Good Gig, Bad Gig.

Last night I did my first wedding of the year. It was only booked in around 3 weeks ago and was booked via a good friend of mine.
Strange really as the Bride and Groom had been planning the wedding for 18 months so I'm told yet 3 weeks before their big day they still hadn't booked a DJ?

Anyway, it was at a local social club in town. Not the best of venues in my opinion but it's not the venue is it? It's what you make of it and the guests you have in it.
Met the couple midweek and went over everything and arranged with the venue to set up Saturday morning around 10.00am. They didn't ask for any documentation (PLI or PAT) yet both of their certificates were displayed in frames by the entrance.

Despite arranging with the venue that I would be arriving in the morning to set up, when I did arrive the guy there wasn't expecting me. His first reaction was ":Censored: we've still got our equipment on the stage!" I said I'd start getting my equipment in and by the time I had, hopefully he would have cleared the stage. When I bought the first lot in I noticed some of their ahem.....equipment. I couldn't tell you what it was except that it looked like it was from the 1960's. It looked battered and bruised but apparently (according to the guy there) it "worked a treat". Within 40 minutes I was set up and the guy came back to have a nose and said "wow! that looks great. where are the CD players?"

So, I am booked from 7.30pm - Midnight. I ask the guy about last orders for later on and he then tells me "last orders is at 11.00pm and time at the bar is 11.15pm. Don't forget that the last song has to finish by 11.15pm too" (don't forget? I wasn't aware of that in the first place!). I tell the guy that I am booked until midnight and he shakes his head. He points to a large notice on a door by the stage which confirms what he has told me.
"Ok, fair enough" I reply.

I'm ready to make my way back home when the groom and my mate and a few others arrive to start decorating the venue. I advise the groom of the time change and he doesn't seem that bothered really so I just think "fair enough". I'd rather have told him in advance than just stop playing at 11.15pm and had to explain why but I also didn't want to put a downer on his day before it had even started if you know what I mean.

Because of the time change I arrived a bit earlier and started earlier as I wanted to give them their money's worth. I walked back to the venue as it was only 10 minutes walk from my house. There wasn't much parking available and I knew it would be a pain getting out of there afterwards anyway so I arranged to go back this morning (which I have just done). It was quite nice actually as I did what I had to do and then literally unplugged everything and walked around the corner to my local to catch last orders and have a nice chill out with a pint before walking home in the snow.

The actual night itself was pretty much up and down. One minute the dance floor was packed. The next it was near on empty but people were singing along in their seats.
First dance was Ed Sheeran - Tenerife Sea (really good first dance song if you haven't heard it before). Last song of the night was Dolly & Kenny - Islands In The Stream which packed the dance floor. Lots of good feedback this morning as some of the guests had gone back to clear up and a nice round of applause from the guests and the venue staff. It wasn't one of those that will stand out and be memorable but I did what I was paid for and everyone apparently had a good time. I must say it did feel quite strange sitting in my local at 11.30pm with a pint after I'd done a nights work.

After Friday nights high came Saturday nights low and Sundays interesting encounter....

Last Saturday we put on a brilliant soul/motown/northern night at The Crescent and folks were asking if we were back this weekend. At least two large groups of people were coming back for more (both lots celbrating birthdays) .... but this weekend only 20 people or so turned up over the whole night, and at various times.... so there were never more than half a dozen in the room!

Last week at 11pm you could not even get into the room.... and they crammed the floor till the end and were begging for more, this week it was just the occasional tumble weed.

Honestly I can't figure it it out, though the publican was really annoyed and kept on asking me what went wrong. I have no idea.

Whilst breaking down the kit toay I had to move it all off the stage quickly as another guy, Dave (snoopy's disco and quiz nights) was moving in for a 2pm start.

What a top guy!! To me it felt like old friends chatting after 10 mins... had a good real good chat with him, this guy has been DJing full time for something like 35 yrs and I was very interesting to here his views on 'life on the road'. Upshot of all this, he already knew about myself and my setup as I had been noticed (I guess) and he had seen my facebook page.. He gets a lot of double bookings (he passes those to a friend of many years) and triple bookings he passes to an agency but hates having to do that. Said he would only ever pass on spare work to DJs with a good setup, and he had just seen a new one on the stage, so would be in touch.

