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Glad you had a good night Peter,Quote:
Originally Posted by Excalibur
Small venue, but always a good crowd.
I did warn you about the low ceiling! how many times did you hit your head on the chandelier? I think I must hit it every hour that I am there!
Well after arranging a visit to the metropolis that is Thwing for Peter, I was at the local Cricket Club.
The client had been married for a month but wanted a celebratory disco.
Nice to have the big rig out after a few weeks of small rooms, not that the Cricket club is that big.
I still have an ongoing issue splitting HDMI signal, The client wanted her weddding pictures on display and in the past I have used the venues 40" TV as well as my two 32" rig screens. I used to split VGA to the three no problem, however the venue has recently installed a new tv and this only has a HDMI input, Now I have managed this before using my HDMI splitter, but it is a hit and miss operation and was not playing this time so stuck to the two 32" and split using VGA.
The Yamaha 15"s were faultless, I really like the quality and level of sound they produce.
The bride was expecting 140 of which 80 turned up, but decent dancing crowd so fairly std music filled evening and home before 2am. :beer1:
Had both a good and bad gig last night, working at the Hotel I do a load of my work at.
Woke Saturday and got the car loaded in my usual preparatory routine , but when I went to open the boot on my Zafira , the lock played up a bit, after a bit of fiddling, locking and unlocking I managed to get it open and to lock when I closed it. Needed a pro to look at it, but adequate cover for the night... Or so I thought...
Later in the day, all suited and booted and ready to go I head out to the car and.... Nothing... Engine doesn't even turn over... Try again... Nothing.
A distinctive kind of fear crept over me, you know one.
After realising the Missus had loaned out our jump leads and the neighbours unable to help, I realised this wasn't happening so managed to chuck the best part of my rig, sans sub, into the back of our astra.. Not ideal using two SRM450v2's for the nights gig but it would have to do.
Then found out the Astra needed petrol (that loud swear at 5.50 last night you may have heard was me) so filled up and got to the hotel 10mins later than I should have... Fortunately the Hotel staff were fine and I was well ahead of time in any case.
Set up, mounting the speakers as high as poss to maximise their throw and actually... With some EQing on my mixer, they sounded really good... Perhaps things were looking up... I then realised I had inexplicably left my laptop stand at home. Vital for me at the minute as I do a lot of video DJing and like to keep the laptop cool and well positioned... A makeshift 'stand' was created using some four way plug banks and the lappy had some breathing space.
In the meantime, my wife, gawd bless her, had called the AA, fixed the battery problem, and turned up at the Hotel to do car swap. Forgot to bring the laptop stand with her... But hey... It was enough.
Got started with background during the meal (it was a Christmas Cabaret weekend, Tom Jones the night before, me on the Saturday, less chest hair but more requests) and at 10ish, kicked off and it was just one of those nights where.... It all just worked. Packed solid on the dance floor... Average age would have easily been 50plus and the music selected to suit, and they loved it, loads of requests, compliments and even a fiver tip at the end of the night. Booked til 1 and 60% were still dancing to the last track of the night.
Given the start to the night I had, it was just the tonic to have such a successful night which I thoroughly enjoyed. Made the heart attack at the start of the night almost worth it!
A walk up gig for me last night and an average night with low attendance (just checked back and I played more songs before the first punters arrived than during the rest of the night) and the usual drunk punters who think they know what works... and don't. Request of the night was around 1:00am while playing Avicii - Hey Brother, "Can you play something current?" I had the pleasure in telling her that what was playing was probably more "current" than her.
Other request stinkers:
Ghost Busters
Easy Lover
Clothes off (Gym class Heros version)
Ace of Base (Life is a flower - requested by the same person in this club every week)
Rudimental
Rudimental
Rudimental
Rudim.... you get the idea. Damn that guy was annoying
Afterglow (cleared the floor)
Gorilla (cleared the floor)
Surprise hit of the night. Gyptian, Hold you. Requested & played almost every week in this club and still getting a strong reaction. Lucky, because the floor was still empty from Afterglow before I played it :D
I've now got a quiet week and then a 90's themed 30th birthday party next Saturday which I've just had the playlist for, and I'm really looking forward to it (90's cheese fest!!!)
