On the Town with Buddy Beaverhausen: Gloria Gaynor, Maxine Nightingale and The Blue Notes @ Resorts World, Queens

Smiles of a summer night! Few nights can compare to Saturday this week for pure joy and celebrating nightlife in New York City as well as life itself!

I went out to Resorts Casino in Queens with my friend, Kevin, whose recent birthday we were honoring. It was a night of wine, women and song or, more specifically, cosmos, divas and a concert.

We had a great livery car driver, a neighbor it turned out, taking us there and back in his sedan. The ride from Bay Ridge, Brooklyn to Jamaica, Queens (extremes of both boroughs) is like international traveling to me. The long drive to the casino was wonderful, as it was all along the waterfront with cooling breezes on a hot day and the smell of salt water was in the air.

Resorts could have its act more together on their ticketing/ admissions but I won't elaborate. They could also provide more seats for the space their showroom occupies, too. Traffic had us arriving just a little late. Harold Melvin's Blue Notes opened. We walked in just before they sang "Don't Leave Me This Way," a song they recorded ahead of Thelma Houston's better known version.

The crowd for this show wasn't all that diverse. Mostly disco dinosaurs, many with canes and walkers, so there wasn't a lot of booty-shaking (well, not in the dance sense anyhow) with all the probable hip replacements except for one septuagenarian gentleman who dramatically busted a move early on. (Was it The Hustle or a seizure?)

Maxine Nightingale, who is 62 years old now, looked all fab and glam. Much hotter than Madonna, almost 57, in fact. She ended with her two hits, "Lead Me On" and "Right Back Where I Started From" after a series of strong disco covers by others like SOS Band's "Take Your Time (Do It Right)" and Alicia Bridges' "I Love the Nightlife." She was in good voice throughout her set.

But the glorious Gloria Gaynor blew everyone away. She has survived and thrived. Go, Glo! She opened with her famous disco version of "Going Out of My Head" and then her '80s dance version of Kander & Ebb's "I Am What I Am" from La Cage aux Folles. Her long set included other disco hits like "I Never Can Say Goodbye" as well as a dance-music version of Christine Aguilera's "Beautiful," another positive, self-empowerment number. Ballads like "Killing Me Softly" and a great gospel version of "Every Breath You Take" were included for balance and diversity mid-way through her act. The audience was teased, tantalized and craving more throughout it.

Donna Summer said if she was The Queen of Disco, then Gloria Gaynor was The First Lady. The two formed a friendship and not a diva rivalry. GG did a Donna tribute that was admired by all. The evening's medley included "Last Dance," "MacArthur Park" and "Heaven Knows."

Of course, our prima diva ended with "I Will Survive," a 10-minute version that left no one disappointed. This has got to be one of the most famous songs, internationally, ever recorded. Even today's younger generations know it.

After the show, I cried and then I held my head up high and went with Kevin to the casino. Beginner's luck, I spent $10 and immediately won $65. I cashed out. However, I did get the opportunity to lean over the balcony and see part of the later show by Robin S doing "Love for Love" and "Show Me Love." Our '90s diva's voice has definitely deepened. She now sounds like Barry White and looks very ghetto in her denham, rag-tag and very "street" outfit. Very butch but still a big belter.

So we were back, from out of space and into our car home. Same driver. We mentioned the show and "I Will Survive" and our commander-in-chief played that song in various languages and English interpretations from his cell phone over the car's speakers, then segueing into other artists like Rihanna and Usher before we got home. Disco on wheels. A party night, right to the bitter end!

Marriage Equality: LGBT Pride 2015

Amazing Colossal Mayor De Blasio Leads the March

New York City Pride Day is on Sunday, the birthplace of the modern LGBT movement, commemorating the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. This year, in particular, we have so much to celebrate!

In 2013, President Obama boldly declared that June was officially Pride month and that the LGBT community's struggle for equality needed to be addressed.

Well, at last, it seems it's all not been in vain. Recently, NYC granted landmark status to the Stonewall Inn, where it all began. And this morning came the news that the Supreme Court ruled in favor of same-gender marriage nationwide. A victory! Excellent sense of timing; gay people always knew we could depend on the Supremes.

The struggle continues, of course, as bigotry will continue. Nonetheless, the importance of this decision in immense. The gay community is thankful for our straight friends and allies who have supported us, been there for us and with us, and marched with us in the parade. We are one.

