THE RACKET : LIST 26 - It Feels Dance-y

I feel like I'm always trying to make a dance mixtape. 

Nora and I will be driving and I'll just play her song after song after song and ask, "Would you dance to this?" Or, "Is this a dance song?" And, more often than not, my beautiful Bonnie-Raitt-loving-late-era-Van-Morrison-obsessed fiance will say, "No." Or, "Maybe," but with a grimace on her face that shows what kind of club she thinks the song might play in.

And I think that's why the dance party in my head doesn't always translate into the mixes: the club I imagine myself at isn't a dance club. It might not even be a club. It's a like a dingy room with a wooden stage and a disco ball way way up in the rafters that reflects the idea of a stage lighting someone probably forgot to turn on. There's a bar, but it's scuffed and the guy behind it only knows how make two drinks - beers and shots. It's the kind of place that feels mean when you walk in, but gives way pretty quickly into worn-in comfort. You might say it's a dive bar, but you aren't surprised when a band or a singer or even a DJ drags their shit on stage. And you really aren't surprised when they hit the button to go and what streams out of the speakers isn't just good, it's good. 

You can feel it in your hips and in your feet and maybe in your shoulders if you're a better dancer than I am, but this isn't the type of place you dance at. It's the type of place you nurse a shot and nod your head and feel comfortable doing just that. 

That's the kind of place I see myself dancing at. So yeah, this mixtape, in my head it feels dance-y. Whatever that might mean.

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