[Note: This column appeared in Eleven issue 2.3, releasing some time around November 2007.]

Your music scene immersion is almost complete. For all intents and purposes, you’re good to go out there and drop some platinum bombs. But where’s the fun in that? Heck, even Britney figured this one out: The real point of getting famous isn’t having tons of adoring fans, it’s having the ability to do whatever the hell you want, while said tons of adoring fans follow every minute of it. That’s how you party like a rock star.

 

Not surprisingly, your partying tendencies might be reasonably hard to break. We college students are, after all, awfully good at partying like college students. My best advice to you is to just get out there and practice, practice, practice. Because with practice comes perfection…and a really terrible GPA.

 

 

So you want to be a Rockstar?

Sure you do. But sitting and procrastinating your astrophysics homework isn’t going to do it. Nor will listening to that unsavory song by Shop Boyz. Party like a Rockstar Party like a Rockstar Party like a Rockstar Party like a Rockstar Party like a Rockstar Party like a Rockstar Party like a Rockstar Party like a Rockstar. Totally, dude.

 

First things first: You’re going to need a posse. The most important elements are as follows:

 

• Mountain Man: He’s freaking big, and his main job is intimidation. He’s there to steer the riff raff away, for bargaining leverage, and I guess for grabbing the Christmas presents that mom hides on the top shelf in the closet. Based on a few movies I’ve seen, every mob boss ever has had one. And you’re at least as much of a big shot as a mob boss. Pick a Mountain Man up off of the Offensive Line on the football team, it’s not like they’re doing much good there anyway. Bonus points and a hospital visit for trying to do it literally.

• Ethnic Man: It’s good to be culture-conscious. And like Mountain Man, there’s always at least one. Not really sure why. Maybe you’ll need a translator for something.

• Bluetooth Man: He’s probably a little short, a little nerdy. Maybe he’s your accountant. Maybe he’s your lawyer and can provide on-the-spot legal counsel, or your publicist to spin the news. Maybe I’m just pretending that guys like me have still got a shot at joining Diddy’s crew.

• That one friend from grade school: Because you can. Preferably the one who was really good at partying and always had great stories for the next morning. Like the time he went out partying, woke up in a dorm he didn’t recognize, decided he needed to use the bathroom, then realized what he thought was the bathroom was actually the corner of this girl’s bedroom. He was cool.

 

You might not be able to find all the right pieces floating around the Wash U campus, so I’d suggest firing up the ol’ internet. People sell all kinds of services on Craigslist.

 

Next thing you might want to consider is a trademark. Lil’ Jon has his chalice. Soulja Boy has his shades (and Superman). Flava Flav had his weird clock thing. What can you bring to the table? I’d really love to see someone with a set of grills with spinners on them, and grills on those. But that’s a little less visible than you’d like. Maybe dust off a Nintendo Power Glove and throw some D’s on that. Or start wearing a viking helmet everywhere. That’d be both epic and hazardous.

 

Once you’ve got your posse and your gimmick, you should more recognizable walking down the street than the Ghostbusters. Want to make a big splash at any given party? Have your Bluetooth man call ahead. Let the frats know you’re coming. Have someone waiting at the door to let you in. Make them announce your presence when you get down to the basement. When you want a drink, don’t get it yourself, let Ethnic Man get it for you. In fact, don’t even order a drink that they’re serving to everyone else. Make something up if you like. They damn well better be able to make it, or my name isn’t Missy Elliot.

 

Getting the full court service doesn’t just apply to parties – use it elsewhere too. I’m sure someone at Bear’s Den has a phone number. Call ahead and let them know that you want a Buffalo Chicken Caesar, no tomatoes, and it should be ready when you arrive, and you’d like the entire back section of the seating area fenced off for you and your crew. It’s important for some reason to block off way more space than you could possibly need, like getting seven booths to comfortably seat the five of you. If they don’t listen, cut the line and take the food and have Mountain Man clear out the back area anyway. That’s why he’s there, and you’re a bigger man now than the rest of the peons on the South 40.

 

Last, but oh most definitely not least, is your photo log. Not only do you need to rock out at parties, but you need to make sure everyone on the internet knows about it. These days, any two bit hack can go to Wal-Mart, pick up a camera, and start acing courses in the Art School. No, really. That place is entirely made up of the slum of the college universe that couldn’t even cut it in the B-school, and now they think they’re hot shit because they’ve got work in an art gallery to which their parents paid $5 entrance ticket after a several-hundred-dollar flight from Krindyland, Florida. You could get straight A’s in there just by showing up once every four classes, and being coherent enough to pick your head up to pretend to take notes but really play minesweeper whenever the instructor starts monologuing.

