Good Gig, Bad Gig.

[Excalibur]

I'm not known as the most personable of chaps on the Scottish forums.

No I can't, it's like shooting fish in a barrel.

So... dance floor is picking up nicely and I now have a new problem. Inappropriate requests from the Groom.

The second thorniest of thorny problems, trumped only by when it's the Bride doing it.

I don't get it when people do this. Clearly the Best man knew that he had a big responsibility to make the day go well for the B&G and had a real desire to make that happen, but he was hammered before I even arrived. Generally if I'm given something important to do I try and keep a clear head!

Sort of fits in with the inappropriate requests. < Miserable Old Git mode engaged: The times members of the bridal party/close family/best mates, claiming to wish to say something uproariously funny which will have the audience either splitting their sides with laughter, or crowding onto the dancefloor en masse..............................

We are then usually treated to a stream of verbal diarrhoea, heavily laced with profanities, shouts, and exhortations of various kinds. Very rarely is the desired/promised effect achieved, I'm sad to say. > Miserable Old Git mode disengaged.

Julian, I'm afraid you've committed the cardinal sin. Thinking like a DJ. You're accustomed to being in a position of responsibility, remaining in a fit state to fulfill your duties, and being all things to all people. That's not the way it's done, nowadays. At the earliest possibility, you get stuck into the lager of choice, and possibly a few shots to help it down, bounce around like a giraffe on ice, and then think you're suddenly the oracle who knows exactly the best things to say and do to maximise everyone's enjoyment, particularly the Bride and Groom. Yeah, right.


OK, my turn. A bit of juggling on my part, I had a function at my local social club for Saturday, and a pub I'm trying to keep in with wanted Karaoke the same night. I offered to do the Karaoke in the afternoon, as the whole area round this pub was having a fundraising day, and it would fill the day for them. No worries, as knowing I could set up the club the night before meant I could leave a set there and take a Karaoke rig out on the road. Wrong.

It wasn't the social club as expected, it was the full village hall, so bigger rig and probably access issues. I've left a message with the caretaker about access, and I'm still waiting for him to get back to me a day after the gig. Hmmm. Long story short, I got set up Friday by a different route, and bit by bit, details of the gig emerged. It wasn't the small 70th Birthday I believed I'd been booked for, but a Karate Club presentation evening, ages from under a year to older than me. Ah well.

So, off to the pub with the Karaoke rig. Let's just say it was an underwhelming experience, and I was leaving just as a throng of punters were arriving. It was ever thus. I got a flier from here, and was early for the Karate Club. Equally underwhelming really, bit of background first thing, then buffet, then play Here Comes Santa Claus/ Santa Claus Is Coming To Town for the man himself to arrive to, and he hands out gifts for the little ones. Bit more background, then a long presentation of belts and certificates ( and if I'd had the big mixer in play, the organiser would have found his mic muted, every time he drummed on it with his fingers to simulate the nervous heartbeat of the recipients. Hilarious, right? ), then three songs before an excruciating auction where the lots achieved way below market value. ( which isn't normally how it's done, but let's let that go ), and equally excruciating raffle with more heartbeats, until it was my turn to shine, yay!

At this point, I feel I ought to point out that I'd started the night with around fifty people in a hall which could cope easily with a hundred and fifty seated, and now the raffle and formalities were done I had a lot less. I then proceeded to be " and Disco " for two mind numbingly boring hours. The under twelves kept me occupied with the usual chart songs, and I rounded off the last quarter hour with Xmas Classics.

So, two gigs where I lost the will to live halfway through, so resounding failures, eh?

Nope, all customers chuffed to bits, and singing my praises. Funny old game, isn't it?

