On Djing...

Last Friday, towards the end of a fairly shit night (some truly horrible people turned up, off their fucking tits, which drove a lot of the nice people away, and by the time I got the management to get rid of the worst one, the damage was done), I mixed Warren G "Regulate" into Blue "Fly By II" - at which point one of the few remaining people went "How can you go from THAT into THIS? Change it!" So I changed it... to "All Rise" by Blue. Pure malevolence, but I was past caring.

oh man, i feel you on that. when it gets to a certain point you gotta make your feelings known.

sometimes you have to let people know you aren't going to take their shit!

Ugh, drunks are the worst.

Just a heads up: Defected has their House Masters discography (35 digital albums) on sale for about $50 on bandcamp right now. I copped.

https://housemastersdefected.bandcamp.com

Let it quietly be known that I was open to a couple of local gigs (for the first time in over 10 years) due to summer + I have COVID so I think I'm safe for a couple of months once I get over it? But having a laugh that everyone just wants me to go to their open deck nights with a cover and paid parking to play for 20 minutes for free*. Back to not playing locally with meeeee.

*cover means I pay them tho

Also @ map, sorry+happy to hear about your Thursdays but sometimes that's the game. And don't beat yourself up about friction with the crowd at times because you're just being you, you're just being human. No one can manage playing AND being charming all night all the time, especially when we all know people absolutely become unreasonable when they perceive you as "the help" for their night out. You're a really nice frood and I hope that Sunday roof thing kicks off for you, also because it'd get you psychologically less focused on the first venue (which seems to cyclically cause you a lot of stress).

And @ Moodles, there's absolutely something wrong with that club system and I'd check that someone hasn't messed with the curves on the EQs or that there isn't a bad limiter or something. I literally wouldn't play on a system that worked like that and if you're DJing at home on anything more than laptop speakers, there shouldn't be that big a difference between what you're doing there and out. Best to bring it up with the engineers at the places you're playing!

I'll definitely look into it more next time I'm there, but I'm also going to make sure I have the gains cranked as much as they can be without going into the red. I think a lot of the music that gets played there is ultra brickwalled, and a lot of what I play is not, so it may need some extra oomph

i finally cold-messaged someone about getting a DJ slot at the bar he books for but haven’t heard back from him (it’s been over a week). gonna keep trying there and other places. my next scheduled gig is the end of this month, the usual LGBT happy hour which is going to be co-hosted by the local gay rugby squad. i’m very excited about this particular gig for…multiple reasons lmao :x

shortly after that i’m slated to co-DJ my friends’ wedding party. they have pretty similar tastes as me so i feel like i’m gonna get to play some stuff in my general wheelhouse which is fun. still a little nervous about it because i’m not really used to playing to audiences who are expecting to actually dance, but hopefully it’ll all go smoothly

also recently made the acquaintance of an older DJ here, he’s an LA local who’s been collecting and playing out for many years now and does a weekly happy hour at a bar not far from me. went to see him play the other week and just hung out near the booth the whole time and chatted with him. happy to expand my DJ pal circle, especially in this city where it all feels sorta impenetrable at times

nice updates. i think just getting out there is important, you never know what's going to come your way. xii those gigs sound thankless but sometimes something is better than nothing i guess?

checking back in with current gay bar this coming sunday. rumors more persistent about "did you hear they're getting torn down?" i will find out how long they're going to be open if i can.

i might see if the bar i want to end up at would be interested in having me on a monday or tuesday night for less $.

After coked-off-their-tits-and-beyond fuckhead week, we pivoted happily back to nice people who like good music week, which came as a blessed relief.

@ Map - I appreciate the "I started DJing in 2020" types telling me about open signups but yeah, I'm not tossing ten at the door and driving half an hour to play 3 songs for 12 straight dudes just waiting their turn. I know I kinda started this thread with "they didn't show up" but they eventually did and I had an okay run here ten years ago. And I came back to stuff hot, getting nods from a lot of mags for the work I was doing during the pandemic. I'm not too elite for lowkey hometown gigs and I'm not demanding headliner slots, I'll open for something cool or someone nice for funsies and two drinks at a house party if I don't have to go far, but yeah, I have a limit.

