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This question & answer is classic: What makes you a cunt? Back in the days of the Sound Factory and Twilo, I would throw people out of the club that I didn't like. I would throw other DJs out of the club. I just didn't want the business to be at my party. It's not about the industry. It's about the people on the dance floor. It's not about checking to see who's playing this or who's playing that. And it's not about what sound system you have, blah blah blah. I would toss those people out. I wanted it to be about the essence of the party and not a critique. But I don't really toss people out of the clubs anymore because I just don't feel I have that much to prove at this point. These days, everyone is welcome. But if somebody does something to tamper with my feelings or something, I'll throw them out. It's the only part of my life I can control.

Here's the article: Junior Vasquez The Hit Maker, The Deejay's DJ, The Innovator, The Infamous, The Diva... Interview by Chauncé Hayden Undisputedly the most idolized DJ and remixer of his time, house music innovator Junior Vasquez, 59, is the perfect choice to grace the cover of Steppin' Out magazine's two-week year end issue. Vasquez, who also was the co-founder of the legendary Sound Factory dance club was born Donald Mattern in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He first entered a career in fashion illustration and design, but later decided upon life as a DJ while working as a clerk at a New York record store. During that time Vasquez made the acquaintance of notables like producer Shep Pettibone, and slowly began to build a reputation on the strength of his appearances at small clubs and house parties. As the 1980s progressed, Vasquez became one of the hottest figures on the club circuit, honing a trademark fusion of bass-heavy house beats with a seemingly endless supply of obscure samples, innovative remix techniques and quirky signatures (such as his penchant for spinning records backwards, or at the incorrect speed). Vasquez swiftly rose through the DJing ranks, and by 1989 enjoyed such notoriety that he co-founded the Sound Factory in Manhattan's Chelsea district. During the six years of its existence, the Sound Factory was among New York's hottest night spots; catering to an ethnically and sexually diverse crowd, the club launched Vasquez to superstardom. Most notable among the high-profile celebrities to follow Vasquez's unique beat was Madonna, who later tapped Vasquez to remix several of her records; he also wrote and mixed material for the likes of Cyndi Lauper, Whitney Houston and John Mellencamp jus to name a few. As a solo artist, Vasquez was responsible for such club smashes as "X," "Get Your Hands Off My Man" and "Nervaas." In early 1995, the Sound Factory closed in the wake of community complaints and Vasquez soon found himself at the infamous Tunnel, followed by a stint at the Palladium; in 1997 he returned to the former Sound Factory space -- now named Twilo -- to host a new all-night Saturday party, succinctly dubbed "Juniorverse." At around the same time that Twilo saw its last days, Vasquez released the mix CD, "Junior's Nervous Breakdown" in June 2000. Today, the Junior Vasquez legend continues to endure through special events throughout New York's network of mega-clubs in addition to the international spin dates that continue to bring Vasquez's musical magic to dance floors across the globe. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Chaunce Hayden: Can you recall the first time you spun a record? Junior Vasquez: Yeah. How long ago was that? That would be about 21 years ago. Did you believe you'd still be spinning records 21 years later? No. I didn't think that I'd be doing it past a week after first putting a needle on a record. It was just a hobby and it grew into all this. I guess it's because I didn't really want or reach out for "it" that "it" found me. You're a big part of music history. Does that impress you? It's funny, because I don't live in that genre or in that publicity hype kind of thing. I'm just an average Joe. It all happens around me, but I don't really live in the world. Although I think it's great! What's your schedule like these days? I was spinning every week. But I took a little time off at the end of the summer for a couple of months. In March I'll be spinning once or twice a month in the city and then traveling a lot. Which I always hated, but I'm doing it because, who the f-k knows, I might not be able to do it again! During your career you've had every successful pop star lining up to work with you. It's interesting that you don't seek them out. They seem to seek you out. I suppose so. Can you name some of the stars that have requested to work with you? Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey, John Mellencamp, Cindy Lauper, Destiny's Child ... it's a long list. Can you name a recording artist who asked for your help but you refused? Enrique Iglesias. Why? I won't do Latin. I have to understand the language. What do you normally base your decision on as to whether or not you'll work with someone? Usually, there's a history behind the group or the person. Rarely will an unknown come to me. So I'm pretty aware of their material by that point. It's a give-and-take situation. Sometimes I'll reach out to them or their management and say, "I love the new single. Can I remix it?" And they'll say, "Sure! We'd love you to!" Or they'll contact my people and say, "We have a single we'd like you to remix." Like with Britney Spears' "My Prerogative." They contacted us, and because my schedule was free I was able to remix it for them. I've heard that your DJ booth cost 8 million dollars. True or false? No! That's fiction. The renovation at [New York nightclub] Exit cost about 8 million. They also said