Tag Archives: Fun Rhode Island DJ

Cyndi Lauper Girls Just Want To Have Fun

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Cyndi Lauper Girls Just Want To Have Fun is such a great and fun song. Cyndi Lauper is one of those artists that it is hard not to like. She is fun, talented, creative and seems to always be completely herself in whatever she does.  A true unique talent who has not veered from her own style and way of doing things.  She was very loyal to her first band that she recorded with, Blue Angel, not allowing the record companies to break them apart.  She eventually found her way as a solo artist and was the first woman to have four Top 5 hits from the same album.

Wedding Bouquet Toss DJ Cyndi Lauper Girls Just Want To Have Fun

“Lauper knew she could write songs, but the record company had a lot of material they wanted her to record. She altered a lot of the songs that were thrown her way, often changing the lyrics to suit her. An example is her Platinum-certified Cyndi Lauper Girls Just Want To Have Fun; Lauper says the original lyrics of the song dealt more with a girl pleasing a man, and therefore she changed the lyrics, wanting the song to be more of an anthem as she felt the original song seemed misogynistic.” Wikipedia

 Cyndi Lauper Girls Just Want To Have Fun Music Video

There are few songs that are more fun to dance and party to than Cyndi Lauper Girls Just Want To Have Fun. The video is hysterical and carries that fun and playful vibe throughout. It is noteworthy that Cyndi Lauper Girls Just Want To Have Fun included girls from diverse races and backgrounds in her video, something that was not yet part of the music industry.  It is very common for a professional Wedding DJ play this song during either The Bouquet Toss or Garter during a wedding reception from women of all ages.

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ

Janet Jackson If

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This past Saturday night I felt inspired to put together a Janet Jackson medley while mixing at a professional DJ gig that began with Janet Jackson If. I am surprised she is not played more these days. Her music is so well designed for dancing and creative movement. Her vocals are soft and somehow forceful and sensual simultaneously.

Dancing at Rhode Island Wedding with Rhode Island Wedding DJ Janet Jackson If

Janet Jackson is the first and only artist in history to produce seven top five hits from one album, Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation 1814. In addition to receiving recognition for the innovation in her records, choreography, music videos, and prominence on radio airplay and MTV, she was acknowledged as a role model for her socially conscious lyrics.

 Janet Jackson If Music Video

http://youtu.be/nzkrWjUjDdQ

I remember driving kids in the van we used to pick them up from school to the program I was coordinating at the time. They played Janet Jackson If again and again, and the girls would practice all her dance steps every day while we were getting ready to begin. I got to know every beat of Janet Jackson If without ever choosing to play it or listen to it:) As a long-time fan of Diana Ross and The Supremes and a professional DJ, it inspired me to hear her sample beats from them along with the powerful guitar chords that introduces the Janet Jackson If.

Janet Jackson If Story

“Janet Jackson If deals with a female narrator’s fantasies of being someone’s girlfriend. The track contains a sample from Diana Ross & the Supremes‘ 1969 song “Someday We’ll Be Together“, and is built on a heavy metal guitar riff heard throughout the song. The combination of heavy hip hop/new jack swing beats with an electric guitar and a trip hop sound was a relative departure in sound for Jackson, and an extension of styles she developed on her previous album, Rhythm Nation 1814. A remix of “If” entitled Brothers in Rhythm House Mix appears on Jackson’s 1995 remix album janet. Remixed. The single contains a B-side called “One More Chance”, a cover of a song her brother Randy wrote, produced, and performed for The Jacksons‘ 1984 Victory album.” wikipedia

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ

Pink Raise Your Glass

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I realize that I am posting the video Pink Raise Your Glass, very late. It occurred to me as a professional DJ, that this is becoming a Rock Classic. Almost every party or wedding that I perform at as a Rhode Island Wedding DJ these days includes this song. It has even made it to 40th and 50th Birthday parties!

 

Pink Raise Your Glass is a great party song with some nice sarcasm mixed-in to the typical Pink high energy rhythms.  It is starting to become rare for Rock songs of the current era to stand the test of time as the Classics of the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s did. There are several reasons for this, one being the rise in popularity of Hip Hop, R&B and Country. Pink seems to be one of the artists that may be able to rise above and sustain popularity and her roots for an extended period, partially due to the fact that she appeals to teens, twenties and adults simultaneously. I hope she continues to produce edgy music like Pink Raise Your Glass, that also reaches widespread audiences.

