Last week’s E.G. Daily track reminded me of bar trivia with my buddies, so I thought I’d expand that into an intro. For a good three years, Wednesday was the day to show off my geek-tastic knowledge of ‘80s music. From ’03 to ’06, my buddies and I went to Steppy’s Bar & Grill in East Norriton, Pa., a bar with a bowling alley attached to it; we went for “Sports & Music Trivia With DJ George.” From nine until about one in the morning every Wednesday night, we’d drink and answer sports questions. There were four quarters, each consisting of six questions. George would read a question, then play a Billboard Hot 100 song from any decade, and you had to answer the question before the song ended as well as give the name of the artist and the year it charted.

Things started off easy. The questions were semi-softballs and the music was like Guns n’ Roses or the Beatles. But as the game moved along, everything grew more difficult. Everyone in my group was in their 20s or 30s, so we had a rough time with the music from the ‘60s, but we made up for it with my knowledge of the ‘80s. There would be two ‘80s songs in the final quarter — a really hard one, and the final song of the night, which would be the “impossible” song George chose specifically to try to stump me each week.

The final question of the night was always ridiculous — the “name every …” question, e.g. “Name every Philadelphia 76ers head coach in order from oldest to most recent.” And the song was something that no one ever got but me. George loved playing those late-‘80s freestyle tunes or one of those Cugini-type songs; Pajama Party and Nocera tracks were also big on his list. Every now and then he would stump me, and of course that would piss me off. But most of the time I was the only person in the bar to know the final song. If that makes me an ‘80s nerd, so be it — but quite a few times it got us some decent prizes, and in some small way it probably led me to writing Bottom Feeders.

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