Good Gig, Bad Gig.

[dj foureyes]

Ever had a gig where so many bad/worrying things happpen and equally so many good things happen too? Me neither until Saturday night. I was booked 6 weeks ago after I did a christening and the customer decided that she wanted me to Dj her husband's 50th birthday party instead of the hotel's resident Dj, who she had never seen in action.
About a week ago she emailed me and said that a friend of hers who owns a bar had forced the services of the singer in his bar, as a present to her husband. She didn't really want a singer for the whole of the night but do I think it could work, him working with me? Not a problem says I, I just need to speak to him to find out what he needs from me and how long he will be performing. She said that she would get him to ring me. He did actually ring my home phone the next day and leave a message but when I rang him back four days running I wasn't able to talk to him until 3 HOURS before the party, when he finally rang me back. he said he needed a channel for his key board and another for his mic.......okey doke.
Right, for the bad stuff.
1.The singer- he was a very accomplished keyboard player, passable singer but his insistance to play along/sing with most of the background music I was playing grated after 20 minutes, so I gave him a big intro and left it to him to play on.

2.The singer- everytime I got a decent number on the dance floor for 10 minutes he got back on the keyboard (after being urged by his manager) to earn his fee. That meant, early on, it was hard to get a dancey atmosphere going.

3.Guess who?......anyone?.....that's right, our favourite warbler- After the organiser noticed that the singer wasn't rocking the casbah and had a quiet word in the manager's lug hole, he said his thank yous and finally handed the reins back to me for the last 2 and a half hours.
I kicked it off with Mr Wonder's Superstition and had a big rush back onto the dancefloor immediately and the singer started stripping his gear down. Two minutes later, when my back was turned because I was taking a request from a customer, there was a loud bang and then total silence. The had tried to unplug his mic and keyboard cables from the back of my VMS4.1 and god knows what he touched but the minute it took to restore the sound was, as you know, a long time to me. Anywho, I was free to crack on after that.

4. The speaker- I noticed that my left hand speaker wasn''t working 10 minutes after the Big Bang (and had left) so I had to run out to the van and get my replacement one.

5. Headphone socket- An hour from the end, whenever I tried to listen to the right hand turntable it was incredibly crackly, absolutely impossible to mix with. I tried changing headphones but I think the earlier shenanigans had knackered it. Anyway, I carried on and

6. Right hand turntable- 15 minutes before the midnight hour my right hand deck decided that it wouldn't produce any sound and Well, for the first time since 1995 (vinyl days) I had to talk between songs while I loaded the next song.........phew

7.Persistant Woman- as usual the J.O.M. crowd were in full effect after the last song. All were put off by the blinding house lighting (which you could burn ants with if you had a magnifying glass handy) except this one very drunk woman. She harrassed me for 10 minutes then the bar manager for another 5 and then decided to return back to me and tell me off for another 10 minutes because " I ruined everyone's night" because I wouldn't play Just One More Never mind, that's what I do

Now for the good stuff...Yaay
1. When I was able to play my stuff, they loved it. I mean LURRVVVED it! I think there was not one person out of the 120 guests that didn't dance at one stage.

2.Hospitality- I was fed and watered (and had my nappy changed) by the birthday boy, his wife and the staff. I was treated like I was the Main Man not the boil on the bum, which we are often treated as.

3. Hotties- Two very pretty twenty-somethings came up to make several requests and were very complimentary.........and not just about the music, which made this old man regain my spring in my step!

4. Wedding- I got booked for a wedding in January (they booked me the next day and I received the deposit today) and it is a decent payer.
5.Events company-The woman who's christening I did previously approached me at the end and told me she had just started a Events company and would I be her DJ for her corporate events........it would be rude not to.

6. Tip- I haven't had one for a while but the 50 sheckles tip from the Birthday boy was very well appreciated from moir.

7. The Hotel- They have put me on their list of recommended DJs and insisted on taking more than a handful of my cards.

As The Four Seasons put it- Oh What A Night

[Nakatomi]

In the words of Groove Armada... Enter in de dance, plug it in an we begin...