Pink Raise Your Glass Rhode Island Rock Wedding DJ

According to Billboard, Pink was rated No.13 on the list of Artists of the Decade and No.1 Pop Song Artist of the Decade (2000–2009.  Pink has named Madonna and Janis Joplin as two of her biggest musical influences. She stated that “I wanted to do it my way with my career, and I had this arrogant notion that people weren’t just interested in my music but me as a person. That was my bit of arrogance, I guess. That’s something I learned from Madonna. I was a fan right from the first time I heard ‘Holiday'” Of Joplin she expressed: “She was so inspiring by singing blues music when it wasn’t culturally acceptable for white women, and she wore her heart on her sleeve. She was so witty and charming and intelligent, but she also battled an ugly-duckling syndrome. I would love to play her in a movie.”

Alecia Beth Moore (born September 8, 1979), known by her stage name Pink (stylized as P!nk), is an American singer-songwriter, musician and actress. In 2000, she released her first single “There You Go“, from her debut album Can’t Take Me Home. The song was a commercial success, peaking at #7 on the Billboard Hot 100. Having sold over 40 million albums and 70 million singles globally, being a critically acclaimed performer, Pink is often seen as the “underdog” in popular music, for not receiving as mainstream attention as her female pop stars peers. Her career accolades include three Grammy Awards, two Brit Awards and five MTV Video Music Awards, in addition to having eighteen Top 20 Hits on the Billboard charts and three #1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100. In 2009 Billboard magazine named Pink the #1 pop musician of the decade, and in 2012 VH1 named Pink #10 on their list of the 100 Greatest Women in Music

British soul singer Adele considers Pink’s performance at Brixton Academy in London as one of “the most defining moments” in her life.

Pink Raise Your Glass Music Video

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ

John Hiatt Have A Little Faith

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John Hiatt Have A Little Faith has been featured in the films Benny & Joon, Phenomenon, Love Happens, Look Who’s Talking and My Best Friend’s Girl. John Hiatt Have A Little Faith has been covered by many artists including  Joe Cocker, Delbert McClinton, Chaka Kahn and my favorite, Van Morrison. Jewel’s version is the one featured in Phenomenon. 

 

Really this is just a beautiful song- the lyrics, the melody and intensity. It certainly carries a message we all can appreciate.

John Hiatt Have A Little Faith Rhode Island Wedding DJ

 John Hiatt Have A Little Faith Lyrics

When the road gets dark
And you can no longer see
Just let my love throw a spark
And have a little faith in me
And when the tears you cry
Are all you can believe
Just give these loving arms a try
And have a little faith in me

Have a little faith in me
Have a little faith in me

And when your secret heart
Cannot speak so easily
Come here darling, from a whisper start
And have a little faith in me
And when your back’s against the wall
Just turn around and you, you will see
I will catch you, I will catch your fall
Just have a little faith in me

Have a little faith in me
Have a little faith in me

‘Cause I’ve been loving you, for such a long, long time
Expecting nothing in return
Just for you to have a little faith in me
You see time, time is our friend
‘Cause for us, there is no end
And all you gotta do, is have a little faith in me
I will hold you up, I will hold you up
And your love, gives me strength enough to
Have a little faith in me
Hey hey
All you gotta do for me girl
Is have a little faith in me

John Hiatt Have A Little Faith Music Video

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ

Chuck Berry Johnny B Goode

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“In the 1960s and 1970s, Berry’s music was the inspiration for such groups as the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. Berry had a number of comeback recordings and in 1972 had the first and only #1 Pop Chart hit of his career with “My Ding-A-Ling. 1986 fittingly saw him inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as the very first inductee in history. As a tribute to his pervasiveness in the realm of rock, a clip of Chuck Berry Johnny B Goode was chosen played in the Voyager I spacecraft, proving Chuck Berry and his rock legacy are truly out of this world.”  The Official Site of Chuck Berry

 

Charles Edward Anderson “Chuck” Berry (born October 18, 1926) is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter, and one of the pioneers of Rock and Roll music.

