BENNY BLANCO® : BLANCODISCO

so, yea. i’m djing a little this week….

so… turn it up.

okay, so what have i been doin over the past couple months. with not a blog entry in site?

was working at a small agency called Creative Priority since the beginning of the year. But, as the summer wained on, business started to move to a crawl and i was growing a lil grumpier day by day. Two weeks ago, i go into work on a monday morning expecting business as usual, and i was called to go into the conference room to have a lil talk. I was informed that I had to be let go.

I wasn’t too fazed about it.

20 minutes later, when I was out on the streets a free man, I called up my buddy, Merv, who had informed me of a freelance gig at the company he works for, Dennis Publishing. The makers of such fine newstand mags like Maxim, Blender & Stuff. By 11 am, I had an interview and by 1 pm of the same day i was let go from CP, i was informed that i’d start work on Wednesday at Stuff Magazine! word! Well, i’m still there for the time being. Hoping to max out the gig as best i can. I’ve never worked at a magazine before and i must say, it’s pretty damn cool to work Pop Culture Content for a change.
Next week, i’ll see if i can leverage some work on the interactive side. *crossin’ fingers* So, thanks again Mervert for the hooksups. Even if don’t last, the experience here is way cool and useful and another thing to add to my list of, done thats.

Check out the masthead for October’s issue:

So, aside from the day gig thingy.. i’ve been regularly dj’in up a storm as you most likely already know if yer subscribed to Blancospam. Depth Charge Thursdays & Moving Fridays I run with my partner and friend, Mark Flynn .
here are some of the images for this week’s events:

I also have been semi regularly playing at an Irish pub on the Upper West Side of Manhattan called the Parlour. Not so much my scene, but, the staff there is wicked and oddly enough, i’ve had my best AND worst gigs in NYC there. We’re suppose to start a regular Saturday gig there, Goin’ Down, where I offered to make a full color flyer, but then, they cut back to just makin some cheapo black and whites ones. Whatever, we’ll see if this gig EVER really gets going. For now, I’m good for their purposes when they need a dj for private parties. They Pay well.

Last night at Mr. Dennehy’s for the weekly Moving Fridays Party, we tried something a little different.

We changed the location of where we put the dj rig. We setup in one of the booths where people normally sit to eat meals. it’s a little pearch in the back part of the ground level floor. You can peer all the way to the front of the bar now. It’s pretty cool I must say.

Now, a little review for last night, I started dj’in around 10:15 pm and rolled out the 80’s remixes and singles to ease the transition from satellite radio to house/techno jammin later on. Around 11 pm, i had transitioned over to the housier grooves and allowed one of the guest dj’s for the evening, Markus Mehta, get warmed up on the decks. My girlfriend, Sheri, showed up with her dinner posse already pre-sauced and hung out til 1 am or so. Markus played til around 12:30 am and after a brief catch up with Dylan Drazen, placed Dylan on the throne to take control of things. Eva and Co. came down to hang out and converse and consume, just hangin’ out for Dylan and Markus’ sets. Around 2:30 am, Dylan ran out of easier listening house and had to stop. His boy fans were starting to cramp in on him anyway. One interesting notable is that this one Fan of Dylan’s, Amid, traveled all the way from Boston to hear Dylan play. He’s never met him either. Just a fan… wanted to come down to see him play! ‘ardcore! love it. i bought him a Blanco Blammo as a very small token of appreciation. I think his day was really made when he finally met Dylan and Dylan ended up hooking up with a free Mix CD. Amid was talking so fanatically about dylan and how he had downloaded all of his online mixes. Props.

So, Dylan packed up and rolled on home and Markus and I were instructed to keep the party rolling, even though there were very few remaining real customers still around. Redboy and lady friend, Connie, showed up as the transition was taking place and fell into a drinking session of shots and beers and megamixed concotions that i have no idea what they were. Manager Victor and Bartender Sean were ready to party and blow off some steam themselves. Redboy cued up a few tracks on iTunes’ party shuffle mode while I made wisecrack and Markus laughin it up. Eventually, Markus and I got back up on the decks and traded tunes back and forth on Miss Pinky unitl 4:15 or so. The lights came up and we sent Redboy & Connie home while the rest of the crew packed things up to call it a night.