Amazing, I was born at the right time to be swept up in history and caught up in a movement that meant personal liberation for me in the end. It liberated me to be who I am in many ways, not just my sexuality. And, for that, I am eternally thankful.

On My Turntables Sept. 27, 2013

Kristine W's back with a new club number that has "HIT" written all over it. You'll drop your cosmos, dahlings, and head straight to the disco floor when Ms W belts out "SoClosetoMe." This is outstanding diva-driven club music the way it always should be. She has a slew of fab remixers, my faves being the Todd Terry Main Mix, especially, and the Tony Moran Destination Club Mix.

Another fab diva returns with a Whitney cover that's tops. Ms Barbara Tucker joins producers The Cube Guys for "I Wanna Dance with Somebody." Cube Guys' original version is pumpin' with poz energy, but you can't get better than David Morales' Pride Anthem Mix. Does the name of this mix tell you where he's going to take us? You won't be able to sit this one out, believe me.

Miley Cyrus, "Wrecking Ball." Holy Hannah Montana, did she get our attention at the MTV Video Music Awards with her performance! As I've said before, the Paul Ruiz remix was fantastic.  Many of the dance mixes out are not as successful; just a bunch of busy noise. The Edson Pride/Sweet Beatz Project remix isn't bad, but I'll stick with Ruiz if I really feel the need to spin this.

Gabry Ponte's Funk & Love do-over of "I Will Survive" is a great, respectful  remix of Gloria Gaynor's eternal classic. Probably not for peak hour but maintains the integrity of the song that will definitely draw people to the floor, plus full of both Funk and Love as promised by its remix title.

Disco most certainly is still in style if UK"s Irish Colleens, The Saturdays, have named their latest song "Disco Love," although the song is more HiNRG in style rather than disco. Fave mix: Starlab Disco Club Mix. Runner-up: Wideboys Extended Mix. In any event, a catchy tune from the dance-music girl group.

Buddy B thanks my blog's audience in the US, of course, but also in the Ukraine, France, Germany, Netherlands, UK, Romania, Russia, Italy, Poland, Brazil, Mexico, Canada, Thailand, and welcome Bangladesh! Take to the dancefloors, share the music, let unity and love, peace and harmony take over our planet. We are one world! SoClose.

Attached below, the original mix of Kristine W's "SoClosetoMe." (And dig those back-up vocals!)

Blog Poll Results: Best Disco Song Ever!

Gloria Gaynor

My poll is closed, the results are in. You were asked to "VOTE for your favorite all-time disco song from the... modest list of classic disco songs." You could vote for more than one song.

The winner from that list is: "I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor, with 13 votes! She has certainly survived with that international hit that almost everyone in the world knows by heart. And she is still going strong; a diva to be reckoned with.
http://djbuddybeaverhausen.blogspot.com/2011/11/presenting-ms-gloria-gaynor.html

But The Weather Girls came in with a close #2, belting out "It's Raining Men" and collecting 12 votes. That song recently celebrated its 30th anniversary, notably on the David Letterman show. http://djbuddybeaverhausen.blogspot.com/2012/10/martha-wash-on-david-letterman.html

Yvonne Elliman's "If I Can't Have You (I Don't Want Nobody, Baby)" from the movie, Saturday Night Fever, was #3, with 9 votes. Sylvester's "(You Make Me Feel) Mighty Real" garnered 8 votes, while Donna Summer's "I Fee Love" received seven. And Cher came in with 6 votes cast for "Take Me Home." It should be noted, however, that the Bob Esty/Michele Aller song was the winner of my Cher poll last month, and you'll note a comment on the link from the esteemed Mr Esty himself. Dj Buddy B was thrilled and humbled by it! http://djbuddybeaverhausen.blogspot.com/2012/11/sharing-cher-results-on-dj-buddy.html

"I Love the Nightlife," by the divine Alicia Bridges, is a perennial disco fave that has been featured in major motion pictures and remixed over the ensuing decades, oddly enough receiving only 6 votes by participants in this poll.

Five songs came in with four votes each: Vicki Sue Robinson's classic "Turn the Beat Around," "Born to Be Alive" by Patrick Hernandez, "Cherchez la Femme" by Dr Buzzard's Savannah Band, Love Unlimited's "Under the Influence of Love" and Pamala Stanley's floor-filler, "Coming Out of Hiding."

