Michael Garrett

I met Michael back in the mid 90's when I was running a DJ remix service called "Ace". Michael bought some of our stock for his shop The Record rack. He really lovely and down to earth. I know many people who knew him over the years that also loved him... as a person and as a DJ.
"keep on dancing" Michael

didn't Michael also play at the Eagle some time? And did he make a record called "You'll Get Over It"?

that guy was so mean when i would go into his record store. not very helpful. ah well. everyone has to go sometime. i'm sure he's missed by his friends, but not very nice.

Michael dear Mickey.
Thank you for loving Robby. You two are together again.
Sister KAy

This is DJ Daniel Wang, now 36 years old, born in San Francisco, California, but i moved to New York many years ago, and now live in Berlin Germany. (maybe berlin is the new san francisco..)

After so many years im still chasing disco dreams... but Michael Garrett was a special chapter, although a very brief one...

when i was 21 years old, barely out of university, i met a handsome man in a Castro bar one night. He invited me to go back to his house and listen to some music with him. I had to walk up steep hills to reach his house, but when we were inside, it was like heaven. Red lights, maybe there was a small mirror ball, and the most amazing, flowing non stop disco music in his room...

i had only been to i-Beam twice in high school (mid 1980s), and not for the sunday gay tea-dances. i didnt know yet what an appetite id develop for mustaches and 70s string arrangements. michael was nothing but warm, generous, and sharing that night. i felt i had no secrets with him. time stood still, listening to his mixes. it felt like heaven...

many years later, after i moved to downtown manhattan, i returned occasionally to visit my grandmother in oakland. i went back to record rack and discovered that michael garrett was the owner. he vaguely remembered me and let me look thru the entire collection of records. i left that store after 8 hours without hardly a drink of water or a trip to the loo. but i left with a huge pile of casablanca, italo, and other disco treasures which i still cherish and play around the world today. there were more LPs and 12"s in the 2 garages next to the shop near the castro, and i only discovered yesterday (it is now 29 may, 2005) that one of my good friends and record enthusiasts, joel martin, who lives in UK, had been there briefly before i and had spent 2 weeks searching thru the piles as i had. what a funny coincidence, we thought! a shop far far away from europe, in a former disco capital, we found a mecca of our musical obsession, joel and i not knowing we would become friends in london years later...

i logged on this morning to find out what happened to michael garrett. a strange surprise, but perhaps not so surprising. it makes me so, so sad to know that he is gone, because he was one of many gay men who taught me what it means to be what i am. to be what we are. where pleasure and art and dancing and love and life are all the same thing. im just one of many boys who fell in love with this amazing DJ one night, and i know he must be in heaven still smiling and dancing now.

i hope he knows that the feeling he gave me and the records he sold me from his store (like the library of alexandria!) live on every time in the parties we keep doing... in germany, in Europe and Japan, around the world...

Daniel Wang

Just to let all of Michael's fans how much
he appreciated it when one of you would
come up to him and say how much one
of his sets had meant to you on some
occaision and how you would always
remember it. He always said that the
thing that made him most happy was
seeing a big group of gay boys dancing
and having fun. We both appreciated
the floral displays that regularly
showed up at the front door. Michael
kept all the vases and would make a
point of saying that we had the biggest and gay-est vase collection in the whole world.

Finally, every card or letter which he received, and there were hundreds
upon hundreds, he would file away
in a special drawer underneath his
Oyster bed; each one according
to the month and year. He would
often take some out and reread
them.


Many thanks to all of you for the
joy that your rememberances brought
Michael.

On Michael's behalf,

His longtime partner and friend
Robert Kimler

+

This is Joan Jett-Blakk on Steve Fabus' computer again.
I just wanted to say how much I will miss Michael.
Disco Heaven must be getting really crowded by now.

was universally loved by San Francisco's gay community. He also played at the Trocadero, the special holiday Gift Center and Galleria disco parties, and the Music Hall.

San FranMichael Garrett was born in 1952 near Austin, Texas and came to San Francisco in 1976.

Michael Garrett was the resident DJ at the I-Beam Disco on Haight and Shrader from its opening in 1978 to its closing in 1992. He played what he called "Modern Rock" music for the Sunday Night Tea Dance every Sunday Night. From 1978 to 1992 the Sunday Night Tea Dance at the I-Beam was the most popular place for the gays of San Francisco to go out dancing and Michael Garrettwas universally loved by San Francisco's gay community.

San Francisco's gay community was greatly saddened by his untimely passing in December 2004 and his beautiful musical spirit soaring towards infinity will be sorely missed by all.