But Hey, Dj, Wait A Sec!

DJ Riz and Sizzahandz. Photo by KT Auleta

Face it, pal, your girl's not dancing. She might bounce around to the occasional Lil' Jon track or something, but she's not losing herself to the music in the moment. That's because females only dance to party records. And we're not talking about "O.P.P." here. Party records are those DJ tools with one popular beat and a couple of vocal snippets like "Put your motherfucking hands in the air!" repeated ad infinitum. You'll know it's a successful party record when the whole crowd is going apeshit.

As one half of Crooklyn Clan, DJ Riz has produced more memorable party records than anybody else. To him, the secret is timing. "You need to pick a hot beat, one of the top five records at the moment. People will be so familiar with the beat that there's no way they're not going to dance. Then you need to pick the chants. They keep the crowd's attention and build up energy." Often, however, a party record will outlast its components. "I still can't get over how, like six years later, one of our records will be played at the peak of a party." According to Riz, party records find their origin in mid-80s megamixes such as Double Dee & Steinski's "The Lesson" series on Tommy Boy. Nowadays, every doofus with a sampler can loop up DMX and think he made a party record. "People even sample the shit we did," Riz says. "Every Tom, Dick, and Harry's putting out a breakbeat. I understand you need more energy in your party, but when you sample a sample record, it gets a little crazy." Don't fake the funk. You don't want to get caught out there spinning the wrong joint at the wrong time. Here are the 10 most classic party records ever. Play these to make the fellas do the smurf, the wop, the baseball bat, and have the single ladies make noise. 10. "Let's Get Ill"
Crooklyn Clan
(AV8, 2001)
A fairly straightforward party record that uses Redman's "Get your ass up and let's get ill" vocal loop over Dre's "Next Episode" beat. When Nate Dogg breaks down into the "Hold up, heeeey," you know everybody's singing along. This breakbeat's tremendous influence can be traced down to P. Diddy's inaugural dance track, in which he yelled nothing other than "Let's get ill!"
RIZ SAYS: "If you listen to this record long enough, you'll hear that we actually go into the ‘B Please' beat. But people always stick to the first couple of minutes, so we stopped making longer party records altogether." 9. "Get Up"
Masters At Work
(Cutting, 1993)
You know that before they started doing fruity tropical house, Kenny Dope and Louie Vega were walking around with one pants leg up, and this little joint is perfect for the occasional hip hop two-step. Flipping lyrics from Gwen McRae's "Funky Sensation" over the Lafayette Afro Rock Band drum break (made famous by "Nobody Beats The Biz"), this one goes, "Get up! Clap your hands and, come on come on and!" for two full minutes. The slower tempo makes it a great soirée starter.
RIZ SAYS: "‘Get Up' is an anthem. It's on an R&B tip, but with a hip-hop twist. I'll usually play this for an older, more mature crowd. People who know where the sample is from. The kids, they don't understand that shit." 8. "Let Me Clear My Throat"
DJ Kool
(Universal, 1996)
This is Mark the 45 King's "900 Number" breakbeat with some dude yelling all over it (DJ Kool, who was last seen spinning "Wanksta" in an opening slot for Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth). It goes a little something like this: "Let me clear my throat! Aah! Aah! Aah! Aah!" This is a terrific party record when you're dealing with a young crowd. The kids love that saxophone.
RIZ SAYS: "This marks the separation from party records to an almost regular record, because you have a guy rhyming on it. DJ Kool was the first one to really make that transition." 7. "Thug Anthem 2000"
Rite Bros
(Rite Bros, 2000)
The constant repetition of DMX's "All my niggas get down like what!" over Mobb Deep's "Quiet Storm" beat is enough to hypnotize an entire club audience. Just for the sake of variety, the Rite Bros stick in Puffy saying, "That's that shit right there" once or twice, but then it gets right back to "All my niggas get down like what!"
RIZ SAYS: "Rite Bros is me and Sizzahandz under an alias. We banged this one out in just a few hours. You can play this anywhere in the set. It's a real simple marching record, with not a lot of mixing and matching. But with party records, the simple ones are always the biggest ones." 6. "The Franklinz"