Kelly Marie's "Feels Like I'm in Love" gathered 3 votes and "I Need a Man," by Grace Jones,  received two. All the nominees were winners to my mind as they remain iconic tunes from the classic disco era that moved us to the dancefloor and, sometimes, emotionally as well. They are a part of our history, popular culture and musical legacy.

Thirty-six people participated in voting. Thanks to all! A new poll will be posted on New Year's Eve and we begin anew!  Love to all ~~ Dj Buddy Beaverhausen

Hurricane Aftermath NYC

Justin Vivian Bond Tweets: "I'm getting ready to go out and fake help clean up the hurricane. I'd like to document this. Could I have some volunteer photogs and props?" Hear that, Romney?


On an express bus from the upper east side in Manhattan to Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, traveling down Broadway, I was shocked by the very long stretch of lack of electricity and the shuttered stores in an area usually so vibrant with shoppers. It is like a ghost town. I used to live in that neighborhood, for 18 years, and would be without power and, possibly, running water if I were still there. Three days after Hurricane Sandy hit NYC, it's become obvious to me that the worst part of the hurricane is its wake; the aftermath, the cleaning up, the going on. Subway service is still not fully back; it might be weeks for that to happen. And did I mention the gas shortage? This is much worse than what we went through after last year's Hurricane Irene.

In Bay Ridge, I am counting my blessings for running water and power for me and throughout most of our community. For those across the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, areas have been hit much harder. My colleague, Cathy, tells me horror stories of the flooding, even deaths, in Staten Island.

"Please don't forget about Staten Island. My family remains without power as temperatures drop," my doctor, Frank Spinelli, pleads to FEMA on Twitter. The situation is bad but New Yorkers are tough.

We will survive!

Hit it, Glo!:

Dj Buddy B's Q & A with Author Johnny Morgan

For my second blog interview, it is my pleasure to get a chance to find out more about Britain's brilliant writer on the topic of music, Johnny Morgan. I highly recommend checking out his blog, Rum Do (see below), to read his entertaining, thoughtful and often uniquely personal views on pop music. His book, Disco: The Music, The Times, The Era is one of my all-time favorite books on the subject of dance music and, in particular, classic '70s disco.

Buddy B: First, I think Disco: The Music, The Times, The Era is an amazing book and my new bible on the topic. It's encyclopedic and obviously well researched. Was it a labor of love for you?

Johnny Morgan: Thank you. It was a labor of love and memory. Disco was a formative part of my growing up and the music, the dancing, the clothes and experience of hearing, seeing and feeling the rush (un-chemically aided) on the dance floor as different tracks blended into one another has remained with me. It was always ignored by mainstream media at the time (1970-1978 particularly) and the kind of tough, male working-class guys I grew up with all preferred rock music — and I hated Prog Rock — at the time. Disco introduced me to a new circle of friends; mostly female and gay, and helped me to discover who I wanted to be aged 14.

BB: How long was this book in the making, from your first draft to your final edits?

JM: I’d tried to sell the idea to publishers around 2004, and had written the outline, had pages designed etc., but no-one wanted to know. It went back into my ‘pending’ file until 2009 and after the success of the Gaga book. It took almost a year of writing and researching the images etc.

BB: I was thrilled to find the foreward was written by Gloria Gaynor! How did that come about?

JM: Very easily. Essential Works (the company who put the book together) simply emailed to ask Gloria, and she said ‘yes’.

BB: The book covers Disco so thoroughly, I can't imagine you left anything out. In retrospect, is there anything you felt you omitted or would like to go back and add?

JM: There are always things that get left out of any book of this kind, simply because you can’t constrain every aspect of such a social, sexual, and political movement like disco into 400 pages. There are some great non-illustrated books on the subject out there, and many have first-person accounts given by DJs and club owners who were there (reading some can be like getting caught in a DJ booth during a screaming queen bitch-fest, though). But there are a wealth of images from back in the day still to be put into context and shown off; the people who were there and took photos haven’t all been published; the flyers, posters, magazines etc. were all fantastically original and ground-breaking works of graphic art and have influenced the fine and commercial art scene and let’s not even mention the fashion world! Because disco was about a hidden world for so long and then when it went overground was so derided by the homophobic, racist ‘disco sucks’ assholes, it hasn’t been afforded the same degree of consideration as other social movements like punk or grunge, New Romanticism or New Wave (puh-leeeze!) by the art world. I’d like to create an art book, consider more of the creative artists and their influence on mainstream and underground art. See Leigh Bowery for example…

BB: Disco: The Music, The Times, The Era is available on Amazon.com and, obviously, I highly recommend it to everyone reading this. In New York, it's been a big seller at Rainbows & Triangles in Chelsea, which is where I scored my copy. Steven, the owner (who calls Rainbows "New York's gay general store"), keeps restocking it. You should have your publisher arrange a book signing next time you're in NYC.