I said likewise as with my extensive contacts in the pub trade (from my day job) I could possibly become overloaded with what myself and my roadies new setup could handle.. so who knows, probably a good contact made there


So all in all a very interesting weekend. Got booked back at the Crescent next saturday regardless..... and have a sneaking suspicion I may get a Friday night elsewhere as well..... more about that if it happens :)

Rich
PS From what I heard later (whilst collecting my last night fee) Snoopy had even less folks in than last night. Can't figure this venue at all

Friday night - 16th birthday party in a garage for a local family (not your average garage - basically a HUGE metal box which made for interesting acoustics - the ONLY gig I've ever done where the RCF's didn't quite cope and I could have done with hiring in bass bins for the night). The 16yr olds dressed and drank like 18yr olds, but the vibe was good and there was no trouble (the birthday girl was a teary drunk, not a violent one!) I think it went ok, but I'm waiting on feedback from the birthday girls mother on this one as she looked none too happy when I left. I think that might have had more to do with the state of the garage though...

Saturday night - 40th birthday party for a friend of a friend at full rates at a local fitness and social club. Got chatting with the barman at the start who I remembered from a xmas party a few years ago and he mentioned that the resident DJ is retiring and asked for my card before I had even started based on the appearance of my rig. Bonus :D Party was the usual family affair with not a lot of dance floor action before the buffet at 10:00, but lots of requests from the many teenage guests. Kicked off with Uptown funk (requested how many times???) and had on/off dancing until the 1:00am finish. During the warmup a guy came up and asked me what kit I was running with and I stood back and let him have a nose and we got chatting as he was a DJ for many years but is now semi-retired. Weird part of the night was the end as I had the last 20mins planned out to wind down the night going from Reach to Peter Andre to UB40 to either Thinking about you or Greatest day. The other DJ in the room had the same kind of idea and came up and suggested Bob Marley or another chilled Reggae track as I went into UB40, but the birthday girl had other ideas and asked me to cut UB40 and go into Guetta, Lovers on the Sun (twice!!) to finish.

Funny kind of night.

I treated myself to a GoPro camera at Xmas which picks up both the dance floor and the booth (including me) and the revelation from this weekend is that when I'm working I actually don't move around much and I mostly look like I'm deep in concentration which can't be that inspiring for the guests. So, my new years resolution is now to make more of an effort to look interested :D

Julian

What a :Censored:stressful week that was!!!

I was only out DJing last night but the whole build up to the weekend and what happened during it was a pain in the backside and I was actually quite nervous when it came round to me doing my booking last night.

First of all I had an MOT on the van on Monday. Up until last year it had gone through fine. Last year it needed some work on it to get it through which included some welding and I spent a few quid on it. This year it needed more and the price it was going to cost was silly. It ended up with me getting a new van and committing to HP for the next 4 years, something I didn't want to do but I did need a new van and it's lovely but I could have done without having to find a couple of grand for the deposit. Thankfully the missus came to the rescue......again.

Then, one of my customers who has booked me for a 40th Birthday in March (who is proving to be a pain in the backside too) started mucking me about. I won't go into it all as it's a bit pointless but it's one of those situations where I wish I had not taken on the booking because I am getting calls nearly every day. Not the usual updates or questions about music etc but silly questions about the equipment and what the lights look like. Most customers don't care about that do they but this one does....and then some more.....and some more after that. No matter how many times I explain what they do or send them youtube links showing what they do, they still keep asking the same old, same old.

Wednesday I hear from my Mum who is texting me from hospital as she's been rushed in. Thankfully she's ok now.

Friday night I must have eaten something dodgy because I was up during the night with stomach cramps and back and forth to the loo and after what seemed like a couple of hours sleep, I was up early and at the venue setting up for last nights booking. I was still back and forth to the loo whilst I was setting up so it took me slightly longer than usual. I'd arranged to set up early after speaking to the venue midweek and this was a new venue for me. The person in charge was very helpful and wants me to go and see her next week. She seemed very interested after seeing me last night.


So, it was a booking for a customer who I've done a number of Discos for. It was her 40th Birthday party. She's a lovely lady and a good payer too. She never flinches about prices like some others may do and she just so happens to think I am the mutts nuts for some reason. I think she's pretty well thought of and respected in her community and she knows the lady at the venue very well.
This booking only came in a couple of weeks ago via a text message as she had already booked the venue and wondered whether I was available. She said she was told that she didn't have to use the resident DJ if she didn't want to (she wasn't very complimentary about them). She'd bigged me up to the lady in charge so when I called during the week that's why the lady in charge wanted to know a bit more about what I do. After last night I would say with confidence that I will be back there a lot more.

