The Economics Of DJing

I’ve just ordered another box of 50 blank CDRs and it has got me thinking about how much my hobby costs.

So they were £7.50 on Ebay.  TDK.  I remember buying TDK cassettes.  I have my doubts over the quality but maybe I should put those cassettes out of my brain.

I do buy 2-3 packs a year, easily.

I seem to need new headphones every year – although lesson learnt – never ever let anyone else use them unless you 100% trust them and always keep an eye on them.  Do not trust DJs that you do not know.  Currently I have cheap headphones, and boy don’t I know it with the rattle in my ears whenever they are on anything but bedroom level volume.

I am hoping to be able to afford a new decent pair next year.  And I will paint flowers on them so nobody wants to steal them.

Of course then there is the hardware to learn the craft.  I spent £1,200 originally on a mixer and CDJs.  I intend on buying technics next year, and will need a CD stand so my CDJs can fit above them, so I’m probably talking not too far off a grand again.  Plus I’ll either need to stabilise my desk (I broke it when moving) or buy a new desk.

I know I should buy my tunes but I don’t.  However this will change next year when I start buying vinyl.

Then there is the cost of going out.  Train fares, drink, food and any extras – the cost of a normal night out except I get a few free drinks.

But whatever it costs, when I get behind the decks and I feel the satisfaction of the first mix, all my investment is worth it – in fact, my investment is inconsequential.  It’s love.

When it is something you love doing, then the amount it costs doesn't matter - though that doesn't mean I will play for free!  Unless I really like you.

I am really lucky to have the residency that I have, and not have to whore myself out for free in the hope that someone one day might take pity on me and give me two free drinks tokens.

And speaking of which (the residency), I'll see you all there on Friday 20th November.  It's going to be a big one - a bit of a Mango re-union.

But who is hosting the after-party?

Not Quite Villalobos-Esque Yet. Except In Some Ways

Friday night was messy.

At least this time I had practised.  I was well prepared.  Lots of music downloaded, new CDs burnt and I practised several times – more than I ever have done.

I still had no idea what I was playing, and certainly no order.  I didn’t even have a first track which is a fairly elementary mistake.

Anyway, I came on just before midnight and Martin had been using USB sticks much to my surprise (I think he had told me but I had declined to listen).  We always seem to have difficulties switching between USB and CDs.  So imagine my panic after a couple of minutes into my set when I realised that the track sounded like it was on loop.  I don’t actually know how to use the looping function (well I have an idea but I’ve hardly ever practised it so I wouldn’t dare use it).

Emergency loop was on.  What the hell?

It kind of worked as my music is quite repetitive at times but I didn’t have a clue why.  In the end I just mixed the track on the other deck – the emergency loop stopped once I took the CD out and put it back in again.

Ahhh technology.  Then the left deck wouldn’t play at the same volume as the right deck.  Had I accidentally turned up to Zeus?

I then figured out I had knocked the crossfader – again I never use the crossfader so it isn’t something I immediately considered.  I managed to knock it all the way across later when trying to cut another track in so I was cutting into silence.  Great one.  But of course, it just sounded like I was playing and getting busy with my mixes – I do do quite a lot of cutting nowadays.

To me it was like a Villalobos-esque trainwreck at times – a couple of my mixes just didn’t work, one was way, way too low-key after quite a heavy track, though I was trying this out on purpose – again Villalobos-esque to flip between minimal styles and heavier house tracks.

Yeah I was wasted too.  V v v v v v v.......esque.

It was busy all night and the crowd stuck with me no matter what I did – even through the fuck-ups though most of them actually worked – and through my repetitive minimal.  I could actually feel the crowd willing me to play something with more of a beat and there I was merrily enjoying my 12-minute long minimal track.

I particularly enjoyed playing this beast of a track – a DJ Rush heavy-duty house track from many a year ago…decades in fact.

I was ready to finish close to 2pm when the next DJ turned up – he had surrounded the booth with his buddies and I had run out of ideas.  Plus I needed some fresh air, it really gets warm in that booth.

And I just want to get down to Chaka Khan.

Which annoying the next DJ cut out of half-way through.

Next time I am really looking forward to being the first DJ, and being able to do my minimal thing though I might progress into some proper deep house.  I keep meaning to do a real deep house set.

I actually feel that I am groping towards my own style, at last, both in terms of music and mixing.  I’m not there yet though.  Were it not for the fuck-ups that would have been an amazing set – and less stressful too!  Maybe I should drink less next time.