 

Among the many bandleaders performing a backup role with Chuck Berry were Bruce Springsteen and Steve Miller when each was just starting his career.  At the request of President Jimmy Carter, Chuck Berry Johnny B Goode performed at the White House on June 1, 1979.  A pioneer of rock music, Chuck Berry Johnny B Goode was a significant influence on the development of both the music and the attitude associated with the rock music lifestyle. A statue 8 feet (2.4 m) tall of Berry, funded by donations, is being erected along the St. Louis Walk of Fame. The dedication ceremony was July 29th, 2011.

Chuck Berry Johnny B Goode Rhode Island DJ

In 1980, when I was a freshman in college working at the college radio station as a DJ and a professional Wedding DJ, I had the opportunity to see Chuck Berry Johnny B Goode perform at a small venue in Dover, NJ called The Show Place. There were maybe 100 people present at the show and it was so much fun! I was so surprised how much energy and enthusiasm he had as ‘an older man’ back then. It is amazing to me that he is still performing today!!!! That was 31 years ago.

Chuck Berry Johnny B Goode Music Video

http://youtu.be/2gv62KbSBQM

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ

Billy Joel We Didn’t Start The Fire

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Billy Joel We Didn’t Start The Fire. Since releasing his first hit song, “Piano Man,” in 1973, Billy Joel has become the sixth best-selling recording artist and the third best-selling solo artist in the United States, according to the RIAA.  Billy Joel has Top 40 hits in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s; achieving 33 Top 40 hits in the United States, all of which he wrote himself. He is also a six-time Grammy Award winner, a 23-time Grammy nominee and has sold over 150 million records worldwide.

 

Billy Joel attended Hicksville High School, class of 1967. However, he did not graduate from Hicksville. Due to playing at a piano bar, he was one English credit short of the graduation requirement; he overslept on the day of an important exam, owing to his late-night musician’s lifestyle. He left high school without a diploma to begin a career in music.  Upon seeing The Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, Joel decided to pursue a full-time musical career, and set about finding a local Long Island band to join.

 Billy Joel We Didn’t Start The Fire Story

“The song and music video have been interpreted as a rebuttal to criticism of Joel’s Baby Boomer generation. The song’s title and refrain mention “the fire”, an allusion to conflict and societal turmoil; Joel asserts that these can’t be blamed on his generation alone, as “the fire” has been “always burning since the world’s been turning”. Wikipedia.

 

For a list of the references throughout the song, please go to this Wiki page “We Didn’t Start The Fire” to get the info on each, it is fun!

 

The first single from the Album Storm Front, was released in September 1989 and it became Billy Joel’s third and most recent US #1 hit, spending two weeks at the top; it was also Billboard’s second-last #1 single of the 1980s.

Billy Joel We Didn’t Start The Fire Music Video

Interesting piece of trivia. 52nd Street was the first album to be released on compact disc when it went on sale alongside Sony’s CD player CDP-101 on October 1, 1982, in Japan.

Billy Joel We Didn't Start The Fire icon Rhode Island DJ

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ

Jon and Nikki Wedding

Gallery

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This gallery contains 33 photos.

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & Boston DJ   Some Photo Credits to Anna Rozenblat Photography  

Diana Ross and The Supremes Supreme Mix

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Diana Ross and The Supremes Supreme Mix. My room as a kid was cluttered with The Supremes ’45s’ with the old blue Motown label. I remember my first radio. It was a little red Panasonic plastic ball radio that only played AM. At that time, most music was still on AM so it was fine. I even brought it with me to the beach when we went down the shore. A year or so after that, I received a Panasonic hand-held cassette player as a birthday present. I used to place the cassette player next to my radio and record songs through the built-in microphone when I heard a song I liked. There were many Diana Ross and The Supremes songs that made it to tape, most of them on the medley. Of course, all of them were missing the first five seconds or so of the song since I had to wait to see what they were going to play. Glad we have moved forward in technology since then:)

Diana Ross and The Supremes Supreme Mix on Motown Records

Diana Ross and The Supremes Supreme Mix on Motown Records

I will not write about their history since the missumusicz has done an excellent job of collecting and reporting their history and that of many of the Motown artists of that period. What a career they and Diana had – true legends who set the foundation for female groups still to this day. I still get to play their music regularly as a professional Event and Wedding DJ.  A quick snapshot of Diana Ross and The Supremes commercial success; 33 of their singles reached the Billboard Top 40 in the US, 23 reached either the US orUK Top 10, and 12 of them reached the number-one position on the US pop chart with “Baby Love” also topping the UK pop chart. 12 of their albums reached the Top 10 in either the US or UK, with five of them going to number-one.

