Club Gig and the Power Went Out :(
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  1. #1
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    Default Club Gig and the Power Went Out :(

    I was playing my first Friday night gig at a local Raleigh nightclub. I've played their trance nights and electro nights, but they were on mondays and tuesdays, so the pressure to perform well and keep the crowd happy was not as intense as it was tonight (Friday and Saturday nights is, of course, when the club makes the bulk of their money). This was the first time I was basically given straight 4 hours to rock a crowd on a peak night, so I wanted this gig to go flawlessly. I started off at 10pm with some house and progressive, and eventually began building the energy. I had a decent group of ladies on the floor building good vibes and so I began to start building up into the main portion of my set. At 11:30 the tail end of a tornado south of our location came through and knocked the power out in the club; CDJs, mixer, booth monitor, house sound, lighting, the whole 9 yards. After a breaker reset and a few other workarounds, we were back in business by around 11:45-11:50, right when I should have begun to start banging it out. The groups that were there have left and I'm stuck with an empty dance floor at peak hour and I'm pretty flustered. I started playing electro remixes of some Top-40 to try and bring back the energy, and eventually the club filled back out again with a new set of people. I had the new groups enjoying themselves, the club got some good promo shots and rep, and overall the night was a great success. However, between 11:50 and 12:15 I was panicking hard. Looking back I'd say that I pretty much picked up right where I left off at 11:30 without dipping back down and building the energy up again (i.e. if the power had not have gone out, I'd say that I probably would not have changed a lot in my set). Do you think I did the right thing, or should I have dropped the energy back down and acknowledging the hiccup, and then continue on from there, pushing the peak till 12:30? Anyone got any similar stories and a description of how you dealt with it? This was a new one for me, so any input would be appreciated.
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  2. #2
    Tech Convert Sound Mutants's Avatar
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    I think you did the right thing. Especially if the crowd cleared out and a new one came in anyway.

    Think about it this way. People hop from club to club for all different reasons, Looking for different vibes, looking for different crowds, looking for tonights after party partner(s) , looking for music that gets them dancing and several other reasons. If the power had not gone out, which by the way is not your fault so don't lose sleep over it, would you have changed (reduced) the energy because of a different crowd coming in, if people had not left? And do you feel that was the right energy for that club at that time of the evening?

    Energy levels should be based on what was promoted for that night, what the norm for the venue is, and last but certainly not least what the crowd reaction to what your playing is...

    Also keep in mind a new crowd coming into a good amount of energy, especially later in the evening are probably looking for, or expecting the set to be at that point anyway.

    This is only my opinion, others may disagree but I always believed one of the first things a DJ should learn is how to get out of a bad situation as fast and as smooth as possible regardless of control over the situation or not.

    Hope this helped, Happy Mixing.

  3. #3
    Tech Mentor rdale's Avatar
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    Glad you are ok. I was at a party in Durham where the power in the basement power was failing, Odi just picked it back up where he left off, or if was in the middle of a routine starting it over. It clipped like 4 times that night until they took a few of the fans off line. It was hotter, but problem solved, that venue eventually caught fire on a none club night. I think 15 minutes instead of 3 or so, I would have started it out at a lower energy, and quickly ramped it up, or chose a banger with a great intro to the drop. Either way freaking out about things you can not control, isn't positive, you have to accept and move on and not worry about it, adapt and be ready for when you can control the situation again. I'm sure the power outage didn't make a difference in your reputation.

  4. #4
    Tech Guru jakeintox's Avatar
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    Sounds like you handled it just right. I've had a few power outages and it's been my experience that people are usually happy when I just pick up where I left off, but sometimes, especially when it's a long outage, or was really dramatic due to lights out, people screaming, etc... you need to tone things down and change the mood. It really depends on the crowd.

    I wouldn't worry so much about when the 'peak time' of your set should be. In club and bar environments the energy of a room can change in an instant due to things beyond your control (power outage, fights, the arrival of a bachelorette party..). It's your job to adapt and react to these things with the appropriate music, regardless of where you think you should be in your set.

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  5. #5
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    All valid points. I realize I probably should have clarified when I said I was flustered. I wasn't a bit put off because of the power going out (like people said, this was totally beyond my control and sh!t just happens), I was a little rustled because of the fact that I basically had to start back from square one (i.e. bring people back in from the patio area, rebuild the vibes and get people dancing again, etc.), and was thinking I had to cram 2 previous hours of set build up into 30 minutes. Sounds like I did a good thing saying to hell with it and just marching on. This was the first time something this jarring has happened to me in a club environment, so I wasn't sure whether I did the right thing or not.
    Traktor Kontrol Z2 | 2x Stanton ST-150 Turntables | Traktor Kontrol F1 | MacBook

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  6. #6
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    I think Sound Muntants hit it exactly right. The state of mind that people are in at the beginning of the night to where they are at 11:45 is going to be different whether the power went out or not. The alcohol inside them isn't going to disappear, new people from other clubs are going to come in expecting the vibe a certain way because of the time of night, a power outage wouldn't change that, and I think you would have killed everything to nothing if you would have started slow because all those people still had the same state of mind when the power came back so I think you did the right thing to start exactly where you left off.

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