Crooklyn Clan
(AV8, 1997)
This is the one with the "All About The Benjamins" beat and Busta Rhymes saying, "All my real live niggas put your hands up!" over and over again. Then it goes into Greg Nice's "Come on everybody let's all get down," then back to Busta. Since the "Benjamins" beat has somewhat of a harder feel, you want to make sure you play this in the middle of your set, right before you get to the uptempo joints and things start to really get out of control.
RIZ SAYS: "We had gotten an advance of the ‘Benjamins' record and made this right away. ‘The Franklinz' was the crown for us, the party record that really made our name. After that, everybody started looping stuff like "throw your hands up," like on that Jay-Z track. I feel we had something to do with that." 5. "Zulu War Chant"
Afrika Bambaataa presents Time Zone
(Profile, 1993)
Arguably Bambaataa's second-best creation ("Planet Rock," hello?), this party record starts with the same Betty Wright guitar sample as Mary J's "Real Love," backed by the proverbial Lafayette drums. The vocals are Slick Rick's "As we go a little something like this," Busta Rhymes' famous "Heel up, reel up, bring it back come rewind" (from "Scenario"), and of course the enigmatic "Zulu! Gestapo!" call-and-response, which everybody thought was "Zulu! With style I flow!" or "Can't stop our flow!"
RIZ SAYS: "Bambaataa does a lot of rave stuff now." 4. "Party Groove"
Showbiz & AG
(Payday, 1992)
Productionwise, this has to be the most impressive party record ever. This was big beat before that stuff was even invented, and it's hard to believe the Bronx's most thugged-out producer set his career off with this jazzy gem. It is a universal truth: Chuck D's "Hear the drummer get wicked" sample will make any goon get his Fred Astaire on.
RIZ SAYS: "This is just ridiculous. To me it's some real uptown B-boy shit. It reminds me of The Tunnel, Homebase, and all these classic clubs where Flex and I were playing the shit out of this record in, like, '92 and '93." 3. "Ladyz"
Crooklyn Clan
(AV8, 1997)
Go to any Haitian party in Montreal, throw this record on, and it's a fucking wrap. People used to play this on the radio like it was a real song. To this day, "Ladyz" gets all the females hype. Riz got a little more creative here, chopping up Foxy Brown's "Take Me Home" into a dancehall groove. The Supercat sample is a nice touch as well, especially when all the white guys sing along.
RIZ SAYS: "This was the flipside of ‘The Franklinz.' Here in New York, everybody played the A-side, but as soon as I went out of town, I couldn't believe the reaction. To this day, in cities like London, people lose it to that record." 2. "Puerto Rico"
Frankie Cutlass
(Hoody, 1994)
Who knows where Frankie Cutlass is now? This Latin legend deserves infinite props for working with freestyle acts like TKA back in the day—and of course for crafting this Puerto Rican Day Parade anthem-turned-international classic. The ingredients are simple: a booming bassline, the same Lafayette drums, and a vocal snippet going "A-Puerto Rico, ho!" Note that Frankie also produced a full album: the superb and slept-on Politics and Bullshit (Relativity, 1997), which featured some of the most original MC pairings ever.
RIZ SAYS: "‘Puerto Rico' is universal, everybody knows that. This record has a real ghetto sound. The vocal sample is from the old Busy Bee and Cold Crush battles. When this comes on, wherever you are, people are always going to yell ‘Ho!' or ‘No!'" 1. "Be Faithful"
Crooklyn Clan feat. Fat Man Scoop
(AV8, 2003)
Here it is, the ultimate, quintessential, all-time-greatest party record ever. Take Faith Evans' instrumental for "Love Like This" and add Fat Man Scoop yelling stuff like, "If you got a 20 dollar bill put your hands up" at the top of his lungs, and you got yourself a dancefest. Notice that it's all in the details here: little snippets like Black Sheep's "Engine, engine, number nine" and The Beatnuts' "You better watch your step" are what really drive the crowd into a frenzy.
Says Riz: "Fatman Scoop got an album deal overseas off of this record. We must've sold over 50,000 copies on vinyl only, and over 800,000 legit units once all the samples got cleared. This record is just constant energy. I always get DJs coming up to me like, ‘This is just too hype. After I throw on that record, I can't play anything else, I'm lost.'"