JM: I’d love to. Thanks for the tip.

BB: There's a great photo in the book of you with Donna Summer (striking a sweet, coquettish pose next to you). The caption mentions it's 1976. That was the year; what was the place? (You look as if you're really enjoying yourself.)

JM: Ah. Sorry, but I can’t talk about that…

BB: Like The Art of the LP, a book you co-authored, Disco is a physically large, "coffee table"-formatted book, filled with amazing pictures that accomodate your text. Because of the layout and all the brilliant archival images (many I've never seen before), I think buying a hard copy of the book is the way to go. Kindle wouldn't allow you the same experience. What's your view on that?

JM: It’s a problem with illustrated books. At present you can’t integrate text and images on an ereader, because when you zoom in on a pic, you throw the text out of kilter and unless you embed captions in the image (thus ruining them), you can’t easily access what is what. Then again, lovely looking, hefty tomes such as Disco + Art of the LP are the reason why physical books will continue to be printed. How’d you give an ebook as a gift and get the same lovely smile when it’s ‘unwrapped’? Doesn’t work.

BB: According to the brief liner notes in Disco, "Johnny Morgan has written popular music books for more than tweny years." How did you get started?

JM: It’s a long story, but basically I got my first staff writing gig (at Time Out London) because I owned a Johnny Cash album at a time when it was very uncool to own Cash albums (i.e. pre-American Recordings), to become their Country Music editor. I got to interview him later, at the House of Cash, but that’s another story, too. Best thing about the first job was getting to know kd lang as she was breaking in 1988. I also freelanced from day one and worked for a lot of different magazines and newspapers.

BB: What attracted you to write Gaga? Was researching that a piece of cake compared to the voluminous Disco?

JM: It’s tempting to say ‘the advance’ attracted me, but it’s also fair to say that I was intrigued by Gaga and saw so many inspirations from my musical past (Bowie, Bowery, LaBelle etc.) in her look, that researching it was a pleasure — and kinda easy because I knew where she was coming from. Well, her and Lady Starlight…

BB: As a follower of your blog, Rum Do(johnnymorgansrumdo.blogspot.com), I really enjoy the way you blend personal, even autobiographical, details with the history of pop music and write about the interrelationship, through the years. How do you perceive your blog and how do you choose your topics?

JM: Back in the day, writing was a joy and the reader was guaranteed because they bought the magazines (and books) I wrote for. In the late 1990s writing became a chore and while the reader was still there, the musicians, artists and creatives that I used to interview and write about were becoming strictly policed by PRs who no longer let the journalist get their client drunk and tease stuff out of them that they should not reveal. I gave up writing about stuff I liked because it wasn’t fun any more, plus no-one was interested — or so the people running the mags, papers and presses kept insisting. My blog is an excuse to enjoy writing again. Hopefully there are people out there who have lived a similar life and recognize the things I write about, or else want to know something about elements of a past which is now gone and beginning to be forgotten.

A friend of mine who lectures at a major University told me the other day that he mentioned David Bowie in a lecture and was met by blank stares. He had to explain who Bowie was. I also occasionally lecture and last year found myself explaining what a Teddy Boy was. So, the blog is there to help me to remember what my life once was, how the world used to be and hopefully inform, entertain and interact with people who are similarly interested. Topics for blogs choose themselves, I get the urge to write and because of the immediacy of the medium, it gets done.

BB: I actually had no idea what the British phrase "rum do" meant, so I looked it up. (Obviously nothing to do with rum, as in Cpt. Morgan's.) What I read was the term originally meant variously "good, fine, excellent or great" but, around 1800, came to mean "odd, strange or peculiar." Which interpretation applies to your blog title?

JM: Definitely the later definition — I’m not so old that I would use the pre-1800 definition. My name also played a part in the naming because of the Captain — a distant relative, I’m sure.

BB: Thanks for your time and for answering my questions, Johnny. I'd just like to ask one last thing: Is there another book you're working on and can you say anything at all about it?