Julian
Last night for me was a good one.
Retirement party for a guy who is retiring early as he's done pretty well for himself. Disco + Karaoke (arrghh!) + Uplighting at one of my regular venues.
Nice guy who was very regimented on timings and what he wanted. We met quite a few times prior to the party so I knew what was required.
He was adamant on having Karaoke as he wanted to get his guests involved. I am trying to phase out the Karaoke as to be honest I don't enjoy doing it. I'm keeping all the stuff though should bookings depend on it and it's always worth having (we all do stuff we don't like don't we).
Anyway, really good atmosphere throughout the night. The guy retiring wanted to kick the night off after the background music with a karaoke song. He'd chosen his songs in advance and there were lots of them! He kicked off things with a really dire, out of tune version of 'Read my mind' by The Killers as he was a big fan of theirs. His pre-requests were mainly Killers, Coldplay & Abba!
He had a slideshow going on via a projector and screen and there were also embarrassing photos of him placed around the room too. When he started singing, people were cringing and I could tell then that the Karaoke would be a waste of time. I asked for requests for the Karaoke and got 2 all evening (I Will Survive & YMCA). I tried my hardest to get it going but you could see that nobody was interested. I also tried to limit the amount of songs that he sung too as he would have been hogging it all night and I think it would have killed the night totally.
After a few speeches and me reading out the results of the Quiz that he'd created that was all about him (most of the guests were work colleagues that had been at the same company of the past 31 years) we eventually got a full dance floor and it was like that for the last 2 hours.
I don't think the night went exactly how he wanted it to (best laid plans and all that) but he was very happy. I said to him just before we finished that I was sorry that the Karaoke wasn't that successful and he said "No problem, at the end of the day everyone has had a great time and that's what I wanted" and he gave me a tip.
Last song of the night was supposed to be a karaoke song (Bohemian Rhapsody) but I played it instead as the dance floor was packed and with 10 minutes to go it would have killed it. Everyone sang along anyway whilst dancing. There were calls for "One More!" at the end so I put on 'My Way' (first time in ages that I've played it) and it proved to be a good move. The dance floor was packed and everyone got up to sing along.
A really good night.
A night off tonight and then back on it next weekend with 2 x Christmas Parties.....It all starts next week, busy, busy, busy.
Well, that's the first Christmas party out of the way for me. If they all go like that then I'll be happy (I seem to remember saying that last year after the first one and they all went well).
I have another gig tonight but it's with my band this time and we're supporting SHAM 69. Should be good.
Bit of a nightmare going on here what with one thing or another but back to the gig report...
I set the background music up on VDJ with a Christmas playlist that also included some chilled out / acoustic / down tempo classics.
I went home, had a bath and went back for around 8.45pm as there were only 60 party people last night. A mixed night with 3 different companies, all of which had re-booked from last year. I recognised a lot of faces and the table of women made me feel very welcome.
I thought I'd take on board some of the comments from another thread about first song of the night so I started with a Christmas song this time. I kicked in with Shakin' Stevens and nobody got up! I might give it another go at the next one and see what happens.
I followed it with Robbie Williams - Candy and the majority got up so I stuck with charty stuff for a while. Biggest song of the night by far was between Robin Thicke 'Blurred Lines' and The Killers 'Mr Brightside'.
I went through the decades and genres, playing as much as I could and it worked. Motown went well as did the 90s (Five, Backstreet Boys etc).
A couple of Christmas songs at the end with Slade and Mariah and then the last song was Queen - 'Don't Stop Me Now' and it was one minute past midnight. Everything went well and I finished on time. I was saying thank you's etc when I noticed a guy who was very drunk rocking one of my speaker stands. I could see it ready to go over so I said "Excuse me" on the microphone and grabbed the speaker stand. He apologised. Then another very drunk lady (same company) decided to grab hold of my microphone and start talking to her work colleagues. I switched it off and told her that the music and everything had to stop at midnight. It was now 12.05am.
She wasn't impressed and wouldn't give me the microphone back. I powered everything down and eventually her work colleagues took her away and apologised. Apparently she was the party organiser and had been made redundant the previous week. She was shouting and swearing and was in tears. A guy came over and shook my hand and praised me for handling it well....(didn't know I did?). He said that he had dreaded what she would say so I guess he may have been her boss?
