DJ Gloria Vanderbilt Embraces Nostalgia On and Off the Dance Floor

Whether it's for playing out at a club or listening at home, DJs and producers typically have an encyclopedic hoard of music, new and old. In The Last Record, they tell us about the last three songs or albums they've purchased, and why these were important additions to their music collection.

This week, we spoke to Meghan Brozanic, aka DJ Gloria Vanderbilt, who prefers to stick to vinyl. Brozanic next spins for the Pleasure Principle at the Whistler. Here, Brozanic largely selects throwback tunes to, "maybe rediscover things I missed," she said.

The last thing I bought was the Cocteau Twins' Heaven or Las Vegas. I bought that on vinyl because it's a really good winter record. It's one of those ones right now where, with everything going on in the country, I find it really comforting. It's happy and sad at the same time, which is the mark of a great record, personally. I've been playing that toward the end of my set, like around bar close, just to sort of mellow things out. I'm really big on listening to certain things in certain seasons. I don't know if that's weird or not. I never want to listen to stuff like this when I'm really happy and I don't know why.

Another record I recently bought was this Carly Simon song from the 80s called "Why." I saw it on Discogs for $5.99 and thought, "OK, I'm gonna do it." It's a little scratched but I just thought I had to have this. And again, there's just something about that song right now that fits the times. It's kind of sad, but it has a good groove. I just really, really like it. And obviously, Nile Rodgers is a genius. I like that it's something you'll hear and not know that Carly Simon made it. It doesn't sound like anything else she's done.

The last digital thing I bought was the 1975 song "Somebody Else," because that's my favorite song last year and I've really enjoyed Matty Healy's cosplay into Michael Hutchins of INXS. It's one of the most exciting things for me because I want people in the rock world to be rock stars and have and embrace that. He's the only one I think who's doing that. I just think that song–I know it's like a theme here–is a happy and sad song at the same time. There's this groove to it. I haven't heard a song like that in a while.

Thinking about it, they all kind of have a similar vibe to them. I appreciate all the DJs that are looking for the next big thing, but for my night, maybe because I want to play vinyl usually, I like to embrace nostalgia and play stuff that people haven't heard in a while or maybe they wrote off. You know, they're over it for a few years and then they think, "You know what? This song is pretty great." Even the most mainstream stuff has value in that too, in terms of DJing, and not just playing super rare stuff.