Ask us all you want about party-perfect drinks but, when it comes to setting the scene with the right music, we go to the experts.
Okay, pressure’s on. You’re at a cocktail party, a friend’s birthday dinner, you’re hosting a family barbecue, and someone hands you the aux cord and says, “Hey buddy, can you queue up some music for us?”. Your mind races – the music you choose has to be right. It’s got to be unexpected but still approachable. It’s got to fit the vibes but also create the vibes, right?
Setting the score can really lift an occasion, but it can be hard to know where to start. In these cases, we’re happy to lean on the expert advice of someone who knows more than most about what makes a great tune – someone like Derrick Gee. Derrick is a longtime radio DJ (formerly of NTS Radio, SiriusXM and Spiritland), podcaster, music journalist, content creator, interviewer and – in our words, not his – someone with great taste in music. So knowledgeable and passionate is Derrick that, when people put on a record in his company, they sometimes get intimidated.
“I think people often feel nervous around me when they put on music, which is unfortunate,” Derrick says. “I think a lot of people feel like their music choice has to be good otherwise I’ll feel like it’s really lame.” It’s really quite the opposite, though – Derrick is like an intrepid sonic explorer, cruising the world listening to everything he can get his hands on to better understand music and the listening experience as a whole. And he’s built up a whopping 508K Instagram and 306K TikTok followers as a result. So, just a heads-up – if you’re mates with Derrick, he’s not judging you or secretly wishing he could change the record. After all, he can share all the music he wants on his socials, his Patreon radio show, or his Spotify – and we highly suggest you check those out.
It was late high school – year 11 or 12 – when Derrick started his music journey in earnest, picking music classes at school, playing in bands, aspiring to be a producer like Pharrell and soaking up music history. “I had a bass teacher that introduced me to Motown, which I think heavily influenced my taste,” Derrick says. “He was teaching me about James Jamerson, the bass player from a jazz background who played on most of the hits, and it kind of set me off on a course of like, wow, there's this story behind the song and that story is quite elaborate. That kind of woke my brain up to learning more than the surface level.”
Since then, Derrick has built his own following and style (dig that silky smooth radio voice), starting with a radio show in his apartment and building into stints at NTS radio in the UK (2016-2020), Sirius XM in the US (2019-2022) and, these days, the Derrick Gee Speaks Volumes podcast and Patreon-exclusive radio show. With Speaks Volumes, the idea is to muse on music – a defence of Drake, a beginner’s guide to hifi audio gear, an interview with a music photographer – with everything wrapped up in Derrick’s egoless opinions. For the 2024 season, expect a few tweaks.
“This season is all interviews speaking to people that have a unique contribution to music – different artists and producers that I think have a particular impact or significance in music history,” he says. “My angle is not being an interviewer in the music radio sense – like, tell me about your latest album – but I want to speak to people that have maybe been overlooked that have made a huge impact that people might not realise.”
The last episode of 2023 saw Derrick delve into his own best-of list, picking out artists that made an impression in the last year. Here’s where you might want to start taking notes. “Laura Groves was my number-one pick,” says Derrick. “Radio Red is just a really beautiful, introverted pop record. It's so tiny and it's so pretty and it's so imaginative and there's the coolness of where she recorded it in her apartment in London.” Also coming into Derrick’s round-up (called ‘Der-Recs’) is regional New South Wales-based folk artist Babitha, art pop singer-songwriter Mitski, and rapper/producer Slauson Malone.
He’s got the knowledge, he’s got the passion – so what does Derrick do when curating a party playlist? To start , it can help to think about the time of day. “I think sunlight has a lot to do with it, it kind of evokes the feeling,” Derrick says. “If you go by vibe, like it's sunny and 26 degrees outside right now and I think that's more attuned to Todd Rundgren or the brighter, lighter side of things. Night time, it depends what's going on, but there’s an Egyptian genre called Al Jeel, which is really fun. It's like pop, atmospheric, dancey music from the ’80s.”
It can also be helpful to curate by occasion. Say you’re hosting a dinner party, for instance – a nice bottle of shiraz and a side of roast beef with a few close friends. Maybe start things on the softer side. “I do think a good amount of jazz goes well with eating,” Derrick says. “There's this record that Miles Davis did that’s for a soundtrack of a French film [Elevator to the Gallows]... I think that sort of sensitive stuff is nice. And R&B is always good, but I don't think music for dining and entertainment should be like bangers while you're having your mains.”
Let’s say, though, that you’re hosting a cocktail party or something a little livelier than a sit-down dinner party. You’re not dancing, necessarily, but you might want to feel a groove that matches your Martini. “I think that kind of lo-fi house-type stuff is always fun,” Derrick says. “It's got a bit of drive but it's not completely dance-dance music. And neo-soul is nice – a bit of Erykah never goes astray. Both Erykahs actually, Erykah Badu and Erika de Casier, they're both tasteful and subtle and not in your face.”
Beyond the specifics, Derrick suggests not overthinking things. Find some artists, albums, genres that you like, and queue them up – but no need to turn it into a DJ set. “I'd throw everything into maybe quiet, medium and loud [playlists] and then not think about it and just go on shuffle,” he says. “But I think one shouldn't be afraid of an album – an album’s there to do an album’s work. I would never be curating it song-by-song, that's DJing.”
Ultimately – and this goes back to Derrick’s regret that friends might feel intimidated playing music around him – it’s important to let your own preferences do the talking. Sure, take the advice, but don’t forget that it’s only advice and not a case of right and wrong. “I think if you have people over at your house and you have particular tastes, you should inject a bit of your personality into it, right? Otherwise you may as well just put on Spotify radio, which is easy and fine, but boring.”