Great Party.

next week, we got some nice Guiness giveaways and Betsy the Housekeeper joining me on the decks.

hey. this is just a test to see if my blog is still running after i was infilatrated by brazilians. seriously, the site was hacked a few months ago and it affected all the index pages on my site. ewwWWwww.
F’ers.

now playing:
B1 Setup (bushwacka!) from the album “12”” by Tokamak

Yes Folks
The Grammy’s came and went this past weekend.
I so didn’t care to watch, just thinking it would be as a painful to view as the Superbowl halftime.
The state of commercial music is so so so sad these days.

Since DJ’s are the out thing like Models it seems these days,
I thought I’d flavor the weekly promo of Depth Charge
with some of the best of what Pop has to offer.
A lil vocal and some good ol’ fashioned Gee-tar.

with out further ado, Mark and I will be…

we’ll be wankin it’ at mixx lounge in the west village this evening.
The cold air continues and so do we.
Come in for the drink specials offered weekly.
Have a sit down. A bite to eat. or even shake yer booty if yer so inclined.
Zone out to cool visuals on the venue’s plasma screen.

mixx lounge
84 Seventh Avenue (between Grove & Bleeker and across from Sushi Samba)
Christopher St./Sheridan Sq. subway stop.
8 PM
No COVER.
Truly Kick Ass Music
Depth Charge Thursdays

resident wankers
Mark Flynn & Benny Blanco®

************
This Friday 13th, I’m dropping a set on the upper west side for a friend of mine.
It’s at an irish pub called The Parlour.
W.86th and Broadway on 86th. Downstairs.
No cover. 10 pm.
If you happen to stumble into the neighborhood.
Save me from Argyle and Khaki.

CONGRATS once again to the Fellow New England Patriots Organization. The game was a bit of a bore to watch at first, but come near the end of the second quarter, things really got cooking.

To those boston friends of mine who may remember that I played at the Phoenix Landing last Super Bowl Sunday when the Patriots beat the Rams in 2002, I recorded the events that took place at the END of the night.

Some of you that were there have been hounding me to digitize the Immortal words of owner Kevin Trainer and of course Blake Courtney (sonic solutions). DJ’s Mike Walsh, Dave Skye and myself provided the soundtrack to a winning night. the link that proceeds contains some profanity… so, if you easily offend, DO NOT DOWNLOAD. for those of you that remember this historic night in Phoenix Landing history, check this funny shit out.

THE PATRIOTS ARE THE SUPERBOWL CHAMPIONS OF THE WORLD

the recording is about 20 minutes in length and 34 MB or so in size.
I take no responsibility for what was said. I just happen to capture the mood of a fantastic evening.

so, mark flynn and i have got another weekly going here in our fine city. new york city that is. Mark sorted out our new space at a place called Mixx Lounge in the West Village. We are calling the event Depth Charge It’s not quite a Moving style event (dedicated upbeat/uptempo/fullon shake yer booty night), due to the fact that the space is a little more chill, but the management is certainly cool if we need to crank things up a notch. For the most part, we play whatever the hell we feel like in the ranges of downtempo, dub, electronic, idm, slow breaks, classics, nu jazz, minimal, house and a touch of progressive and a rock tune or two. We “mixx it up” here at the lounge which has fairly good sound in an intimate setting.

We found out this week about some drink specials. 2 for 1 Cosmopolitans and $3 Bud Lights if yer into that sorta thing. This past thursday, i got really stinkin drunk, cause the previous owner of the bar came in and reconized Mark and I from eating at our favorite west village Korean restaurant, Doh Wa and said to the bartenders… “make sure you get these guys fuuuucked up”… so… needless to say. 4 shots were downed. and a heavy hangover for me on friday to trudge my way through at work. not fun…… the night before. fun, HELLS yea.

Bottom line. DEPTH CHARGE looks like it will shape up to BE the place to go for a thursday evening. we roll out the tunes circa 8:30 and blend on through the evening til it’s past yer bedtime. This next thursday, February 5th, we’ll have REDBOY as our guest, cause, Mark Flynn will be up in Boston. We haven’t officially made it official that we’ll be having guest dj’s for Depth Charge, but we want to see if the night picks up and then book accordingly.

Coming up in February… the kind people at Earthprogram have invited my hard drive and laptop to their new monthly event at the ever oh so eclectic.. Open Air bar in the East Village on FEBRUARY 20TH. the event is called RAZORS. The event will also feature pal.. REDBOY as well as ALLEN KEY, NICK CAIN & JOEL T. should be a hoot with these group of Nuttahs.