JM: Thanks for asking me. At present I’m ‘between books’, but as soon as I
fix on something, I’ll let you know.

Note: Johnny Morgan's Gaga, Disco & Art of the LP are available on Amazon, Barnes & Nobles and -- of course -- wherever fine books are (still) sold. Additionally, if in New York, visit Rainbows and Triangles, 192 Eighth Avenue between 19th & 20th Streets to purchase a copy of Disco: The Music, The Times, The Era. Please check out Johnny's blog. If you're into music, you'll love it.

Presenting Ms Gloria Gaynor

If there is a theme song for me at this precise point in my life, surely it would have to be Gloria Gaynor's eternal disco smash-hit, "I Will Survive." I've been through a significant number of personal tragedies and traumas in the past few months, but now things are finally starting to look up. I think I'd qualify to be on the old tv game show, Queen for a Day, if not for the gender barrier.

On that 1950s series, housewife contestants spoke, often through uncontrolled sobbing, about their recent financial, physical and/or emotional hard times. Their distress was gauged by the response on an audience applause meter. The deeper the tsuris, the more thunderous the applause! The "biggest loser," as it were, would become Queen for a Day, given a crown to wear, seated on a velvet throne, handed a bouquet of long-stemmed roses to embrace as tears streamed down her face, just like the reigning beauty queen in a pageant (or the Hunchback of Notre Dame at the Feast of Fools)! She also received prizes for being a hopeless wretch like a washer, dryer or a vacuum cleaner. It was a particularly sado-masochistic experience (the crown should have been made of thorns) and a forerunner of today's reality-tv shows.

For all us Queens for a Day, disco queen Gloria Gaynor is our patron saint when she belts out "I Will Survive." And that she did Saturday night at B.B. King's Blues Club in New York. "I Will Survive" is one of the best-known dance songs ever, a timeless international sensation and a celebration of inner strength and the ability to move ahead in the wake of adversity. Although literally about surviving the end of a love affair, it strikes a nerve with everyone who has ever gone through hard times and was made stronger by them.

The deluxe, extended version performed at the end of Ms Gaynor's set was extremely powerful and electrifying, worth the price of admission alone. GG virtually turned the packed house of seated patrons into a disco of enthusiastically dancing, prancing party people.

Ms Gaynor looked fantastic and quite youthful in basic black with a change of sparkly overlays. Her resonant, rich voice is practically a force of nature. She opened with her disco cover of "Going Out of My Head (Over You)" that was immediately engaging, and then launched into her Gay Pride fave, "I Am What I Am" (from the musical, La Cage aux Folles), followed by her 70s club and radio hit, "Never Can Say Goodbye." An awesome start!

Other highlights included songs from the Grammy Award-winning singer's brand new album, the 2003 club favorite "I Never Knew" and her encore, "Just Keep Thinking About You," a dance hit from 2001 that boasted an outstanding remix by our boys at Almighty in the UK, as well as a house music cover of The Supremes' "Stop in the Name of Love."

Known as a dance-floor diva, Glo naturally strives to show her versatility. It is here that she drops the disco ball, however. Throwing in well-worn ballads like "The Way We Were" and "Killing Me Softly" just don't live up to the rest of her set, no matter that she belts them out with flawless conviction and style. Meanwhile, beloved dance songs for which she's known ("Anybody Wanna Party?, "Honey Bee," "Casanova Brown," "Substitute" or her disco version of "How High the Moon") were disappointingly excluded from the night's set in favor of rather random pop tunes.

Ms Gaynor nonetheless ruled the stage with an easygoing, casual and smoothly professional presence and grace, accompanied by her band and back-up vocalists par excellence. It was an overall exciting and rousing night of entertainment. But she shouldn't shy from her disco dominance one iota. She is what she is, a disco diva on top of the mirrorball. Gloria Gaynor wrote the foreward to Johnny Morgan's magnificent book, Disco: The Music, The Times, The Era (described in greater detail in my blog entry, "Eye Candy"); she wrote it with wit, intelligence and an obvious love of disco as a musical genre. She is very much aware of her iconic status in that genre and, to paraphrase "I Am What I Am," what she is needs no excuses.

Gloria Gaynor has survived and she has resurrected the upbeat and all-inclusive joy of disco music for a new generation. She is not just Queen for a Day, but Queen for all time when it comes to the eternal beat of the dance floor.

