A DJ TALE: When you turn up for a gig and realise that you don't have any music to play!
I CAN’T BELIEVE WHAT HAPPENED LAST NIGHT DURING MY DJ SET!
So, I was playing an old school party last night. I usually make sure I’ve got CD back up (I’m paranoid like that), but recently every single one of my gigs has involved CDJ’s that take USB’s. So being a bit short on time, I took my main USB stick plus a backup, just in case.
Walking into the venue, the party was awesome, a huge dancefloor with so many people I recognised from back in the day dying to hear me relive those old memories of dark rolling electronic music. Techno and early german hard trance from the mid 90's. I was absolutely sure they’d love my set… just not quite in the way it panned out!
Stepping up
My good friend and huge name from back in the day was blasting the sounds out. He’s a happy hardcore DJ, so of course the pianos and lyrics were in full flow. Not my thing you understand, but I have big respect for him. But it was time to get serious. Or so I thought…
My first USB stick didn’t seem to be recognising itself. OK no worries, I’ll use my backup. Great that one works. But why is the second deck not showing the tracklist? And where is the link cable? And OMFG there is NO LINK CABLE because these are older versions of CDJ’s!! Oh shit!
What the DJ without Music did Next
I ran out to find the promoter but was met with, ‘well that’s all we have’.0
HOLY CRAP!!! Back at the stage my friend was packing away his Force & Styles 170bpm anthems and there was 2 minutes left until I had to go on. Christ.
‘You haven’t got any CD’s I could borrow for my set have you mate?’, I asked. He looked at me like I was on drugs, but after telling him the dilemma, he was immediately back in his CD wallet to help me out.
‘Have you got anything without lyrics?’, I said sheepishly. He nodded but didn’t look particularly reassuring. I was starting to sweat now. This was not good, not good at all.
How one blags a set
So I started off with the fastest track I could find from my working left USB stick. ‘F***KING HOSTILE’ by Lenny Dee.
The dancefloor looked a little perplexed that I’d started so hard but I knew I simply had to match the tempos of these hardcore CD’s. God knows how I was gonna do it. My DJ friend and saviour handed me the first track for the right CD deck. In the headphones I thought, ‘great the tempo’s match, but the auto cue isn’t working’. There was simply no time to check what was gonna happen later on in the track. ‘OK here goes nothing’, I thought - and proceeded to mix it all in.
To my astonishment, it all seemed to be fitting. I felt a sense of relief, the sweat dissipated. Crossfader slowly over, first track finishing, break coming now…. and BANG - second track in!
But to my horror, within seconds, piano’s erupted from the speakers. Not just ordinary piano’s though. The happiest piano melody I think I’ve ever heard in my 25-year career as a DJ!!!!!!!
WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!
My heart sank.
It felt like I’d just sold my soul to the devil. Everything I’d ever worked towards, destroyed in a split second. I wanted the ground to swallow me up. I put my head down and let out a little wincing sound (and that wasn’t from my mouth!).
But... HOLD ON! What the hell was happening?
As soon as the piano came in, the dancefloor ERUPTED.
Source
Hands went 20 FEET IN THE AIR! The crowd let out a massive cheer. They were chanting my name! WTF?!?!?! WAS I DREAMING??!!?!!
If you can't beat 'um, join 'um
I quickly figured that in order to get over this set without slitting my wrists, there was only one thing for it. Forget my musical preconceptions. Forget my anal techno-ness. And simply get into what I was doing. I DJ’ed at a few weddings when I was 13 so surely this can’t be so bad? I have never been one to be a party pooper either, so I thought hell, if you can’t beat them join them.
Source
I grabbed a light stick and catapulted my hands in the air. The most epic piano breakdown known to man. The crowd went even more crazy. I got a small rush. Hmmmm, this piano malarkey might not be so bad after all.
For the next 60 minutes, I was Darren Styles DJ meets DJ Dougal with a little DJ hixxy thrown in for good measure. DJ Gammer would have been proud.
My friend stood by my side handing me CD’s making signs with his fingers as to which track I should play next. And as expected none of them were anything remotely similar to anything I’d play. The happiness level was off the scale. But you know what? I actually had fun. And the crowd did too!
Five minutes before the end of my set, Legendary hardcore DJ Slipmatt made his way to the stage with the usual flight case full of ten tonnes of personal DJ equipment. He obviously won’t be having the problems I’ve just had, I thought.....
As the final piano drop kicked in he took a double take like I’d lost the plot. Turning to him screaming ‘I’m not even playing my own tracks mate, let’s ave it!!!!’, I skipped off gayly to the front of the stage with my hands in the air. What the hell must he have thought. Oh dear. Oh well!
What A Great night
The set finally finished and yes, I can promise you I won’t be forgetting to burn back up CD’s ever again! But the fact I managed to pull it off was kind of insane and yup I’m actually a little proud of myself.
I’ve played a whole crate of other people’s records before when my own records haven’t come off the plane, but they’ve always been records that are similar to what I know. This time, I didn’t know a single track and they were all so far removed from the kind of music I play, that I might as well have been playing Morris dancing music!
Finishing up, I packed my bags and thanked my friend for helping me out. (Not many DJ’s would stay and help a fellow DJ out like that, so I seriously owe him, What a thoroughly decent chap!)
Awesome
But what I wasn’t prepared for was the queue of people when leaving the stage. It took me at least half an hour to get out. ‘Great set!’, ‘Awesome!’, ‘When are you playing again next?’. All of a sudden I’d gained a thousand new fans, all dying to hear my next happy hardcore set. hehe, If only they knew! I thought.
And so, DJ Lesson 1 ….. NEVER EVER FORGET TO TAKE A F*****G BACK UP.
OR YOU ONE DAY MAY FIND YOURSELF SKIPPING AROUND GAYLY TO HAPPY HARDCORE LIKE I DID! :D
You have been warned!
Now where did I put my glow sticks....
