Good Gig, Bad Gig.

Last nights gig was a 40th for a lady who is the music teacher at a local school. It was a small party for 40 people (35 women and 5 blokes).

Really relaxed and chilled atmosphere from 7.30pm - 9.30pm as they were all chatting and catching up. A lot of them were teachers and staff from the same school. I didn't realise it would be so chilled out early on and thought that it would be a really long night with the amount of guests and the atmosphere at that time. I didn't have a request list to go on and just had "I listen to Heart FM...". The lady had said she was a full time Mum in her email but then I was told she was a music teacher so I was a bit confused.

I announced that I was taking requests but it took them a while to start coming in so when I announced that the buffet was now available, I also asked everyone to think of a song from the last 40 years and I would play it during the buffet and during the evening. They started flooding in from then on and the mixture of music was so diverse but entertaining.

It more or less ended up being an 80's Night with cheese with the majority of people dancing as soon as they'd finished eating. One table of geeky blokes and a few older ladies didn't get up all night and just sat there in the corner, chatting and drinking. One (very nice) young lady danced to nearly everything and kept requesting songs. As the night went on and the wine got to her a bit more, her requests became cheesier but they got people up as she rounded people up. She was a massive help to me last night and I was glad she was there.

All in all, a decent night. I texted my missus early on in the night to say that I thought I was in for a boring night and in all honesty, I didn't see it going on past 11.00pm judging on what I could see and the atmosphere but I was proved wrong.

The only negative I can give on this one is that a lady came up and asked for the 12" version of 'Tainted Love' / 'Where Did Our Love Go'. As soon as it started, people jumped on the dancefloor but then as it went on (remember, it's about 9 minutes long), I could see people getting bored. One lady did the cut throat thing, indicating that I should cut it....then another one did it and in the end there were 3 ladies standing infront of me doing it. It made me feel uncomfortable. I ignored them for a while as I think it's rude and one of the worst things you can do to a DJ but with 2 minutes left I decided to give in and spoke over it as I faded it out and went into something else.

It was funny as the lady that requested it came over to me and thanked me for playing it and described her colleagues as "Boring farts".

Customer happy, guests happy and I got another gig from it for November (another 40th).

Thinking it may be worth making a shortened "12 inch" version so that people can still hear Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go but in about 4:30 instead of 9 minutes. I remember playing the 12" back in the day and even then it did drag a little. Likewise the Human League - Love Action/Hard Times.

Agreed and something that I am thinking of doing later this week is doing a remix kind of thing where I can extend it a bit using looping. I didn't want to try it last night on the fly and the lady actually requested the 12".

[Extend 'Tainted Love' and not the whole thing as that would obviously defeat the object].

Pretty good night, a summer ball for British Military Fitness at a hotel in Derby. I've struggled with young (say, mid-20's to mid-40's) groups at this hotel over the last year. I did a couple of late Christmas parties that were a struggle, and a Young Professionals ball that was equally frustrating. You know the type of night...you're convinced that you're doing the right thing in the right order, but it's just not firing? For a while, it looked like last night was going the same way. I had a few requests, and every time I tried to follow it with something of a similar genre, it bombed.

I decided around 2230 to stick pretty much unwaveringly to chart/dance/RnB, just flinging in the odd request in a pretty disjointed way. Really not keen on doing this, but it worked and kept the dance floor full. Then, around 2300, a guy approached me with a list...the stuff of nightmares for a gig like this. Written on the list were words like "Steps", "S-Club" and...dare I say it..."Phil Collins" :eek: :eek: !! And so it came to pass. "5,6,7,8" followed by Rednex, followed by "Reach". Some of the guys gave me a load of grief over the opening bars of "Reach", but they stayed. I followed "Reach" with "Mr. Brightside", and never have I been so grateful for that instantly recognisable intro! Anyway, great night...full dance floor for the most of it, and the carpets round the side. Also, an unusual twist at the end of the evening...which I'll write about in the Supporters area.

Oh, and Phil Collins didn't get a look in!