I'm a complete nobody by comparison and I steer clear of open decks gigs like that, the only way I could imagine justifying them would be if I just wanted a chance to get some extra practice in on a professional setup.

i'm doing my tea dance again this summer! old bar wants me back. the one that just canceled my thursday has basically ghosted me and is going down the shitter / getting sold. sundays 5-9 are sooo much better for me time-wise too.

yay that's great!

Sounds great! Them selling explains some of the issues you've been having - sounds like lots of behind closed doors drama. Glad you can wash your hands of it.

first sunday went well overall, had a few of last year's regulars come & managed to please 2-3 other groups who wandered out onto the patio. happy to be back at it but it's still a wonder to me how hauling a few fairly light things into a bar and standing there for 4 hours can make me so incredibly sore and tired.

i think it's because that whole time you're in "performance mode" - like even when i feel kinda bored in the booth i'm still conscious of being perceived/on alert to whatever's going on with the decks, plus standing still for four hours is kinda exhausting anyway. glad the first sunday went well!

both my gigs this past week were very fun. the rugby boys apparently liked my set at the LGBT happy hour, heard secondhand from someone that "everybody was vibing" to my set (lol LA). my pals' wedding went over a treat too, the dance floor stayed consistently hoppin' throughout the evening. i had one sorta-humiliating screw-up there (accidentally loaded a song onto the deck that was playing), but the crowd compensated for it by singing along to what i'd been playing which was very sweet. i'm not used to commanding an actual dance floor, it was kind of an amazing experience.

if anyone's interested, this is what was played at the wedding (i did roughly the first and last thirds, another friend of the couple took over for the middle third). the couple in question are gays with very cool tastes, i had planned to play some deeper cut italo stuff but had to cut a bunch of selections for time:

Rufus & Chaka Khan - Ain't Nobody
Pointer Sisters - Automatic
Diana Ross - Upside Down
Patrice Rushen - Forget Me Nots
Sister Sledge - Lost in Music
Black Box - Everybody, Everybody
Company B - Fascinated
Taylor Dayne - Tell It To My Heart
New Order - Bizarre Love Triangle
Human League - Don't You Want Me?
Deee-Lite - Groove Is In The Heart
Mary J. Blige - Family Affair
TLC - Creep
Prince - Let's Go Crazy
Madonna - Ray of Light
Kylie x New Order - Can't Get Blue Monday Out of My Head
Shannon - Give Me Tonight
Jennifer Lopez - Waiting for Tonight
Azealia Banks - Luxury
Crystal Waters - 100% Pure Love
Janet Jackson - Escapade
Goldfrapp - Ooh La La
Robyn - Hang With Me
Cher - Believe
Whitney Houston - It's Not Right but It's Okay (Thunderpuss Mix)
Sharon Brown - I Specialize In Love
Donna Summer - I Feel Love
Mariah Carey - Heartbreaker (feat. Jay-Z)
Beyonce - Cuff It
Prince - U Got The Look
Haddaway - What Is Love
Corona - The Rhythm of the Night
Real McCoy - Another Night
Klymaxx - Meeting In The Ladies Room
Righeira - Vamos A La Playa
Chris & Cosey - Oktober
Q Lazzarus - Goodbye Horses

i'm not used to commanding an actual dance floor, it was kind of an amazing experience.

totally!

loading a song onto the deck that's already playing is something i still do from time to time but the ptsd from it has created a muscle memory where whenever i get to the load to deck option i'm super deliberate about it now lol.

that wedding set looks fav, thanks for sharing it!

super good wedding playlist - seismic last 2 tracks!

Was just driving to Company B yesterday. All time fave.

I still take the needle off the playing album. It only happens after a really good transition. Never a bad one.

