DJ Michelle Leslie Brown is one of our all-time top mix masters. The woman provides. In just this past week alone, she’s handed us not one, but two outstanding mixes. She’s a double-your-pleasure kinda lady, I suppose.

Woah! Where the hell did that dude come from? We do not condone smoking. Repeat – smoking is not good for you. But this man did come up when I googled “double your pleasure” – but we’re only inviting him to lounge on the back porch – not to come inside and have a drink.

Anyway – last Wednesday, Jenn B was ill and Jenn M Den Mothered and danced the hell out of class. This is what she and the other lovelies jammed out to thanks to DJ MLB’s fine ear and eye for tune stacking.

And just one week later, fortunes have been reversed with Jenn B being the healthy one and Jenn M taking a health breather for the team. My oh my change keeps changing.

Just a couple of hours ago, DJ MLB donned her alter ego, DJ Re-Run and brought back some supremely magic memories with her Election Night Mix… revisited. She played this same mix exactly one year ago. Even though in this past year a coupla little things have transpired… like a massive recession, global banking system collapse, new wars being waged, still not equal rights for all, etc… tonight we took a break from the grind of all the bad news and honored all the changes that have already come, and made an inviting space available for all the inevitable change to be.

Thank you DJ MLB for reminding us that yes we did… and yes we still certainly can. We know darn well we can work it out.

[p.s. And if you're so inclined to hear one of your den mothers fumble for words trying to assess what's changed in America this past year on Australian radio (from a year ago and today) knock yourself out here.]

Let’s face it, Halloween is always risky business: razor blades in apples, needles in candy bars, all you can drink costume parties.  And there’s always the danger of putting off your costume idea until five minutes before DDPP.  Well, clearly one of your den mothers had the foresight to plan something mam(mary)moth, and the other slid in just under the wire…

If you missed it, be sorry!

Believe it or not, the scariest part of Sunday wasn’t even our costumes!  We rocked out to a super spooky mix by none other than DJ Jill O’ Puddin’ Pops, the master of murderous moves!  We also got geeked up on sugar.  Because really, Great Pumpkin aside, candy is the true meaning of Halloween. 

BOO!

AND, in other exciting news, DDPP is on Yelp.  Stop on by and give us a review!  Tell all of your friends!

Every now and then I come up against a mix so relentless in its fabulousness that I literally can’t take it. What I mean to say is that the beats are so hot, my heart wants to dance itself out of my chest on EVERY SINGLE SONG!!!  And my brain says “Yes!!!  Keep dancing!!!  Dance faster!!!  Dance harder!!!  Dance more!!! Do this song justice!!!”  And then my legs say “Are you kidding me?”

And later, the next day, after a healthy dose of ibuprofen has turned the pain in my knees down from a scream to a dull throb, I go looking for pictures of rubber legs on the internet to illustrate my point and come across this:

Don’t worry, I can tie this together: I loved DJ Sassybrass’s mix yesterday as much as that cow loves that old man’s chin!  And I wasn’t the only one: four, count em, FOUR people came into the studio off the street to check out the flavor behind the bad-ass tunes.  One of them was a dude quite possibly a decade or two older than the above cowpoke.  You should have seen the smile on that guy’s face!

And as if that didn’t make this Sunday exciting enough, it was DJ Sassybrass’s birthday!  Not just her celebratory birthday mix, her actual birthday!   I gotta say, I’m loving this trend.  DJSB, after the gift of your killer mix we here at DDPP have something to present you.  It’s even better than a birthday cake:

Yeah that’s right, it’s a giant Twix.  And it comes with instructions.  You’re welcome ladies.

Happy Birthday DJ Sassybrass!!!  Thanks for shakin’ what your mamma gave ya, and for thankin’ your mama.

Like the autumn leaves perpetually piling up on the ground and in the gutters, our to-do lists have also been magnificently piling high, only sadly it’s not as fun to take a running leap and jump into them. This is all gibberish for saying why today we bring you last Wednesday’s mix and soon we shall bring you yesterday’s mix. 

Speaking of gibberish, do you ever wonder why there’s absolutely no need to understand they lyrics of a song in order to rock out unabashedly?  The beat, the instrumentation, the emotion of the singer’s voice – it usually says it all. Like this dude below, for instance. 

Music just makes working up a sweat on easier. But don’t just believe my vague generalities, there’s some science behind it people. 

For the last 20 years, Costas Karageorghis, a sports psychologist at Britain’s Brunel University, has been setting the research pace for understanding our need to groove and move. According to Kargeorghis, there are four factors that contribute to a song’s motivational qualities: rhythm response, musicality, cultural impact and association. The first two are known as “internal” factors as they relate to the music’s structure while the second two are “external” factors that reflect how we interpret the music. Rhythm response is tied to the beats per minute (bpm) of the song and how well it matches either the cadence or the heartbeat of the dancer. A song’s structure such as its melody and harmony contribute to its musicality. The external factors consider our musical background and the preferences we have for a certain genre of music and what we have learned to associate with certain songs and artists. (for more click on that link above)

Last Wednesday, DJ Honeycrisp tapped into the collective musical background and preferences we have for a certain genres of music and created a vortex of rhythm response. We sashayed and parlayed our ripe BPMs into swirls, twirls and ended with a room full of very happy girls. Thank you for being our “Fall Girl” DJ Honeycrisp. You picked just right.

