Neetu Balram and Sean Rush Wedding
“Jamie of Ceremony DJs was incredible both before and during our wedding! We knew we may have a good match when we visited Ceremony DJs' website and it declared, "Finally, a DJ as cool as you are." Jamie and my now husband immediately hit it off. I loved that Jamie prioritized getting to know us and our tastes, but also took the time to hear about our guests. He has a great sound system, which was important for our outdoor venue. Jamie was super friendly, easy to work with and incredibly professional, keeping us on track and focused, without overburdening us. Jamie even made it out to our venue a few months before the wedding to check everything out and talk through the plan. Day of, Jamie was a lot of fun and killed it! He had music going from the moment guests arrived at the ceremony to the final moments of the reception. It all tied together and set the mood for every aspect of the day and evening, transitioning seamlessly. Our guests had great things to say and we couldn't agree more. Thank you Jamie!” -Neetu Balram
“Ceremony DJs and Jamie in particular were awesome to work on. From the moment we met, I felt like we totally understood our vibe and was able to really build on the things I already liked. His skills really gave the wedding the perfect feel, and all of my friends and family loved it. Additionally, Jamie is a calming force pre-wedding. He exudes that "I got you" vibe that's super helpful when you're stressing out about a million little details. Great guy, great DJ!” - Sean Rush
A Secluded Indian Wedding in a Fairy Tale Forest
Sean and Neetu were totally cool. But amazingly, that isn’t even the most interesting part of this story! What turned out to be amazing was what might at first glanced seemed to be the impossible, challenging part of this wedding - learning to DJ like we were in Bombay, India in 2010. We all obviously hit it off right away with our shared love of all things indie rock, indie dance and dare I say, punk, but the thing that really turned out to be the joy of this one was learning to DJ Indian.
A Hip, Young Couple
We all riffed enough at the meetings to know that I could push things into way more underground of a territory than I can normally even with our hippest clients. These guys were literally walking down the aisle to Yeah Yeah Yeahs “Maps”, so that right there sets a bar that you have to rise to meet as a DJ with an equally adventurous selection in that area of the hits.
An Even Hipper Family
The groom’s family is perhaps, hilariously in retrospect, very punk rock. I’m getting older and it’s still funny to me that people’s parents are like “The Clash, yeah!” But I guess that’s where we all get it from. My dad definitely hipped me to Blondie and the Cars when I was a kid, so they’re out there! Anyway, when your family is punk rock, it opens up huge possibilities for cool stuff, and when you add to that an event that’s heavy on the friends, things can really happen.
An 80’s Alternative Ceremony
We decided to riff on the light through the trees to kind of tease out a shimmering, sparkling, 80’s kind of feel for the ceremony and cocktail hour. Yeah Yeah Yeahs “Maps” has echoes of the Jesus and Mary Chain “Just Like Honey” and even the Beach Boys “God Only Knows” if you go deeper than that, so we tried to riff on the Byrd’s guitar indie pop style of the early to mid-80’s to set that up and accentuate the light and airiness of the space. I think we did some stuff like the Cocteau Twins “Lorelei” and the Smiths “Boy With a Thorn In His Side” to set up the processional before the ceremony started.
A Modern Indie Rock Cocktail Hour
For the cocktail hour we slowly made things more modern with some newer stuff that had that Jesus and Mary Chain feel like Alvvays “Marry Me Archie”. All of this went over surprisingly well, because, like I said, Sean’s family is totally punk rock. It turns out, the caterers are also very punk rock, because right when I was going to chicken out on playing indie guitar music, they came to reassure me that they all love it, know exactly which songs I’m playing, and are so grateful it’s awesome because apparently every other wedding DJ does the exact same thing and it’s generally horrible.
Thank you, and you’re welcome!
An Indie R&B Dinner
For the dinner, we tried to bridge the gap between the indie stuff and what would eventually be an epic Indian dance party, by incorporating some newer indie stuff with more of a funk and R&B undertone. This is where we can squeeze in things like Frank Ocean, Childish Gambino and Solange but still keep it in a zone where it’s not too weird to hear the most recent Phoenix album.
A Legit Indian Club Experience
After a few chill indie ones, we were ready for the main event - Indian club music. Neetu is a champ, and she and I went to town on this as a special project. I obviously didn’t know the faintest bit about modern Indian club music, though we did do at least one event that was classic Indian disco, so I had a few tricks up my sleeve, but nothing like this. We did full modern Bollywood.
We get a couple of situations like this every year where I literally learn a whole genre from scratch with the help of the clients and this was one of them. If you’re comfortable enough with DJ’ing and how the underlying music theory works that goes into it, you can basically sight read the music based on BPM and key for an awesome set, even if you don’t know the music. But only if you have a massive request list and take the time to rinse the internet for the sickest remixes, cross reference all the artists, soundtracks and features and generally go to town on the prep work.
Between Neetu’s amazing requests and my diligent researching and cross referencing, we pretty much nailed it. And it’s funny, because when you play a set like this, you’re kind of hearing it for the first time yourself, so it’s really exciting and spontaneous.
