Thoughts on being a mobile DJ? and speakers…
I’m considering becoming a mobile DJ (weddings, proms, etc.) any of yall have advice on becoming a mobile DJ? I’m not massively knowledgable on sound equipment. Do you guys recommend any certain speakers or subwoofers over others? I dont want to go and spend money on some crap speakers and what not so I think this lovely forum has all the answers I need 
I think you need to give some more info, what’s your budget. How many people you like to entertain with your set up. inside outside. You prabably need some lights. etc… Somekind of dj booth. How big is your transport it will need to fit. Some back up plan if equipment fails how will you handle that.
But your first concern will not be equipment, If you are not an experienced dj. you might wanna hook up with some other mobile dj’s and learn something from them on the road. Ask them if you can help them out for some time to learn.
Further you could always start renting gear for the first couple of times. Good for your wallet, if it’s not what you want you didn’t spend a lot of money and you can calculate it in your asking price.
Weddings are some pretty important events for the people involved. you don’t wanna spoil that for them because you don’t have a clue what you are doing. it’s not a club environment. 
You really need to read the crowd, and be able to play with that.
Most weddings people will like to hear the known songs, and you have to deal with all ages. And find out the age of the couple. it always works to bring in some of the songs they loved in their teens, and student time. But grandma and granddad might wanna do a little dance as well.
Sometimes you gonna need to use a mic. for you but as well for speeches etc.
A good mobile dj further needs to have a large collection of music in a lot of different genres, that’s expensive too. Expect a lot of requests. So some music knowledge will not harm as well, get to know the popular songs of the different time era’s. As a mobile dj you seldom get to play only the songs you like, you have to be willing to set your personal preferences aside.
Go to the website djtutor.com tons of videos that will help you in the right direction.
But when you get the hang of it it can be nice and on top of that most mobile dj’s earn better then club dj’s.
Good luck.
I’ve been DJ’ing for 6 years now, I do a lot of club gigs, but I see that A lot of people are getting paid better by being a mobile DJ. I have a $5000 budget. I have a pioneer controller and I’m getting a DJM 900 NXS mixer and 2 CDJ 2000s. I’m planning on doing a lot of weddings and proms, probably 100-400 people at a time in one hall. Sometimes less than 100, because I do events at my college as well. Good advice tho man, I’m just wondering about what speakers to buy, I dont know whats good and what I should avoid!
Don’t bothered with the top range pio set up. It might be great for you, but for your clients all they care about is the music and the experience. You want to spend your money on a sound rig, a light rig and a DJ booth. Also, a backdrop is a good idea, and a ton of business cards. Once you build your business and have a good client base, you can buy all the CDJs you want to use.
I have 2 JBL 115’s, and they are great, but they are heavy. You really have 2 options when it comes to sound: passive or active. The self-powered speakers are still fairly heavy, but they are easier to set up.
60 pounds.
If you want self-powered, I would go with their EON series.
If you are looking to add a subwoofer to this set-up, I would go down to a 10" or 12" cabinet.
If you are looking to go a little cheaper, Peavey is also a solid brand:
[quote=“Sambo, post:4, topic:65887, username:Sambo”]
Don’t bothered with the top range pio set up. It might be great for you, but for your clients all they care about is the music and the experience. You want to spend your money on a sound rig, a light rig and a DJ booth. Also, a backdrop is a good idea, and a ton of business cards. Once you build your business and have a good client base, you can buy all the CDJs you want to use.
[/quote] +1 That
If you are looking to make a business, you really don’t need the CDJ’s unless your club experience is good enough to take you to doing festivals.
Sambo is right nobody of your clients will care if you use a controller, and as a mobile dj. You best work with software, it’s easy to search all those request.
Get a brand name speaker system. i would go active get 12 inch speakers and for starters one active sub. EV, JBL, RCF, Yahama don’t have to be the top of the line but don’t go for budget speakers. I have RCF’s ART 422 but they are pretty expensive great speaker though. At the beach where i gig every weak i use JBL PRX 600 Very loud and clean sound. use them outside in full sun and i live in the Caribbean. they have been discontinued now but probably you can still find them for a decent price. The 700 PRX are the new ones but save yourself some money.
Don’t get the jbl prx 625 or 635 they seem to have problems overheating.
