Two lives to live

We all live double lives. For some of us, it may be innocent and non-committal, like the sports jock that’s secretly into soap operas, or the Ph.D academic that’s a gun-toting gangster in an online video game world at night. For others, it’s maybe a bit more involved, like the museum liaison officer who is also a bagpiping drag queen.

For years, I myself had an alternate reality. From 2003 to 2007, I was a mild-mannered nerd journalist by day and superstar DJ at night. Well, okay, maybe not a superstar DJ. It’s not like I was being flown around to play foam parties and do rails of booger sugar off of strangers’ abs. But I did hold down a weekly Friday night residency in one of Montreal’s swanky boutique hotels. The kind that charges $8 for a Labatt 50 (I know, right?).

But what started as a lark, a way to make some cash while playing some jams for really, really rich people, slowly turned into one of the strangest social experiences of my life. Looking back on it now, it was a rare opportunity for me to see how the other half lives. The upper half.

Sometimes, to watch people conspicuously consume with such abandon, was ummmm... how can I put this…… completely crazy? During peak times, some people just look for ways to spend money, and that includes paying off the DJ. Now to be honest, I had no illusions of what my job was: play music, make people happy. I’m not some music snob who scoffs at requests, and the truth is I like most of the stuff people ask for anyways (FYI: I draw the line at Pussycat Dolls). So I listen, especially if they grease the old DJ palm…… Here in brief are the three most memorable tip situations from my former life.

BORIS
According to management, Boris was rumoured to have ties to Russian mob. His brother supposedly owned the Benetton Race Team and he had just flown in for the Grand Prix on a private jet. While this sounds like a completely preposterous story, the first thing you realize when you work in the high-end service industry is that anything is possible. He had reserved the entire sunken VIP in the back of the club for himself and his stable of 10 six-foot-tall Amazons, who apparently liked to get “jiggy with it.” “Play heep-hop!” he commanded as he half-sashayed over, a girl on each arm. “My girls, they want to dance sexy!”

As he said this, he ditched the girls and came behind the booth and, taking out a wad of cash, he started peeling off twenties. At one point, he got tired of counting and then stuffed the entire stack of bills into my hand. “Play 2Pac!” I looked at the ball of scrunched twenties and fifties in my hand, then looked up at him, “Boris, for this kind of money, I’ll play 2Pac, 3Pac and mothafuckin’ 4Pac if you want.”

ISTVÁN
István appeared early one evening with a small entourage. I assumed he was some kind of European national, as he was well dressed, slightly Aryan looking and flanked by beefy-looking men in crew cuts, who I surmised were his personal security team. Eventually, when he got sufficiently soused, he staggered over and announced, “I eem fram Hungary! My brother, he just became Canadian ceeteezen! You mast play song for heem! I give you manee!” Again, a stack of cash in my hand. So I ask what he wants to hear.

“Play Bariwide!” Ummm, what? “Bariwide!” Sorry I don’t have that. “Yes! You mast! Bariwide! You know Bariwide!” Umm, sorry, is he Hungarian? “No! He ees fat black guy. Bariwide! He sings Kent get enaf of your lav babe!” It took me a minute, then it hit. Oh. BARRY WHITE! “Yes that’s what I said, Bariwide!” I cued it up and played it.

PETE
Pete was visiting from Boston. Unlike most Bostonians, he wasn’t an obnoxious thick-necked chief who drinks too much and tries to start fights if people look at him funny. But like many Bostonians, he came to Montreal to get wasted and show us how real Americans party. At one point, he was enjoying my set so much, he threw a handful of American bills in the air above me and screamed, “Yeah son! This is how we do it in Boston!”

After my laughing fit subsided, I quietly collected the now booze-soaked bills and stacked them neatly onto the turntable. When I turned around, Pete was standing there and asked, “Umm, hey bro, do you mind if I get those dollar bills back? I need them for the strip club later. I’ll give you the exchange in Canadian……”

I counted out the 13 dollars for him and said it was okay, he could keep it. He insisted and gave me 10 Canadian. I guess that’s how they do it in Boston.

Riff-Raff@sympatico.ca