Playing your first ever DJ gig, whether that’s a mobile event, a club gig, residency, in a bar, whatever, is one of the most nerve-wracking things you could possibly imagine. It’s equally that way if it’s the first gig you’ve played in a long time, of course.
Here at Digital DJ Tips, we teach DJs to be ready for any kind of gig. And in this article, I’m going to share 10 of the biggest tips that come out of our DJ training that I think are applicable to pretty much anyone who’s approaching their first DJ event. Hope you find them useful.
10 Tips For Smashing Your First DJ Gig
1. Confirm all the techie stuff
You need to know for sure what you’re expected to play on, what you’re expected to bring, how it all plugs in, and crucially, what your plan B is should there be any problems keeping the music playing.
There’s nothing worse than the music stopping and you not knowing what to do next because you haven’t planned for the eventuality.
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Plan the gear side early, and then you can spend time on what really matters.
2. Be completely sure about what music is required
Again, this is crucial. Get this wrong, and everything else you do doesn’t count for anything. Sometimes the people who are booking you aren’t great at explaining what they actually want. So one way around this is to ask them who they think is going to be coming to the event, and then use your knowledge of music to guess what might be required, and hold your thoughts alongside their attempts to tell you what they want.
Another good way is to pre-read the crowd, which is something our tutor James Hype speaks about, where you use any sources available to you, like the club or venue’s social media, or the feeds of DJs who play there to get a sense for the people who go there and the music that’s played.
Of course, if you can visit, even better. Ultimately – anything you can do to ensure that the music you’re planning to play is correct – is a task worth doing.
3. Have a master playlist
Right from the very beginning, as you practise for this all-important event, work on a playlist that’s about twice as long as you’re going to need for the event that you think is going to do the job.
Don’t add any music to that list without listening to it properly, and make sure all the songs on that list are properly prepared with cue points and so on. All of this is going to mean that you are completely up to speed with all of that music on the night.
Read this next: How DJs Always Know What Song To Play Next (Without Ever Panicking)
What you don’t want is a pile of music that you haven’t practised with or listened to properly, or worse, picking the music from your whole collection, which is never a good thing.
4. Plan your first five songs
There are many DJs who still do this, having played hundreds of gigs. But for your first gig, this is a solid gold tip.
Planning the songs, the order you’re going to play them in, and how you’re going to transition between them means that at the beginning of your set, when you’re going to be the most nervous, you’re not having to do any thinking at all. You’re just following a pre-prepared set of music that you’ve practised so many times.
By the end of those five songs, you’ll be far more comfortable on the equipment, far more comfortable with the crowd, and ready to start DJing properly, if you like.
5. Have random mixing practice sessions
This is where you pick songs at random from your master playlist for the event, and see if you can mix them together. This is fun! This isn’t meant to be serious, and you’re not meant to get these mixes “right” every time. It’s just building your confidence that you can move around that playlist reasonably successfully.
Why? Because planning a playlist for an event is one thing, but that doesn’t mean you have all the songs in any kind of order, and you never deviate from that playlist. This technique gets you comfortable with the most unlikely of transitions, and then the ones that you end up doing on gig day will probably be far easier.
Read this next: How To Find Time To Learn DJing (Proven Method For Busy People)
Watch the show
Prefer me to talk you through this? In this video, a recording of a live show from the Digital DJ Tips YouTube channel, I talk you through everything in this article, and we take questions from our community on the subject.
6. Have a full dress rehearsal
This is where you play the whole gig at home as if you were playing it for real. You play your first song, or even better, your first five-song playlist, and then you continue to play without a pause until the end of the time that you’re going to be playing for. Doesn’t matter how many times you mess up – you’re not going to let the music stop, and you’re not going to go back and try again.
This is the opposite of the “random tunes”-style practice session, and this one gets you used to everything, from standing there for that length of time to accepting that as long as the music didn’t stop, the transition was probably good enough.
7. Record your practice sessions and listen back
As a new DJ who hasn’t played in public before (or for a long time), your confidence is likely to be quite low, and you may feel that your skillset isn’t high enough. But the one time when you really can’t judge whether that’s true or not is when you’re actually DJing – because you’re too busy doing it!
So especially for the dress rehearsal, record the whole thing and listen back to it the next day. This will give you confidence that it’s actually OK, and you’ll also spot the transitions that may be better or worse than you thought they were when you were performing them, so you’ll do them better next time without even trying.
8. Have a stress-free gig week
No matter how organised you are, you are going to feel the strain as you build up towards that gig. You’ll be dreaming about it, you’ll be worrying about it, you’ll be questioning your life choices, and all the other stuff we do when we’re building up to something that’s important to us.
Read this next: Dreading Your Next Gig? Here’s What To Do…
It’s important not to pile our necessary extra stress in on top of this, so try and keep the stress levels low at work and at home, get other people in your life onside, rejig any big commitments, and of course, sleep and eat well in the build-up.
You’ll thank yourself for it on the day.
9. Get there early and set the right atmosphere
Two things you want to avoid are turning up in a bad mood and being late for your first ever DJ gig. By getting there early, you get a chance to smile, look people in the eye, and set a nice vibe for the whole event, because guess what? As the DJ, that’s your job!
You also get the chance, if you are DJing with other people and you’re not the first DJ on, to have a good listen to what they’re playing to give you more encouragement that what you’ve got planned is going to be all right.
Both of these things – turning up on time and being in a sociable mood (even though you maybe don’t feel it on the inside) are important because the DJ’s job is to transfer energy from DJ booth to dancefloor. Your gig begins before you play your first song, it begins when you arrive – remember that!
10. Execute your plan and trust that the nerves will pass
You’ve done everything right until this point. You’re confident about the gear, you’re confident you got the music right, you know the music, you’ve prepared your playlists, and you’ve rehearsed everything. You’re mentally in the right place. And, you got there in plenty of time.
All you have to do now is what you’ve been planning. Play that first five songs and trust that the nerves you’re feeling will pass. I can guarantee you’ll get to the end of your first DJ gig, however it goes, having had a great time and ready to do it again. So hold your nerve for the first 15 or 20 minutes so that you can enjoy the rest of it.
Finally…
Learn to rock ANY gig: The Complete DJ Course
These tips work whether it’s your first gig, a mobile event where you’re meant to take all the gear, or just an hour in your local bar where a friend has said that you can come and play with them – and everything in-between.
However, all first gigs are different, and there may be something we haven’t covered here that you want help with. Or, you might have read this, and it’s brought back memories of when you were in exactly this position.
Whatever, if you’ve got something you’d like to add, we’d love to talk to you about it. Please use the comments underneath to do so. And if you are reading this and your first gig is very close – best of luck from all of us here at Digital DJ Tips!
Phil Morse
