Pajiba

For the background, some Vince Garaldi CD's would be nice. And you can never go wrong with James Brown.

Or, if you want to get into new territory, you could always hire a novelty rap metal band to cover Rage Against the Machine. Best...wedding...ever.

I would make a suggestion here, but i put all the songs i like on a mixtape to my girlfriend. Those are her songs now dammit!!

But I do think "Hit 'Em Up" by 2-Pac could make things fun.

It's 'At Last' that's untrue, right TK?

For our reception, we instructed the DJs to stick to standards for the cocktail hour - lots of Sinatra and Tony Bennett (we were going for a lounge-y feel). It was perfect background music while folks nibbled on hors d'oeuvres and fought over the bourbon tasting table. Incidentally, I don't recommend a bourbon tasting table if your dad's a notoriously mean drunk.

For the post-dinner portion of the reception, we had lots of 70s and 80s classics, and people loved it. Yeah, it was cheesy as hell, but the dance floor was full all night and everyone had a blast. You can't go wrong with Footloose, Disco Inferno, old Rob Base and yes, we had the Electric Slide. I don't care what anyone says, that shit gets people moving.

Anything from The Traveling Wilburys seems to go down well with all generations I have found.

RebeccaD:

Do you perhaps mean "senior citizens"? As a middle-aged person (40s), I assure you no-one of my age group likes The Commodores.

Hmmm. Never plan to marry, so I'll approach this hypothetical-like:

In My Life- The Beatles
Hell, come to think of it, almost anything by them would do.

La Vie En Rose- (I personally prefer) Louis Armstrong, though Edith Piaf would be lovely too.

Those would make good slow-dance/mushy songs. For dancin', ermmmm...Elvis or Motown would be good for all ages. In addition to bands/artists like the ones Dustin listed, I think early, big-band jazz could be fun/pleasant-noise-pollution for everyone, but that might be just me. :-)

Or, when all else fails, go to a karaoke bar. Their song menus are pretty similar to wedding fare. Have some drinks, go through the book, and make two lists: what you like and what will bring the Murdertank to the DJ's home. Submit both lists to your DJ, with clearly printed headings.

Good luck, feramones, and have fun! :-)

At my wedding, we had a DJ, and provided him with a list of songs. Our reception line music (when guests arrive at the reception to greet us) was supposed to be Bob Marley Legend. My wedding party and I were standing in the line when Kenny G starts playing. I left the line, marched up to the DJ and told him he had better play what was on the list or he would need to leave without payment. Why do they do that??? Frank Sinatra, Al Green, Elvis Costello...all very good.

I'm a romantic sap, so I vote for Here and Now by Luther Vandross.

If you wanna go real old school R&B, try You're My Latest, My Greatest Inspiration by Teddy Pendergrass.

Congrats on your impending nuptuals, Feramones.

I have nothing to add, just wanted to say that my brother and his wife had their first dance to David Bowie's As the World Falls Down from Labrynth. It was wicked awesome, and now I can never get married because there's no way I will ever find a song as rad for MY first dance.

Thanks a heap, Justin. Dickhole.

Hrmmm...

Lady Donut and I went the iPod route. It worked rather well. The only problem was that we had our room reserved until midnight and didn't expect the dancing portion of the evening to start until 10:00 pm. So, we only had a couple of hours of music on the playlist.

The dancing portion of the evening started after 10 pm, the dinner ran late and there were some technical difficulties (the speakers got unplugged), but the guys tending our bar were having such a good time that they kept serving and we didn't end up shutting the whole thing down until around 3:30 am. We ended up playing the same songs over and over and over... Not that anyone minded at that point.

I guess the moral of the story would be, it's better to have too many songs on the play list than too few.

Listen, feramones - and this is going to sound horrible...

Unless your guests are cool as cucumbers, bite the bullet, hire a fucking DJ and let them do their routine, predictable thing... If you've got a large family/number of guests of all ages, guarangoddamteed they're gonna be requesting "Save a Horse, Ride A Cowboy", "Beautiful Tonight", "Chicken Dance", "YMCA", "Macarena", "Mony Mony", "Love Shack", "We Are Family", and every goddam predictable wedding song you've ever heard in your life... That's just the way it is. You could dick around with your iPod forever, have a list of great songs all set up, and the thing is - no one will dance to them unless they're familiar wedding dance fodder.

I Swear to Christ this is true.

