Bootie Top 10 - March 2009

9freak9 - Dance Wif Ur Hands In The Ayer (Flo-Rida vs. Chemical Brothers vs. Tag Team vs. LMFAO vs. Fedde Le Grand) - Australia
This track has been Mysterious D's "secret weapon" at Bootie for a few months now. Combining several "put your hands up in the air" refrains from a few different songs, along with an infectious dance groove, this is guaranteed to kick your party up a notch and have those hands in the AYER!

Copycat - Blind Esmeralda (Hercules & Love Affair feat. Antony Hegarty vs. Santa Esmeralda) - Sweden
"Ethereal flamenco disco" is perhaps the best way to describe this, with each element brought to the table by a different artist. Antony Hegarty's dreamy vocal flows wonderfully with Hercules & Love Affair's disco instrumentation, but it's the addition of Santa Esmeralda's horn-packed, over-the-top, '70s cover of "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" (from the movie "Kill Bill") that makes this mashup pure heaven.

Faroff - Funky Shack! (Lipps Inc. vs. The B-52's vs. Soulwax vs. Patrick Hernandez vs. Yello) – Boston / Brasilia
Faroff is a Brazilian bootlegger currently living in Boston, and as a regular DJ at Bootie Boston, he's really stepped up his mashup game, as this track amply proves. This is a perfect retro blend of '70s vs. '80s, taking two of the best party jams from each decade and placing it on top of the very '00s Soulwax throbbing groove, and spinning it into dance floor gold.

G3rst - Bloom To Me (Nirvana vs. Koop) - The Netherlands
This one took a while to grow on us ... it's such a radical reworking of Nirvana, that we weren't sure what to think of it at first. But taking Kurt Cobain's vocal and meshing it with the jazzy lounge stylings of Sweden's Koop takes some nerve, and the result is a kooky and inspired take on a '90s classic. This is now Mysterious D's jam, and the Bootie audiences seem to love making up swing-style dances to it.

Lock3down - Gorilla Idol (Gorillaz vs. Billy Idol) - Toronto
We'd almost forgotten about this '80s chestnut, until Lock3down ingeniously updated it with a Gorillaz vocal. The real payoff though comes three-quarters in, when Del tha Funkee Homosapien starts rapping over Steve Stevens's blistering guitar solo. Just a fantastic pairing!

Mighty Mike - The Complicated Scientist (Avril Lavigne vs. Coldplay) - France
A guilty pleasure, to be sure, this has been Adrian's cheesy, over-dramatic "end of the night" song for a few months now. It's utterly shocking to us how many drunk people seem to know the words to this horrendous-yet-strangely-catchy Avril Lavigne song! And somehow, mashing it up with Coldplay almost disguises it's awfulness!

DJ not-I - More Cowbell! (Sisters of Mercy vs. NAPT) - Vienna, Austria
Yeah, yeah, we know our goth roots are showing on this one. This Sisters of Mercy darkwave classic gets a electro dance floor makeover - and with the anachronistic assistance of Christopher "More Cowbell!" Walken, it keeps a firm smile on our faces while spooky dancing. In fact, we've been told this track has been thown into rotation by DJs at some of our local industrial clubs, like Meat.

Party Ben - Live Your Life Punk (T.I. vs. Rihanna vs. Vampire Weekend) - San Francisco
We're not huge fans of the preppy college rock of Vampire Weekend, but somehow - shockingly - Party Ben has made them tolerable with the addition of T.I. and Rihanna. Maybe it's because he's replaced most of their vocals with the "heys" and "hos" of T.I., which work better for us than the yelped "hey hey hey" of New York's most over-hyped band.

KINGS OF LEON 2-FOR-1 SPECIAL!
Tone396 - Fire In A Bottle (The Police vs. Kings of Leon) - UK
DJ Rodeo - Knocked Up (Lykke Li vs. Kings of Leon)
It wasn't until we dropped Tone396's effortless "Fire In A Bottle" at a Bootie LA party that we realized just how HUGE the Kings of Leon have become. Sure, The Police acapellas are starting to sound a little overused in the mashup world, but this just WORKS. For the second track, DJ Rodeo's mysterious mashup takes Lykke Li's cover of "Knocked Up" and makes it sound like KOL singer Caleb Followill is doing backup vocals for HER! It's dark and ghostly, yet beautiful, putting shivers down your spine.

DJ Y Alias JY - Shut Up And Take Me Out (The Ting Tings vs. Franz Ferdinand vs. Aretha Franklin vs. M/A/R/R/S) - Munich, Germany
Take two of the most danceable indie rock songs from the past few years and put them together – how could this NOT work? Sprinkle in some Aretha and "Pump Up The Volume" for some spice, and you've got another mashup stormer, courtesy of one of Bootie Munich's resident DJs! This track is made for FUN on the dance floor.