woebot's djing post

[don_quixote]

http://www.woebot.com/2007/07/ipod_rave.html

hooplah!

we once considered bringing along a laptop with wifi so we could cater to anyones requests mainly because we almost exclusively dj whatever whoever is paying us wants us to play, but decided it would be too much of a faff. so we just cover most bases and if anyone said anything then we'd try and get as close as possible. (i threw away the goddamn queen cd in a fit of rage after the person i dj with played it when i told everyone we didnt have any queen to stop us playing it)

anyway, rather than getting us to download it, some guy once made a request by bringing along his goddamn memory stick. thankfully we didnt have a laptop with us... we learnt from that experience when we had a loose connection once and it kept cutting out and all the people who were dancing could here was us swearing loudly :-/

the best way to stop people making requests is to look intimidating haha

 

[Edward]

Obiovusly you're there to entertain people so if they don't like what you're doing you should notice and try and move the style towards where the people are.

But you're a DJ, not a jukebox.

I always tell persistent requesters one of the following:

if you want to control the music, you should become a DJ, no really, you're obviously really into it blah blah

or

you should go somewhere with a jukebox instead of a dj

or

look, everyone else is dancing and having a good time, you are the only one complaining. why should I change it just for you?

unless they actually request something I was gonna play anyway, then I smile and go "yeah that's a great idea!"

 

[STN]

I'm an awful, drunken mess of a DJ, which perhaps makes people feel (correctly?) that they have more jurisdiction over what I play. What's weird is the persistence bordering on desperation with which people badger you - it seems as if they simply cannot have a good time until they hear the tune they want.

 

[swears]

I don't think DJs should have to take requests. I want to rely on the DJs good taste to entertain me on a night out, it's nice to be surprised a flow of great tunes you've never heard before, and may never even identify. (That sort of adds to the magic, imo)

 

[Logan Sama]

I never do requests. And it is down to the promoter to book the right DJ for the event, not the DJ to change their set for the event. Obviously there are certain exceptions, but I would never start playing a completely different type of music or style seeing as it is pretty fucking obvious wha you are getting when you book me.

 

[elgato]

a while back two friends and i were hired for a girl's birthday do...my friends provided their rig. she had asked me in a very casual manner, knowing what i played (at that time only hip-hop) having seen me play out and about at uni. i had agreed cos i thought it'd be fun. after 6 hours of travelling with decks and records, then loading, unloading etc i was beginning to reconsider the wisdom of my choice, but then we fired up the system and it got a bit exciting again. i reached for my tunes to get the night started with some classic, easy-on-the-ear everyman hip-hop, only to be told within 3 tracks, in no uncertain terms, that hip-hop was not to be played this evening. needless to say i looked down at my bag stuffed solely with hip-hop with some degree of despair

i then had to spend a good hour or two saving tracks from various proffered easy listening cds onto my laptop, to create a playlist appropriate for the party. after which i pressed play and felt the desire to take it easy for a little while...had some food, chatted to some ppl etc. we then played it out (with various further bumps, problems, aggressive demands), packed up and began the journey back across the country. it transpired later that she was 'furious' because i had 'taken the piss', and 'done nothing'!!! furthermore she was apparently shocked that i had subsequently failed to apologise for my behaviour.

i think ppl often see 'dj' as synonymous with 'servant' in this kind of situation... as mentioned, some kind of half-way jukebox

 

[Logan Sama]

Did you not turn round and say you were a Hip Hop DJ who had only brought Hip Hop music?

 

[STN]

I think people often think you're really grateful to be offered a slot at their party or whatever (I'm strictly unprofessional), rather than that you're doing them something of a favour (though with my sets, this is debatable).

 

[elgato]

Did you not turn round and say you were a Hip Hop DJ who had only brought Hip Hop music?

of course! she just shrugged it off and said something like 'well its not what i want'.
i didnt even bother to engage with the discussion of rights and wrongs after the event, it didnt seem worth the effort

 

[Logan Sama]

You should have called her a cunt and packed up your shit.