Pick out 5-10 songs you really want played, your father/daughter dance, your first as a married couple, and let the brain-dead DJ do their thing. Play whatever the hell you want during dinner/drinks though... And listen to TK regarding the whole "Silent DJ" thing - too many think they're either comedians or the world's greatest entertainers.

It's also not a bad idea to have either a top ten DO NOT PLAY LIST, or speak to the DJ prior to the event, letting him/her know that no requests are to be made - otherwise you get some goddam cousin out there shaking their uncoordinated ass to some Lady Gaga bullshit...

I fucking hate wedding DJs. Period. With the blinding hate of a thousand suns...

I'll agree with a few others that keeping the beginning light with some Sinatra and other standards worked very well for Mrs. Fletch and I. The older crowd really enjoyed it and they were able to get a few dances in before my slightly inebriated friends took over the floor.

As for the rest, as long as you keep it a good mix and don't stay on one particular genre for too many songs in a row, you should be fine.

Highlights for us were when the DJ started playing Jungle Boogie, Brick House, Superstitious, stuff like that. Seemed to have people of all ages on the floor together.

Oh and multiple weddings have taught me that EVERYONE will get up for Livin on a Prayer. And I hate Bon Jovi.

Last wedding I went to, the DJ played "Electric Kingdom" and I lost my shit. It was grand.

(No I didn't dance, I was just really, really excited)

PaddyDog:

Nope, in my experience, The Commodores (Too Hot Ta Trot, Brick House) are crowd pleasers with people my age (32) and older.

What the hell is the "dollar dance"?

The dollar dance is when guests pay one dollar for the honor of dancing with the bride and/or groom. Some people make out like bandits by doing this. I felt icky about having a dollar dance so we didn't, but in retrospect I suppose there are ickier things to do for money.

Jackson 5, Al Green and definitely Modern English's "Melt with you" or Nouvelle Vague's cover for a slow song.

...in retrospect I suppose there are ickier things to do for money.

Have you ever been to a PA wedding, Pinky McLadybits? Some sell shots at the wedding, sometimes by themselves, sometimes coupled with the dollar dance - you pay your dollar, take a shot, then dance with the bride or groom. At my cousin's wedding, you had your choice of jello shots or whiskey.

You think you've got it
Oh, you think you've got it
But got it just don't get it
When there's nothing at all-aaah-aallll--ahhh--alllll...

Congratulations feramones! I would highly recommend you go to iTunes and check-out songs from Vitamin String Quartet. They basically cover popular songs but in a string quartet style. Very nice and very tasteful; but hilarious if/when some guests pick-up the tunes being played!

Cindy, that sounds exactly like what I want to go for. Putting together that playlist is gonna be insane. Doy you have any specific albums or such that you can recommend?

As long as it isn't The Dan Band version of "Total Eclipse of the Heart". Depending on your Grandma, that might end her.
I fuckin' need you more than evah..

Oh my goodness, we had SO much Traveling Wilburys at our wedding, Paddydog. My husband and I are both huge fans, and it turns out my dad is, too.

My wedding had a lot of people in their early 30s, and a lot of people in their early 60s. Three Dog Night was a big hit, as were the Beatles and the various super-popular classic rock/80s songs, since everyone knew them and they're danceable. Motown was very popular, too, b/c my friends all like it, and all my parents' friends grew up with it. We had Sinatra and some nice BB King for the slow songs (our first dance was Come Rain or Come Shine). Also, swing music was popular among both age groups.

Have you considered classical music for the background? We had a bunch of Mozart (and actually Bartok, b/c that's how I roll, but I will admit that it was a purely selfish decision), and the Mozart went over well. Some of the older people were sad when we played Sinatra during the meal, since they wanted to dance to it.

Seven weeks? Exciting! Congrats, feramones!

A cautionary tale:

We made up a playlist on a laptop for our wedding. Unfortunately, it was accessible to the guests, and a couple of well-meaning people who wanted to hear a particular song would just walk right up and click on it--apparently oblivious to the fact that it was messing up our "shuffle" and causing songs to be played multiple times....for the love of pete, make sure nobody else has access to the iPod!

As for what to play, I'll second PaddyDog's Traveling Wilburys suggestion. The Mamas and The Papas' "Dream A Little Dream Of Me" is a nice one....

Figgy, you have to dance to De pies a cabeza by Mana for your wedding! And Pavo Real by José Luis Rodriguez. And anything by Rafaella Carra.

It's cool being Latin 'cause your playlist is always bilingual.

