Good Gig, Bad Gig.

[Excalibur]

Last night was my works night out. Apart from being the only male in attendance all I got was:

"why isn't he talking, shouldn't djs talk?"

Jim, your colleagues have taste and intelligence in abundance. Wish them Merry Xmas from me.

Then, just a few minutes later when I thought all was well and I was playing Clean Bandit - Rockabye (as requested), another girl approaches me and asks if I can play "something current".... I reply "Well, this is current. What else would you like?".... She then proceeded to argue with me that Rockabye wasn't "current" and asked me to play "that Sean Paul song"......

You've got to love some punters, haven't you? Well you have now that fetching them a swift one round the ear is frowned upon. ( Joke, in case anyone thinks I'm advocating violence, heaven forfend )

Instructions for tonight? Only two Christmas songs to be played, when Santa comes in for the kids. Birthday girl ( who is of a fine vintage, much like myself ) wants 70s, 80s, Motown and " Old Fashioned Rock and Roll. "
I'm either going to love or hate tonight, I just know. Depends on whether that playlist receives widespread approbation or not.

[Nakatomi]

Top gig last night covering a Christmas residency for a friend, and providing a walkin disco for my residency. I set up the residency gear in the afternoon & left copious notes for the DJ because he'd be using my lights in (SHUDDER) NON-DMX mode :O

So my actual gig.. easily the biggest crowd I've played to in many a year & also one of the nicest & most up for it. Bumped into an old work colleague there who'd last seen me leaving the building in a somewhat shocked state on learning I was being put under consultation (i.e. offed). Parking my van in the hotel carpark was er.. interesting & I got upstairs in the nick of time. Setup & started the playout doing background duties & proceeded to look for an IEC lead to plug in the booth's starcloth. Hmmm. No cable to be found anywhere. Hey ho, no bother I've got loads in the van... so sorted that out.

Background went on during the meal & I started to get irritated by the flashing light rig so messaged the boss to see what I could do. Not much, so they were all turned off til disco time. Ah and there was a stage for a band, but no band - all would be brightly lit by the aforementioned lights as if to say "look at me, come over here & dance on the stage!" so I said I wouldn't mind winding the stands down & repositioning the PARs. Jees, did I ever get some funny looks from the customers. hahaha. That done I settled in to a nice warmup background set. I threw some Christmassy songs in there too but didn't want to go overboard. Come dessert time I had dancers. Whoops. Michael Jackson's 'Billie Jean' soon sat them back down again until clearing up was complete (always one to be careful with - some venues absolutely HATE activity going on when they're just trying to finish their job). Soon though, the house lights in my half of the massive room (easily 200+ people) went abruptly off & I took that as the 'go' signal.

According to the boss, I absolutely rocked the place, which is nice to hear. I did think it went well, though trying to convince Doris that maybe a different Abba song to Dancing Queen would go down better fell on deaf ears, and almost cleared the floor completely. I rescued them with Stayin Alive by the Bee Gees (of course) which resulted in a request for Kung Fu Fighting. I teased it in over a looped outro of Stayin Alive "Everybody was... "... huge cheers from the crowd. I did it again a bar later.. .bigger cheers. Wait, one more bar & then let it off to do its thing. Smashed it. Who says you only need a play button & 2 faders?

By the end I'd serviced all requests bar Champagne Supernova (Really?! ) & Macklemore's Downtown. They didn't seem the type to go for that song so I politely ignored the £50 offered me to play it. (Yeah right, like that's ever gonna happen lady!). The guests mostly kept off the stage but those who didn't were good enough to do as I asked very quickly. We ended with a barrage of christmas tunes - Shakey, Wizzard, Slade & finally Mariah. A massive round of applause at the end & my way out was hampered by people wanting to shake my hand. Ahhh good times!

I headed to the res. hotel to pay my DJ his dues. Hello, what's this? A speaker's been moved. DJ swore he never touched it. I don't mind kit being moved a little (honest), but this was ridiculous. The tripod - and I'm not making this up - had a legspan of about 9 inches & wasn't even locked off. If anybody'd so much as looked at it too hard it could've been very bad news for somebody. The place has had enough bad press lately without a lawsuit for a personal injury added to the list. I looked into this today & apparently a DM had moved it. He's off my xmas card list til he's completed the tripod training course

[Imagine]

Who says you only need a play button & 2 faders?

Tonight that's ALL I needed. Strangest one ever if I'm honest.

The brief, a karate club's presentation evening.