 

Anyway. Celebrities have their pictures plastered all over the internet. Thanks to Facebook and Myspace, college kids do too. What’s the difference? Real celebrities have paparazzi follow them around everywhere. As much as I love seeing Lindsay Lohan being barely capable of standing up straight at a night club, I apparently also need to know what she’s wearing while she’s hungover at the mall, and what kinds of foods she’s bought at the supermarket. That’s important!! So, it’s time for you to save one of those Art School kids from their pittance of an existence, and hire them full time as your personal paparazzi (and no, the hired paparazzi guy doesn’t count as part of your posse, for those of you questioning the structural integrity of my article. Go read a textbook if you want structure, leave me alone). Get pictures of yourself walking to class, talking on the phone, eating a sandwich, getting in the shower, taking a nap, trying to screen press a t-shirt, playing Halo 3 at 3:30 in the morning instead of studying Finance, trying to discretely breast-feed a baby at a Starbucks, grabbing a bite at Mallinckrodt, checking stuff out at Vintage Vinyl, everywhere. Then make sure that, once your photos are up, they’re tagged with witty and controversial stories like “OH MY GOD LOOK SHE GOES SHOPPING AND DOES HUMAN THINGS BUT SHE THINKS SHE’S BETTER THAN US BECAUSE SHE IS.” Bonus points if your private parts are hanging out, are visible through your clothing, have been poorly photoshopped to appear to be visible through your clothing, or just if they exist. Negative bonus points if you’re a lolcat. Man, that fad ended quickly.

 

 

Throwing Down

 

You’re not always enjoying the free drinks and don’t-clean-up-after-yourself policy at other people’s parties. Time to throw rockstar parties of your own. The first thing you’ll need to do is make it exclusive. The general townsfolk are not welcome here. Have Mountain Man at the door, give him a clipboard, and let him borrow Bluetooth Man’s headset. He’s now your bouncer. He doesn’t actually need a checklist or anything, just give him a few Connect-The-Dots puzzles to make it look like he’s actively monitoring the guest list. What’s the point? Now, everyone who shows up thinks they were only allowed in on a personal favor of yours. Also, you can have Mountain Man screen for a potential “That Guy who can’t control his voice or limbs and ends up accidentally shattering a shot glass all over the floor of your kitchen,” or “That Girl who immediately after showing up needs to go home and ends up throwing up in the car on the ride back.” Nobody likes a That Guy.

 

The second step in preparation is to set up private VIP rooms. These are all the jazz at clubs. I think the way it works is “Okay, we’ll trade you some walls to drown out the ridiculous levels of noise and sweaty people for a 9000% increase in the price of a drink.” Among other things. I’d say just set one up for yourself to lounge in luxury. The image in my mind has lots and lots of velvet, and a reclining chair made out of waterbed. Invite party-goers to come in and visit and see how grandesque you are. At your leisure, make up more cool words to describe yourself

 

On that note, it’s a good idea to have one or two really ridiculous, useless, and expensive items floating around somewhere. Like a self-watering palm tree. Or a microwave the size of a standard refrigerator. Or electric scissors. Lead your patrons to the conclusion that you’ve got such little common sense that you must be the trendiest person this side of sliced bread. See, you don’t even know what that means but you know I’m right.

 

Another thing to consider is actually throwing a guest-listed famous-persons-only party. Real celebs do this all the time. Start your invite list off with the following:

• The President of SU

• Chancellor Wrighton

• The kid who created the Graffiti Facebook application

• Terrance the Tacqueria guy

• Me

• Dan Beckman

• Professor Mauer

• Chuck Berry

• So Taguchi

• The mystery guy who graffiti’d “Insert Tuition Here” on the Millbrook construction site

• That old guy with the beard who’s on the computers in the library at all kinds of strange hours

Well…maybe pass on that last one.

 

Last thing to consider is your pong table. Stop what you’re doing right now, go get your table, and throw it off a balcony onto some unsuspecting children. Pong is without a doubt the single worst thing to happen to the party scene since Mosh Girl, or since Cascada’s “Every Time We Touch.” It’s completely unsocial, completely filthy dirty unhealthy, completely obnoxious to clean up, and completely taking up space that could be better used for dancing, or for a pile of discarded White Castle container things. How hasn’t this occurred to anyone else? Effective immediately, going out to play pong no longer qualifies as “going out.” It’s closer to going out to play Atari. With better graphics.

 

 

 

The Morning After

 

You’re probably hungover. Hopefully you remember some of the fun you had last night. But you’ve probably got tons of work to do that was put off because “man, I’ve got all weekend to worry about that.”

No time now to clean up. Wade through the scores of crushed cans and snack items tot he bathroom, and stare into the mirror for a minute just to make sure you’ve still got a face. If you like, you can quickly measure your night’s success by calculating a) how many groupies are in your bed, b) how many bros are passed out in your bathroom or common room, c) how many glass items and general paraphernalia are broken or otherwise maligned, d) how many times you remember watching the movie District B13 over the course of the night, and e) how many inexplicable bruises and contusions you discover on your body. I’d say anything 11 and over puts you into bonafide party stardom status. Hey, we gave the magazine its name for a reason.

As far as hangover cures go, there’s no set rulebook. If you ask me, the best thing you can do is pick a food and spend a day convincing yourself that eating it is a fail-proof way to clear your head in the morning. Sooner or later, it’ll start to work. At least, that’s what they taught me in Psychology class, I think. For inspiration, my meal of choice is the Patrick Ewing Breakfast Burrito, available wherever breakfast burritos are sold on campus.

Get out there and rock it.