Digital nightclub help

DJ Life & Community General Discussion
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Digital nightclub help

Hi im new to this forum but i specifically signed up to get opinions of DJ’s using programs like Ableton, Traktor, Serato etc and products that can really enhance a DJ’s performance taking it beyond the original “2 turntables and mixer” setup. Im in the process of opening a nightclub and i would like to have my entire setup based around these new technologies. Ive experienced first hand the power of these technologies in the hands of capable DJ’s and in my opinion it greatly differs from average nightclub experience with live remixing, editing and the combination of some pretty mind blowing FX. I understand most DJ’s bring their own gear that their familiar with. My question is what should my setup include. If you are a DJ who uses this kind of gear what would you want a club to have to get the best possible performance out of you? Money is not an issue. If you were touring and you came to my club what would be your dream setup be that would help enhance your performance? I’m not talking about your personal set up but one that would be great for any DJ using new digital technologies. What setup would be ideal. Any comments on my business plan are welcome as well thank you so much for taking the time to read this.

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My take:
Traditional 2xCDJ/2x1210 Setup (yes, some people still use 'em and you might need 'em if someone has unexpected problems with his laptop/midi hardware, plus the new, albeit expensive CDJs are also midi controllers, and who wouldn’t like to have them available if needed?)

Some way to hook up DVS systems without problems, something like the magma switchbox.

PLUS
a freakin’ huge mixer with enough free channels so there’s no need to unplug/replug anything. Also easy access to the free channels so anyone can hook up it’s soundcards without problems. Patchbay, maybe?

AND
A lot of space to put my gear, maybe some rugged-as-hell fixed laptop /gear stands.
I kind of picture a set of flip-out stands right above the TTs/CDJs, so I don’t have to run hundreds of miles between my laptop, Otus/VCI/Maschine (or whatever) and the mixer, but that’s probably wishful thinking.

A DJ booth that is safe from drunk people tryin to fiddle with all these interesting controllers with flashing lights or laptops would also be a plus. After all, as much as we all wish for it, laptops and most midi devices are still not as super-rugged as designated DJ gear, and constantly hoping that your gear is safe can really make a night in the booth a lot harder.

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Thanks man if you think of anything else no matter how far fetched or wishful thinking let me know. Thanks again!

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Honestly, I think that the main things I’d need are thus:

Crystal clean sound system. It’s amazing to me how these venues will spend thousands of dollars on mixers and CD decks and turntables and mixing desks and other various pieces of gear, but it’s all coming out of the shittiest of sound systems.

A solid mixer. This is key. I want something that I can easily access to hook into. Hell, if you provided the phono cables already hooked in, labelled for the channel they are on so I know, it would just save time, plan and simple.

I would save provide CD Decks and turntables (more importantly the CD Decks) because they are good backup and not everyone uses a fully digital setup yet.

But most importantly, to me, is space. Nothing kills the experience more than needing to set myself up in a 3x3 box with another guy, and try not to ruin his mixing while making it possible to make the transition seamless. Not to mention that you run the risk of pulling out the wrong cables.

If money is no object then focus on the sound and on the space. You only really NEED (in my opinion) to provide a solid mixer that’s connected and optimized. The rest is give and take. Personally, I don’t think the CDJ-2000’s are worth it, and the CDJ-1000’s will work like gold for anyone, but that’s my opinion. If you have the dough they can’t hurt.

Oooh, and I forgot. The space for the DJ should be separated from the crowd. I don’t need the people all up in my shit, watching me spin, being able to touch my, or anyone else’s, stuff. There should be a clear path so you can know who is there, and who is and is not allowed to be there. Also, the DJ section should have adjustable lighting for the personal taste of the DJ there. I don’t need a ton of lights cause I have my laptop and my controllers, and the light kind of makes it hard for me, but my buddies on CDs always suffer and need those flashlights.

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In my opinion the onky thing that expect to find in a booth when I get there is a proper 4 channel DJ mixer (DJM-600-800, A&E Xone, or something of the like) 2 cd decks, 2 Technics, and a decent monitor. Anybody who has a setup that includes extra gear is going to bringing it and setting it up themselves.

As your lining out your PA, the other question that you need to ask yourself is whether you’re going to have a Front of House setup, which will determine where your main console should go. If you end up going with your main console out front, it’s a nice courtesy to provide a small format console in the booth besides the DJ mixer. Something 16 channels or so. But again, musicians with complicated live setups that include keys, hardware ect. are/should be bringing these types of things with them.

I would echo the sentiments of a few people above here. All the gear in the world stashed in the booth if you don’t have a proper system, and this is where your money should be spent.