[Shakermaker Promotions]

I'm writing this review from a hotel room as I stayed over after a couple of beers with some of the guests from last nights party.
Let's go back to Friday's party first of all.....
To say it was a "messy one" would be a massive understatement. There were 5 different companies in for the evening and I counted 6 guys out of the 100 guests. I have never seen so many women so drunk.
Fair play to them for dancing all night and being very complimentary but the constant backing into the Equinox screen soon became annoying if I am being honest. One girl in particular was a bit 'hands on' and whilst I am not one to complain, I did feel uncomfortable at times, even though she was quite a stunner (albeit a very drunk stunner).

A good night though.

Last night was a party for just one company. 95 guests attending (a fitness bootcamp) and I must admit that I was very apprehensive about this one. The reason being, I did their party last year and they gave me a less than easy time.
I need not have worried though because they were absolutely spot on. Yes, they were drinking big time but the dance floor was packed all evening and they were really getting into it. There were a few old friends attending (I didn't know they were there until halfway through the evening), hence the couple of relaxing beers at the end of the night.

Tonight I am back there for a small party of 50 with an 11.00pm finish. It's another bunch that I have DJ'd before and if it's the same as previous years, it is doubtful that they'll make it to 11.00pm. Looking forward to getting back home later and sleeping in my own bed.

Back next week for another bunch of parties and then the final furlong!

Incidentally, I'm starting all of the parties this year with Backstreet Boys - Everybody (Backstreet's Back) and it is working very well.

[Nakatomi]

My last Saturday wedding of the year last night. And a Christmas party in another room just to make life more fun. Yay!

Rolled up way way early to setup the xmas party rig. Micron booth, 2 mackies, stairville LED PAR thingy and 2x powerflowers wirelessly DMXed master/slave. That done,I had to wait a while for the wedding reception room to be cleared so I could get in with my stuff - ah but because the xmas party people are starting to arrive already can we possibly get the wedding party into the room by 6.45? Erm... maybe? 6.30 on the dot by walkin DJ & his trainee showed up so I helped them get sorted out & returned to my booth.

First dance was scheduled for 7.30pm but people were a little late coming into the room. I gave them a few minutes warning of the 1st dance during my intro but as the time approached half past I noticed we were still light on people. I played Bruno Mars - Just The Way You Are to pad out a bit. Bride & Groom appeared at the centre of the dancefloor with a look of thunder about them. Bride yells this isn't our song! I know! People are still coming in, I point out so you've got a couple of minutes don't worry. Phew.

A little later I announced the big moment and could barely hear applause or cheers, but off they went regardless. Straight into Shut Up & Dance to follow, and then tumbleweeds until a bit later. During buffet time a woman begged me to get some heavy Clubland donkish music on. I explained I wasn't going there while people were still eating & said maybe later. Later, she returned asking for Northern Soul. Talk about going from bad to worse. Sheesh. Most of the guests didn't seem like either kind of crowd so I skipped it.

Not many actual requests other than one from the bride & one from her Dad which I'll come to in a minute. I eventually found the level of the room, in that they loved a bit of rock. Oops forgot the request for Penny Arcade which I had to cut short due to morons refusing to put their drinks down. Gawd, the prices this place charges for drinks I'd be putting a lid on my glass never mind throwing it all over the dancefloor! Anyway, bride asked me to play M0 - Final Song which I went straight into from a deskstopped Penny Arcade (take that, ye booze throwing muppets!). Went down fairly well, so I ploughed into some recentish dance & then went into 90s for a while. That section went a bit like this:
M0 - Final Song. Tinie Tempah - Girls Like. Steve Angello rework of Show Me Love. Sandy B - Make The World Go Round. Then a sneaky long looped intro over the top of the remains of Sandy B.. of Born Slippy. The roof was starting to show signs of coming down during this.. loads of haze, loads of selective strobing & blinder flashes, selective blackouts.. whoops from the guests.. and at a decent point a nice deckstop into Insomnia.

And it was then the bride's Dad came over to demand Gangnam Style Okay, I'll play it next I said. Maybe it'd work. He went to the bar & on his way back came up again. "ARE YOU IGNORING ME? You know how much I've paid for all this? I'm paying your wages!" Oh great. I ignored him anyway. I don't get paid enough to put up with that kind of crap. Gangnam Style did get played next all the same.