 

[elgato]

I think people often think you're really grateful to be offered a slot at their party or whatever (I'm strictly unprofessional), rather than that you're doing them something of a favour (though with my sets, this is debatable).

this is true. in many circumstances tho, i am extremely grateful for the opportunity. but thats not to say that theyre doing me a favour (if you know what i mean). but with this one, i think what she really wanted was a sort of mobile disco kind of affair, which obviously made things difficult given that she hired a free party sound system and hip-hop, house and techno djs

 

[swears]

What pisses me off is when shit DJs get sets because they are mates with whoever runs the club, surely this sort ovf thing is bad for business. You want the best possible sets right?

 

[elgato]

You should have called her a cunt and packed up your shit.

haha perhaps yes, but sadly i am not of that nature. she was also (at the time) a very good friend of a very good friend (to this day i dont know why) so i felt that to some degree she would be accountable for my behaviour

but yeh, i shouldve probably done as you suggest

 

[DJL]

I think DJing is misunderstood still. Bands are - through no sense of logic or reason (this is common theme running through everything in our current times) - automatically better. DJing is seen as lazy and easy. The cult of the Super Star DJ fucked things up big time as far as image retrieval was concerned. Successful dJing in my eyes is now far more difficult and impassioned than traditional band smithery due to this misconception/idiocy.

 

[IdleRich]

"of course! she just shrugged it off and said something like 'well its not what i want'.
i didnt even bother to engage with the discussion of rights and wrongs after the event, it didnt seem worth the effort"

I just don't understand that whole story at all. If she'd seen you dj before and asked you to turn up and play then how could she complain if you brought your usual stuff? If you had a bag full of hip-hop then how did she expect you to magic up a load of different records? I don't see how anyone could fail to see your point of view if you'd told them what you just told us.

 

[elgato]

I just don't understand that whole story at all. If she'd seen you dj before and asked you to turn up and play then how could she complain if you brought your usual stuff? If you had a bag full of hip-hop then how did she expect you to magic up a load of different records? I don't see how anyone could fail to see your point of view if you'd told them what you just told us.

it was no less bewildering to me. i never to this day fully understand how she percieved that she had been wronged. she didnt complain that i'd brought my usual stuff as such, rather that upon doing all that i could (with the uploading etc), i had relaxed and enjoyed the party, leaving the others to take over for a bit, rather than continuing to toil in vain (superfluously and continuously) to correct a flaw incapable of full correction.

as i say, there seemed to be this bizarre expectation of a professional mobile disco type-affair, despite her asking (casually) a free party system of students to provide the service, for a ridiculously small sum of money. but she didnt seem capable of seeing that any fault could be with her booking the wrong kind of service

no-one, as far as im aware, failed to see my point of view, except her. but i never actually discussed it with her after the event, i just heard from other people how she had been saying how angry she was about the whole thing.

i suppose the point relevant to this thread is that she must have made the assumption (at some point, for some reason) that a dj is some sort of multi-purpose tool, a jukebox... she hadnt considered that we might be specialists in what we did, or that there should necessarily be a difference between the result gained from hiring us, or some 50-something with a microphone and a wallet full of CDs

 

[bruno]

maybe she fancied you and you didn't pay attention?

 

[Landfill Elektronikz]

I'm a fucking ace wedding dj (ask any of my friends!) but its a whole different ballgame to proper club djing. even before ipods, people always constantly badgering you for their faves - the onslought increasing in intensity throughout the evening as they get more drunk. but its someone's big day so you gotta do the do and if that means they all start shocking out to 'dancing queen' or 'come on eileen' then so be it.
but of the small amount of serious club dates i've played over the past couple of years, nobody ever requests tunes...maybe just beg for a rewind occasionally. the proper dj-audience relationship seems to still be intact at the sort of clubs i hang out at.

 

[DJL]

I'm not a massive fan of rewinds ever since they first started appearing in Jungle. Much prefer to hear an uninterupted set. Rewinds force attention onto the DJ when in reality it is about everyone at the party being equal. My favourite parties are when the DJ is out of sight and attention is on the crowd/dancers/visuals - essentially the music and not the dj. I think it is the film 24 Hour Party People where Steve Coogan as Tony Wilson describes the dawn of rave and dance culture as a celebration of the medium rather than any one person, peoples, record etc.

 

[mms]

i went to a wedding recently and had a completely weird experience as a dj, for about 1/2 an hour of serious speedily mixed energetic disco and funk i had everyone on the floor as if a fever had come thru them, everyone in the place
I played one garage track and the entire place cleared.

yeah you should play what you want, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, the dj's paradox.