It’s not unusual for a DJ to walk into a club planning to play one sort of thing only to have some bigwig order him, midperformance, to play something else. That practice is unheard-of at Play, an experimental dance music series held every Monday at Danny’s Tavern, a low-key house-turned-bar on Dickens just east of Damen. Organizers Bob Davies (who performs electronic music under the name Pal:ndrom and DJs as simply Bob) and Ray Rodriguez (aka DJ Ray_Rod) give their guests the freedom to play whatever they want, even if it’s nothing like what they’re known for. There’s no cover charge–DJs spin for tips–and yet the series attracts local celebs and touring artists alike.
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In ’94 Davies left home for the University of Kansas in Lawrence, a town he found too small, and after a year he transferred to the University of Wisconsin in Madison. Though he majored in studio art, he took sound-design classes so he could use the university’s recording facilities. He formed an ambient noise band called Rehab. with a high school pal, Brian Kelly, and he cultivated his DJ skills spinning downtempo (a category that includes trip-hop and other chilled-out electronic music) weekly at a wine bar.
At a party Davies met Alex Horn, a video artist who performs under the name Nanodust. When Horn persuaded the owner of the now defunct restaurant Okno to let him hold events upstairs there, he urged Davies to drop off some of his work. Davies brought over samples of his graphic design stuff along with a demo mix and landed a job doing the restaurant’s menus and promotional materials. Within a few months he was also spinning trip-hop and jungle while Horn projected video art. But the slick restaurant wasn’t attracting the kind of crowd that appreciated loud, dark, undanceable music, and after a few months the relationship soured. Kenny Kordich, a bartender at Okno, was also a manager at Danny’s, and he suggested they try something there instead.
Lately Davies and Rodriguez have been expanding their community to incorporate members of the visual art world too. By 2000 Davies had landed a job as junior art director at an upscale marketing and advertising company (he’s since been promoted to senior digital editor), and was using his resources at work to design and print flyers and handbills. Last year, however, he allowed six other artists–some pros, some not–to get involved, making each one responsible for two months’ worth of promotion. The results ranged from cutesy collaged postcards to bright red foam balls embossed with minimalist white text. “The Play visual aesthetic is just as important as the music,” Davies says.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/J.B. Spector.