my booth was on hydraulics. The person who did that interview got all the facts wrong. They tampered with it. The hydraulics were for the lights, and the booth cost about 8 thousand dollars! I always like to correct that because that always makes me look really, really out there! There are thousands of DJs in the world. What separates you from the others? I think it's because of the genre of the music that I play. It goes back so far for me. My roots are in soul and R&B. I play for that audience and I produce remixes for that audience. I'm not big on the hip-hop scene, but when it comes to house or dance music, that's my thing. I think it's for that reason and a little bit because my life is full of drama and I'm a little bit of a cunt. What makes you a cunt? Back in the days of the Sound Factory and Twilo, I would throw people out of the club that I didn't like. I would throw other DJs out of the club. I just didn't want the business to be at my party. It's not about the industry. It's about the people on the dance floor. It's not about checking to see who's playing this or who's playing that. And it's not about what sound system you have, blah blah blah. I would toss those people out. I wanted it to be about the essence of the party and not a critique. But I don't really toss people out of the clubs anymore because I just don't feel I have that much to prove at this point. These days, everyone is welcome. But if somebody does something to tamper with my feelings or something, I'll throw them out. It's the only part of my life I can control. Who's the biggest celebrity you ever threw out of a club? (Long pause) Chrissie Hynde. I didn't throw her out of the club, but I threw her out of my booth. Why? Because she took her top off and got all in front of my turntables. She's a sweetheart, but while she was performing she wouldn't want me to come on stage and take my pants off. When I'm working I don't socialize. I don't talk to my friends. I'm just very focused. How many people do you allow in your booth on any given night? Me, maybe the light man if he's working in the same area, and my manager. Sometimes my boyfriend. But they know my turf rules. They know to come in and grab some water and then go and dance. Over the years, I'm sure you developed a long list of both friends and enemies. Which list is longer? Enemies. I don't have a lot of friends. I have a problem with friendships. At this stage of the game I'm not sure why people cling to me. So I have a lot of trust issues. There's a lot of bad that comes along with this territory. How so? Being on top of the heap. A lot of bad comes with that. I won't say that I'm a mega star, but in my realm I suppose I would be. So it's hard to go about everyday business. So I would say the enemy list is much longer. Give me an example of what is bad about being number one in your business. Okay, I don't like being hovered over. But I like the benefits of being who I am. I'll give you an example. I just got a gym membership to David Barton for my friend and me. I went there the first time to pick up my membership and the guy at the counter asked me how do I spell my last name. That kind of freaked me out a little bit. But the next time I went to the gym the guy behind the counter said, "You're the man!" So there's good and bad. It's sweet and sour. Sounds more like an ego issue than anything else. It goes beyond that. Another example of what is bad about this business is trying to have relationships. That's top of my list. It's the worst thing of being who I am. I usually meet them in the clubs, and I'm a long-term guy. I like relationships. It's just hard for them because I don't see myself as someone who's playing in front of 5,000 people. I'm just a person who's in love with someone. I can't party and I can't be distracted. I have to be with someone who doesn't distract me and whom I can trust. You're tremendously huge in Japan. Why is that? I love it there. If I could master the language I would consider living there. I think to them I'm the epitome of the American DJ. They see Junior Vasquez the same way they see Levi's jeans. It's protocol for them. What country produces the best dancers in the world? Here. I have to give props to the hometown. Obviously, you don't hide the fact that you're gay. Yes. I read that you prefer a gay crowd to a straight crowd. Is that true? That's false. I will not put labels on things. My crowd, ever since I started, was a paradise garage crowd. Meaning it was mixed. It was non-sexual. It's not about going to a club to hook up. It's about hearing the music and partying and meeting your friends and dancing. You really have to be ahead of what is happening to enjoy what I do, because I'm very tomorrow. I'm not yesterday. You have to be musically inclined to listen to me. I'm definitely more about a mixed crowd. I'm not a circuit DJ. So I can't really get those jobs. I did the Gay Pride dance at The Pier [in Manhattan] once and it was an amazing feeling for me. But it's not something that I could do all the time. How do you feel about the bridge and tunnel crowd? That's fine. I got a lot of bridge and tunnel people at Arena. But I lost a lot of that crowd when I went to Twilo because that was supposedly a gay club. But I don't like that. I like everyone in my room. The only thing I don't like is fighting. When new people come to hear me I just want them to leave thinking, "Wow, now I know what you were talking about! This is f-king great!" When you DJed at Manhattan's infamous Tunnel nightclub, you were probably as popular as you've ever been. Personally, I think my time at the Palladium were my glory days. Because I was in control of that club. I designed it. In fact, that club's DJ booth might have actually cost a million dollars! I would say the Tunnel was an angry period for me, to tell you the