I did the unthinkable - Left a gig without playing!

DJ Life & Community General Discussion
1

I did the unthinkable - Left a gig without playing!

It’s 1 AM, the club is packed and it took 10 minutes just to get to the DJ booth.

For some reason, the manager of the place was DJing (i.e, changing songs after they finish). As I put my DJ bag down and start unpacking i see rows and rows of drinks and clothing items but I take some of it away to make room for my stuff.

While I’ve got my laptop in my hands and fiddling with the Echo DJ sound card to get it into the express slot a girl comes running and jumping, bumps in to me and makes me drop the sound card on the floor, in the dark.

Out with the cell phone, use the light to find the sound card, pick it up, dust it off and start fiddling again.

It takes another 10 seconds before one of the manager’s friends comes and leans right across me, pushing me to the side, to speak to the manager who just went from a low tempo hiphop beat to a 135 bpm “I’m blue…” remix, knowing I’m just about to go on and play an RnB set.

I almost lost my balance while being pushed so I try to shove him backwards somewhat carefully to regain my balance. That’s when the guy picks a fight with me.

I explained to him I’m supposed to get on and play in 5 minutes and I need some space to setup. The icing on the cake is then the manager, who defends his friend, saying “he’s with me”. Well… duh.

5 more people come pushing their way through to get their sweaters and jackets in the booth and I had enough.

I packed my stuff back down, told the manager that I’m leaving and tried to explain why. He ignored me, and I left. During 15 years of DJing I have never, ever left a gig, until tonight.

Have you?

2

Simple answer to that question Is, no I have never experience something as bad as that.
You did the right thing walking out. That is terrible behaviour on the part of the manager.

3

make sure you mail him a bill for your fee. he booked you. he didnt provide a place for you to work. its his bad, not yours. if he refuses to pay, inform him youll be taking the bill to a collections agency to get payment on your behalf.

4

I never left a gig. That their loss. Dont burn bridges with the owner. Just let it be. send a email saying hey sorry about what happend and let him know your side of the story.

5

its a tough situation, but yeah - it was right what you did.. but do as JesC said and just explain in an email to the owner (and CC the douchebag manager on the email as well!), that way hopefully the manager will CC you on his reply to the situation and you can post it here for our entertainment!

6

Do not apologize. Email him telling him what happened and why you did not play (don’t be rude though - explain to him like you did to us), but there is ZERO reason to apologize. Fuck that shit. Straight up. If you have no reason to apologize, don’t.

7

man that sucks! sorry about the rough nite. I don’t like when people pack in the dj booth unless there is tons of room..which is rare.

8

Seems like bad advice in the long run… That is, if you ever want a gig in the same state again.:confused:

9

I did this once before but only because the owner was a douche and had booked a huge party that brought their own DJ and never called me to tell me not to come in. He did the right thing in booking it, I was a house DJ and this party brought a huge audience that I wouldn’t have brought, but why the fuck did he forget to mention it to me? He had booked me for the night and we had talked a couple days before. Douche. There I was walking in with my equipment (this was back in the day before S4s and shit; I had brought 2 turntables, mixer, and 4 bags of vinyl) and the bouncer didnt even want to let me in. He’s like, oh, there’s already a DJ here, we don’t need one, like I was a fucking traveling encyclopedia salesman or some shit. It took me a half hour till I finally got to the owner; he was apologetic but basically too drunk to care, he bought me a drink while I simmered down and he promised it wouldn’t happen again. And while that particular disaster never happened again, enough bullshit did that I finally quit playing there. It’s one of the huge drawbacks to trying to do business with people who own and work in bars – a fair number of them are alcoholics.

10

^ Hey, I work in a bar :disappointed:

11

Years and years ago, I already left a jam packed bar in the rush (12:30) just because the club owner was always in the booth to suggests stupid things and pissing me of while the dancefloor was jam-packed. I warned him few times, then remove the needle from the vinyls, then get out of that place. That was funny.

Rule #1: don’t f*ck with the DJ after few warnings.. at least me :wink:

12

I sent him a text, to meet up and explain, we’ll see how it goes. He’s just a young kid and totally clueless about what it takes to run a club. He thinks it’s enough to have his 30 friends there every weekend. I literally have to remind him 2-3 times every week just to get payed.

I’ll keep you updated how it goes :slight_smile:

13

If it works out and he wants you to play again,make sure its on your terms and you get paid on time every week without running around after him! Good luck!

14

You’re probably an alcoholic. :smiley:

But to get back to the story Emil, you might want to rethink if you really want to continue playing there.

15

So, the manager finally called me and wondered why I left last night. Apparently he was totally clueless about what was going on last night and according to his friend, who was pushing me around… I WAS the one who picked a fight with him. Ehm…

I explained what really happened and he apologized, talked about being nervous about DJing (since he’s not a DJ), breaking up with his girlfriend recently and having too many things to deal with (then maybe a good idea to leave the DJing to a DJ).

I accepted the apology and we’re meeting next week for a chat about things and then I will make my “demands” about what I expect when I get there. i.e, clean and empty DJ booth and no clothes over the equipment so I don’t need to dig around after plugs and connectors.

I think it’s important to sometimes take a stand and make demands as a DJ. Due to the huge competition between DJs, it’s easy to be too accepting and I know he could replace me with some joker within a day but I’m glad he recognizes my experience and opened up a dialogue instead of a fight.

So, yeah, seems leaving last night was the right thing to do and talk about it calmly today.

16

i see this ending well!

compromise if you have to

17

Heres an idea, put together a mix (maybe 45mins to an hour) of stuff you KNOW warms up the crowd for YOUR set and burn it to CD.

Turn up early, tell this dude to mix in your CD and he can leave the booth and give you time and space to setup and you can drop in when your ready.

I’ve seen this work a few times and solves alot of problems with transitioning between DJ’s and keeping the vibe with the crowd.

18

Droctavia: That’s exactly what I usually do, but first I take my things out of my bag, connect sound card and stuff like that because until I start up the laptop, test run everything, that alone is going to take at least 5-10 minutes.

But I could barely get to the booth and didn’t have room to even bend down to get my cables, let alone a CD out to give to the DJ, who wasn’t even paying attention to me trying to communicate with him.

But yeah, this is normally what I do both when I get on, and when I get off and it’s a super smooth way to transition… if you have the appropriate mix in hand.

19

My two cents on this is be careful with the strange behavior of people on dope (ie:cocaine)

20

GOOD!

You have the balls…Excellent!

I have done the same…before.

Started playing at a clubs opening…3 tracks in and the owner…says her friends wants to hear normal music. all 3 of em.

The club is PACKED with our invites…all there for PSYTRANCE.

She gave me so much shit…i packed up my shit (was my gear they were using) and put her CD on…just after I turned my track off and shouted to the crowd to thank the owner!

I walked to my car and left.

Needless to say…the club never played Psy again…and my mate the manager left. They now have sailors drinking there…