Spun for an hour at the local record fair yesterday. Was a fun experience, if a little expensive.

Got a gratifying number of people coming up and asking what a song or other was, compliments, and just seeing people generally grooving & having a good time. One guy came up and asked where he could hear me play — nice! (Even though the answer was “nowhere, ECK-tually”) When the main DJ came back on, one of the other vendors texted me just “Get back on the decks.”

The expensive part came when I was back-cueing and hit “start”, which I assumed would cause the table to stop spinning backward and run forward — but instead it ran backwards at speed and threw the tonearm off the record. Stylus was damaged & I’ve ordered a replacement for the owner, whoops.

lol at "get back on the decks," good work. sucks about the stylus :|

And then out of the blue today I got a call to do a coffee shop set on Thursday afternoon. It’s during work hours, but I don’t have any meetings so I’ll take the afternoon as a PTO and do it! Fifty bucks plus free lemonade, at least it’ll pay for half that stylus.

I love it when deeper cuts unexpectedly land. Tonight it was Azymuth “Jazz Carnival” into X-Press2 “Tranz Euro Xpress”. Frankly, I was trepidatious, but they got solid reaction and track ID requests for both. You just never know.

totally, it's so gratifying.

so far my sunday tea dance has been .. attended, lol. 10 people or fewer each sunday but that's ok. if a handful of people come and enjoy i have a reason to be there. last night we had a huge electrical storm roll in around 8:30, torrential downpour. bar owner had installed a tin roof over the patio before last winter and it held up pretty well. i got kind of emotional playing "together again" by janet jackson with lightning and pouring rain in the background.

my last bar has asked me to return on thursdays and i've said yes. it's going to be a busy summer. i've already spent a few weeks of the extra income on new outfits lol.

started back up at the other gay bar on thursday nights last night and it was great. i have this run of 10 or so tracks that i roll out at the right time and folks got a little delirious. the queen who i had issues with previously was not there. i had several compliments / people asking me what nights i'd be playing, and handed out business cards twice. couldn't have asked for a better return. also apparently the bar isn't even sold yet, i was huffing on rumors lol. but who even knows what they're telling bar staff.

Got a last-minute gig tonight at a brewery. “Don’t bring anything, just your records.” I brought 45 adapters, headphones & cartridges, all of which I ended up needing. One of the turntables had low, crackly output. Swapping carts revealed it wasn’t the cartridge; swapping channels revealed it wasn’t the mixer. I ended up cobbling together an aux cord from stuff I had in my car and stuff that was lying around, and “spinning” every second song from my phone. Not ideal, but it worked out and they asked me to do another night later in the summer. Success? Success.

nice work, love to troubleshoot sound when you were supposed to start 5 minutes ago

way to go hd, sounds hectic but awesome that you pulled it off. very professional.

one of my biggest challenges is not getting stressed when there are sound issues.

Same, map. I agonized over that for years and then finally just decided to relax and let house sound guys do their job. I'm just one aux cord nowadays so whatever.

I finally got an offer from a local dude to play something at something that isn't a house party, but I have to bring all my own equipment + I'd need to buy new stage monitors because they apparently don't have any (??) and my reference ones from home are underpowered for the space + carry those monitors four blocks to load em in and out. Also there's another DJ who has to have all their own equipment and we have to have two separate setups all night. Pay was laughable. I'm back to not playing locally, at least until my friend's art gallery opens and I'll be doing a downtempo social function there.

I DJ'd the wedding of an ex at the weekend. It was really well received, but I have a new found respect for wedding DJs. So many supposedly upbeat "good times" party anthems actually have meta-textual lyrics about heartbreak and how everything is going to go to shit. I'm sure no one who is drunk and dancing would care too much, but it's only when you're up there playing these songs, they suddenly develop a weird context

Weddings are hell to DJ. You have my infinite sympathies.