Another weeknight wedding, but one I'd been looking forward to for quite some time - the last communication I had from the bride was back in June (!!) but oh boy what a playlist she gave me. First dance was to be Barry Manilow - I Can't Smile Without You (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) .. closely followed by Sir Mix-A-Lot - Jump On It. Yeah I know.. start as we mean to go on but seriously? Heheh.

Gave the crowd their ten minute warning intro before the cake cut & first dance, then massively bigged them up for the actual events.. they were doddering a bit so decided to take matters into my own hands by getting everybody to count them down & plunge the knife in.. Then they did the first dance.. I let it fade out naturally as they received a massive round of applause... Then with Jump On It's intro looped (a bit) I managed to get the floor just about full... and wheeee off we went on a merry musical journey. This lasted for ooo, a good half hour until the buffet opened, and then barely a soul could be seen on the floor. Oh well, I thought.. another weeknight wedding graveyard shift.

WRONG!

After the buffet I picked away at the playlist but it soon became apparent that the B&Gs more pedestrian choices were going down like the proverbial lead balloon. Requests for the same weren't going down well either. Time to take matters into my own hands again. I willingly left my comfort zone & headed off into the territory of reading between the lines of the playlist - the more shall we say esoteric items providing clues to what else would go down well - and you know.. they didn't just go down well.

I really should export the playlist for this one at some point because it was an absolute belter. There was a 90s dance section, an indie section, a metal section.. and a nice slowdown section where I took the opportunity to play 'Protection' by Massive Attack which was on the playlist (too damn good for background musak duty, that one). Maybe would've picked a better track to come out of than Savage Garden - Truly Madly Deeply (a bride request... long loop on the Massive Attack intro & it worked really well as I mixed it I thought).. but hey ho... by that point there was half an hour left & I wanted to build them back up again quickly.

Oh my GOD. I love 'Protection'.. it holds so many special memories for me & to get an opportunity to play loud it was a joy,,, and by the massive throng of people hugging on the dancefloor my decision was well & truly vindicated.

And so, we came to the four records the B&G danced to on the night they met (in this particular order):

closer - NIN
crazy bitch - buck cherry
spitfire - prodigy
tarantula - pendulum

These went down an absolute storm... They were seriously loud.. and the bass! Good ole Mackies - they acquitted themselves very well indeed. Infact, I'm not sure what I did differently tonight but the sound was in a totally different league to usual.. they generally sound 'good' (well for 15 year old speakers) but they blew my socks off tonight in terms of output volume and bass grunt. The only thing I did out of the ordinary was to put them up on their stands another notch higher than usual. Go figure.

The last 2 tracks were Groove Armada - Superstylin'... I thought it'd be a good fit & close to 80 people were bouncing along to it... followed by N-Trance - Set You Free which (I was told by the best man) is the groom's favourite song ever. No accounting for taste, but hey.. ovations all round & now I need to replenish my business card holder

Afterwards the duty manager, a barman & myself (grudingly on my part) ventured into town. I figured I could use a chillout & you know what, an hour as a punter did the trick nicely.

A life affirming gig, make no mistake. Way off the beaten track, just going on instinct for a lot of the time, a real rush. Loved it to bits!

[Benny Smyth]

A life affirming gig, make no mistake. Way off the beaten track, just going on instinct for a lot of the time, a real rush. Loved it to bits!

[Jim - Scotland's Party DJ]

Really small but good wedding last night only slightly marred by a huge diversion and the fact I realised I'd left a bag with £300 worth of lights in the car park when I got home

On the upside it was in Stirling and I'm off to Aberdeenshire tonight so it's en route (ish) and saves me making the journey back just to collect the bag.

[Nakatomi]

A wedding for me last night. Plus band. The band were late, but were complete gents & only needed me to move my gigabar tripod to the left a bit so they could set up. They did the lion's share of the music and were, in the words of the yoof, totes amazeballs. They had the crowd in the palm of their hand, a professional performer, every one of them. Young too. I've never seen a wedding band frontman dart around like that!

I usually get out of the way of the band if they're just murdering songs to lacklustre dancefloors, but this lot - Agent Smith had the floor packed from the start of both one hour sets to the finish so I stuck around & worked my lights. Made my job damn near impossible when they'd cleared off though. Heh. Still a pleasant enough gig. One for the record books, a band who made my life harder than usual, but for a good reason!

