I was not alive for Dylan going electric, but I was alive for the Diwali riddim. I can’t imagine that the sixties felt so monumental. In 2003, it seemed that every other song on the radio was built on the Jamaican producer Steven (Lenky) Marsden’s backing track, named after the Hindu festival of lights and instantly recognizable for its jubilant handclaps, surging, feinting bass line, and stuttering drums. In the hypercompetitive world of dancehall, a popular riddim is an invitation to brinkmanship, artists big and small jumping on the beat to see who can make the most iconic song. I saw the best minds of my generation lose it to Wayne Wonder’s “No Letting Go.”

Those handclaps were everywhere. Not quite applause, more like the sound of strangers finding unison. Wonder began releasing records in the mid-eighties as a teen-ager, and his sweet, angelic voice never left him. While most riddims remain unchanged from version to version, Marsden tweaked his backing track for the major artists who wanted to use it. For “No Letting Go,” originally released in 2002, he started with a whistling synth line, a patient build that’s always reminded me of Stevie Wonder’s “As,” keeping the percussion at bay as Wonder (no relation) crooned about his baby. “Got somebody, she is a beauty / Very special, really and truly / Take good care of me like it’s her duty / Want you right by my side night and day,” Wonder sings, as pieces of the rhythm track drop in. The handclaps arrive with the force of history, and as Wonder soars into the chorus it feels as though this is the only love song that has ever existed.

At the time, a friend and I d.j.’d a party at a bar in Cambridge on Thursday nights. I handled the early hours, coaxing folks onto their feet, managing the evolution from curious head nods to proper dancing. We would trade off during the party’s peak, and then, late into the night, he would start playing dancehall. He would move through the other Diwali-riddim contenders, like Bounty Killer’s underdog anthem “Sufferer” or Danny English and Egg Nog’s jubilant “Party Time” or Sean Paul’s vaguely sinister, wee-hours jam “Get Busy.” Then, there would come a moment when I would dig through his crates and hand over “No Letting Go,” and we’d watch people, who’d been strangers a few drinks ago, stomping, clapping, exploring ways to jigsaw their bodies together.

The Diwali name and festive percussion gave the song a faintly South Asian vibe. The early-two-thousands were a time when the pop charts were filled with hits that eyeballed some kind of cross-cultural conversation: Missy Elliott’s tabla-sampling “Get Ur Freak On,” Nas and the Bravehearts’ Orientalist fantasy “Oochie Wally” (a personal favorite), the lite Bollywood-isms of Truth Hurts’ “Addictive.” As far as gimmicks go, it was nice that this one looked beyond our borders. I spent a lot of my twenties trying to make disparate sounds harmonize, song-length reprieves from geopolitics. Sometimes being a d.j. means trying to piece together a world you want to live in—at least until people get drunk enough to start harassing you with requests.

There are certain genres that seem inappropriate to play during cold weather. Dancehall sounds like a tease in the dead of winter. Yet “No Letting Go” was a song for all seasons. We played it in the fall, when Wonder’s line about growing apart—“They say good things must come to an end / But I’m optimistic about being your friend”—fit the season’s melancholy. We played it in the winter, where its stomps and claps sounded like people marching together, huddling for warmth. And then, come spring, it felt like we were conjuring the gross, sweaty months to come. The years blur together, yet I still feel like summer doesn’t start until I hear “No Letting Go” boom from a passing car.

My life is a lot more boring nowadays, and the mere idea of carrying crates of records makes my back ache. A few weeks ago, some neighbors on my block in Brooklyn got married. They filed the proper permits with the city, blocked off our street, and invited all of us neighbors to be a part of their wedding. Their guests were decked out in fine suits and funky dresses even though they would just be hanging out on the street for hours. Vows were exchanged on their stoop, and the couple leaned on the hood of a car to listen to the speeches. Trash cans were wheeled away so a d.j. could set up in their small front yard. We watched them party all afternoon from our steps across the street, basking in someone else’s love, before retreating indoors as the sun set. Later, I heard the opening synths of “No Letting Go” and ran back outside just in time for the claps. It had never sounded so good. I felt overjoyed for the happy couple—by now, the bride had sheared off the bottom of her wedding dress so it was easier to dance—and went back inside to get ready for bed. The night belonged to them now. ♦