Yeah I don't enjoy doing those kinds of things, but it was a favour and I was playing mostly to old friends

man i'm grateful i have a busy pride weekend

last night was a good night, even though there was literally one shitty speaker on the floor that worked (something popped last saturday and they lost the rest).

i have an hour set tonight at a party with lots of other djs. going full gay-club-pop.

sunday, who knows what's in store, but i'm grateful i can go a little deeper in that venue without feeling like i'm letting down the floor or whatever.

hell yeah, get 'em

last night some cool girls gave me lots of compliments and followed my insta, and the bartender told me a dj i like was throwing my name around recently in a good way. i have to remember the good things.

xp :)

love to hear all this map (except for the blown speaker part) <3

i don't have another night until the end of the month but it's technically a pride gig so i guess i should have 'padam padam' at the ready lol

haha! <3

I’ve got a couple of Pride gigs coming up, the second one at a great venue in the nearest city, and I’ve got an 80s Hi-NRG night in Nottingham to look forward to as well (thanks to what turned out to be a most advantageous hook up in Manchester a couple of months ago, ahum).

any other way of landing a hi-nrg night would be lacking.

I just ‘inherited’ a collection of a few hundred Hi-Nrg 12” singles. My partner’s best friend moved to Thailand and her husband was trying to find a good home for his collection and asked me if I’d be interested. Was I ever!

They are all in immaculate condition, so much so that it’s hard to believe they were ever played, yet he says he listened to them relentlessly in the mid to late 80s. It is the only music he ever bought and he was obsessed with Hi-Nrg for a few years. There is a handful of late period Italo 12”s in there too and oddly also two 12” singles by The Cult, but all the rest is pure Hi-Nrg. I’ve not had a chance to listen to much yet but from looking through probably know a third of it already and can tell that a fair chunk of the rest is going to be on the extreme cheesy end of the Nrg spectrum, but I am fairly sure I’ll find some gold in there. The “Male Stripper” picture disc I never knew existed looks awesome!

The guy who gave me the collection is autistic which I guess could be reflected by how well kept the records are but also in that he had this obsessive interest for a few years that very suddenly stops. He never bought music before he discovered Hi-Nrg and said when House music came along and more or less replaced it at the dance music record shop he frequented he lost interest and never bought another record again, ever. It’s also interesting to me that he is straight and seemed to have a particular penchant for the most suggestive of Hi-Nrg tracks. He had a lot of Recca 12” singles which rather than A-side and B-side designations, have a Top side and a Bottom side.

Hi-Nrg was of course huge in straight mainstream working class clubs in Scotland and a lot of England at the time. It was the dominant soundtrack for many years as demonstrated by the Saturday late night ”live from a nightclub” hit ITV programme “The Hitman & Her” hosted by Pete Waterman who made most of his millions with PWL’s diluted (but sometimes brilliant, and always brilliantly mixed and produced - shout out to Phil Harding) Hi-Nrg sound. I’ve long bored people to death going on about how the vast majority of Man 2 Man’s “Male Stripper” sales were in Scotland and if a Scottish chart had existed then it would have been number one for here months. It is firmly lodged in the psyche of almost all Scots of a certain age - an eternal favourite for so many people, the vast majority of whom, at the time at least, were somehow unaware of its gayness. Such a curious thing! The guy whose collection it was told this story about how he used to play his 12”s at home so much that they would get stuck in his dad’s head. His dad, a very working class Glaswegian worked in a factory and his work mates started giving him curious looks as he was constantly (unconsciously) singing the chorus of “I Need A Man” by Man 2 Man at work. So, I guess some people did notice.

I asked him what he liked so much about Hi-Nrg and he just said ‘“the energy”. Fair enough.

irl lol

The “Male Stripper” picture disc I never knew existed looks awesome!

oh my god

irl lol but also feeling a little called out w/r/t neurodivergency / owning the most suggestive of tracks

Aren’t we all neurodivergent here? That’s the only reason I hang out here.

Well jel of your haul there stirmonster (and also dying to know what cult records were in there)

“Resurrection Joe” and “She Sells Sanctuary”.