Every time I hear Charlie Daniels' "Legend of Wooley Swamp", memories of a special gig on the Louisiana bayou come rushing back like the last sip of a potent New Orleans rum punch.

A local trade organization for which I did a number of picnics, called me for their usual summer shindig. Only this year it was to be held at a national park built around a honest-to-goodness bayou. Yup, the kind with snapping alligators and big-as-your-head bullfrogs who are nowhere near as articulate as the TV ones who say "Bud-wei-ser" OK, maybe it wasn't rustic as all that -- at least they had one of those small prefab metal buildings where the kitchen was housed. And I do mean small. With barely enough room for my speakers, and with 60 feet of extension cord to reach the outlet not occupied by the refrigerator, I pushed aside a few tables and cranked up the rock right on time.

There are three things Cajuns can't resist -- crawfish, beer, and Fats Domino music. We had all of them in abundance. The crush of bodies inside were swaying and sweating. But what brought the crowd to a fevered pitch wasn't my Chuck Berry megamix, it was the busy swarms of Buick-sized mosquitoes starting to pound against the window screens as night fell. That's when I realized the party organizers hadn't planned on such a large turnout. The crowd of guests didn't want to leave the building to be eaten alive by mosquitoes, and new arrivals couldn't get in to grab a brew.

What? No access to beer? This would never do! So to lure the guests out of the building so everyone could get to the food, the clubs' officers decided the DJ would have to move outside to the surrounding greens. In the blink of an eye a dozen well-meaning partygoers were transporting my equipment. Their beer-addled climb down the precarious steps with my DJ coffin made me cringe, but somehow it arrived intact.

I instantly realized the hosts missed one small detail -- the electricity was now about 150 feet away. Let me give you a quick lesson in electrical engineering. If you've never used that many extension cords to pull enough amperage to power a good-sized DJ rig, I'll save you the trouble. You can't. Turn the mixer above 4 and the amplifier browns out.

The increasingly disgruntled host was wildly gesturing at me from the other side of the greens as if to say, "Hey, DJ! Are you a moron, or what? Well, maybe I am -- but at least I'm a prepared moron! No sooner than you can say "Justin Wilson", I simultaneously ricocheted a biting mosquito off my sweaty cheek and pulled out the smaller backup amp I always carry. Alas, the swamp continued to work its voodoo upon me -- with no walls to enclose the sound, the music carried about 20 feet. To be heard, I was forced to turn up the midrange to resemble the tone of a police bullhorn.

It was then and there I learned that well-balanced audio frequencies matter little to drunk Cajuns. The tinny sound perfectly complemented their requests for 50's and 60's music -- it became like listening to a giant transistor radio. They loved it. I punched up "Louie, Louie" just as the last of the hazy sunlight disappeared behind the Spanish moss.

Suddenly I saw red flashing lights bounce off the trees. People stopped dancing and looked around. The way the night was going, I wouldn't have been surprised if it was a UFO landing in the middle of the swamp. No such luck -- it was US Park Service rangers demanding to see our permit to have amplified sound in the middle of a protected wetland. Permit? What permit?

Law abiding disc jockey that I am, I shut the music down and the guests were beginning to leave -- despite two more hours on my contract. I was just starting to make my goodbyes when the club president piped up. It seemed he and some friends had rented an overnight cabin in the center of the park and wouldn't it be great to move the remaining kegs and music there and continue the party?

The cabin was even smaller than the first building and the wooden floors were old. Still, you have to hand it to people who are determined to party against all odds! I threw on some 50's jitterbug rock and admired these revelers' tenacity. As more and more couples crowded on the creaking boards, the violently shaking floor began to make my CD decks skip. How I wished digital buffers had been invented then!

Amid the grumbling of the now intensely inebriated crowd, I pulled the last trick out of my hat -- an old library of cassettes I had taped for just such an emergency. Had I finally outsmarted all the devilish forces at hand? Alas, suddenly the crowd's taste shifted to Top 40 and I was dealt the final blow... I discovered the backup cassettes hadn't been updated in years!

We were destined to end the night in the musical hell that was 1985. Now if that's not scary...