By Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer WESTERN BUREAU:
'REAL WENZDEZ' at Club Juice in New Kingston had it all going on except a massive crowd in the wee hours of yesterday morning. The Fire Links sound, with the Fire Squad at the helm, was clicking, reaching for tunes from Beenie Man to 50 Cent and Wayne Wonder to good effect, riding the dancehall time machine from Position to Vitamin S with equal aplomb. The party girls were in the house, forming the majority of the small audience, utilising the room the space afforded to do the latest dances and the good old staple of the dancehall ' wine like crazy'.
The ambience in the club was good, with zinc sheets at strategic places, including the side of the selectors' booth, providing a throwback to the good old days when dancehall fans 'beat zinc fence' in appreciation of boom tunes. One man used a sheet to good effect, pasting his dancing partner against it and doing his level best to imprint its grooves into her back permanently.
In addition a raised portion of the dance floor, inset with multi-coloured lights, winked, glowed and provided a setting for a couple girls to 'bruck whey' when the music really hit them. The only drawback was that not that many people turned out for the mid-week indoor dancehall fun. The flip side of that was there was no problem in seeing the people present and with the party girls in the house, there was tonnes to see.
The selectors in their raised booth also had a pretty good view and made good use of it with instructions to a particularly well-endowed wining machine. After she had capped off a spectacular series of gyrations with a 'head-top' style for Backshot and Position, the selector advised the promoter to link the music room with a prize for her. "When gal gwaan good we gi dem a prize," he said.
HYPE THE LADIES
The Fire Squad also had general words to 'hype' the ladies, at one point sending a request to all the girls who 'no dash wey belly', who 'no get dial tone when dem call dem man' and 'no trus' dem hairstyle', having to 'wheel' the dance track I'm Alive as they started howling. He was not finished yet. "Yu have some girl, cockroach a play football inna de house, an rat a play netball inna de house. From yu know seh no insec' naa play inna yu house...," he said, as the ladies screamed their rodent-free status. He was not finished yet. "Yu have some gal, have dem pickney a Jubilee an tru de pickney ugly dem run lef him, or dem wait until docta gone an exchange de baby," he said. From yu know seh yu naa run lef yu pickney an yu naa swap no baby...," he said and the girls got going. He was not done yet. "Yu have some gal, have phone an fram dem got it no credit no go pan it, ongly de one Digicel gi dem. From yu cellular 'ave on credit, tun it on,' he said and a bevy of beauties dutifully lit up their instruments.
After going through the very recent dancehall of Sweet To De Belly, the semi-oldies of Anytime, the good old icon Shabba who Gi Dem Shabba, hip hop with In Da Club and other tracks, two selectors moved up front for dance class. Beenie Man's Dude was the tune of choice and it got very extended rotation, as the dances were displayed and done.
Of course, the 'Blas', 'Signal De Plane' and 'Parachute' were all a part of the fare, but the selectors came with the 'pump weights', 'defence' and 'know me fren', an arm curl, basketball move and high five respectively. The 'Labba swim' had them splashing and when the selector called for the dancers to 'gi dem a run', the ladies went bouncing and jiggling along. The music turned to Baby Cham's Vitamin S, as the vibes continued hot an' hard at Club Juice's 'Real Wenzdez' well past the 3:00 a.m. mark.