Young kids suddenly appeared to bombard me with requests for Whip NaeNae & JuJu.. gah... at ten to midnight. Really?! Rrrr. So I did & the kids showed the adults all their moves & we went to more cliched wedding fayre. For the end I did my big outro kind of thing & sent them into a reprise of the first dance, which resulted in a beautiful ending - which was only marred by massive amounts of booing because I refused to play one more song. Tough! I can't repeat what the bride's mother shouted at me. It involved Elvis & a word starting with the letter C anyway.

Packing down & getting 2 rigs out of there took the best part of 2 hours thanks in large part to all the loitering people. Still one I'm putting down as a great gig though. Why let 60 or so heads spoil it?

[Shakermaker Promotions]

Another Christmas party last night at the residency and this time it was a small party of 50 for Debenhams with an 11.00pm finish due to it being a Sunday.
A relatively young crowd who were the slowest eaters ever. By the time they'd finished their (2 course meal this time), it was 8.30pm and then once they'd done the raffle and presentation it was gone 9.00pm. I have been starting around 9.15pm with 100 guests and a 3 course meal.

It felt like a long day yesterday and I was both raring to go and looking forward to my bed at the same time.

They were up for a party though and it was mainly current chart stuff to start off with until someone asked for some cheese (action songs).
It was the first time this year that I played the likes of Cha Cha Slide and Macarena etc.... and it worked wonders. Every single person was up on the dance floor.
Although they were dancing for the 2 hours that I played for, it felt a bit subdued because they all had to work today. Apart from a handful of people (which included the management), everybody stayed until the last song of the evening.

Because of the small numbers attending, it meant that I could get out pretty quickly and I was loaded up and heading towards the motorway by 11.30pm.

It's been good going so far. Fingers crossed that it continues this way.

[ppentertainments]

Thus far my Xmas parties have been quite uneventful really. Each one really good, with the smaller numbers tending to be more lively – Monday only had 24 people and last night 20, but they were definetely livelier than the 120+ nights.

Sunday saw me pop back into wdding mode for the day, with an all day wedding, starcloth & Uplighting. What a sight that was, I am sure some guests got mixed up with Halloween dress and Xmas/wedding – it was a Xmas themed wedding.

The bride was one of the nicest people you could meet and was an absolute pleasure to deal with, the rest of the party were the exact opposite and you could feel the tension in the room. First ‘kick off’ was when the step-mother refused to sit in the same row as the Mother – even though this is what the bride had wished for, then after that it was a constant competition between the 2. Room changeover after the ceremony saw them each popping in every 2 minutes and undoing what the other had done. When the bride came to see the room she was speechless and tears developed as it was very overwhelming for her – the groom however couldn’t even be bothered to come into the room. The bride said to me at this point ‘there are already people bitching out there about me’.

Everyone into the room, meal served, onto the speeches. Half way through the brides Fathers speech the groom ‘had to go to the toilet’, the best mans speech nobody knew what he was saying as was so drunk already.

Onto the evening and the Brides sister was doing a dance routine immediately before the first dance. I ensured everyone was in the room (had to wait for best man, groom and their friends to finally leave the bar) and the sister was fantastic at her routine. Announce the first dance and the groom had dissapeared again. Bit background music, groom appears after 15 minutes, get the signal for the first dance, make the announcement, groom leaves to ‘go to the toilet’.

The rest of the night consisted of the bride and about half a dozen of her friends and bridesmaids on the floor. They were big Clubland fans so about 11pm popped some cheesy clubland on, which they loved. About 1130 the Grooms sister comes storming over, banged the booth and said ‘this is a F’in wedding, what the F is this you have been playing all night, get it changed or my husband is coming to chin you’.