Or you could have a team of midgets with Super-Soakers fulla booze riding around in assless chaps on great danes. By the time you bring out The Fetchin' Miss Gretchen & Don Juan Donkey, your guests will be far too hammered to care about what music's being played...

If there are any Wedding DJs reading this, Psst! Guess what? I hate you...

The husband and I just got married 7 weeks ago :D

Our intro song was Rammstein's Du Hast but the stupid wedding dj messed up and couldn't play it at the beginning of the reception (we were pissed) but ended up being able to play it later as we all head banged our way around the dance floor...

our first dance was to ELO's strange magic... the father/daughter dance was Zeppelin's all of my love... we used spinal tap's gimme some money to announce the money dance... for my bouquet toss I played the ramones blitzkrieg bop...

we had a 80's/90's/00's heavy play list with some classic rock thrown in for good measure and some fun little inside jokes as well (we danced to Chuck Berry's you never can tell and have a bunch of great pics of us doing our best pulp fiction poses for example)

Congrats and my advice is to pick songs that you'll like and that will make the evening memorable for you :)

Ok. I have two sisters and a brother, all of whom are married (suckers). Both of my sisters did the church wedding/catered reception/DJ thing. My brother got married on the beach and had a barbeque and a cd player on the beach's gazebo-thing. I cannot for the life of me remember what music my brother and his wife played, but I'm certain it was mostly Spanish flavored (his wife and her large family are Puerto Rican), and there were no line-dances. It was delightfully dance-y.

My sister K did the restaurant reception. The DJ was someone they knew from where they work, or something along those lines. They did the dollar dance, they did the Electric Slide, they did the chicken dance. They did alot of the Billy Joel/Elton John school of oldies, and the Motown-y stuff. It was nice, every person got up and danced for at least one song. Their first dance was "At Last". Her husband and his family are Filipino, and I don't recall there being any traditional Filipino music, though there was a little bit of salsa mixed in here and there.

My sister E did the hotel reception. I'm not sure if their DJ was a friend of theirs, or if it was a guy someone else in the family had used at some point. They used none of the normal wedding dances, IIRC. Not one. Their first dance, after they came out to the floor and looked all serious, was to "Accidentally In Love", and they bounced all over the dance floor. They did the Bon Jovi, the Journey, the No Doubt, a lot of fun, younger stuff, mixed with A LOT of salsa (her husband and his family are Cuban). Everybody danced at that one too. However, I believe that it was largely because E and her husband had, seriously, one of the most relaxed, jubilant, happy weddings I've ever been to (or in). It was the least stressed I've ever been as a bridesmaid, and I have quite a few hideous dresses I'll never wear again hanging in my closet. (It could also have been that my Cuban in-laws are INSANE dancers. Seriously, they're like near-pro.)

Now that this is the ongest comment of my life, I'll sum up: So, it really kind of depends. If everybody is upbeat, everybody's gonna dance. (I do think the dollar dance is kind of tacky though.)

Wife and I had "I Wanna Be Your Dog" by The Stooges for our first dance. The DJs came over to our house about 2 weeks beforehand and we went over what we did and did not want played at the reception. We made one concession the entire night due to an a**hole uncle of mine going out and downloading "Fishin in the Dark" onto his iPhone and asking to have that played. I figured if he wanted to spend the money to do that, we could oblige.

We hired a DJ for our own wedding many moons ago, and he was asked not to play the chicken dance. He did. Everybody danced.

A close family member hired a DJ who was asked not to play the hokey pokey. He did. Everybody danced.

I was asked to semi-DJ (collect and arrange all the mp3s and set up the stereo system) my brother's wedding. I was asked not to play the locomotion. I did. Everybody danced.

We all have those ridiculous cliched songs that we absolutely hate and think we are doing our guests a favor by banning them from the playlist. But the fact is, all that shit gives people a chance to be cheesy and tell the old "oh man, I was at a wedding on the weekend and did the hokey pokey with some dude's aunt Edna" story.

Moral of the story: Play all the cheesy cliched theme-dance music so people can get up and make asses of themselves and pretend they're only doing it to be ironic and cool, even though they're genuinely having a good time.

Just make sure and do it AFTER everyone is sufficiently liquored up and the ties have been loosened. Makes it that much more fun.

And as implied in my last comment, it's too late to pick wedding songs for myself now. But I do look forward to the Mr. and I dancing to 'Is That All There Is?' at some milestone anniversary party someday. You're not jaded enough at the wedding to get away with playing it for that though.

