DJs need more than spinning records

John Badalu, Contributor, Jakarta

The floor is crawling at a notorious club in downtown Kota, West Jakarta. People are not looking at each other. Everybody is too busy to wait for that beat to sway their bodies. The music is pumping harder and harder and people are getting hysterical.

This music guru of the night definitely knows how to fulfill people's needs for melodic release. DJs have arrived in a big way in the entertainment world in the past two decades.

Looking back at the history of deejaying, turntables started out as toys for lower classes. The turntable was invented at the end of the 19th century, but almost nobody had heard of its existence.

It only became popular among poor Jamaicans and Puerto Ricans (at that time the Puerto Ricans who lived in New York were called Nuyoricans) in New York. They couldn't afford to hire live bands and singers, so they played records nonstop on two turntables just to keep the party grooving.

This was when the term disc jockey was used for guys who happened to have a collection of records and knew how to operate a turntable. The music played by the Disc Jockey at that time was called Nuyorican beat and was considered to be decadent.

It was not until the 1980s that deejaying broke through to make a mark on pop culture. When French DJ Jean-Michel Jarre composed Zoolook using samples of different kinds of music, people turned their head and listened to this bizarre sound. At the same time hiphop music and break-dancing were taking the world by storm.

DJ culture peaked in the 1990s. Suddenly DJs were competing fiercely with live singers. Clubs started to open in towns around the world, showcasing the talents of DJs, who were creating their own identities, mixing tunes and generally taking over as the kings of the night. It seemed like every singer and group who released an album included a bonus track remixed by a DJ.

Take the duo Everything But The Girl, for example. Their single Missing was an average seller, but when the same track was remixed by a DJ, it sold millions and millions of copies.

Nowadays, world-class DJs have their own legions of screaming fans. The quiet island of Ibiza in Spain got a facelift and became famous for dance parties attended by clubgoers from all over the world.

DJs are the hottest commodities in entertainment. They travel fast and earn thousands of dollars a night to play records in the most glamorous cosmopolitan cities. What a life!

While the economy struggles, the DJ business has never been better and it keeps climbing. DJs now have their own record labels and are chased by producers, party organizers and beautiful women.

Here in this country, the DJ scene started in the 1980s. Back then, the only DJ we knew was Adam Jagwani who resided in the notorious and famous Stardust Discotheque in Kota. But he sure was one hell of the disco king. People rushed to buy the disco song compilations that he mixed and recorded.

Aside from Stardust, the hot places to go and be seen were Ebony in Kuningan, South Jakarta, and Oriental in Jakarta Hilton International and Musro in Hotel Borobudur, both in Central Jakarta.

Creeping into the 1990s, more clubs were opened and people had more choices to go dancing. The music started to shift into heavier beats and a scratching mix of different sound. More amateur DJs appeared and tried their best to win the crowds.

The decade was definitely the highrise of clubbers here. There were parties going on almost every weekend. Tanamur, one of the oldest discos in town which is located in Tanah Abang, Central Jakarta, was always packed on weekends. It was such an interesting place, with all kind of people can be found. From prostitutes (male and female), to businessmen, expatriates, students and also celebrities.

Around 1993, however, the DJ phenomenon was always related to drugs, with ecstasy pills inundating dance floors. People who craved for the beat seemed not to get enough by dancing. They needed a boost, more energy, more hard beats and adrenaline. And the music that only goes with it was the monotonous house music.

Things went better by the late 1990s. There have been many big parties sponsored by cigarette companies that used DJs as entertainment. Parties got more various and more creative in concept. And names like DJ Riri, DJ Anton, DJ Deni, DJ Romy, DJ Wingky and scores of others emerged.

They play more of mellower tune at a lower tempo instead of house music. Chill out music, new age, ambient, eclectic, soulful sound is preferred instead of hard techno, tribal or trance.

Those popular DJs don't play in one certain club anymore. They prefer to spin the vinyls for big organized parties. The clubs are more for the young emerging DJs to start their professional careers.

Although the live bands in cafes are still favorite entertainment, slowly and convincingly the scratching DJs are stealing the market bit by bit. Clubs like Embassy and Lava Lounge in Senayan, Retro in Semanggi, Musro and Stadium in Kota are always packed any day of the week.

Some big international DJs have also toured Indonesia, including the famous Ministry of Sound, Graham Wallace, Mario Piu and many more.

The DJ scene is heating up right now. The demands are high, and so DJ schools are now flooded by young music spinner freaks. Whatever the music is, DJs rules. They are absolutely the music masterminds who make people keep grooving.