jorn
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jorn
Member“…or I just had a couple of drinks and I wanna press a button…” That cracked me up. 🙂
MemberTerry_42, post: 20108, member: 1843 wrote: I guess you ment Adit, .
Yes, woops! I meant to target the OP and accidentally typed your name. Sorry ’bout that 🙂
MemberTerry, get your mind out of the gear. The hardware and software you use are merely tools; akin to the brushes and canvas of an artist. Are they important? Sure, but YOU are the master of your tools, not the other way around. You’ll see the following phrase repeated over and over again, here and elsewhere:
[INDENT=1]Know your music![/INDENT]
[INDENT=1] [/INDENT]
Your music is another tool. To the prior analogy, it is mixing of the paint upon the canvas. Your success as a DJ primarily lives in playing the right music at the right time. <— read that 4 times out loud. 🙂[INDENT=1]Know your audience![/INDENT]
[INDENT=1] [/INDENT]
Take the music you know so well and know how to make any crowd happier than they ever knew possible. Master this and you can do this with two old ipods and a disco ball.I’ve seen samples of Phil’s courses. They look fantastic. Green as you are, I say buy ’em!
But, I also highly suggest trying to get a gig with a local DJ company or somesuch. Nothing can take the place of real experience. Even being the lackey carrying speakers and watching for an entire summer could teach you SOOOO much.
DJing is not a science, it is an art where we apply science.
MemberJosé Reach, post: 10532, member: 918 wrote: DJing is not about themself, it’s about the audience.
this
MemberI have a contract that I’ve used, but am reticent to share it because I Am Not A Lawyer™ and do not want to give you legal advice. Still, there are some things you want to be of, and it’s up to you the extent to which you feel you need to have them in writing, if at all:
• P-p-p-power: At a minimum, you should be sure that you have access to a dedicated outlet near where you are performing. And by dedicated, I mean that you need to be sure that nobody is plugging anything into that circuit anywhere else. You’d hate to have your gig cut cold by a short in a rented champagne fountain.
• Other “physical” requirements: Do you have to haul your gear up some stairs? How much space do you need? Will you be in the way of other decorations, etc.? Do you expect them to provide anything else, such as a table?
• The Timing of Things: It’s important to have an agreement on when are you expected to start playing music for the reception and when it should and. Also, do they expect you to play dinner music? If so, are you prepared? Wrapped around all of this is set-up and tear-down time. Figure out how much time you need to setup and sound-check and insist upon it. I have often set up my gear for a 6pm reception at 10am. That allowed me to get my gear in place and ensure everything was working before decorators started pinning stuff up around me.
• What You Are Not Doing: This is a matter of who is responsible for what, and it can be pretty important. I’ll reiterate my IANAL disclaimer here. This is a private event; THEIR event. You are hired to come in and play some music; period. You are not a security guard, crowd-control, etc. Insurance, etc. is not on you. It’s not your job to help clean up afterwards or to track down a missing bride. (You can do those things if you wish. 😉 ) You are also not there to take anybody’s abuse, be it verbal or physical. I don’t mean to sound like a downer here; most wedding receptions are a blast. But, they are also a place where liquor is often flowing and people can be… emotional. Your plan is to stay cool. I bring this up because in most bar/club situations, they have staff dedicated to all this stuff. At a wedding reception, they have caterers, photographers and, well, YOU. Once the ceremony is over, you have several hundred people ready to party. Do not sign up to babysit.
• Have a Plan: I’m not talking about music here; I’m assuming you have that well in hand. (You’d better!) I’m talking about the traditional ceremonies that happen at a wedding reception. Things like the garter toss, couple’s first dance, dance with the parents, dollar dance, etc. You need to find out now if any of that is happening. If it is, YOU will be expected to run it and run it well. If not, be prepared for any of them to come to you as last-minute requests.
• This Isn’t ABout You: And… I’m going to start a raging debate here…. it’s not really all about the bride/groom/mother-of-bride (*gasp!*)…. it’s about all the guests as a whole. And, specifically, it’s about keeping as many people happy and dancing as long as you can. So, check your ego at the door and serve your room as if your life depended upon it. Nobody cares who you are, they care about having fun with their friends and family. What you are is their drug for the night. CONVERSELY, you are the expert here. You did not get hired for somebody to draw up a 4-hour playlist for you. If they want to do that, I recommend they rent a PA system and fill up an iTunes playlist and save money paying you. This is the delicate part of DJing, and it’s much much harder at a wedding reception. Your audience is broad, and there will always be somebody armchair-quarterbacking your work. Stay cool. Stay polite. Keep that dance floor bumpin’.
“Do you take requests?”
“Yes, I take them all. Some of them I even play!” 😀
MemberGeez, guys, you took all my tips already! 😀
I take my iPod to the gym, out mowing the lawn, etc. and listen to podcasts and my new music over and over again. This helps me:
• Discover new music, as mentioned.
• KNOW the music I already have. I might, on the fourth listen of a song, suddenly have some epiphany about how it might mix into an old classic, for example.
July 6, 2011 at 2:21 pm in reply to: What type of person is the most annoying during your set? #3015Member“Do you take requests?”
“Why yes, I take them all! Some, I even play.”
MemberOne thing I can say about this debate and others like it is:
The debate is here and in similar circles. Our audiences… you know, the large contingency that we (or most of us) play for? Yeah, they don’t give a crap. At all.
So, if you are successful in pleasing your audience, then the armchair quarterbacking about your methodology is nothingness unless you allow it to be otherwise.
MemberI do storage operations optimization consulting and development for Fortune 100 companies at [a large technology firm you’ve all heard of]. 😉
I double-majored in Philosophy and Applied Psychology.
I can also touch my thumbs to my wrists and move one eye independently of the other.
No, I do not know what that buzzing sound is.
MemberMost people who trouble themselves with trying to nail down an identity for others do so because they cannot nail down an identity for themselves.
MemberI know enough to know I wasn’t much following it… and to wish I knew less. 😉
June 27, 2011 at 5:12 pm in reply to: What type of person is the most annoying during your set? #1044MemberYou know, I can deal with most personality types…. it’s part of the job. (Everybody’s an armchair quarterback.)
I’m most concerned with people who pose a physical threat to me, my equipment or other patrons. I have no time for big, rowdy, mouth-breathing drunks who get all manacling when you won’t play Lynyrd Skynyrd. “In the parking lot, you can totally be as free as a bird, I promise. You should go try right now.” 😉
MemberOne of the largest barriers I see is the fact that, currently, the most HD space you can get in an iPad is 64GB. Even if I **shudder** downsampled to 128 kbps AAC files, that’s not a very big library one can tote along.
MemberBenny Mackney, post: 246 wrote: It was a 45 minute “screw the popular crowed, let’s find the people with my taste in music” set, so there was plenty of electro house, dubstep and a bit of DnB. The closest I got to mainstream was Dodge & Fuski’s “Guettastep”. When I got the “play some good music” request, I just said “I’ve just played you half an hour of good music” and stared at her until she went away.
Benny, I mean this is the kindest, as-helpful-as-I-can-be manner; really:
You kinda deserved that request, and she was probably right. Your taste in music is only relevant in so far as it is used to make you better at making your crowd as happy as you possibly can. It’s not your dance floor; it’s theirs. I, for example, hate country music. But I make sure I know it enough to be able to play it when needed.
You kinda said it yourself, you didn’t care what the majority wanted. You might want to change your angle a smidge, or you are in for some long, painful nights. 🙂
[INDENT=2]Case in point: My brother had a summer job working at a burger joint. He cooked up some tasty burgers. He’s a vegetarian.[/INDENT]
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