Have you ever felt "out of place" at places you have DJed?

The past two house parties I've done have been pretty rough. The first one was for a bunch of hipsters at an art expo/kegger (yeah...) and I opened up the night with a lot of grunge/classic rock type stuff. Then the ladies started getting a little sloshed and wanted to dance, so I switched to some electro. All the hipsters were like "WTF bro, shit's weak" and I just didn't give a f**k, because there were people enjoying it.

The second one was more electro themed and it was my first time working with another DJ. The set was perfect and we fed off each other great. Unfortunately, there were a grand total of 20 people that showed up and someone got drunk and started slapping people, which turned the whole night into a drama-fest and generally bummed me out. Except for the music, the party was crap.

I played at the upstairs of a bar once that was filled with about 20 people. They usually play pop music. All I had that was low enough energy was R&B. I don't play straight pop music. I had no booth monitor, so it was difficult to beat match, so I just faded in and out of songs and didn't worry about it.

The bar "doesn't like hip hop" and last time I was there, downstairs on their dancefloor (again with no one there) I was told by a manager that he couldn't play my music upstairs because it was "too much hip hop" and I needed more pop (meanwhile they are playing hey there delilah by the plain white T's, which is depressing daytime bar music, upstairs). I just gave him a quizzical look, and went back to mixing. One thing was though - the bartenders and wait staff loved the music I was playing. They kept coming up to me and telling me good job, since I guess they were tired of listening to the same old boring pop shit over and over again. There were two bartenders downstairs with me, and I asked them if they wanted me to play anything, since they had to listen to the music and do nothing, and they said they liked what I was playing and to just keep doing my thing.

I just tend not to worry about it anymore. You can never please everyone. Doing house parties has taught me that much. Just keep doing whatever you do.

Definitely. The place I play friday nights had a bit of trouble with trying to change their crowd as it was getting a bit rough. This is when they hired me as some 'new blood' to try and change the vibe of the night. It used to be a lot of bashment, garage, ragga... generally too rowdy and drawing a rough crowd.

I was told to play 'commercial, so tried to stick to well know house stuff, dancefloor classics, pop, and some 80s classics. Literally everyone in the bar was coming up to me and bugging me to play bashment and "stuff we can dance to!"

I've never felt so out of place and unwanted at a gig before or since.
Eventually the problem got sorted by the doorstaff just being ruthless about who they let in and its quite a nice vibe there now.

I played this one gig, on a stage, in front of people, it was weird as hell. I certainly didn't belong, but it worked out. I'll never do that gigs again.

I had a one off gig at a strip club about 20 miles from where i live. it was halloween so i expected the club to be busy. i looked at the playlists in VirtualDJ they already had playing music regularly and came across pretty much what i expected. It was RnB, UK garage, Speed Garage, Soul, Pop, little sexy jumping house/electro and cheesy chav mixes mostly. I started off with some what i'd call post funky or perhaps minimal funky. After about half an hour i started throwing UK garage loops over so to bring it up. That was the start of the complaints. I then threw on an hour of typical RnB, half the tracks i played they'd got already on VDJ. The club started filling up and some punters were dancing so i decided to try again to bring it up with some house/electro. The girls complained straight away, I hadn't even mixed 1 track. I ignored them even though i felt like giving up and throwing on their VDJ. However I continued and went into my comfort zone by increasing complexity of my dj'ing adding loops. samples etc. I looked up about 30 mins later and by the looks of it, this encouraged more punters in the place as there was a speaker outside the front door and there was a que to get in. The club started turning into a bar rather than a strip club. The girls were pissed off but as i'm a long term friend of the owner who trusted me. The night ended up a big success for the club for people paying on the door and drinks behind the bar. The girls ended up starting to enjoy themselves rather than complaining as there was a good atmosphere and management started to throw freebies their way. It maybe a regular thing in the summer and i was lucky it pulled off. It'd have been harder with bollywood but saying that i have used samples and such before in sets.

moral of the story, don't take gigs that you aren't 100% stoked about and KNOW that YOUR choice of music will be well received. don't whore yourself out.

I "dj'ed" my company holiday party... Been with the company for 3 years but this was the first time i went and they always wished there was music playing during the party so the decided to ask me to do it this past holiday. Never knew the room set up but they told me to move a few tables and i can set up. Every one who sat next to the dj table had to have been 40-60 years old.... Every one who was my age (28) or around my age were on the other side playing pool or at the bar. .. But once most of the old ppl left and the younger crowd got wasted at open bar they started to dance.

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Originally Posted by Jay Wilde

moral of the story, don't take gigs that you aren't 100% stoked about and KNOW that YOUR choice of music will be well received. don't whore yourself out.

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I think that's bad advice actually. Sometimes playing out of your comfort zone forces you to become a better DJ. I've learned how to mix hip-hop and r&b a lot better since taking this weekly gig and it's just made me a better DJ because I constantly burning through tracks and trying to find a new one. Then again, I like open format DJing. Anything else is fucking monotonous.

Also It's not "whoring yourself out" - sometimes you have to play the game to get ahead, plain and simple. I've grown really tired over the years of the statement "don't whore yourself out" - because all that means is that you are too scared to do or try anything different. There are plenty of famous open format DJ's (Like DJ Vice) who used to be wedding and event DJ's before they hit it big. Just because you think your super-specific genre is awesome doesn't mean everyone else will - and it doesn't mean it gets you paid. If you can afford to DJ and not get paid - good for you, I hope that works out - but I can't. I don't have that luxury or the desire. I love to DJ, but I hate being poor. And my hate of being poor trumps my love of DJing or any genre of music.

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Originally Posted by Frank112916

I think that's bad advice actually. Sometimes playing out of your comfort zone forces you to become a better DJ. I've learned how to mix hip-hop and r&b a lot better since taking this weekly gig and it's just made me a better DJ because I constantly burning through tracks and trying to find a new one. Then again, I like open format DJing. Anything else is fucking monotonous.

Also It's not "whoring yourself out" - sometimes you have to play the game to get ahead, plain and simple. I've grown really tired over the years of the statement "don't whore yourself out" - because all that means is that you are too scared to do or try anything different. There are plenty of famous open format DJ's (Like DJ Vice) who used to be wedding and event DJ's before they hit it big. Just because you think your super-specific genre is awesome doesn't mean everyone else will - and it doesn't mean it gets you paid. If you can afford to DJ and not get paid - good for you, I hope that works out - but I can't. I don't have that luxury or the desire. I love to DJ, but I hate being poor. And my hate of being poor trumps my love of DJing or any genre of music.

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I see your side also, and I did the open format thing in college to pay the bills 4 nights a week, and hated every minute of it. My love is with electronic music. Id rather not play at all, than play open format. :)

But yes, your perspective is accurate in the open format club/bar world for sure. The only EDM guys who get big, get big from productions not DJing ;)

My co-worker has a friend who needs a DJ for her son's First Communion. He asked me but I'm gonna have to pass on this. He mentioned "she wants Polish music"... I have no clue what to look for.