Diana Ross and The Supremes Supreme Mix Music Video

http://youtu.be/H9T9E3d6xAY

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ

Ritchie Valens Sleepwalk

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It is hard not to feel the energy and Soul that the great Ritchie Valens Sleepwalk put into every guitar lick in this song. Smooth as silk without being overproduced. I recently had a Groom ask for this song to be the song that he and his mother would dance to for their Mother-Son Dance.  I fought hard to contain the tears that well-up every time I hear this song. I do not remember the scene in the film La Bamba but I remember it was one of the more emotional ones. There are few artists from that era that had a full-length feature film made about their life like Ritchie Valens Sleepwalk. As a professional Wedding DJ, I get requested plenty of his music these days and continue to feel moved by his music.

Ritchie Valens Sleepwalk Music Video

He was born Ricardo Esteban Valenzuela Reyes. He was asked by his producer and agent to change his family name to make it sound ‘more american’. Its strange in 2011 to contextually imagine that happening today, where nearly twenty percent of American population is Latino.  His death along with other pop stars Buddy Holly and The Big Bopper is still considered an American tragic story. After the February 2, 1959, performance in Clear Lake, Iowa, Holly, Richardson, and Valens flew out of the Mason City airport in a small plane that Holly had chartered. He was on the plane because he won a coin toss. The plane, a four-passenger Beechcraft Bonanza, departed for Fargo, North Dakota, and crashed shortly after takeoff in a snow storm. The crash killed all three passengers and the pilot; at 17, Valens was the youngest to die on the flight. The event inspired singer Don McLean’s popular 1971 ballad “American Pie“, and immortalized February 3 as “The Day the Music Died”.

Ritchie Valens Sleepwalk with Rhode Island Oldies DJ

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ

The Bee Gees Stayin Alive

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The Bee Gees Stayin Alive. I was in 7th grade when John Travolta was at the peak of his teen icon status with his role as Vinnie Barbarino on the TV show Welcome Back Kotter.  My brother who was four years older than me, met and became friends with him strangely enough at a bar in Miami. They stayed in contact for a little while and  once I answered the phone and sure enough John Travolta was on the other end. My brother wasn’t home and I took a message.

Fun Rhode Island Wedding DJ Dancing Bee Gees Stayin Alive

It wasn’t till I was in high school that Saturday Night Fever and The Bee Gees Stayin Alive came out. My brother liked Disco, at the time I was not as much a fan. I have grown to appreciate how it is so well-made for dancing. As a professional DJ, The Bee Gees Stayin Alive such an effective tool for mixing genres and generations.  It continues to amaze how often I get The Bee Gees Stayin Alive requested by people of all ages from teens, college students, middle-aged and older folks at weddings and parties. There are many remixes of The Bee Gees Stayin Alive out these days that are all fun and great party songs.

The Bee Gees Stayin Alive Music Video

The Bee Gees Stayin Alive is a disco song by the group Bee Gees from the Saturday Night Fever motion picture soundtrack. The song was written by the Bee Gees (Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb) and produced by the Bee Gees, Albhy Galuten and Karl Richardson. It was released on 13 December 1977, as the second single from the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. It is one of their signature songs. “Stayin’ Alive” was placed at number 191 on the list of Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

Upon release, “Stayin’ Alive” climbed the charts to hit the number one spot on the Billboard Hot 100 the week of 4 February 1978, remaining there for four weeks. In the process, it became one of the band’s most recognisable tunes, in part because of its place at the beginning of Saturday Night Fever.”

The Bee Gees were an interesting group who made their name originally as a Soft Rock, almost Folk, in the 60’s and early 70’s. They had a completely different sound and energy in their first round as pop stars. They gained international success and lasted nearly forty years as recording and preforming artists.

DJ Mystical Michael Rhode Island DJ & NY DJ