Below, Ms Gaynor at the Crimea Music Fest earlier this year:

Eye Candy

"What book is Dj Buddy B reading now?" If this, possibly, is a question on your minds that you've been afraid to ask, fortuitously it's one I'm prepared to answer.

As my friends know, I love trashy celeb bios. The more salacious and scandal-infested, the better. Gone, virtually, is the high-minded literature of my days as an English major as I make my way through a morass of purple prose. It was my doctor (Frank Spinelli, author of the very well-received The Advocate Guide to Gay Men's Health and Wellness) who recommended Not the Girl Next Door by Charlotte Chandler, catering to my rather unhealthy and not-quite-well, I'm certain, pre-occupation with all things Joan Crawford. (I recently purchased a "Joan Crawford: America's Sweetheart" button off ebay if that clues you in to my obsession!)

While a breezy, well-written recount of the star's life, NtGND unfortunately comes a cropper (as Judith Crist used to say) when it comes to airing dirty laundry, something I steadfastly demand. (I have standards after all!) In fact, the bio is gushingly protective of JC, quoting from Ms Chandler's first-hand interviews with Crawford and taking Joan's often phoney, image-perpetuating spins on her life unquestioningly at face value. It's a virtual sin, as far as I'm concerned, for which there is no penance. According to this account, Joan arrived in Hollywood as a pillar of moral virtue without a silent blue movie or casting couch in sight!

The book, still being read, languishes on my night stand near my bed while, on the little, goldfish-patterned table, sits the magnificently large, "coffee table"-formatted DISCO: The Music/ The Times/ The Era by Johnny Morgan, published by Sterling (NY/London/Canada). The book is lavishly illustrated with amazing, drop-dead-gorgeous photos of legendary disco divas like Labelle (Patti, Nona & Sarah), Gloria Gaynor (who wrote the foreward) and Donna Summer (posing with the author in '78). This book was recommended to me by my friend, Steven Spiro, owner of Rainbows & Triangles on 8th Avenue in NYC (19th/20th Sts.), which is where fellow New Yorkers can snap it up. Otherwise, check out Amazon or order through your bookstore. (R&T has a large book section catering to the gay community; so, if visiting New York, stop in and peruse it along with the dance-music cd section.)

The book is a true treasure and Mr Morgan is a genius on the subject of disco music; his knowledge is encyclopedic. DISCO is nothing less than an absolutely definitive story of the rise and fall of an era beginning with its start in the go-go clubs of the 1960s (London's Ad Lib Club, New York's Peppermint Lounge) from the music's Soul and Girl Group origins. This isn't the kind of book you can Kindle. Largely because of the photos and design, you really have to experience it in book form.

From the marketing notes on the back of its jacket: "These are the stories of excess, success and duress; myths are exploded and dance steps decoded. Every night was a party. And you can relive it here." In this instance, believe the hype. Brilliant! I love this book and highly recommend it!

Gloria Gaynor writes beautifully, in her foreward, of the infamous 1979 Disco Demolition Night in Comiskey Park: "[I]f these people hated disco, why did they have disco records to begin with?" Good point! Go, Glo! And she does goes on: "I happen to know that disco has never died though;... It has simply changed to protect the innocent."

ps: On the current dance music front, as I predicted back in May, Ricky Martin's "Freak of Nature" is on the rise to number 13 on the US Billboard Dance Club Songs chart, after 4 weeks, up from #21 last week. It is included on my Gay Pride 2011 promo. Kylie Minogue's "Put Your Hands Up" is at #16, strongly after only 3 weeks. It can be found on my "Fagtastic" cd, still popular since distributed for dj-promo-purposes-only in April. Adele's "Rolling in the Deep" holds on at #48 after 16 weeks with Lady Gaga's "Judas" at #30 after 11 (both on the Pride '11 promo). Beth Ditto's "I Wrote the Book" (on my recent "Fire Island House Party" promo) is now at #26 with Gaga's "Edge of Glory" up at 8 (on same promo). And Yoko Ono bursts onto the scene once more with her current "Talking to the Universe". And she was actually at Peppermint Lounge!

Lastly, I want to thank everyone who has viewed my blog thus far, I hope you enjoy my posts or promos, and a special thanks to viewers in Thailand, the Ukraine, India and Iran. (I do check my stats, you know!) Dance music pulls us together. Make love, not war or, as I always say: Why fight? Dance! Fuck Disco Demolition Night and all the haters of the world!

Love, peace, happiness and disco! :)