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hey

sorry just to clarify are you going to have bands on and a live music set up or just DJ’s? I thought initially reading your post just DJ’s but Agent Cooper’s post seemed to suggest live bands, and there would be several pretty big changes I’d make depending on which one.

Anyway assuming its just DJing, then I wouldn’t worry too much about the digital equipment as such, as any DJ who uses is will almost certainly have their own laptop with their collection and possibly also controllers too. But what to focus on is:

Decent sized DJ box with plenty of room for people and equipment. Not talking MASSIVE but enough for an event where you may have say two DJ’s that are working in tandem and also a lighting or video jockey, so a comfortable 3 people fit where there is room to move about and not be bumping into each other. Fairly low walls so the DJ can see everything that’s going on and the crowd can admire their skill working the decks and equipment, but with perspex barriers all the way round so there is protection from spilled drinks and wandering fingers that like to push buttons.

Equipment wise just like everyone has said a GOOD 4 channel mixer (Rane, Formula Sound, Ecler, Vestax etc, preferably NOT Pioneer :stuck_out_tongue:) , with two CDJ’s and two 1210’s. Though neither are my weapons of choice (and i’d much rather see vestax vinyl decks personally) they are the standards and pretty much required.

Some little connection boxes built into the wall or next to the mixer so that laptop connections or other things can be plugged straight in without having to lift the mixer out its rack or dig about in the wiring and stuff in the back.

And lots of extra worktop space, at the very minimum some sort of laptop stand or shelf next to the mixer plus a flat space in front of the mixer for a VCI or other controller so you have room to set up and are still centered on the crowd.

And CDJ 1000’s will be fine don’t waste the money on 2000’s, invest it into making sure you have a good quality and well designed, set up and processed sound system, powerful enough to do the job and still have headroom so your not pushing any components to the point the begin to sound nasty, and with nice big limiters because most DJ’s seem to actually know very little about sound systems and believe the ridiculous myths about “it only sounds good when you push it into the red” or “this mixer is designed to be pushed into the red” or other such drivel which inevitably sees them lighting up the mixer level LED’s like a Christmas tree. (but then again they also believe that Pioneer Mixers sound any good at all, which is another discussion entirely lol :stuck_out_tongue: )

Decent DJ booth monitors as well, preferably a left and right pair and preferably flown from the roof at 10 o’clock and 2 o’clock from where the DJ will be standing so they’re up of the worktop providing more space to move about and the DJ(s) can face the crowd the whole time and still hear fine.

I have spent many years designing sound system installs for bars and clubs as well as many other music and sound engineering jobs, if you like PM me a little plan or layout of the space along with some info on size, capacity and what type of music etc and an idea of the budget your looking at and i’ll give you some idea’s of how i’d lay it out and stuff.

k

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^ Not to take things off topic, but you are not allowed to take shots at Pioneer sound quality after you mention Ecler in a post:roll_eyes: We can argue all day about sound quailty, features, ect. but the the bottom line is that you should have something that most people are familiar with and have played on before. Whether you like it or not more people have played on a DJM-600 than have ever even heard of Formula Sound or Ecler.

As far as the bands go I was just kind of thinking out loud. As you said most DJ’s are not familiar with sound engineering, so I was putting it out there as a suggestion. I’m not sure what his intentions are for the venue, but if you are building something from the ground up and money is not an object I would try and make it as versatile as possible. I used to run FOH at a club that had plenty of digital/live electronic acts with 12-20 inputs that required an engineer. Shit, half the Dj’s I used to see playing required somebody to keep an eye on their gain stages.

Good points about booth size though. Nothing worse than taking elbows to the ribs from somebody that you’re playing with or another person trying to setup.

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Would it not be worth having an imac with serato/traktor pro/aleton loaded into it?

even just serato and ssl hardware

I know most people bring their own gear but it’d be great just to be able to rock up just with a usb stick?

I can see problems with that mind…

I think what people have already said about 2xcdjs and 2xtechnics with a bigmixer (preferably 6 channels i’d say) and lots of room and an accessible patchbay to plug into would be the thing to do.

I think if money were no object i’d get those pioneer 2000s. I think they’re expensive but look pretty dope. then you could just bring a hd or usb stick and rock it.

I like the idea of labelled phono cables already being attached to the mixer too.

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Where is this nightclub opening?

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I think an awesome idea for a DJ booth is one with two DJ ‘stations.’ i.e. a mixer with 1210s/mk3s on one side and a mixer with 1210s/mk3s on another side. It would require a spacious DJ booth and a little extra money, but I think it’d be cool to have, and it’d make life a hell of a lot easier for DJs going in to take over for whoever they’re following.