truth. Why? Because I had lost the original Sound Factory. A club that I had put blood, sweat, and tears into building. I was hurt. I thought the club was closed down forever. But when I found out it was opening down the street I was very, very hurt and upset. But then [former Tunnel owner] Peter Gatien took me under his wing. That time really was a healing process for me. Peter Gatien eventually lost The Tunnel and The Limelight, and was deported back to Canada after a long list of legal problems because of drug dealings in his clubs, as well as tax issues. Did Gatien get a raw deal, and did the U.S. government treat the disgraced club owner unfairly? Of course. I'm battling raw deals every day of my life too. Because when you're on top you're feast for everyone. But Peter treated me very well. He totally left me in charge and believed in everything that I did. He always had my back. It was a great experience. I never had a better experience than I had working with Peter. And believe me, it's progressively gone downhill ever since Peter left, to tell you the truth. I would have catered food every night. There would be a Gucci bag waiting for me at the end of the night. Because you were making Gatien a ton of money. Yeah, but I was paid back for that. Things changed after Peter. Look, in my opinion, Peter was a victim. He was the top honcho and the government was going to bring him down. Because you cannot ignore the fact that there's a lot of rigmarole going on in the clubs. There's a lot of drug selling going on. We can't turn a blind eye to it. We all have to be vigilant against it. But I think Peter was top man, wrong place, wrong time. Let's talk about drug use in the clubs. What's your opinion of ecstasy? It's funny, the gays have surpassed ecstasy. Now it's GHB. That's the problem. I found that the last three years the biggest drug to cause the most problems is GHB. It's closed every club I've worked in. The ecstasy doesn't. The bridge and tunnel crowd does ecstasy. That's more for the straight crowd. The gays are using GHB. One drop too much and you're being dragged out of the club. It just doesn't look good. You can flip out on ecstasy but you can still leave the club on your feet. Have you tried any of the so-called club drugs? I've done ecstasy once in my life and that was in Miami a long time ago. I just did it. But I don't understand the drug. I think it's to each his own. You have to be smart and not abuse them. Party drugs have been around forever. When I first started going out to clubs it was LSD, acid, pot, and angel dust. It's never going to go away forever. I'm also an angry person about bars that close at 5 a.m. Because those are for people who are just alcoholics. They're just people getting drunk and doing cocaine. You have it everywhere. So unless you close every club, you're not going to get rid of it. You have to be concerned about it and not turn a blind eye and say, "It's not going on in my club!" Because it is. The problem is being blamed for it. I've been blamed for it a lot. I've been singled out for it a lot. I have to be very careful and make sure that when I perform at a club that my contract is ironclad so that I don't get sued. I'm hired as a DJ. I'm not using drugs, I'm not selling drugs, and I don't condone it. It's up to the club to figure that stuff out. So what happens? The club increases security and the kids complain about being searched and they stop coming and then I have to move on. It's a rock and a hard place situation. You knew this next question was coming. Let's talk about Madonna. I know. You were very good friends with her, but then the relationship fell apart after you used one of her personal voice mails to you in a club mix. How would you describe your relationship with Madonna today? There is none. How close were the two of you? Very close. How do you feel about that? I don't care. Were you shocked by her reaction? A little bit. I understand why she was upset, but at this point she needs to get over it. If you were trapped in an elevator with Madonna, what would you say to her? I'd say, "Get over it." I would say, "I still love you, but you have to get over it." I think she's brilliant, but I think too many people were talking and it got messy. So I just ended up paying her legal fees. I don't think she was all that mad with me. I think it was coming more from people at her label. So much time has passed and she's moved on, but that hasn't stopped me from remixing her stuff. I'm still vigilant about remixing her music whether she agrees to it or not. Since the Madonna incident, you've used other pop stars' voice messages in your remixes. I have? Didn't you also recently use Whitney Houston's voice message in a club remix? Ohh, the one about "Crack is Whack." I didn't steal anything from that. That one was actually passed around. Actually, just to clear the air on the Madonna call, the original [remix] had her voice message on it. But when I put the record out, I had an impersonator do Madonna's voice. That's what most people don't know. I used a voice over person because I knew that I could get in trouble. So I took her off the mix and used someone else. But it just wasn't enough because the person actually said the name Madonna. So she had a problem with me using her likeness and her name. She didn't like that people were making money off of her. She felt like I stabbed her in the back. It's a shame because we really were friends. Were you so close that you could call Madonna to come over and help you move furniture? Yeah, we had a great relationship. I flew to New York during the Bedtime Stories party and held her hand because she didn't want to do it by herself. It's a little sad. It's a little sad that that went down. In fact, now that I think about it, if I was stuck in an elevator with Madonna I would probably be