Wednesday, April 01, 2009

Stump the DJ

Since it's April 1st, I thought I'd revisit a prank I pulled a year ago on some friends. (this was posted once before as part of another post) For the sake of anonymity we'll call them Dude and Chick. This prank was not pre-concieved, but if I ever get the chance to try it on some new people who haven't heard me tell the story then it most certainly will be.



After a semi-stressful night of work two of the other supervisors and myself decided to head out to a local bar for drinks. (the supervisors are the aformentioned Dude and Chick) There was a DJ there that night and he said over the mic that he was taking requests and if anyone had any to just come up and tell him what we wanted to hear.

That’s when I proposed a bar-game. I don’t know if this is a game other people play, but it’s called Stump the DJ.

“How do you play Stump the DJ?” Chick asked.

“It’s easy,” I told her. “We make up a band and request to hear it a song from them.”

So we started brainstorming for band names. It had to sound like a real band and we threw several ideas out on the table; Black Sunday had a good run, then I suggested Silver Jews (someone I was certain they had never heard of). They thought Silver Jews sounded horrible, not like a real band at all. (for those who don't know, the Silver Jews were a real band, a member or two went on to form Pavment... Another band that a lot of people haven't heard of... google it). I was trying to get a feel for their musical expertise, especially because Dude graduated from college with a bachelers in something music related. I was pleased that they hadn't heard of them.

Next I suggested Queen Franklin and we toyed with this one for a while before I suggested Soul Coughing, a band that was not unheard of but not common. I watched them for recognition and saw (thankfully) that they had never heard of Soul Coughing.

“That’s what I’m going to request then,” I said, getting up from my stool.

"I don't know, that's not really a good name," Dude said.

"Yeah, you said it's supposed to sound like a real band," Chick said.

“Well I'm going with it, I don't care... I think it's a great band name. And I'll ask for the song..." I acted like I was pulling this song title out of thin air, when in fact it was one of their few 'hits'... "Super Bon-Bon.”

Then I walked away from them, went up to the DJ and requested it. The DJ hadn’t heard any requests for Soul Coughing in a long while, but he did have the song.

I returned to the bar and Dude and Chick were excited to hear how it went.

“I walked up to him and asked for Soul Coughing's Super Bon-Bon," I said, trying to look disappointed, "but he didn't really pay me any attention. He just put a thumb up. So then I asked him if he had it and he kind of rolled his eyes and said no." I sighed here. "He didn't even bother looking."

They were pretty bummed.

"Big build up, no pay off," I said. Dude and Chick nodded in agreement.

Then, two or three songs later, the DJ announced that the next song was from a band called Soul Coughing with the song was ‘Super Bob-Bon’. The bass started pumping and the looks on their faces... Their jaws just dropped. It was all I could do not to laugh, I dropped my jaw as well trying to look as astonished and dumbfounded as they were. "No way," I said.

It only lasted a few seconds, but it was glorious. It was also great to watch the reralization hit as Dude looked at me and said "Fuck you, Poop." Then chick slapped my arm and called me an asshole.

Long set-up, but everytime I think back on the looks on their faces... Holy shit was that a solid pay-off.

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