Think Pink Radio

*Photo By Christa Holka

Mel Racho teaches digital design at Depaul University and is member of the Chances Dances crew. She’s no stranger to TPR’s screen, she talked to me about the Critical Fierceness Grant this year and her extra cute tweets can be found at twitter.com/melissaida

SHE WOLF = HEAVY CROSS – I know I’m ignoring GAGA, oh snap, etc. But as your friend and occasional DJ, 2009’s end is nigh and, as of this very moment, there are only two songs that can be yelled at me on repeat occasions that I will gladly drop at a dance party without privately tuning out and blank dancing.

QUEER CHICAGO – Is it just me or did like 15 new queer nights pop up overnight? In terms of organized dilettantism, Chicago has kind of strapped it on this year and there are a lot of people into it. I love this town.

THE TRIUMPHANT RETURN OF KELIS – Look I had year. Yeah whatever, KELIS had a year. That cookbook? Want it. Want to cook from it while I shake my ass to “Accapella.” Seriously, it is a song that sounds like it is busting out of an underwater discotheque and I want to be there.

TWITTER NOW RULES THE ENTIRE WORLD – If you were a particularly alert nerd, you got on Twitter when it was beta in 2006 and are now really, really bored when you see the @ symbol next to anything. But this is 2009, Twitter is a threat to/legitimizes information sourcing. And, now, being connected means being bored.

LA ROUX’S DEBUT – I write this with a sigh, as recall the night I drunk-googled LA ROUX LESBIAN to zero affirmative results. Still, “In for the Kill” and “Bulletproof” make me shape a soapy shower faux hawk and secret sing-yell when my roommates are not home.

THE NEW SUPER MARIO BROS FOR Wii – Depending how deep in it you were – like you totally FREAKED OUT when you and your brother got the original NES back in the old country where it was called the Family Computer and you played only two games religiously, Mario (my pick) and Altered Beast (his pick) – this isn’t really top ten material. But I picked Mario.

GUCCI MANE – Oh man. Gucci! Brrrr. I hear that distinctive growl/bark in a song’s intro/breakdown and I am there. No one says OK on the radio like Gucci, I mean it. “I Think I love Her” was my secret anthem this summer. And I wasn’t Esther Dean.

LOGAN SQUARE – I am into Logan Square. Even its quirks: moms, labs and babies. El Cid. That Midwest Trajan Column. The occasional gunplay. I’ll take it all, now including: The Dill Pickle Co-Op, New Wave Coffee, The Whistler, The Rocking Horse. For better or worse, it got real crowded in the LS – a HUGE year.

TIGER WOODS IS A HORNBALL – I’m an Internet nerd. It might be even time to collude the two words: I’m an Internerd. TMZ.com. Jezebel.com. When I really want to scratch it, Perez Hilton. So, I internerded all over this stupidly juicy and twisted story. It’s the undoing of one of this country’s most peripherally spit-shine golden boy jocks. Now they’re making a porn called “Tiger’s Wood.” It’s so good right now.

NEON GOLD RECORDS – Everyone’s got their blogroll. This one is on mine. Basically, these guys have been around just over a year and throughout that year’s course they boutique released 7” Passion Pit, Marina & the Diamonds, Penguin Prison and Wolf Gang. I could keep going and sound like I’m plying faves from that stack but really what I’m saying is this has been a solid year for a solid start-up.