This post features photos by: Dakota Fine, Mike Danko, Alyssa Lesser, Garai Rice, Bradley Portnoy, Ben Droz, Lexie Moreland, Chris Chen, Liz Shen, Chris Svetlik, Nicole Agguire, Sergey Guryakov, Katie Edson and I am sure I am probably forgetting someone. Our photo core is better than your photo core.
Can you believe we've been all spending time together (half-naked at that) for 14 weeks now? I mean, things must be getting serious. It has been a terrific, amazing, sporadically really scary summer and Summer camp is rolling up to a close, this weekend with our very special, END OF THE SUMMER DANCE (feat. Chris Burns and an all star space disco lineup from NYC). COME! COME! COME!
In the meantime, here is what happened since June (click on links to see full photo sets):
Beautiful Swimmers DJs and we all got to know each other. In the flesh
We had 7 local bands come and do early 90s song covers. This resulted in a day of Smashing Pumpkins, Tribe, Joy Division, Oasis, Nirvana and more. We also played our one and only game of twister, which got extra competitive.
Yeah, we're not quite sure what we meant by it (Cale just really loves "Tom goes to the Mayor") but it gave us a chance to have our smoke machine out and carry around sherlock holmes pipes. Lil'El, Mixblooded, Nacey and Steve Starks provided the jammy jams.
This is kind of where we hit our stride. I mean, you really cannot go wrong with the theme: moon bounces, space limbo, astronaut ice cream, the goods. Ed Dudes, Deep Sang, Nitekrawler and DJ Meistro were at the space command DJ booth.
It was 4th of July so we figured, the time for fat camp is now or never. FATBACK DJs did a mindnumbingly good job at keeping all 960 people that were there entertained, we had a stilt walking Uncle Sam, a pinata, a pretty gross ice cream cake eating contest, a dirty balloon toy maker and some other stuff. This was the party I was most worried about, it being a holiday and all, but it was probably the most fun I've had on 4th of July ever. Oh, and we had a rocket. It was "epic".
Continuing the streak of "best themes ever", on week 7, we partnered up with Mixtape and Karl Jones for "Jesus Camp" but gay. Here is what happened:
- -the very wrong nativity scene
-a very special campfire singalong
-the born again exorcism tube into the (baptismal) pool
-the crucifix dance party
-the jesus led conga line
-the “balloon alternative” balloon toss
-the Jesus in drag and Adam and Eve appearance
-our poor interns made to suffer as the Holy trinity
-the Jesus Saxophone solo by the pool
-the bedazzling of the crucifixes crafts
-more nuns than we even expected
and, of course…
-that dude in the Borat banana hammock (I swear we don’t know him, he just showed up, and God bless him for that)
This is where we just, frankly, had no clue what to do anymore. I mean, how do you follow up the Space/Fat/Jesus camp trifecta? Apparently with: fake blood, red food eating contests (which almost resulted in actual bloodshed), bear costumes, fortunetellers, spooky limbo etc. We had Ivy, Jahsonic and Philippe and Patrick from Fatback do appropriately eclectic DJ duty.
This was hands down the biggest party of all. I was completely and utterly worried about it (I am not even going to pretend that I wasn't) but the BUZZ Djs did a killer job, people were REALLY into reliving their ealry 90s youth, EVERYONE (and by that I mean the 1039 people that came) was SO HAPPY, and for the first time ever, there was a real dance party.
THEN we toook a little 1 week break the first weekend of August and came back with a vengeance for:
Which was probably my guilty pleasure favorite of the series. Andre Herndon stopped by with his machines (Fritz and Kathryn of Ipod Jukebox did their thing early on, rounding out the DIY theme of the day), everone got TRASHED (in a good way), and the following happened:
- -The collective rain dance to Toto’s Africa
- -Ezra’s yacht rock WHILE wearing a captain’s shirt
- -Both “Say my name” AND “Killing me softly” sang PERFECTLY (seriously-PERFECTLY)
- -The MTV Spring Break vibe “No Diggity” Brought on
- -Those 2 dudes singing a completely unexpectedly perfect “Wake me up before you go go”
- -”I want your sex” and “Faith” both with on-the-spot-choreographies
- -the “Toxic” Scream-Along with Dakota on falsetto back vocals
- -The all girl, all swimsuit rendition of “Baby got back”
- -The smoking jacket, air humping ode to Electric Six’s “Gay Bar”
- -The interns/dakota combo butchering “Stacy’s Mom” for Libby after last week’s Tinted Windows escapade
- -Tito singing “She’s a lady” in poolside drag
- -The final close-down to “Total Eclipse of The Heart”
then
which featured customized kazoos or around-the-pool kazoo-alongs with Rick, America's premiere kazoo entertainer.DJ Neville Chamberlain and Mark Zimin DJed.
then we had rain on what was meant to be Indian Summer/OMG IT IS SO HOT CAMP whihc leads us to this week's
WEEK 12: BOOT CAMP
Which, in collaboaration with Sneaker suite, featured Tabi Bonney doing his thing on a life guard chair, the manliest of all limbos we've ever had, and a super ALL STAR DJ line up of Tittsworth, Matt Nordstrom and Stereofaith. Plus, gummi toy soldiers and some swearing over the megaphone.
Mike Danko took photos:
As you can see-its been REAL
See you all THIS SATURDAY when we make it a goodbye to remember:
Previously in BYT Summer Camp Photos:
- 9/7: PHOTOS: Back to School Summer Camp @ Capitol Skyline
- 9/7: BYT Sells Out Camp
- 8/31: PHOTOS: 90210 Camp
- 8/24: FRENCH RIVIERA Camp
- 8/10: Photos: BYT Cold War Camp
- 8/3: PHOTOS: BYT Summer Camp: Karaoke Camp Part Deux
- 7/7: BYT Cowboy Camp
- 6/1: PHOTOS: BYT Summer CAMP CAMP @ Capitol Skyline
- 5/11: PHOTOS: BYT Summer Camp: THE OCHO
God loves a cheerful giver.
PUUUURRRPPLLEEE PAAANTTS !!!!!
Svetlana, it's 'corps.'