Ideas for spinning in lounges

I've got a new Saturday night residency at an upscale lounge. The instructions are "not too much hip hop or house". Of course when the crowd (25 - 40) gets there and starts drinking, they want hip hop, and request it. I'd just do more electronic music but as I mentioned earlier they don't want too much house (general term they use for electronic music). I play some rock and some classics but I'm having a hard time really getting the party started b/c my main weapons have been taken away (aka house/EDM and hip hop!).

What would you guys play? I've been dropping 80's/90's classics and stuff like Treasure Fingers "Cross The Dancefloor". I'm not really enjoying myself though as I don't really feel like I can really do my thing. I started playing a little too much vocal electro house the other night and the manager said the music was "too clubby". So I started playing top40 the rest of the night and ended up sounding like every other dj in town.

So...I'm looking for some music suggestions that fill the aforementioned criteria. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

that doesn't sound like much fun man...if they aren't paying you much and you aren't enjoying yourself i would i would suggest seriously looking for somewhere else where you WILL enjoy yourself. If they are paying heaps then i guess you better suck it in lol. Good luck anyway man

Thanks. They're paying pretty good ($300 for 10pm - 2am).

For the most part the staff (including the managers) have been diggin' my sets but under different conditions I'm a hell of a lot better. It's just frustrating knowing that I could blow their place up if they'd let me.

And yea...as soon as I find a club to play at instead I'll probably jump on it.

I'd just suck it in then dude. use the lounge as a base then when u get into some club let loose the dogs of war. we are lucky in a sense that when we approached the owners of our bar the only stipulation we had was that we can play whatever the hell we wanted, and they were cool with that though. Still a bit of a compromise with my own town sets but DANG, even if the crowd are gagging for it u still cant step it up...geez :p

check out Empress out of Brooklyn. she has some lounge to her groove. Portishead is also good

check dj enferno out he is mixing about the same stuff you sayin not to much hip hop, some rock, old school stuff and more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlJoGSV8UV8

hope the vids help

Play some 80's New Wave or Synth Pop, you can never go wrong with that, just stay away from the cheesey 80s Come One Eileen


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXLHUThBib8

simply play "lounge"music...you know, the laidback stuff...

Thanks guys!

Good call on the Enferno vid! I've seen those but forgot all about them.

I can't just play 'lounge' downtempo type music b/c even thought they don't want hip hop or house, they want it to be energetic.

There's always trip hop...

Daedalus has some good mellow blippy stuff, Massive Attack, Portishead...

But still.. they don't want electronic music and they don't want hip hop, what do they want?

Ive played a loungey sort of place before, playing old-school jazz sampled based hip hoop, rare groove funk and electronica like this:



*NB - THIS SONG IS F***ING AMAZING




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR06j0SwsLM&fmt=18

I'd have a go with some 80s soul and jazz-funk, not sure how big it is over there though.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rumblejazz

Ive played a loungey sort of place before, playing old-school jazz sampled based hip hoop, rare groove funk and electronica like this:



*NB - THIS SONG IS F***ING AMAZING




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR06j0SwsLM&fmt=18

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Absolutely! Great track!

MY vote is with the 80's stuff and maybe some mashups and as much as I hate to say it freestyle (god I hate freestyle) .

my idea of a lounge, is like wine, cocktails, european beers, big sofas,moody lighting, and tbh................i cant imagine listening to 80's music in there.....:confused:

pretty much they want a good mixture of music, not to much house, to much hip hop, just mix it up

Oh, and Praga Khan - Breakfast in Vegas... nice mellow dance track, really good breakdowns.

i guess if you really want to keep playin here youd better do what these guys are suggesting. a paid DJing job can be hard to find (ive never really been paid) so i can understand why you'd want to impress this guy.
if youre willing to take a risk just play what you think is best. fuck the bar manager or whoever he sounds dense. play to the people. youre the dj and this is your area of knowledge, you are a professional and you know better than dense-face :cool:


but all it really comes down to is wetha you wanna make music or money?

if it were me id play liquid dnb until i get told to shut up then id fuck off

Honestly, in the end, I'd agree with Kaon

Play to the crowd. Be sure to bring business cards... in case they love you but the manager hates you, they'll be able to keep in touch with you if they want to see you spin again

koan and DvlsAdvct is got it right, if they request it play it and once the bar manager sees everyone dancing and drinking he will be happy.

pretty much make him alot of money he will shut up

Check out Madlib's "Shades of Blue" album. He was given free reign to sample the entire Blue Notes catalogue...

truly a work of art!

for lounges, keep it chic.
people want to groove, get their head nod on, not break a sweat (at least not until later).
Bar owners are bar owners, not music selectors, that is why they hired you the DJ. Always keep that in mind. Just because the music utilizes hip-hop samples, that doesn't make it rap music and just because there is synth noises or electro based drum patterns doesn't make the track house. Of course you know that, it is unfortunately your duty to subtly explain that to the person who cuts your check. As stated earlier, as long as the patrons are happy and the bar is selling, you are doing your job.

here's a few suggestions for artists. google lounge music and you should hit a playlist on the net somewhere for more ideas. or you can visit labkids radio blog on www.myspace.com/societyofleisure

please note, although some of these artists could be categorized as downtempo, don't be fooled and don't sell the artists short. 85 to 110 bpm is a good range for laid back music; avoids jumping into dance anthems or putting the listener to sleep. mix it up, with some jazz, funk, n soul grooves.

Bonobo; Radiohead; Thievery Corporation; Prefuse 73; DJ Shadow; Nouvelle Vague; DJ Cam; Bebel Gilberto; Royksopp; Free The Robots; Mr. Scruff; Federico Aubele; Kid Loco; Boozoo Bajou; Sneaker Pimps; Yesterdays New Quintet; Zero 7; DJ Sun; DJ Frane; Bjork; Tosca; the list can go on and on... but that should get you in the right direction.