[Excalibur]

Saturday before last was covering for a friend. Customer's daughter said her mum liked 90s dance, so when asked to do so, off I went with some. Four tracks later, manager's in my face, saying I'm not playing 90s dance. Since the ones I'd played were from Now Dance 97, I pointed this out. We had a " frank exchange of views".

It turns out that birthday girl's hubby was the ( one and only ) complainant. Audience applauded at the end, and birthday girl gave me a kiss and cuddle at the end, and said she'd had a brilliant time. I regarded that as a success, hubby said it was good " later on", so that was praise of a kind. All good, eh?

No. I don't think I'm on the manager's christmas card list, as he's banned me. Doesn't bother me unduly, as I didn't intend to go back anyway. For what they pay, I'm not having aggro like that.

Friday, local WMC, Good access, and a very sprightly and friendly 70 year old client. Played mainly 60s and 70s, hardly anything modern. Nice gig.

Saturday, 65th birthday, next door to previous week's ill fated gig. Karaoke as well, fancy dress ( which I wasn't told about ) all made for a hectic evening, especially with the little ones singing half of Frozen, and the like.
Must have gone well, cos at 2am I got an email:
" Just want to say big thank you got a amazing nights of entertainment :-) was perfect thank you :-) ".

Second outing with the Proel V15s, and at the end a lady came up to ask if I'd installed the in-house system, cos it was excellent. She was full of praise for my two cabs, when she found out that's what she'd been listening to all night.

[Nakatomi]

And last night (Sunday) I had my very first ever 80th birthday party. No info, no name, no gender.. hey I'm a top class DJ I can cope, right? Yup!

An ex-RAFer called Ray was to be surprised by many friends & family on arriving at the hotel - thinking he was going out for dinner. Bless. I wish somebody would do that for me someday. If I ever get a bloody night off! Anyway...

Lights out & everybody waiting on him coming through the door. I had my finger hovering over the 'This is your Life' theme tune ready to go. And we went, but birthday boy damn near jumped out of his skin. I love surprises, me.

Hit the background music immediately, trying to get a feel for what'd go. Hmmm. No likey, no likey, no signs of anything going on other than chit-chat. Shall I canvass the room? Nah, bide my time. Buffet opened at 8pm, so stuck with BG music, still fishing around decades & genres - I didn't dare go past the 1950s, but still didn't go any newer than the 1980s either. Cake cut after the buffet, and a big round of 'happy birthday' followed by three cheers.. then a song for Ray & his daughter (who'd arranged the party) - Doris Day - Secret Love. I'm all like "hmmm... what to follow this with?" as the floor filled up to capacity. Requests came in for rock & roll, jive & jitterbuggy type stuff.. great! So how to get from here to there? I was buggered if I knew, but had to try.

You know I just can't remember how, but we gradually eked our way towards Little Richard et al without losing a soul on the floor & it stayed that way for a good 90 minutes or so. Rest periods of slightly slower songs were needed of course, & I dipped into the 60s then ultimately the 1970s later on. 11pm saw a good few people leave but I still had a handful of old dears up & about. Songs from Grease attracted the younger viewers, then a spot of Dirty Dancing tunes.. and then the younger folks started leaving too. Boo! By 11.30pm my output levels were just about tickling the bottom LED on the mixer VU meter & things stayed that way til last orders at 11.45 when it was officially called end of the night.

A funny old gig, way way wayyyyyyyyyyyy out of the ordinary for me, but I enjoyed the challenge. Didn't half bring a smile to my face hearing the cheer as 'In The Mood' came on.

[Nakatomi]

In the immortal words of The Scissor Sisters...

"I don't feel like dancin'" would be the refrain from the attended guests of the wedding I played to last night. I rolled up earlier than usual having spoke to the groom the other night - there were details the first dance had which required the use of walkie-talkies. Really? Yes, really.

Long story short, Mr Groom had hauled in a 'laser projector' to shine down on the dancefloor from a room overlooking the court - and this needed me to radio a member of staff to tell them to switch the 'laser' on at the right moment in the song. Take That's 'Rule The World' was their chosen song - the groom insisted on me watching a video of them rehearsing the dance (excruciating I'm afraid to say) to be fully in the picture about timings. Laser on after the 2nd chorus, and then invite everybody onto the floor with a whole minute of the song left to play. That schedule wasn't for changing. Fair enough, I thought.