OK - I've done various presentation evenings over the years (not karate I might add), they all run in a roughly similar manner don't they? Apparently not

Rocked up, set up and turned on the background music whilst I caught up with the boss to get the exact timeline for the evening. A demonstration of karate skills by the kids, food, awards, raffle, dancing in that order. Now I knew there wasn't going to be a lot of dancing as I was only booked to 10:30 and it was very much a kids affair.

Settled in and was treated to an awesome karate display (how do they manage to get the kids so disciplined?), then back to background music because they were supposed to be starting on the food. After about 15 minutes it became apparent that the timeline had slipped somewhat. Never mind, I had the forethought to pack the kids party gear in the back of the van - let's make it an ad-hoc kids party

A little limbo, balloon and spoon racing, space hopper racing and wipeout later (one of the Sensai's got a little too dizzy doing that one), it's finally grub time.....back to background music for the next hour. So far, I've played a total of 4 songs at any reasonable volume and only had the lights on briefly.

Food finally over, it's straight into the presentations. Because we're behind time, these are done at warp speed (I was actually struggling to load the walk-up tracks in time for each one, let alone fade them in and out). Then - raffle. How many prizes??????

The raffle on it's own took us beyond the 10:30 finish time. But (and it's only because I'd set it up), I finished things off with a quick Idina Menzel moment and the snow machine (sing loud kiddies and put your hands in the air ). Eventually got out 15 minutes later than planned with compliments a-plenty (I don't know why.....I didn't actually DO much). Like I say, a very strange one, but the rest was appreciated

Tomorrow is the last of the run this week with a kids/family Christmas party I've done for several years. A good wind-up with sleigh bells, live phone-calls from the SantaFone, and a visit from the big man himself.

There may be one more adult one next Thursday in a Cambridge college - awaiting confirmation on that one (she didn't call to book until last Wednesday....talk about leaving it late). If not, tomorrow is my last for the year

[Excalibur]

Young Wayne's words made me wonder if I could do it.

I got this one because the previous DJs they've had seemed to have a routine of playing nothing outside of the YMCA genre. OK, I get that....not a problem. It's possible to do a party without cheese (yes Peter....it IS! ).

60th Birthday, only play two Xmas songs. What a fine vehicle to launch the cheeseless disco. Timings were thrown out of the window after half an hour, and the lovely birthday girl was happy to take everything as it came. So, we had background, buffet, Santa, heads and tails, and it was time for me to do my stuff.

So, I played music of quality, integrity and taste, and what happened? The punters mocked my barren dancefloor.
I was mortified, but determined to show it could be done. A request came in for Wig Wam Bam, swiftly followed by Gangnam Style, Cha Cha Slide and Macarena. End result?

Packed dancefloor. It was ever thus. My, but they were fickle though, some of the gold plated can't fail tracks failed totally. Still, they had a lot of fun, I did as well, and my Rock and Roller R12 got it's first run out at full stretch. It's an awesome piece of kit, two trips to the van got it all.

Tonight, a presentation night for a dance troupe, with a bonus for me, a Roadie!! Davesounds' lad Matty is going to assist, should be fun.

[Imagine]

Young Wayne's words made me wonder if I could do it.

I didn't say it always works though did I? Sometimes it's the only thing that'll get 'em going. I was lucky on Thursday that they appreciated other stuff instead.

...and my Rock and Roller R12 got it's first run out at full stretch. It's an awesome piece of kit, two trips to the van got it all.

They're good aren't they? Depending on which PA I'm using I can actually get my entire rig on top of mine in one trip with careful packing and a couple of bungee straps

[Jim - Scotland's Party DJ]

I had a good gig only slightly tempered by a phoenix knights-esque events co-ordinator who wanted to be the centre of attention.

He had his own mic going through the room tannoy and at times he'd be talking over me or whatever I was playing.

He swore - he called a punter a "greedy " over the mic within the first 15 minutes of people arriving and finished up with some really uncomfortable chat to a girl at chucking out time I don't even want to go into - he did all of this over the mic :/

He wanted to do lots of stupid "games" to get people "into it" while they were in the middle of dinner

He kept coming over - OK what are you playing next? Try a bit of this or a bit of that.


There were actually quite a few people in the room I know and one came over at the end - goign to play one more tune? "I've already played one more and I'm over time, I'll get my baws booted by the venue and agency"

Next minute she's over with the eejit (who told me the hard ending times which I was now bang on) "stick on a Christmas tune - Mariah Carey or something" I played that about 10 minutes ago.., Just put something Christmasey on so all of a sudden I look like a killjoy and he's the man

Got a bigger cheer and more dancers than th eband though

That's it for 2016 - not much of a break - up in ye olde St Andrews for a wedding in the first week of 2017.

