MANILA, Philippines - A proverb goes, all work and no play makes Juan a dull boy. A guy who toils and carries a weighty family name bears this adage in mind.
This is Muntinlupa Rep. Rozzano Rufino “Ruffy” Biazon, son of Sen. Rodolfo Biazon. He is the spin doctor of the Congress — not in a political sense but in a musical note.
Ruffy is not a classic sober politico. He loosens up through DJ (disc jock) mixing. He goes loco over the beats of Lady Gaga. “Lady Gaga’s music is very good for dancing. The melodies are catchy and the rhythm makes the body move to the beat naturally,” he says.
His DJ mixing is not a top secret though. Several times he’s asked to play music at parties.
“I spin at parties and being a politician, it is an added attraction to the audience,” he shares.
He hastily adds, “It’s my form of relaxation therapy. It’s a way of entertaining people. I get a natural high playing music which spurs people to go to the dance floor and dance to the tunes I’m playing.”
Music, he says, is the elixir of life. It controls our mood, it makes us groove.
Recounting how he got into DJ mixing, he shares, “My father tolerated the loud music I played but he didn’t support it by not buying me equipment.”
In his pre-teen, he was exposed to disco music of his elder brother and sisters. Ruffy got fascinated at how one song seamlessly transitioned in another song. “When I was in high school, mobile discos were the ‘in’ thing. I knew some people who were involved in the business. They let me try out their equipment and eventually, I learned how to do it. It was all self-taught. I was spinning at least three times a week.”
The songs of his youth was ‘80s New Wave music. His top favorites are New Order, The Smiths, Depeche Mode and Spandau Ballet.
But this doesn’t make him old-fashioned. He is hip, trendy, and well acquainted with earlier rap music of Snoop Doggy Dog, Ice T, LL Cool J, Tupac Shakur, Notorious B.I.G to the newer artists like Kanye West, Lil Wayne and Souljah Boy, among others.
“The music genres I listen to range from classical to pop. The only genre I don’t listen to is heavy metal,” he says.
What’s cooler is his vast CD compilation of tracks he mixed. “My collection fills up three cabinets, not counting the music I download from the Internet. I have digitized the music I use for mixing and my hard drive has almost 15,000 songs,” he discloses.
Ruffy doesn’t keep them all to himself nor shelter them to collect dust. “I posted some of my mixes in Facebook and in the Internet. To my surprise, they’ve been passed on to so many people. I suddenly get messages from people I don’t know from all over the world asking for more,” he says. Ruffy also gives CDs to friends and relatives as gifts.
“First, trust your instincts,” shares Ruffy of his tips on music mixing. “Knowing how to count beats is an important skill as well as knowing measures of music. Knowing the structure of songs is also important, that is, knowing where the break of a song is. The break is where transitions are usually done. You also have to update yourself with the latest trends in music as well as the popular songs. Knowing what to play at the right time is the key in making the crowd happy.”
Being a music lover that he is, Ruffy nevertheless reveals that he is no dancer and a singer. “Let’s just say I love music but I’m only a DJ. I’ll play the songs, not sing them. It’s my dad who loves singing. You wouldn’t want to see me dancing,” he laughs.
For him, life will be incomplete without a sound track. Finally, not discounting the politico in him, he describes Philippine politics using song titles: “Crazy For You by Madonna and The Politics of Dancing by Re-Flex band.”