very nervous. Because I'm upset that we can't be friends. But who knows, maybe one day she'll get a Grammy for something I remixed for her. Who knows? Boy George has gone from '80s pop superstar to club DJ. What's your opinion of Boy George as a DJ? As a DJ ... blaaaaaah! All I can say is as an artist with Culture Club, he was a genius. Phenomenal! His voice, the songwriting, everything! It depresses me to think that he fell back to doing this. To me he was the icon and the epitome of the '80s. His androgynous look was f-king amazing. Now it's just too bad that he's gone on the club circuit, being nothing more than a ravy, transy DJ from England. I just don't get it. What is your opinion of Club Kids? The old ones or new ones? Can you be a new Club Kid? Much like, can you really be a punk rocker after 1981? You're talking about Peter Gatien's Club Kids. The Michael Alig period ended all that because of what happened. But now there's a resurgence of it because of the electronic music now. There's a new batch of what I call "till 5 in the morning" clubs. They're doing electronic '80s music and the punk rock stuff, so it's developing again. There are new Club Kids and drag queens and new craziness going on. I've seen things like this come around four times already. But of course nothing is ever as good as the first time. You mentioned Michael Alig and "what happened." You were referring to Alig's 1996 murder of fellow Club Kid Angel Melendez. The crime was turned into a film called "Party Monster" starring Macaulay Culkin. Did you see it? Of course. What did you think of it? Dreadful. I think it was dreadful because they just focused on one thing that happened. But that's not really what it was all about. I wasn't into the Club Kid world, but I can tell you that they over exaggerated everything! I kind of pushed the Club Kids out of The Tunnel. I just didn't condone the Club Kid thing. My door policy was there's a doorman, a guest list, and you pay to get in. It wasn't about who's at the door, and I'm going to let that one in or that one over there in! It wasn't about them, it was about me. I know that sounds selfish, but the party was about me. So the party had to be whom I let in. Did you know Michael Alig? Not well, but I knew him. Will you ever write a book about your life? I started one, but it got shelved. It would probably be hard to write one now. Why? Because I wouldn't be able to conjure it all up again, and I wouldn't want to share it all. Besides, I really don't remember much. Is there one night that stands out over all the others? The closing of Arena at the Palladium. To be involved with a club that was actually being leveled and to know about it in advance, and have an absolutely wonderful closing night where people took souvenirs was amazing. It was actually documented on film. Is lip-synching wrong? I think it's dreadful. Although I've worked in studios with a lot of artists and once the tape is stripped and you hear the vocals you can see how vulnerable they are and how we have to mix it and make it sound great. So singers panic. That's why you need background singers that have the right octave against your voice so everything is blended. But I don't think it's right to do that. If you're out there performing, then you should sing. What music do you listen to now? Does rap excite you? No. I like a lot of R&B. I hate to say names, but I just worked with Darren Hayes from Savage Garden. I just did his single, "Darkness." That kind of music excites me because there's remixes in all that stuff. It's very hard to do that to hip-hop because of the tempo of the music. I get excited by anything that has soul. Is music lacking soul today? Yeah. Too commercial? I don't know if it's too commercial, it's just what sells. Did former Mayor Giuliani destroy New York's nightlife? No! People did it. It's a hard thing to figure out. Let's face it, there have been a lot of bad guys in the clubs who have gotten away with murder, and that's bad too. Mayor Giuliani was just doing his job with the task force business. I mean, you've got to pull the strings somewhere because these kids can't be dying! You've got to control them somehow. And that's up to the club owners and the city politicians, but it's got to be fair. It usually never seemed fair. What about the ban on smoking in clubs, bars, and restaurants? That's a load of crap. I'm smoking right now. (Writer's note: Junior Vasquez lights up a cigarette in the center of the Roxy dance floor.) It's stupid. I do everything in the [DJ] booth, including piss in the trashcan. It's just so stupid. Name one artist you want to work with right now. Probably Gwen Stefani. What will you do when you've finally spun your last mix? Who knows what I'll f-king do when I'm done with this. What will it take for you to give it up? Just being tired of it. My manager will kill me for saying this, but I go through major periods, especially the last couple of years, where I'm just getting tired of it. What keeps me going is knowing that people are still coming out to hear me. If only two people showed up, I would say, "Okay, it's time to give this up." But when I throw a party and 4,000 people show up, I have to keep doing it. To tell you the truth, I don't know how to get out of it. Finally, how would you like to be remembered long after the lights are turned on and the music is turned off? Certainly not in an open casket! I don't want to be remembered lying in a casket! (Long pause) Probably for being genuine and being true to what I do, and that it's not a job for me. It's my love and my passion. It's not about the dollar bill. I have a manager for that. What's the last song of the night? "I'm Every Woman." Whitney Houston's version. If they can't get Whitney to sing it live, then get Diana Ross to sing "The Boss." Your remixed version? Of course.