I agonized over music for my wedding. My Mom is from a big city, my Dad a small fishing village and my husbands family are all edumacated, high-society type folk (all kinds of alphabet soup after the names in that family). I code named the whole event "Operation: First Contact" Finally, I got tired of trying to please the masses and the soon-to-be hubby and I made Play/Do Not Play lists. Mostly they got ignored, but the first song of the evening was AC/DC's Hells Bells, I got to watch my Dad get on the dance floor and dance and sing to Shania Twain's Man, I Feel Like a Woman (I am scarred) and I witnessed my 72 year old great Aunt sing the "alternate" lyrics to Billy Idol's Moni Moni. Oh yeah, we're all class. Anyhoo,the point is the DJ played a little from every genre and everyone had a good time. Don't fret it! Congratulations!

Bill Withers-Use Me

My friends feel it's their appointed duty
They keep trying to tell me all you want to do is use me
But my answer yeah to all that use me stuff
Is I wanna spread the news that if it feels this good getting used
Oh you just keep on using me until you use me up
Until you use me up

figgy if you mean the 50s stuff, I can look for my wedding stuff and see if I can find the list. (Some examples: Only You, Peggy Sue, Why Do Fools Fall In Love, The Twist, I Only Have Eyes For You etc.)We went through a lot of our Dads' music to find songs we knew and loved. Let me know.

Big Band and Swing, I'd have to research. I'm sure there are plenty of "best of" compilations out there to look through.

The husband and I played "It's The End of the World" by REM at our reception. It was awesome and really funny if you knew both of us well. I had a long standing bet with my best friend that hell would freeze over before I got married. Look how that turned out.

I recommend "What A Wonderful World" by Louis Armstrong. It's a beautiful song.

Congratulations feramones!

First, you should read neurotica's post over and over again. And then some more. Share it with your fiance. It is absolutely true.

I've been there. I remember agonizing for weeks over music. In the end, with the exception of a near-ban on country music, we picked out the first couple of songs, let the DJ do his thing otherwise, and let the guests make requests. It was a fabulous time, guests stayed til 2:00am and they still tell us all the time that it was the funnest wedding they'd ever been to.

A final note - Bon Jovi will indeed pack the dance floor. There is no reason this should be so, but it is.

"The Book of Love"- The Magnetic Fields
"God Only Knows"- The Beach Boys
"First Day of My Life"- Bright Eyes
"Sea of Love"- Cat Power
"Flowers in the Window"- Travis
"Brand New Colony"- The Postal Service
"In the Aeroplane Over the Sea"- Neutral Milk Hotel
"Earth Angel"- Death Cab for Cutie (from the Stubb's the Zombie soundtrack)
"Part One"- Band of Horses
"Baby I'm Yours"- Arctic Monkeys

Some of these are a little different, but hopefully something most people can tolerate. They will all definitely be played at my wedding. They're mostly kind of slow, so I guess they would have to be background music.

Also, I've always sworn I would play "I Believe in a Thing Called Love" by The Darkness at my wedding. I don't mind alienating people.

Clee - As the World Falls Down was our last dance at the wedding - I wanted it to be our first, but hubby wouldn't move on that one, so our first was Thank You by Zepplin. Aside from that, all we told the DJ was no country whatsoever. Otherwise, we let him do his thing - there were 200 people at our wedding, there was no way in hell our taste in music was gonna be generally pleasing, and I wanted people to dance. The DJ wasn't too douchy at all, we lucked out. The song that we walked down the aisle to (the one where you go away, after your married) was the "Throne Room" from A New Hope. If you're even a little bit nerdy, I highly recommend this - they clapped politely when it was announced we were man and wife, but the positively ROARED when they heard the music. Our friend who does a damn swell Chewbacca was supposed to roar at the end, but he was a groomsman in another wedding that day and didn't get to our wedding till reception time.

(Stay turned for the obligatory "Dad trying to line up a gig for his daughter the violinist" commercial):

String quartet for dinner. Pay well.

Thank you. Now:

Joe Cocker's "You Are So Beautiful" for the bride, won't be a dry eye in the place (then maybe "I Shaved My Legs for This?").

"Sharp-Dressed Man" for the groom.

IIRC, people demanded that my aunt sing "Crazy" at my cousin's wedding.

Finally, "Rodeo Song" for when you want the old people to leave (about 6:30 -- better have someone guard the pile of presents).

Lyle Lovett is good and reliably safe. Go with "Lyle Lovett And His Large Band" for a good mix.

If you only play one big band/swing tune, make it "In The Mood" by Glenn Miller. Everybody knows it, even if they can't name it.