Once that was all over I was approached by another guy who presented himself as the boss of one of the other companies. He wanted to say a few words over the microphone (obviously he had seen the other woman have a go at it so he wanted a go which is fair enough I guess). I explained that I had powered everything down and I had to finish at Midnight. Again, he wasn't impressed. He walked off moaning....well, staggered off moaning but then 2 minutes later came back over and apologised and thanked me for a great night. I doubt if he remembers moaning or thanking me!!
I know the last part is a negative but it really was a good night. Bring on tonight!
Come on, come onQuote:
Originally Posted by Shakermaker Promotions
Hurry up Gary come on
(it had to be done)
Took me back a bit. Once upon a time children, most gigs were like this. :D Last night I did a house party for a 50th birthday. Set up in the living room, big gazebo next door with plentiful drinks, and a splendid buffet in the other room. The fancy dress theme was 60's/70's, and we had umpteen hippies ( including one with the biggest Afro I've ever seen in my life ) a couple of pimps, a few Austin Powers, and some splendidly accurate outfits from the Ladies. We were for some reason which baffles me graced with three nuns, the Flintstones and their wives, and one I didn't recognise. :confused:
Played some great tunes, Stones, Rod Stewart ( the person who requested that didn't know "Stay with me " was Rodders, albeit with the Faces. :eek::eek: ) Elton (a couple from Yellow Brick Road ) lots of Tamla, Commitments, and a bit of easily recognisable Northern Soul, as well as a few modern ones, and a bit of cheese . Overran finish time by a mile, stopped when we were down to the last few hardy souls, and packed up. Best part? The drive home took four minutes! Reeeeeeeeesult. :D
I dont know if its me but things seem very quiet this year compared to others, having dj,d for 16 years all my past xpn,s have been straight into party stuff and as soon as santa has left the building and i,ve done the works party shout outs everyone used to scream and shout and imediately run onto dancefloor going mad. Have done my 5th one last night and i must say its not happening for me this year and others have said same. they just sit and talk ,i always tell the crowd that a request sheet is ready to be filled with songs and messages but the few i get are very downbeat songs that you would only consider playing later on the slow section.just seem to get the odd few up to occasional songs and thats it. ! I can honestly say i have never done a christmas party night where not one person danced to wizzard! which is what happened last night, even soul banana killed the floor. as the d-ream song goes, THINGS CAN ONLY GET BETTER.
A busy weekend for me. Friday afternoon saw me at one of the more challenging local primary schools and the gig went well. The sessions are broken into an hour for years R/1/2 and then 90mins for years 3/4/5/6 and usually the disco for the older kids gives me trouble because either the kids run me ragged with requests that are either inappropriate or just badly received, or they don't respond well to the games (or I get trouble afterwards because they're singing swear words into the songs). I gave the gig a lot of thought this time and went in with a set play list and a set plan for games and both worked well. Positive feedback on the night, and a lot of very happy kids too - despite being told to go away every time they came up with a request :D
Friday evening I worked at a walk up gig at a local club until 2:30am. Mediocre attendance (which was kind of expected) and a very mixed age range (19 to 50) for a mainstream club meant I worked hard all night to keep everyone happy. More good practice at dealing with awkward customers who aren't very tolerant of others tastes.
Saturday night saw me at the local community centre for a ruby wedding anniversary for a lovely couple and their family. 60 odd in attendance so another hard night keeping everyone happy. However, very happy customers as they got their Elvis with a mix of Xmas classics and a good number left at the end :D Around 22:00 I looked up and started to worry about where everyone had gone as there were very few people sat at tables - then I realised everyone was still there, they were just all dancing, so I relaxed :zip:
After doing a kids party, and then a family party, I started wondering if I should do more to entertain the kids at family parties early on. I know another local DJ who runs the first hour or so of family parties like a school disco with a really high level of interaction with the kids (games, party dances & all!)
Next week I've got something similar going on - Xmas party at a school on Thur, Fri at the club again, Sat is a 60th birthday party at a local community centre.
Julian