Other good option are the Yahama’s DRX12 (Highly recommended by a lot of mobile dj’s) even louder and good sound. see them on ebay for arround 650 dollars and with the sub a Yahama CW118V for arround 700 dollars you have good system. probably could get a deal if you buy it all at once. if you could get a deal for 3 12 inch speakers and 1 subwoofer for 2500 dollars i would get that, let them throw in some cables too and maybe two speakerstands. You can use the third 12 inch for monitor, or when the reception is in another room you can use third speaker for background music and you have a backup plan when one speaker fails on you. Then later you can buy your second sub when you think you need more bass.
12 inch because you can use them as well without a sub for some parties if the room is smaller. get a 18 inch active sub. for future proofing events for the kids that love bass.
Use the other 2500 dollars for lighting and a second hand computer as backup when your main computer fails.
Go for some wash lights maybe two moving heads so you can wash the room and see if you can find some totem trusses for a descent price. Further look at skrim king.
example of an easy to transport totem.
For trusses you can always look if you can find some second hand ones.
The first impression to a client is always important see if you can have a setup with a clean look. Now washlights and movingheads are the way to go.
For a dj booth you can start with a very easy to build yourself booth. get a 6 feet foldable table. and buy some white pvc plumbing piping and connectors you can build a frame that you can set in front of the table. ask somebody with some sewing skills to make from white spandex a tunnel ( So you fold the spandex and sew it together like a condom
You can pull that over the frame and you have a clean white front, put a wash light under the table behind it and your booth can have any colour you want.
An example of making a booth, i did one but not that high just enough to hide your cables will be fine, you don’t wanna hide yourself and ofcourse i did a different method for the spandex. but think about what works for you.
You can even make totems from pvc but they are less stable.
get some skrim kings or make them yourselves for the speaker stands put some lights behind it and with two totems next to it you will have a cleangood looking setup. later you can expand in trussing if you think you need it and more wash lights to wash the walls of the room. There are enough great ideas for lighting on youtube. dj mickeymike is interesting to look at he has some cool ideas.
Look at what he did with these mirror balls.
Don’t go for budget speakers if you have the money, Your clients will love the sound and you will have less headaches go for active you will love the time you save in setting your system up and for all when breaking down. Get a setup you can handle yourself. and is easy enough to transport. get a cart to transport your stuff in and out of buildings.
Use your earned money to upgrade your lighting first, then afterwards you can spend your money on toys like cdj’s. and you can ask more money when putting upgrade lighting packages for your clients. Get a haze smoke machine instead of a regular one when you think you need one. Lot of places don’t allow smoke machines, sometimes a haze machine is ok.
And maybe invest in a gobo projector, get one where you can print your own gobos.
something like this
Some great tips for weddings by dj tutor Brian s redd, check his video’s it will help you a lot.
Good luck.
2x alto tss15 2x tsssub 15 multiple lights 12 channel behringer sound board 4 wireless mics 1 wired multiple external hard drives back ups of backups have been usuing virtual dj pro with a numark ns6 full lighting rig.. All in all if say including music collection in probably 7k in for hardware I have an account at local pro audio store for 3k that if something very bad were to happen with any peice of equipment I can quickly source replacements instead of having to order for a good price… Being a mobile dj coming from a club dj back ground takes some getting used to…
F
Luckily I had some really good starting gigs that helped me become kind of goto guy for things that guarantees me business… Ideally I am shooting for 3 weddings a month for summer hope to be at that by next summer…
You will find once word spreads and reputation grows you will be booked for more then weddings… Remember start cheap to establish yourself once you do that you can increase your fee… Also have different pricing tiers… Some with lights some without some with complimentary mics some without…
If you are real serious about weddings look at getting hi def projector to offer in a package and also to maybe add video to your arsenal…
You will find sometimes best sound quality doesn’t matter some people just like loud… It’s kind of a shame but it’s true… With my current sound setup I can safely blow away about 300-500 people depending on accoustics of building…
One thing I can’t stress enough is when setting up run sound checks and walk around the place to see how it sounds and what point your bleeding ears up front and quite in back so on and so on…
Now what I’ll likely be adding is 2 10 cabinets to use for different placement besides foh because you then can extend the life of mains by passing off so e of that extra sound to smaller cabinets
Yamaha active line dx are really nice and not much more… I choose altos because at the time I had access to them for well below regular pricing due to distributor connections.. After this summer I am likely switching to pk sound speakers but don’t want to dump 4k into yet… Also I should stress running a eq and some sort of signal processing lots of full range speakers have really good low end but need a eq to really find it..
