"What a disaster! If I ever sound to you as though I'm considering hearing DJ Ewa again, please remind me that I've been deafened twice by her. My right ear still hurts. I'm so cross with myself that I stayed in the room for 90 minutes. If this DJ has not already been deafened - and she must be - she surely will be soon."
The milonga was billed to start at 2000. We arrived around 2020, being among the first there, with our choice of tables. I like to arrive early to feel how things develop. Again, I was surprised how unenthusiastic people seemed to be to come out. Despite the delayed start the DJ still did not start the set, clearly waiting for more people, which I felt was disrespectful to those already there past the billed start time.
When it finally came towards 2030 the opening track was a poor choice: Que lo sepa el mundo entero which I know but rarely hear, consider a weak choice in Rodriguez and a disaster as an opener to any tanda, never mind the main night of a festivalito. Embarrassing then - but no surprise - that of the six or seven couples in the room no one danced it. The DJ watched attentively, looking curious. The remaining tracks of the tanda were great and well matched. I danced from the second one and by the last one everyone was up.
I felt the bass reverberate faintly in my body like a warning and groaned inwardly. The DJ desk was behind the speakers, and to the side. In the first or second tanda the DJ checked the sound twice by coming to stand next to, but (oh, wisely) not in front of the two speakers, which were on the floor at one end. This is why the DJ should dance: one or two tracks now and then - including the cortina - to tell, sound-wise what conditions are really like on the floor. I realised she must be wondering if the sound was too loud and decided (so I could stay) to confirm that to her: "If you were wondering if it's too loud, it is". She nodded and nothing happened for a few minutes, then I thought it came down very slightly but stayed too loud. Perhaps she didn’t hear me. I should have left then but lots of people were arriving including women I wanted to dance with.
Twice when I danced as the girl I was standing right in front of the speakers during the cortina and that's when my ear got damaged. I will never stay for music that loud again. I know she was aware of how uncomfortable it was because she kept fiddling with the sound, especially when in one cortina I begged my partner to move us on from there and she grinned, looking uncomfortable.
The music itself was much better than the drama this DJ played at the EITF. The tracks this time were mostly good for me.
The set still felt unbalanced being very much on the "strong" side. There was Demare e.g. Mañana zarpa un barca but that I think was the softest it got. Next closest would probably have been the Caló: e.g. Pa' Que Seguir and A Las Siete En El Cafe which is not really what I mean by soft anyway.
I told my last partner I was leaving early. “I think I’m done too”, she said meaning I think dancing but she was with her friends. I said it was too loud for me and too chaotic in the ronda. "I feel the same" she said, "and yet" - with a half-shrug - "here I am". I knew what she meant. I said it is difficult when you have travelled far for a milonga and things are not optimal.
But increasingly, because I am ultimately never happy in milongas that have things wrong with them - a bad floor, poor sound or are too cold I feel one needs a Plan B - friends to leave with and do something else, or even just the pleasure of silence and a good book. At some such places you can outride a difficult atmosphere by watching quietly but it is hard and more a test of will than a good night out. At others like El Quinto where for me the floor wasn’t ideal, the temperature was freezing, the dancing poor and the music had been artificially slowed to undanceable, I stayed for the chat and to see what happened because often, even if you do not dance interesting things happen. But while having travelled I might stay there, they are not places I generally want to return to.
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