I was booked from 8.00pm - 01.00am which is the usual deal with this customer. She knows exactly what she wants and doesn't want. Her and her staff are all into Dance, Chart and R&B. Ok, nothing wrong with that but doing that for 5 hours is a bit of a push for me at times. One of the reasons I was a bit nervous was because for the past 2 bookings that I have done (the last was 18 months ago), she has provided me with an extensive list of stuff she likes so I've worked with it and added in other stuff. Despite many texts and calls this week chasing up her requests (because she said that she didn't really want much from the old lists), I didn't get anything so I went in to the gig with a blank page as such. Well, I didn't really because I thought I'd print out her previous requests just to use as pointers. One of the first things she did when she saw me was to apologise for not giving me any ideas. She then told me that she had 100% confidence in me because I was "awesome".....er, ok? No pressure then eh!
A nice compliment yes but I am far from "awesome" when I have dodgy guts, haven't eaten a thing all day and am knackered, dehydrated and full of nerves before I even start. Add to that not much of an idea as to what she is into these days.
She is definitely not the Cha Cha Slide, Whitney Houston or party type.

I wouldn't say I "winged it" but I was looking for inspiration at times and going through my various folders and playing stuff that I hadn't done for ages and it was just working a treat. One lady came over and asked if I could play some Abba and also the track 'Cecilia'. I wrote them down and knew that they were likely not to get played and when the birthday girl came over to tell me that she was loving it and so was everyone else, she noticed them written on my sheet. I said to her "They're a no, no aren't they" and she nodded. "Keep doing what you're doing" she said "It's excellent. My friends and the staff are all loving it"....so that's what I did.

It worked well. The dance floor was pretty healthy all evening and I had lots of great feedback.
A couple of things to mention though.....

Firstly, a guy came over and asked me for a business card. He said "Do you do weddings? I am getting married next year and am interested in booking you but I'd like a varied music selection because I couldn't hear this kind of stuff all night" - I found that funny and explained that week after week I am either doing a wedding or booking where I am playing a varied music selection. I explained that this selection was simply because it was what the customer wanted.

Secondly, a guy came over to have a nose at what I was doing. He wanted to have a look at my stuff and seemed very interested. I asked him if he was having a good time and he said it was great. He stood there for a few minutes and then went back to the dance floor. I was beginning to get a bit light headed after not eating all day and dehydration so I put on one of the customers favourite tunes - Pete Heller - Big Love. I put the 10 minute extended mix on as I wanted to get some fresh air. The doors to the room were right by me so I nipped outside and observed. I looked at it all from the customer's perspective and saw the lights and full dance floor and people enjoying themselves and it put a smile on my face......until I saw the guy who had spoken to me behind my console.
I went straight back in pretty quickly. He was pretending to DJ behind the decks and had placed his drink on my stand. I said "Oi, what are you playing at?" I could see he had obviously mucked about with my EQ settings on the mixer. "Let me mix the next track" he asked... I picked up his drink and gave it to him and then said "Sorry mate but nobody touches my equipment. This is my job and my living, go and do one please" (I did say please and I kept my cool). He knew he was in the wrong and scarpered pretty quickly even though he was twice my size!

At the end of the night the birthday girl was more than happy. When she came over to me, the guy came over with her and apologised and said "top job".
The lady in charge said to give her a call to arrange to go and see her next week.
This morning I have woken up with an eye infection (stye). It just gets better doesn't it.

I've had a similar kind of week. On Friday morning at work we were all called into a meeting to be told the people who'd volunteered for redundancies weren't enough so... there are to be compulsory redundancies. It was pretty much 'off you go, if you've not heard by 11.30 you're okay'. Talk about tenter hooks! I wasn't called in, so I'm 'safe'. For now. Safe? Nobody's ever safe!

Then on Friday night, my mother phoned to say my Dad has been found to have an enlarged prostate which is probably benign but they're running some tests...

Last night I was handed a wedding reception disco at a local hotel. No, the hotel wouldn't return my requests for information about the booking - but as it turned out a ceilidh band were setting up when I arrived at 6pm. I was slightly inconvenienced by the boot of my car refusing to open - I generally use the spare key since I'm not the main car user but the central locking had decided not to open the boot (the main remote key opened the boot first time when I got home.. Grrr). I rigged the gear up & set out to find out a running order, names etc... Which thankfully the band knew because the manager wasn't forthcoming.

