and gently turned back anyone who tried to slide by. The Foo Fighters are a ROCK band, their stage is quite strong volume-wise, and Steve was just the man to control it for them. The Foos proved they have a sense of humor by inviting crowd favorites Tenacious D. to come out and play a few songs, before the band started administering their severe thrashing.