Red Rag to a bull (partly due to tiredness maybe) but I immediately cut the music and put some soppy slow stuff on and announced why. Floor clears, and bride came over to say ‘good on you, she has been a miserable bitch all day and is seething that you have embarrased her, well done’

The groom and his friends weren’t seen anywhere between 900 and 1150 when he came in to ask why the Rock music he requested wasn’t been played – quite obvious is was not just alcohol he had been consuming. I pointed out that maybe if he was in the room he would realise that his music was played for most of the night.

End of the night the Bride (as she had all day) came over to thank me, and went round all of the staff individually to thank them. She said 90% in the room came to not enjoy the day, which she was expecting, but her and her friends had a great time.

Was tempted to give her another business card to keep for after they are divorced and she finds herself someone decent, but thought better of it lol.

[Imagine]

A cheeky midweek Xmas party last night in one of the Cambridge colleges (I'm doing the rounds of those at the moment....nice places if you can get into them but more often than not a nightmare to physically get in and out of).

Tonight, a very well to do company in a very posh hall inside a college. Literally no expense spared (we're talking massive igloo photo booth, a separate events company to put gobos on the ceiling and uplighting, a venue dressing company to make it look like a winter wonderland, oh....and yours truly).

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! ).

Set up in good time (once I got in), and hung around for the meal to start. Background music levels checked, I went and settled into the common room and waited, waited some more, and then waited even longer for the meal to finish. The guests leave the hall for the common room to allow the venue staff to do the turnaround (30 mins was quoted and 30 mins it took), whilst I did a little bit of last minute tweaking and sound level checking before the main event.

Eventually at 10:20, the guests are allowed back into the room. I'm only booked to midnight (and it's a strict midnight to boot)....this is going to be easy peasy

And it was. The ice-carved vodka fountain thing appeared and it was DJ 1 - Photo booth 0 on this occasion. A full dance floor for the full 100 minutes.

I followed the college's rules, I didn't upset the principle (who I was warned would soon let me know if it got too loud as her flat is literally above the hall), and as a bonus, managed to get the porters to isolate the fire alarms.....I used my hazer machine

End of the night, loads of applause, a stack of business cards given to the events manager who is always being asked for discos and the start of the struggle to get out, which was compounded by the fact the porter seems to have dozed off for the night and it took nearly 20 minutes to get his attention so I could actually get off site through the rising gates.....

Only another 4 yuletide parties to go....getting bored of Mariah and Shaky now but if they're all this good......result

Back at yet another college tomorrow night. Unfortunately, the client has been "upgraded". This means their meal is in one hall, the disco in another so plenty of time to set up and no background duties. The downside, the upgraded room for the main event is upstairs


***Edit****
Peter was curious a while back as to how 15" tops would work with 12" subs. Answer....fantastically well (it surprised me).
I had the DXR15's up on tripods and a single DSR12 in stealth mode under the booth....it was just enough bass in that particular room (bear in mind it's a big, ancient college hall with a lot of echo) to shake the floor without bouncing back at me

[Excalibur]

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! ).

Wash your mouth out with soap that man! We won't have that kind of filthy talk here!

[Imagine]

Wash your mouth out with soap that man! We won't have that kind of filthy talk here!

OK - especially for you then Peter, I played cheese tonight by the shovel full

Another Cambridge college tonight (I could get used to playing in those places....the rules are soooooo much nicer and the guests so much more respectful). This time the guests were the staff from an international college where I've done parties for the students.