The time came to announce the cutting of the cake, then I played out the first dance & the couple were joined by many other couples. After that the ceilidh band struck up & had lots of people dancing. Time & dances rolled on until the willow was stripped. The buffet was called open at 9pm & I played background music until 9.30 when the band were going to do one more stripping of the willow before the disco. Ah, but the groom asked the band not to bother. The reason for this was that the majority of the guests had left!

I worked with the few people remaining, taking requests & playing them all to a good response. For the rest of the night most of my mic time was devoted to announcing the arrival of taxis for yet more people to leave. The last half hour was spent keeping the sum total of six people happy. Nobody was left by the usual last orders time so we called it a night.

The room was at full capacity before the buffet, with everybody enjoying the ceilidh band whether they were dancing or not. After that.. who knows?

Onwards & upwards, next weekend I've a wedding reception on Saturday (Valentine's day of course) and Sunday night next week too.

EDIT: Oh yeah, I forgot to mention the guy who took me to task for not being a 'proper' DJ. "Where's all ye records?", he asked. "See this arm?", I said, waving my right arm at him.. "It's two inches longer than the other one from all the years I carted vinyl around with me". We had a bit of a laugh & compared notes on our own wedding discos, with him sympathising with my lot by the end of the conversation & wishing me luck.

I'll use that line next time someone accuses me of the same. That's a good one!

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Originally Posted by DJ Jules

. Weird part of the night was the end as I had the last 20mins planned out to wind down the night going from Reach to Peter Andre to UB40 to either Thinking about you or Greatest day. The other DJ in the room had the same kind of idea and came up and suggested Bob Marley or another chilled Reggae track as I went into UB40, but the birthday girl had other ideas and asked me to cut UB40 and go into Guetta, Lovers on the Sun (twice!!) to finish.

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Really? I try to leave the night on a high, winding it up rather than down. Am I in the minority on this?

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Originally Posted by little al

Really? I try to leave the night on a high, winding it up rather than down. Am I in the minority on this?

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I always try to end the night positively if that's what you mean. Where the last track is dictated by the customer it's out of my hands but the last time this happened the song was 'One Day Like This' by Elbow. IMHO a slow dirge of a song but you know, seeing everybody, and I mean EVERYBODY joined hands singing along proved the point.

Some venues, not necessarily where mobiles involved actually have a policy of playing a 'clear the place' kind of track. When I worked in bars & clubs part of a big chain this was Dean Martin's 'That's Amore'.. and it didn't always have the desired effect ;)

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Originally Posted by little al

Really? I try to leave the night on a high, winding it up rather than down. Am I in the minority on this?

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For the most part I like to finish on a high, but it's not a set-rule. Last night for instance. The night started to fizz away around 11PM. There weren't many guests, probably around 40 all night. When it started to dwindle around 11pm with the older guests heading home I approached the Bride & Groom and asked how they wanted to proceed. We could finish early on a high whilst there are still enough guests or end the night on 'a high', or whether they would like to carry on until midnight? We had around 20 or so guests left but the groom asked if I would mind continuing until 12? Sure, no problem, I'm booked till then anyway. He asks if "I could just wind it down for the last hour, nothing too fast of a tempo". Again, not a problem. I asked if he had any favourite genre of music that he would like included for the last hour, and he mentioned '80s and 80's slow rock and power ballads'. I started off the last hour thinking the last 20(ish) guests might start drifting away with an hour of down-tempo songs during the last hour, but they all remained on the floor with the bride and groom until the end of the night. NEVER UNDER-ESTIMATE HOW WELL THE CLIENT KNOWS THEIR GUESTS! So whilst it wasn't the high-energy crescendo I like to finish with, it ended up being a perfect finish to the night that suited the tastes of the clients and their guests.

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Originally Posted by little al

Really? I try to leave the night on a high, winding it up rather than down. Am I in the minority on this?

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I suspect you're not - I usually go with the atmosphere in the room based on what has been successful through the night (unless I'm in a club and then I'll wind it right down for the last few tracks). In the majority of cases this would mean going from Reach into something similarly 90's cheese into one of the usual suspects to close (Dirty dancing, Take that, New York, etc) but in this case most people have drifted off and the 15-20 or so left were scattered around and not grouped together and the few requests I'd had leading up to the finish had been MUCH lower energy tracks that I couldn't have played (Thinking out loud, Adele, etc) so I thought I'd wind it down. The Guetta track was a complete curve ball from the birthday girl.

Julian