This is a 6+ hr DJ Afrika Bambaataa set list from tunes he would put down at the Roxy ( a roller disco) in NYC circa summer ’83 where the flyer proclaimed: No Skating! Just Dance Your pants Off Every Friday Night! – B There!
Hosted by Fab Five Freddy, with live Graf art provided by Futura 2000, while the Double Dutch Girls & Crazy Legs from the Rocksteady Crew would be Breakdancin’ down on the floor Jazzy Jay & Bambaataa would man the wheels of steel and a DJ battle featuring Grand Wizard Theodore vs Grandmaster D.S.T. ( made famous via Herbie Hancock’s Rockit) would soon be scratchin’ up a storm. To get a sense of the vibe, this clip posted below from the 1984 film “Beat Street” has a scene shot there featuring Bambaataa and the Soul Sonic Force performing their electro funk rap song “Same” with cameos from the Rock Steady Crew.
This 6 hr+ mega mix I have made available as a playlist on either Spotify or Amazon Music recreates the crate diggin’ sequences of contemporary music one might experience in a hot early 80’s club that kept beats pumpin’ until the sun came up. This old school tracklist featuring soul , electro funk, rock, new wave & early Hip-Hop faves of the day was compiled from archival playlist info provided by Bambaataa himself. The original posted mix included 80+ Songs, but rights holders have begun pulling catalog songs from shady silicon sucka streaming platforms, so results may vary on your music apps.
I listed all the O.G. 80’s club mix tracks below, whether currently available, for completists to seek out and so you can find out what you’re missing from artists as varied as Newcleus, Marley Marl, Strafe, Egyptian Lover, Reggie Griffin, Re-Flex, KRS One, The Fantastic Aleems ft Leroy Burgess and even Foreigner whose recordings may no longer can be found on Spotify.
2009 pic of the Roxy in the old Meat Packing district on edge of Chelsea before it was demolished to make way for a modern residential highrise
Photo By Aloughman – https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7161708
Mike’s Mayday Mixcloud 2 HR Tour
My Mayday Mix is ready!
Rotober Random Revelations Mixcloud
Gotta lil’ bored and needed to share some quarantunes with my peeps online… If yer around me in the house, you’d know I spend hours everyday regurgitatin’ through thousands of albums . For those that don’t have the pleasure of me drunkenly thumbing through the shelves and pulling out obscurities I created a digital simulation. This is an official 2 Hour Guided Missile Of a Mixtape, literaly pounds upon pounds of platters painstakingly plopped under yr Spin Doctor’s new needle. (NOTE: long before a hippie jam band in NYC used the name Spin Doctors, I was using the Spin Doctor moniker on flyers for my DJ gigs around San Francisco. I eventually gave up because you know, Little Miss Can’t Be Blecch was getting way too much MTV time, and killed my buzz).
We Begin With Members Of The Dils Cowboy Nation Covering Dave Alvin of The Blasters And End With Wanda Jackson Imitating Charlie Rich. In The Middle We Get Tales Of The Big Boys Playing With Trouble Funk & Gwar Being Banned From The Club For Life At Their Very First Show. There’s Cosmic Sounds Of The Zodiac, BT Express, Flo & Eddie, Kendra Smith, Tom T. Hall, Chuck Prophet, Nick Lowe, The Mexican Hat Dance, Stax Soul Icons & Successful Major Label Heavies Revisiting Their Punk Roots. A Rarely Heard Hip-Hop Collab Between Lil’ Jon, Jay Z & Too Short, Indie Rock Rarities From The Incredible Casuals, And Beatnik Beatch, Plus Hawaiian Islander Protest Music From Israel Kamakawiwo’ole & Michael Kahikina. Dusty Springfield vs Tony Joe White, Hank Ballard vs Kris Kristofferson, Roberta Flack vs Les McCann …So, Uh, Yeah It’s A Thing & It’s All Happening Deep Inside The Random Revelations Rotober 2020 Mix.
Anyhow the the turntablist spins sonic stories for the masses in my latest Illegal , Immoral & Fattening mix…