The plans changed at the last moment as to quite what was happening and at what times (basically they ended up meeting in one room, eating in another and then dancing in yet another....all spread across the college grounds). So, in my tired and confused state, I turned up at the time I'd previously agreed because I couldn't for the life of me remember what the new arrangements were. Turns out, I was about three hours too early

Oh well, nice easy set up then (once I've actually got from the van, across the various courtyards, through the kitchen to get to the lift and actually into the function room). At least the lift takes the fully laden Rock 'n' Roller R12 at full length

Got set up and took a walk around the grounds (as one does when in posh establishments). The guests were having a right merry time in the Great Hall eating their three course dinner (I'd had a couple of chocolate bars en-route). Even bumped into a couple of them having a crafty ciggy between courses (I don't miss doing that!), and it turns out the vino-collapso was flowing nice and freely during the meal.....oh goody

Eventually (at 9:30, bearing in mind I'd arrived shortly after 6pm), they're moved from the Great Hall to the Upper Hall where yours truly hits the button on Mariah Cary yet again.....boom - they're dancing....game on

It was another night where I couldn't do anything wrong. Everything just worked. Requests came in aplenty (mainly cheese and the regular party staples I would have played anyway), but they were happy and dancing so I'm not complaining. The biggest bonus of this particular establishment is that disco entertainment must end at 11:30....no exceptions or arguments....hey ho!

Half an hour later, I'm down through the kitchens, in the van and beginning a very slow trip home in fog so thick you can't actually see the road

Just two more to go this weekend (both kid's type functions), and I'm now running out of steam. I'm actually starting to feel burned out by doing 5 parties in the space of a week.

[Jim - Scotland's Party DJ]

Last gig of the year tonight at ibrox stadium

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

"go and tell the dj you're a dj"

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

"what would you play next?'

"do you need a mac to dj?"

And so on.

[Shakermaker Promotions]

I travelled down to Hampshire again yesterday morning and had to endure one of the longest journey's ever. Cars broken down in the fast lane on the M25 really didn't help and I am bunged up with bloody cold too.
Headed straight to the hotel to set up and then attempted to chill out for a couple of hours.

Christmas party at the residency with 3 companies attending and just under 100 guests again.
Everyone appeared to be up for it once I'd done the usual introductions and advised them all that they could request songs. Sometimes, I wish I could be blunt with people because I kind of get fed up with being polite at times.

I'd been playing for around 20 minutes when a girl came over and unbelievably asked me for Drowning Pool - Bodies! Now, I like the track, always have but I told her I would see what I could do but it was unlikely because it wasn't really appropriate for a Christmas party. She then decided to have a go at me because she thought the music I'd been playing was rubbish, despite her and the other guests packing the dance floor.
I tried to ignore her but every other song that came on, she'd look over at me and swig from her ever full glass of red wine. She was clearly full to the brim with it.

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"..... I felt like pulling my own eye balls out at the time. I felt like crap and was having to deal with some 'too cool for school' silly cow that eventually got it and eventually got into the party mood....

As if that wasn't enough, the other girl comes back over and says "Well, if you aren't playing Drowning Pool, can you play Linkin Park - Papercuts?". I simply replied "I doubt it if I am being honest, sorry".
As she was walking away, a friend of hers approached me and asked me for Kings of Leon.... I told her I would be playing it shortly. The end of the current track was fading out and B52's - Love Shack was cued up. As it started playing, she turned around and gave me THAT look.....you know, the cut throat look and shouted..."really??" sarcastically. I could have throttled her!

We were about 45 minutes from the end of the night when I am approached by a guy who asks me for some 80's. "No problem" I reply.... He then does a classic...."You probably haven't got any, in fact...I doubt if you've heard of him but, do you have anything by Nik Kershaw?"
I laughed, cued up Don't You Want Me? by The Human League, pressed play as the previous song faded out and then watched the dance floor fill up. I thought I'd try Nik Kershaw (The Riddle, as requested), and it had a mediocre response.

I was glad when that was all over to be fair. It wasn't easy at times, standing there having to endure evil stares from girls who couldn't get their own way and who were commenting about the tunes. It wasn't all night though as they soon calmed down but it was enough to make me feel self conscious about what I was doing. I don't think I'll ever get over that as it's one of those things that has always narked me.

Back there tonight, tomorrow and then Thursday before I can go home and do Christmas Eve at my local, a wedding on the 29th and then start something new (more on that in the new year).