This is what a party with me sounds like
A banger is worth a thousand words
This isn't a wedding playlist lifted off the internet: it's how I play, in 45 tracks. The first eleven actually played at one of my weddings, in this order, and the whole night is on video. Press play and picture your people on the floor.
The player is Spotify’s and loads when you press play. Without a Spotify session you hear 30-second previews. Open in Spotify
What actually played
Eleven tracks, one real wedding: a Jamaican family raised on reggae and dancehall, and a Seville family of sevillanas, rumba and whatever's on the radio. My job that night was getting both of them dancing to the same thing.
These are the tracks from this list that dropped at the party, in order. The whole set is on YouTube, uncut, with its highs and the odd dip. Tap the minute next to a track and the video jumps to that moment.
What isn't on the list counts too: that night I also played what the couple had asked for, dancehall and reggaeton included, songs I'd never have picked that got their people jumping. This is how I build every set.
- SeptemberEarth, Wind & Fire
- CelebrationKool & The Gang
- Uptown FunkMark Ronson, Bruno Mars
- Can't Stop the Feeling!Justin Timberlake
- Hot StuffDonna Summer
- Blame It on the BoogieThe Jacksons
- Dancing in the MoonlightToploader
- I Gotta FeelingBlack Eyed Peas
- Get BusySean Paul
- Johnny B. GoodeChuck Berry
- I Got You (I Feel Good)James Brown
How I build a set
There's no wedding playlist I play every time. There's groundwork with each couple, and the set comes out of that.
That's what people call open format DJing: playing across genres, with taste, for the people on the floor.
Your playlist
The first thing I ask for is a Spotify playlist from the two of you: lots of songs, made without thinking about the wedding.
A few conversations
We filter it together: the ones you love, the ones that can't be missing and the ones that mean something. That way I build what you love first.
Your people
What each family likes in general, who has particular taste and which requests to honour: the rapper cousin who wants at least one track, grandma and her sevillanas.
The odd requests
At that wedding they asked me for "Candy" by Cameo, for a line dance. I'd never played it: at a wedding here nobody would dance, and everyone would just stare at the DJ. That night, the whole floor danced it for five minutes. It's in part 1 of the video, the daytime party: it's how it ends.
In blocks, with windows
I build the set in blocks that fit together and leave windows open for requests on the night. I don't improvise from start to finish: it shows, and it comes out worse.
Room for surprises
Your whole playlist doesn't go in, and it shouldn't. The must-plays go in, whatever fits, and songs you don't expect that I know you'll love from what you've sent me. The surprise is part of the party too.
What else is on the list
The floor-fillers
After the eleven from that wedding come the funk and disco that get every table up: Stevie Wonder, Chic, Kool & The Gang, Cheryl Lynn, James Brown.
Classic R&B and hip hop
Beyoncé, Blackstreet, Notorious B.I.G., 50 Cent, Dr. Dre. The part of the night when my generation shouts every word. Plus a rock and roll block for the parents.
Cocktail hour and the last song
Bill Withers, Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield, Sérgio Mendes. What I play on vinyl while people arrive, and what closes the night without a dip.
It's a list, not a set: live, these tracks get mixed, cut and reordered for the people in front of me. And at your party the backbone won't be this list. It'll be yours.
Where do you picture it?
Your wedding in Spain
One or two weddings a month, built on your playlist. From a vinyl cocktail hour to the last track of the open bar.
Your wedding in Seville
Haciendas, country estates and city venues: the music of your wedding, in my city.
Hip hop and R&B for your wedding
The songs that work on a wedding dance floor, and when to play them.
Questions
Will you play this exact list at my wedding?
No. This list is here so you can get a feel for what a party with me sounds like. Your set is built from scratch around your own Spotify playlist, the venue and the people coming. Some of these tracks will definitely drop; others won't fit you and won't be played.
Where do the tracks that "actually played" come from?
From one of my weddings, in the province of Seville, which is on YouTube in full with the minute of every track. The first eleven tracks on the Spotify list are the ones from that night, in the order they played; the rest of that set, the couple's requests, isn't on the list because it's not what I'd pick for yours.
What if our music is nothing like this?
Then we talk. If your thing is rock and roll, 80s pop, reggaeton or Spanish rumba, there's a part I handle well and a part I don't. I'll tell you clearly, and if another DJ would do it better than me, I'll tell you that too.
Why doesn't the player start on its own?
Because you put the music on, not the website. Spotify doesn't allow autoplay, and nobody wants a page to start blasting. Without a Spotify session you hear 30-second previews; with one, the full tracks.
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