Back to the setting up & the bride's mother's surprise had arrived - an ice sculpture in the form of a dragon - very impressive actually - all the way from Leicester (!) and it wasn't cheap. Well, I doubt anything carved out of a block of ice is... When that was all set up, Bride's mother decided everybody could be let into the room to admire it. Great. Not wait 10 minutes & let the room turnaround be finished, and Mr DJ finish tidying cables etc. Oh no. Very annoying.

So to the first dance.. it seemed nerves had got the better of the couple & it looked less than well rehearsed. Oh well. From there, it was kids' disco territory until buffet time when more than half of the guests decided to leave. Interestingly, the guests with kids stayed much later.

Dancers were few & far between, and if anybody was enjoying the music they had a funny way of showing it. Any attempt to interact with the guests & attract requests fell flat. Ah well, it's going to be a long, long night then. And so it was.

11.40pm came along & the groom came over to say he & his Mrs were off to bed. "Thanks for a great night. You were brilliant!" he said, shaking my hand firmly.

[Excalibur]

I think I'm going to see both ends of the spectrum this weekend. Compare and contrast.

Legslappers last night, and whereas the last one I did for them was all young 'uns who got taxis into town as soon as the drinks finished, last night's was 95% " recycled teenagers ", like me. The FFN did their stuff, and left me with just over an hour of heaven. Dire Straits, Free, Stones, Beatles, Tamla, Commitments, Neil Diamond, and a few interesting requests.
One lady was flabbergasted to find I had more than one Johnny Cash track ( I was slightly surprised to find just how many I had ) and was happy to play Walk the Line. It went down very well. Another wanted some " real oldies ", like Clash and Depeche Mode!! I cheated with the Clash, and played I Fought The Law, as the older ones knew the original. I'd have loved to add Police and Thieves, and Should I Go, but I feared they wouldn't be so well received.
For me and the guests, a fabulous night, spoiled only by having to drive 75 miles home. Ah well.

And tonight? 18th, with iffy playlist. Big PA, lots of lights. Last night, two cabs and a powerbar. Like I said, compare and contrast.

[Nakatomi]

Well well. Last Wednesday I'd taken delivery of my brand new Alto TS115A speakers so it'd have been a crime not to given them a proper road test. I had my Mackies in the car juuuust in case, but the Altos performed way better than I expected - indeed they sounded much better than when I heard them in person.

Anyway.. a wedding - with loads of tracks to play ranging from the downright maudlin (Simon & Garfunkel - Sounds of Silence ... I ask you... at a wedding reception?!?!?!?!?!) to the positively tread very carefully at a wedding gig type (Artemesia - Bits & Pieces!). With only about 60 guests due to come to the evening I had reservations about whether it'd be a good night or not, but it ended up being pretty good in the main. The run-up to the event had been full of communication - mostly one sided mind, with them resolutely refusing to answer questions about no-play tracks or anything relating to their own tastes.

Sticking points for me were being asked to play a song from the playlist I'd already played (to a decent response), again within an hour of first playing it. I grudgingly accepted, thinking "what's the harm?" & within 30 seconds the bride came over & asked me to fade it out. Turned out the song in question (Garth Brooks - If Tomorrow Never Comes) was a track from a recent family funeral & was upsetting people. She apologised for me having to be put in that position. Huh? Er, so don't put it on your bloody playlist then! Got rid of the song, much to the annoyance of the 8 people having a group hug to it - I explained by sign language who'd asked me to kill it and swiftly moved on. The rest of the maudlin songs in their playlist were binned.

Onwards to buffet time - and people just weren't up for getting back into party mode for nearly an hour. This was too much for some (one Mancunian accented woman told me as much, very rudely) & they left. Oh well.

From here it was a steep uphill climb and numbers continued to dwindle. Working with the remaining unplayed items from the playlist there were outbreaks of dancing until the last half hour when we were down to six people left. Ah what the hell, I thought.. still give it yer all...

To wind up the night I played a 10 minute frantic minimix of Prodigy tunes. The groom - well he said I'd been amazing. The bride was more reserved in her praise.