Florida is known as many things: provider of oranges, land of too  many good college football teams, mecca of hot young Cubans and cold east coast retirees, America’s wang.  But it’s first and foremost the Sunshine State, and this Sunday Florida provided us with her greatest bounty of all: MC Sunshine!

After a week of gloomy-ass rain, the simultaneous burst of actual and MC Sunshine dropped on us like a bomb.  It was almost too much for us vitamin D deprived Midwesterners, yet we just couldn’t get enough! That boom boom boom you heard on the other side of town was the sound of us knocking on wood.  For an hour there was nothing to worry about, and it felt almost as good as we looked on the dancefloor.  By the end of that heart pounding mix we were having a hard time staying alive–but again, Florida comes to the rescue:

But enough about death, let’s talk about birth!  This Sunday was another birthday mix!  Two in one week! Let me say we feel honored, MC Sunshine, that you’d celebrate with us.  I’m so honored in fact, that I can go against all my Southeastern Conference instincts and present you with this:

Though, to be fair, it’s chock-full of laxatives.  No, I’m just kidding!  Maybe.

Seriously though, Happy Birthday MC Sunshine!  You a bad Mamma (Ramma) Jamma.

Dearest DJ Tunerkin, in honor of your birthday, we at DDPP have fashioned you this fashionable cake and given you the nickname “Navin” – which is of course, the backwards spelling of “Nivan”, which is of course if you add the letters RA (an acronym for “Ridiculously Awesome”) gives you NiRvanA, which is of course, what you helped us to achieve last night with your superb mix of tunerkin favorites followed by sweet birthday cuppy cakes. But this is all obvious.

Thank you DJ Tunerkin for continuously inspiring us with your musical tastes and incredible moves! Every DDPP you are at kicks it up many, many notches. May the birthday Nirvana you achieved last night somewhere between 7-8pm last this whole year through.

It was Jill’s 2nd DDPP of her life. And what does she do? She transforms into DJ Jill’O'Puddin Pops and rocks the hell out of it. I’m tempted to rename her DJ Quarry because of deep recess of rock tunes she excavated so expertly. We danced hard. Kind of like this guy, yet we only revealed our inner spazzes, not our rumps (*warning at 1:24 in).

Jill’O'Puddin Pops’ mix has got me wanting to visit the freezer aisle in the grocery store once again, to hopefully find something along the lines of what’s below taking place behind the lean cuisines.

I am sorry to say that DJ Easy bake has not had an easy round here at DDPP. First time she decides to DJ, class gets all screwed up and the place has been rented out to another group. The second time she is scheduled to DJ, she gets sick and can’t come. Lo and behold, her mix showed up in our studio with a another beloved DDPP member. Even when she was down for the count, DJ Easy bake’s timer was right on schedule for all the DDPP ladies to enjoy. It was sweet, tasty, and oh so delicious with the edge of her cakes slightly burnt just like we like ‘em. Easy Bake…you can cook something up for me anytime.  You rocked it girl and you weren’t even there. Nice job on the mix.

1. Sitting in Limbo (Jimmy Cliff)
2. Gotta Work (Amerie)
3. Actor Out of Work (St. Vincent)
4. Feel the Girl (Ms. Jade)
5. X Offender (Blondie)
6. Powder Room (The Knux)
7. Let’s Spend the Night Together (David Bowie)
8. Let’s Run (Le Tigre)
9. Move (Q-Tip)
10. Diva (Beyonce)
11. Romeo (Donna Summer)
12. Into the Groove (Madonna)
13. Conceited (Remy Ma)
14. My Life Would Suck Without You (Kelly Clarkson)
15. Superstition (Stevie Wonder)
16. Nu Nu (Fannypack)
17. Bad Man’s World (Jenny Lewis)

check out these tasty treats

See all ya’ll this afternoon to steam up the studio! Gonna be a hot mix for a chilly day.
xoxo
jb

I, Kelly Joy Vanater Peraino apologize to anyone who showed up to class today and experienced my spaciness in the flesh!  I showed up to class without my keys to the studio and proceeded home to grab them.  I realized when I returned that my “be right back” note said I’d return by 5:10pm rather than 4:10pm.  I don’t know if ladies showed and decided they couldn’t wait for “an hour” or if we just had a poor turnout. 

Luckily DJ Cumberbun (yours truly) disappointed herself and not another DJ by having to cancel class. 

Thanks to Victoria for being the lone woman waiting for me and thanks to the Lord above for inspiring me to put her phone number in my phone a year ago.

IF ANYONE CAME TODAY WITH THE INTENTION OF DANCING PLEASE LET KELLEY & JENN KNOW NEXT WEEK FOR A FREE PASS.

Love, your trustily scatterbrained Den Mother (Kell V-P)