As for wedding party entry music, I was a bridesmaid for my husband's brother recently and he and his now-husband kept the entire party in the dark about our music. We all ended up dancing into the reception hall with tears streaming down our faces from the laughter that erupted as we heard "It's Raining Men" come pouring from the speakers. Fun times.

I vote for Barry White, figgy. I'll look through my stuff tomorrow, (gotta find the box) and get back to you.

Husband and I love monster ballads so our first dance was to the acoustic version of firehouse's "love of a lifetime"...rock on!

I made a very detailed CD full of meaningful songs and gave it to then-fiance's buddy who was a DJ and was DJing our wedding as a wedding present. It took me forever to get it just right.

Asshole played reggae all night instead. Only points he got was for playing some funk/soul/James Brown that we could dance to while the band was setting up. Long story.

Anyways, two of my songs that never got played that I think would be great wedding songs:

Dire Straits - Romeo and Juliet
White Stripes - We Are Gonna Be Friends

And TryScience - Jump, Jive and Wail is a Louis Prima song, the Brian Setzer version is a cover.

And and, we had a very informal wedding so there was no bridal march bit - to let people know we were heading towards the ceremony bit, the officiant turned on The Elvis Theme (CC Rider?). We had one friend whose only job was to find us that song.

As someone mentioned above, you really do have to play "The Hokey Pokey" and "Macarena" and "The Chicken Dance," but didn't mention a very good reason: If there are gonna be kids at the wedding, for 10 minutes it's going to keep them from running around and knocking shit over and getting into the booze and generally driving parents nuts.

If you don't play Let's Stay Together by Al Green, we'll then you and your betrothed are doomed.

30 Helens agree.

When my sister got married she and her husband also went the ipod route. A lot of the songs they played to dance to were sort of their favorite songs, not particularly "dance songs." It was a small wedding and all of the family was dancing along, even though they didn't necessarily know the music. The only song that really got all the friends and co-workers to come join the dance floor was, I kid you not, "ABC" by The Jackson Five. If you really want people of all ages dancing, I highly recommend 70s pop songs.

Haven't read all the comments yet, but I'm getting married in 13 weeks, and we won't have a dj. Luckily, my fiance's entire family is a band, so they are going to play for us as a gift. However, these are a few things I want to be played:

2 of my friends will be singing, "Come What May" from "Moulin Rouge." Hey, bite me, it's MY DAY and I love that song!!!

The end of "Layla" (got to be a "Goodfellas" thing)

"Tiny Dancer" just because I want the "Almost Famous" moment

"I Will Follow You into the Dark"

"God Bless the Broken Road"

Any other ideas?

Best way to end a wedding reception? Have the entire room circle the bride and groom whilst singing "Hey Jude", then have everyone close in on them for a group hug. While still singing, mind you.

Ms. Janet, funny story actually, at my friend's recent wedding we did the Chicken Dance and the wedding song was "God Bless the Broken Road". (Hey, I enjoyed doing the chicken dance. I'm still a kid at heart.)

Ive never been to a wedding but having Jeffster play would be pretty great.

CD's weren't invented yet when we got married (cough cough). We had a live band.

We walked down the aisle to "Pachabel's Canon in D."

We slow danced to "Annie's Song."

We had a blast dancing to "Shout!" A little bit louder now!

"Mint Car" by the Cure for a happy first dance.

I forgot to add a personal favorite song for a wedding: David Grey - "The One I Love".

I also love "This Year's Love" by him as well.

May I be really cheesy here? I mean, we are all good friends, right? Since my fiance's family literally is a band, how absolutely cool would it be if they pulled off the wedding scene from "Love Actually"? I would melt right there on the grass.

Wedding music is a matter of personal choice, so I won't suggest anything to play at your reception. However, my personal favorite fuck song (or hell, the whole album for that matter) to play that night when you seal the deal would be "World In My Eyes" on the "Violator" album from Depeche Mode. No electric slide, macarena, chicken dance hokey bullshit...just good 'ol fuck music for your wedding night.

I know this'll annoy some of the single people on the thread, but I must admit to liking that little tradition where the D.J. calls the married couples on the floor for a song in order of how long they've been married.

figgy, I'm still on the hunt and I haven't forgotten you. I haven't found a list yet either. But I did find one CD that we had with some decent songs on it.

Sea of Love, There Goes My Baby, All I Have To Do Is Dream.

I'm going to keep looking!

Consider following God Only Knows with this one:

This Must Be The Place - Talking Heads