Hey everyone, been DJ’ing for about two years now and just started playing out. I’ve had three shows now, all of which I was the only DJ for about 4 1/2 hours straight. My question is what is the etiquette for DJ’ing extended periods of time like this? Should I be taking breaks, or putting on a long track to take a break? What I’ve been doing is basically actively DJ’ing the entire time, making sure the mix was interesting and that I wasn’t just fading songs in and out one right after the other.
So how would you approach long form gigs like this?
Thanks as usual, this is the most helpful forum I have ever used
Sure, mix well every time and make it interesting, that’s great!
Just make sure you control the energy a bit, I think there were a couple of blog articles about this last year. Basically, just don’t come in hard with all the bangers too early on, and don’t keep up a massive energy level for 4.5 hours straight. build in a few drinks breaks where everyone can calm down for a few minutes, then gradually build it up again. You don’t want everyone to burn out at 11.30.
Unless everyone’s on drugs, then all bets are off.
I would say yes, you need take breaks in a 4 1/2 hour set. A nice long song or short 15 minute pre made mix that gives you enough time to go to the bathroom would be good. I wouldn’t do that more than twice in that time though and probably just once unless it was really needed.
This is one thing I wish Traktor had that DJay by Algoriddim does have. In DJay you can set a playlist, tell it to only do a certain amount of time of each song and randomly pick the next ones. If I was doing a house party or something, I’d run Automix for 15 minutes or so and walk away.
As an added bonus, after 15 minutes of the software trainwrecking every transition, I looked even better afterwards and people realized it wasn’t the computer doing everything!
You can create a playlist and Traktor will cruise through it. I’m not sure really why you would need it to be random, just put the songs in random order when you load it.
Pffftt. Thats what smoke fluid bottles are for (dispose after)
I did have the unimaginable experience of working in club needing to shutting its doors for an hour after said smoke fluid bottle got used in the machine a week later at midnight!!! :eek:
Think the official line to punters was flooded drains, not "you just inhaled atomized piss! "
Jeez, 15-20 minutes? What do you guys do in the bathroom?
First thing I do when I’m playing somewhere new is work out my bathroom route, so I got a rough idea of how long it takes. For example, place I’m at tonight I can get to the john and back in just under 2 minutes. Less if it’s not so busy. If I need to do anything else, I never need more than, shall we say, an extended club mix, (of if it’s an indie club, I Am The Resurrection by The Stone Roses).
I think if I took 15 minutes off the boss would be asking questions. That’s like, 6 or 7 quid he’s just paid me to do nothing.
(dispose after)