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lots of space on the table

some kind of patchbay, so people can plug their toys without touching the club mixer

at least two laptop stands (should be very stable)

lots of space to put the laptops/controllers/stuff

don’t forget our vinyl spinnig freinds - make some shelf at the back of the booth for record bags

there is a place at my hometown called The Block (http://www.block-club.com/), that have a toilet for the dj right behind the booth, how cool is that?

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plain and simple, if you want to stand out…Have a super bangin system and the sound guys to make it bang every night…and amazing lights, look into Floor lighting as well, and make it super Hi-Fi futuristic and ur set to go…put the DJ booth above the crowed and give them lots of space, and a nice big screen behind the DJ displaying artistic Effects…!

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yeah man - one word. SPACE!

and stands.. there’s nothing worse than getting a bad back because your laptop and controller are too low in a booth with no space.

and as has been mentioned - a decent mixer with plenty of channels - something like a DJM 1000 is always good to see - with plenty of RCA leads around the place to speed everything up. Especially if theyr labelled. could be v cool!

CDJs are important along with Vinyl possibly, althought theyr unlikely to get much use. Going adventurous and getting midi controller mixers like a 4D probably sounds like something you ought to do - but it would be a total waste of resources. the whole advantage of the digital DJ is that he can carry all he needs in a rucksac no trouble.

Definately SPACE though :slight_smile: where is this by the way? i hope its in the north of england (although it’s majorly unlikely..!)

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Hey thank you so much for responding! My night club set up is really just for DJ’s right now, FOH is definetly necessary and the club as of right now well be located in the NE USA preferably Philadelphia. Is their any specific gear that may be worthwhile to have on hand besides 4 channel mixer cdjs and turn tables? Really anything that could enhance your digital performance to really make a set stand out from a normal club laptops, software, hardware, midi etc etc. Once again you have been very helpful thank you!

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why not install a pc with a decent monitor into the booth with software (ssl, tsp, ableton…) already installed and audiodevice hooked up to the system…so the digidj only needs to bring his controller and an externaldrive? some spare active usb ports build in the booth

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Honestly, I wouldn’t trust a machine in a club to run correctly. I would rather bring my own, on a machine I’ve tested and troubleshooted, than risk a club’s machine crashing and not knowing why.

If you set something like this up in Philly I have a few promoter/DJ friends in that area that would LOVE a club like this to work in. Drop me a line so I can, at least, drop them one :slight_smile:

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yeah i’m the same, dont think a pre-installed computer would be any help.

You’d have the problem firstly of people having either a mac or a PC, and their hard drives defo and possibly usb sticks as well only being formatted for Mac or Windows so you’d need to have both to cover bases.

Then the user, as well as importing all their tracks, would have to import their controller files as well to map their controller properly and get that all set up.

Then once the user removed their hard drive the listed tracks they added would all be in the library but the hard disk would no longer be there, and so within even just a month the Library would be swamped with names of tracks that didn’t exist and you’d have to manually keep going through and wiping it.

Then finally as DvlsAdvct says i probably wouldn’t trust a pre-installed system anyway, wouldn’t wanna have it crash mid set because i hadn’t set it all up and didnt know it was stable, or i wouldn’t wanna risk some other DJ accidentally bringing a virus in on his own HD/mem stick, and then when I use it it gets transfered onto my HD/Mem stick and then back to my set up at home.

All in all would MUCH rather just bring my own already set up and organised and ready to go lappy and plug it in.

Think good 4-6 channel mixer, pair CDJ’s, pair 1210’s and a sensible set of fly leads/connection boxes/patchbay is honestly everything that the DJ box would need, along with decent amount of space and a couple of stands/shelves of various types so you have plenty of options when setting the stuff you bring out.

Spend the rest on making sure the sound system is good enough and a decent lighting system, both on the dance floor possibly with video elements via a LED or projector wall that VDJ’s could connect into, and in general around the club with interesting lighting and LED use to make the place look the shit :smiley:

k

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yeah.. pre-installed computer probably is just more troublesome than it’s worth…

if you want some funky addition to your booth, then i’d imagine audiovisual - like a couple of webcam type things hooked up to the booth. You could have them showing what the DJs doing with his controller maybe - as it’s more interesting than watching someone beatmatching with CDJs.. just a thought! I saw that once when loose cannons played, it was cool :slight_smile:

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Yeah thats a good idea, if you have a VDJ system of some sort then you could also mix in or switch over to some cameras on the DJ box to let the whole crowd see whats going on :slight_smile:

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If you’re going to provide a computer, then I’d say provide it exclusively for VDJ’s along with equipment to the house system and the ability to change it out of you hire an outside VDJ