I just picked a magazine up at Pub 46, what a great interview! http://www.steppinoutmagazine.com/ Enjoy!!!

Just picked up a copy of Steppin' Out Magazine and Chaunce of the Howards Stern Show did a great interview with Junior Vasquez, here is the link: http://www.steppinoutmagazine.com/

Those were great times, you just don't see shit like that on this board anymore, what a shame.....

I love the photo icon!!!!!!

http://www.bigfatbaby.com/newfun2/flash/boobies.cfm

There is one in Morristown, NJ 4 floors!!!

You need to stop wearing open toed shoes in the summer and the winter when YOUR TOES ARE HANGING OVER THE FRONT!!!!! :eek:

Gee, I hope his house was clean since the Feds were rating it. On a scale of 1 to 10 did you find out what they rated it? The people want to know, so when you find out, please share the information....Thanks!

ANGER MANAGMENT MISTER, IT WORKS FOR OTHERS, MAYBE IT WOULD HELP YOU!!! Now run along back to your pathetic life.

Whatever, asshole. Last you checked he was working for you, okay!!!!!!!!! You need to take some anger management classes. Try 1-800-CALM-DOWN. Maybe you should try that first before you try to get another job in a bar.

Do you think I give a shit if you think I have a shred of decency? Last I checked, Mark Anthony wasn't in the club business anymore, he has recently come back on the scene. So maybe people should check their references before posting peoples numbers, don't you think......asshole?