What We Are Listening To: Monster Children NYC #3
Hello, my name is Naz Kawakami. I’m the new Deputy Editor of Monster Children based in New York City. Did you know that for a number of years, I was a radio DJ? You probably did because I never shut the fuck up about it. My show was called Night Drive, every Thursday from midnight to 3AM. Those were good times. A lot of sex, drugs, and partying were done in that little Honolulu radio studio. None of it done by me, but it’s still cool to think about.
Anyway, since taking this Editor job, I spend most of my day the way I spent my days as a DJ: listening to music. Some good, some bad. Some old, some new. Every week, I’ll be compiling the week’s worth of music into a playlist. Songs we’ve been enjoying, songs we’ve just (re)discovered, and songs that offer a preview into what features we have coming out soon. Not the newest, not the rarest, just good music. The mood of the week over at the MC New York City office for you to judge and enjoy.
The last couple of months (decades) or so, I’ve been a real Debbie Downer, standing in the corner at parties and going home before midnight, which is weird because I’m always harping on about how important and good and cool dancing and dance parties are, and how I wish this generation wasn’t so god damn shy to do it. Everyone my age and below goes to venues to look cool rather than feel good. Looking out across a dance floor, everyone looks like they’re waiting and hoping to be captured in a Reel looking hot, and that is the death of culture in my eyes, but also the death of unapologetic, unpretentious fun.
I long for hot sweaty rooms of people dancing around to music that isn’t crap. Not to say that my music isn’t also crap, everything’s crap to someone, I guess. Just that I wish I could find a place that played my crap music instead of everyone else’ crap music. In the meantime though, this week’s playlist is what I’ve been dancing in my apartment to. Some obvious, some obscure, some fast, some slow. Much like Monster Children as a whole, it’s got a little something for the punks, the disco kids, the cool kids, the ravers, the indie kids, the goths, and the sad idiots like me. Someone signed a book to me this week, and in it, they wrote what I will now adopt as the sentiment for these weekly playlists, which is, ‘Stay up late, fall in love, dance until your feet bleed.’ Have a good weekend.
Feedback, comments, complaints, recommendations for places in New York that play my kind of crap, email me.