Up until that point, the wedding was great, but this was really off the charts. You really want people to know the songs, and everyone knew the songs. You really want people to appreciate the arrangement, and people were really getting what I was doing. As a group, we laid it down. Pretty seriously, as the amazing video by the good folks at The Good Folk Film Co. can attest.
It really did feel like we were actually at the club in New Delhi in 2016 or so. Neetu didn’t put this in the review, but she says to me “It’s as good as any brown person, I’ve ever heard!” Which I feel like is tremendous complement in a room full of Indian family members.
A Top 40 & Trap Denoument
We closed it out with some pop dance ones like Icona Pop “I Love It” (the song at the rave in Girls) and a few Drake type ones towards the end. All and all, pretty amazing. And held together better than it sounds the styles were slowly blended from indie rock, to indie dance, to indie r&b and hip hop, to Indian club, to main stream pop, to Top 40 Trap.
The one thing I regret is not playing Lizzo “Truth Hurts” for last song. I’m sorry Neetu, they were shutting us down and I was pushing my luck already.
Big Ups & Shout Outs
Special shout out to Fogcutter Catering for letting me know they were picking up what I was putting down right when I might have lost faith.
Special shout out to Mendocino Outland for keeping me in delicious cocktails all night long. And getting me that one referral. We’ll be seeing each other soon!
Special shout out to The Good Folk Film Company for making the best of video of anyone we’ve seen and generally being really nice and supportive as fellow vendors.
Special shout out to Arica Grace for running the show and calling us back a few times since then - we really really appreciate it.
And all time special shout out to The Madrones aka The Brambles for imagineering an amazing space. It’s literally a steam punk fairy castle in a magical glade with a full partying and catering amphitheater. When I grow up, these are the guys I want to be.
In conclusion, it takes a village. And if you bring me your request A game, I can bring you a trip to India travel free.
Ceremony Songs
Prelude:
Processional:
Recessional:
The Naked and Famous" “Young Blood”
First Dance:
Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti “Baby”
Requests:
Big Star “Thirteen”
The Ronettes “Be My Baby”
The Marvelettes “Mr. Postman”
Television “Days”
Joe Jackson “Is She Really Going Out with Him”
The Replacements “Unsatisfied”
The Clash “Lovers Rock”
The Smiths “Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want”
The Stone Roses “Shoot You Down”
The Velvet Underground “Sweet Jane”
Wire “I am the Fly”
Jesus and Mary Chain “Just Like Honey”
Modern Lovers “Someone I Care About”
Morrisey “Suedehead”
Buzzcocks “Ever Fallen in Love”
The Ramones “I Want to Be Your Boyfriend”
Echo and the Bunnymen “The Cutter”
New Order “Dreams Never End”
Chromatics “I’m On Fire"
Daft Punk “Make Love”
The Knife “Heartbeats”
Washed Out “Feel It All Around”
Gold Panda “You”
Foreign Exchange “All That You Are”
Vince Staples “Big Fish”
The Internet “Special Affair”
Little Brother “Lovin’ It”
Victoria Monet “New Love”
Blood Orange “You’re Not Good Enough”
Frank Ocean “Lost”
Jamie’s Indian Club Set:
Prabhu Deva, A.R.Rahman “Urvashi Urvashi”
Ranbir Kapoor “Badtameez Dill”
Ranbir, Anushka, Pritam, Arijit, Badshah, Jonita “Ae Dil Hai Mushkil (The Breakup Song)”
Jaam “Gallan Goodiyaan”
Vishal Dadlani & Shalmali Kholgade “Balam Pichkari”
Dil Dhadakne Do, Priyanka Chopra “Gallan Goodiyaan (DJ ETC Remix)”
Marshmello x Pritam “Biba feat. Shirley Setia & Shah Rukh Khan”
Varun, Alia, Tanishk, Neha, Monali, Ikka “Badrinath Ki Dulhania”
Dabangg Feat. Malaika Arora Khan “Munni Badnaam Hui”
DJ Zedi Feat. Lehmber Hussainpuri “Sadi Gali (Club Remix)”
Khoobsurat, Badshah, Aastha “Abhi Toh Party Shuru Hui Hai (DJ Chetas Remix)”
Lehmber Hussainpuri “Sadi Gali”
Ranbir Kapoor, Deepika Padukone “Balam Pichkari (Dj Chetas Remix)”
Himesh Reshammiya “Hookah Bar”
Mika Singh & Shefali Alvares “Subha Hone Na De (Remix)”
Vishal & Shekhar feat. Shreya Ghoshal; Udit Narayan; Vishal Dadlani & Shekhar Ravjiani “Radha”
Khoobsurat, Badshah, Aastha “Abhi Toh Party Shuru Hui Hai”
Panjabi Hit Squad “London Thumakda (Wedding Remix)”
Ranbir Kapoor, Deepika Padukone “Dilli Wali Girlfriend”
Sukhbir “Ishq Tera Tadpave (Oh Ho Ho Ho) (Remix)”
Venue: The Brambles / Planner: Events By Arica Grace / DJ: Ceremony DJs / Videographer: The Good Folk Film Company / Caterer: Fogcutter Catering / Bar: Mendocino Outland / Florist: Wild Club Design / Rentals: Found Rentals & Encore Rentals / Hair & Make Up: Dreamcatcher Artistry