Well it was the 'table songs' wedding last night, the guests were well oiled by the time I started, and took about 20mins to drift onto the dancefloor after the band. (I think they thought it was the band still playing despite the stage being in darkness !) So I played a couple of chart R&B tracks and some of the girls came onto the floor.

Then played the first of the table songs and not sure if they came up, but the floor was pretty full. Only thing was they decided to put the hot food out right behind me about 10min after I started (see pic below, food was on the right up against wall) Lucky i had my fan on the floor !

One mid 50's woman said can you play some oldies as this music is :Censored::Censored::Censored::Censored:e, i told her the bride had said she wanted r&b as well as the songs for the tables and as it was her day that's what I'll be playing, but if I can slip some in later I will. She said well you know best but nobody's dancing I pointed to the full floor and she responed with but they're not enjoying it. I gave up after that and she went to stuff her face !

the girls were 'bumpin n grindin all night and the floor was pretty much full for the 3.5hrs I played. Only thing was one datamoon fupped up so just used one with the dynamos and the starcluster. details in another thread about that, I mentioned it to the bride when she was thanking me and she said it didn't matter as they still enjoyed themselevs. (see we worry too much !)

There's been lots of comments on her facebook page saying how much they enjoyed the music and I think they were surprised i had all the songs they asked for ! But I didn't play Whole Lotta love ! At the end of the night I got everyone in a circle and played thier first dance song, At Last by Etta James, then they shouted for one moe song, I had Maniac cued and asked the manager, he agreed and they all enjoyed it. Well apart from one silly girl who asked whay I didn't play Maniac 2000, my reply ? because it's over 7mins long !

The only photo I took as the bride didn't want me to take any and post them online:

http://pix.sparky-s.ie/images/2c3c8.jpg

sounds good Paulie, what was the venue? Had a similar wedding in athboy, meath last night, all that they wanted was chart!

The Ritz - Carlton , Powerscourt. The bride posted a pic on her Facebook page showing a TV on the mirror in the bathroom ! Mind you the cheapest rooms start at €260 per person without breakfast :omg:

Friday nights gig was a funraiser,unfortunatly the organiser was hopeless.she wanted to do things her way and did not listen to my advice.Not much dancing to begin with,infact it was about 10.30 till i got them in the mood and filling the dancefloor.At 11pm she wanted to draw the raffle,i knew this was a bad time as going by the ammount of prizes it would take up to 30 mins if not longer to complete.
It was 11.40 till i started playing again,the venue instucted me to finish at 12.so as you could immagine this did not go down well.play us one more,we will pay you extra if you play till 1.the venue only has a licence till 12 .so it was a case of taking lots of abuse while packing my gear away.
If she listened to my advice on how best to run the night,then it would not have ended this way.


Saturdays wedding was fantastic,great crowd all up for a good party,i was booked till 1am,but venue manager says if playing loch lomond i had to do this at 12.30,because after this it was to be quiet background music due to the residents above the function room.i explained this to the b&g and adviused we finish at 12.30.both said that was a good idea.3 people came up told me it was great can i have your business card.

My most regular venue has a midnight curfew. I sometimes get people asking for more but when I tell them I cant I never get abuse.

Odd wedding for me last night. Really nice couple, and their aspect of the playlist was a doddle. The trouble was that they did one of those request slip with invites type thingy*, so got a massively mixed bag back from their guests, ranging from Jim Reeves to Katy B. On paper, it didn't look that horrendous, but it was very hit and miss on the night. Mind you, it's always easy to blame the massive, incoherent playlist....perhaps it's just that I didn't do a very good job with it? I feel like I did my best, but ???? As I say, full dance floor for pretty long periods, but also managed to clear the dance floor entirely on a couple of occasions...always with things from the playlist!

*I include a line about sending request slips out with invites in my confirmation letters, and offer to provide slips to do this. I'd never given it much thought in the past, but just saw it as a way of getting my name and number out in all the invites. After last night, I'm reconsidering. Any thoughts?