[Daryll]

Another night in Basingstoke , guess I should have never moved away...lol
Still , a big gig for me ( on behalf of Gary) with 300 people.

OK not 300 in that pic , but that very early , They also had a band , very good and well supported, as they would be , they all worked for the same company the evening was for
I was asked to play background while the guests arrived , well after peaking my system , and that's loud , they asked to turn it up . er.. I cant , that's flat out, and I refuse to go so loud it distorts.
They also had a "living table" , loved it , very different.

Still the band well over stayed their sets , supposed to be 2 X 45 minutes , more like 2 X 1 hour + , now bear in mind this was by far the most people I have played for , seeing 200 + dancing was awesome.
All the music was modern chart , apart from the last three , Mariah carey, shaking stevens and slade , no prizes for guessing the song titles...lol

Easy load out , even it was a tad muddy , one more local xmas gig on the 23rd and thats it , having NYE off for a change
And I must thank Gary for giving me the work , the guy is a legend , as well as a nice guy

Cheers

Daryll

[Excalibur]

And I must thank Gary for giving me the work , the guy is a legend , as well as a nice guy

Cheers

Daryll

That's the beauty of networking on here, it's a win-win situation for both parties. First person gets a gig covered by someone reliable and suitable, second one gets work they might not have had.

[Nakatomi]

I had all the stops pulled out for my first xmas party at my residency proper last night. Singing along, dancing in their chairs.. all to the background music - kept in check because interfering with the staff clearing & serving is a big nono IMHO. Well at least there it is because it's not the biggest room in the world. So, by the time dessert stuff was being cleared away I was playing very upbeat music. No musical wallpaper like Bubble here! It was during Aha - Take On Me that I saw the time was right, so the instrumental break got nicely looped & I used that as a bed for saying hello to all the tables over the mic. Ah, what a nice change a DM willing to give me those details! Loud cheering, clapping.. I was amazed how well it went.. and then boom! House lights went down & disco mode was activated.

From then on it was relentless. Cheese requests led to more cheese & just when I thought it couldn't get any more cheesy up came a request for Superman. Oh go on then. All safety catches off I had 80 people doing the actions & being videoed by the partys' appointed scribes. Hope that doesn't turn into more bad publicity for the venue - it's been in the local (and national) news more than once this week

Not all the requests were party favourites though - I had people asking for Chris De Burgh A Spaceman Came Travelling, Alanis Morrissette's Ironic, Robbie's Angles, James Arthur Say You Won't Let Go... Kate Bush (!).. WTH is wrong with some people? Heh

A guest came over to tell me one of the parties was from the local cycling club, so if I could make some jokes about them I was to feel free. Damn... how do you tell clean jokes about cyclists? I pondered & pondered & pondered... then a request came in for Amarillo. Aha! Over the instrumental intro part I said "okay, Aycliffe Velo Club.. I bet you lot have never had to ask for directions...". Up next, 500 miles.. insert joke about Strava's route recording here...

Cut to the end with a still full house & rammed floor to Slade.. and cheering by the bucketload. A lovely gig. I might yet be converted to actually looking forward to the party season.

[Shakermaker Promotions]

Thanks for the kind words Daryll. Really appreciate it.
As you know already, there will be lots more in 2017. Glad you enjoyed the night and although the numbers may appear daunting beforehand, you did it and you know you can do it in the future.

Last night was hard work for me..... It wasn't the gig itself, it was me feeling like absolute death due to this horrible cold that I've got. Don't feel too great today either but one more party tonight with an 11.00pm finish and then off until Thursday when it will be my last party down here until NYE (still have Christmas Eve and a Wedding to do before that though).

So, the actual booking last night was probably the best of the bunch so far. Multiple companies all in attendance and one of those included a gentleman who was celebrating his 97th birthday. I made a really big deal about that when I did my usual introductions and welcomes and I had everybody singing Happy Birthday to him which was really nice.
Great crowd who were really up for it from the first song until the last. I can't really say much more than that apart from that I really needed my bed by the time I'd finished. Crashed down at the hotel last night and didn't sleep too well.

Back again in a few hours for a small party for Morrisons. If they are like they were last year, it will be a good one. If they are like they were the year before last, it will be an earlier night than scheduled. I know which I'd prefer to be honest.