One thing I would say is a must for weddings is something like the american dj gobo zoom since can make your own congratulations gobo… Also the led messenger would add a bit more snap to your setup…
Professional look is important also.. And please for love of good always test your equipment the day before… Normally I run my setup for an hour or two prior to an event just to make sure… I’ve seen laptops show problems out of no where… I currently bring 2 laptops to gigs for saftey sake…
When your charging 700-1200 for the night you have to leave the couple or money man happy he booked you and that will also help bring more bookings your way… Also be flexible on pricing if for example you doing a party and they were expecting 200people but only 75 showed up be kind and charge less since they will be inclined to make you the goto person…
Also if you may find your always chasing that club bass sound… Most people don’t want their wedding to be like that though so keep that in mind… A good piece of advise start volume low and then progressive bring it up or else you’ll find your over driving your gear to keep up with the demand… More alcohol the louder they want it don’t go balls deep before their lubed up
I love you guys!! so much information, I was planning on spending on CDJs and a DJM but I use those in clubs regardless. I know this business is a lot different than the club business. I’m looking at buying some active powered speakers, souldancer, you’re my hero, you gave me so much info, i know exactly what I’m going to head towards. If you guys have any websites that sell most of this stuff at good prices I am more than willing to check them out. If you guys are ever in the Dallas area hit me up! I DJ at night clubs here so I wont mind sharing my VIP table with yall
No problem, i’m as i said in the caribbean so for me the prices are different then yours. But go to djforums.com in the speaker section i always see a guy telling he will beat any price in speakers and lighting. think his name is al poulin. might wanna contact him.
Well known internet shops are agiprodj, proaudiostar, idjnow. they will all try to beat each other in prices. but probably your local shops will do the same as you show them what deal you can get with another. depending on wich brand they buy their stuff is like 20 to 40 percent cheaper then the retail price you see advertised in their shop. ofcourse they need a earn something but you can get prices down, and the more you are willing to spend all your money with them the better the price.
I added some extra video’s for you in my last post.
and this site might help you too. http://www.mobilebeat.com
Enjoy the ride
It could be BillESC that sells speakers, well just read some through the forum you will find it out.
In the US I’d use idjnow they have very competitive pricing when I was younger I did a fair amount of business with them before moving up north… On Canada I use axemusic for planned purchases and I phone directly instead of ordering online… Locally I goto long and mcqaude for unplanned purchases…
+1 on the Alto 12s. I really like mine and they are very affordable. They have decent low end and are fine without subs for small events. I also have four harbinger 18’s, but only use the two for large weddings. I power them with a 5kw Certain Vega amp and use a balanced Minidsp for sound processing.
As far as lighting, led par cans daisy chained together are great for wash lighting. Too many different lights going on at the same time looks cheesy IMO.
As far as a mic, a wireless mic or two is a must. People like passing the mic around for speaches and cables get in the way.
Your controller will be just fine. Most wedding DJ’s that I know don’t mix anyways.
Man absolutely save your money for the speakers and get something to play easily with your laptop ad having always all your music with you!
I’ve been working a couple of times at birthday parties or stuff like that, only one thing is important: gotta have the music they want!
Don’t be afraid maybe to factor in say $50 to $100 an event for iTunes there have been times I’ve actively downloaded songs that I didn’t have from iTunes while at an even… Also have spare cables you will get the odd person asking to play something off their phone and if it happens to be someone important to the event or wedding it may go a ways to allow this to happen… I normally keep a few 1/8 to RCA jacks in my cord case
For this reason
For speakers, I can’t recommend the QSC KW series enough. They are some of the best sounding speakers you can get in that class. On top of that, one of the key factors that (surprisingly) no one mentioned is warranty. If you are planning on doing mobile applications, your gear is going to take some abuse, and a good warranty is a god send. QSC really puts their money where their mouth is with a 6 year warranty.