Also very much looking forward to having Tim Sharpe back next time as our headliner.

And looking ahead, I am craving the simplicity of having vinyl and vinyl decks to play on.  Though I won’t be buying any until January at the earliest.

See you on 16th October.

Just How Good Was Friday?

The last couple of Dark Matter nights had been pretty quiet, especially July.  I had put it down to the time of year – no students around, holiday/festival season and the warm weather not enticing people to basements.

All of these factors were still in place last Friday so I expected another quiet night.

I was less prepared than ever.  I had a load of boxes behind my decks so couldn’t be bothered to move them for practice, not to mention my free time was required for cleaning my old house last Friday, prior to DJing.  I had no broadband still so couldn’t download the new tunes from the last couple of months of tube-digging.

And then the warm-up DJ didn’t turn up so I went on for the first hour, except I mostly only had house music with me.  I did have a few minimal CDs but ended up playing quite a few tracks I’d played before – a couple of shaky mixes too.  I did slowly get into it and something seemed rather odd – despite having initially cleared the room of the 10 people I found upon arrival, people were coming downstairs and staying.  Despite my minimal.  And many of them were pretty young ladies too.

It isn’t a party unless you have gays, blacks and hot women.  Fact.  All boxes were ticked by 11pm.

I had quite a few people talk to me whilst DJing, including some cute eastern European girls who were in a nice way asking for something they could dance to.  I asked them in a nice way to be patient.  They left.

I also had an exceptionally pretty, tall blonde girl come up to me and ask “Can I dance with you?”.  Well, of course I mumbled in a why the fuck is she dancing with me kind of way.  I appreciate I am brilliant and beautiful but I have limits.  Then I clocked on that she was just trying to make her boyfriend jealous so I quickly high-fived him.

Towards midnight, Samantha and Bowler came on and did an unplanned back-to-back which was really quite excellent.  They crowd loved it, the cute eastern European girls came back, Sam and Bowler pushed it more in a techno direction than I think anyone else has done for us (we are not talking Surgeon/Perc kind of techno but ballsy enough) and it stayed busy.  Until it got too hot.

Ahhhh, the bain of my life.  Yes the fucking air conditioning stopped working.  After 10 minutes we eventually found a manager to come and take a look and it came back on.  The crowd was probably a third of what it was previously but it soon built back up and became busy again.

Myself and Martin then did a back-to-back to bring it to a close, with an unexpected cameo from Pete Wheeler and it remained reasonably busy, though I didn’t really have much in the way of tough music to play, and there was no way I was going to play house music at the 129pm which I inherited, so I felt that I had to bring down the pace.  Again I was unprepared and ended up playing tracks I’d played before.

It definitely wasn’t my best set, it was just good enough, but the night itself was my favourite so far, I enjoyed it a heck of a lot, and it was exciting to see how busy it was.

I was actually quite touched at the end when a very cute Polish girl came up to me and said how surprised she was that we played that kind of music here, that she hardly ever gets to go out and how much it meant to her.  That is why I love DJing.

I cannot wait for the next one – I hope you are going to join us.

Things That Can Be Done Whilst Mixing

My hero, Ricardo Villalobos got a slating whilst DJing at Cocoon In The Park, mostly by the Carl Cox fan-boys for not doing enough on the decks - for doing his camp little dance, for not constantly twiddling the mixer knobs and for having the temerity to pour himself a drink rather than have a skivvy do it for him.

I am of the school that you should let the music tell the story - who cares if you can crab-scratch on 3 decks whilst doing a handstand?  Not that I am suggesting Carl Cox does many handstands.  It is of course, horses for courses - I prefer Ricardo's style from Carl's by a country length - but I wouldn't boo Carl Cox for his preferred style.

So it got me thinking, what else can I do whilst DJing?

I recently recorded a minimal techno mix (cheap plug alert) - 3.5 hours long with several of the songs being of the 10 or so minute-long variety.

Repeating Repetition by James Winfield on Mixcloud

Firstly I had a shower.  The track was mixed in, the next track was cue'd up and I had 8 minutes left.  It wasn't the longest shower ever but enough to clean myself and my mullet.

I also brushed my teeth and had a shave, but these don't take too long.

I later then had opportunity to make myself a bacon and egg sandwich whilst one of the tracks was playing.  I did have to rush upstairs once the food was ready for the next mix (I had a timer on my phone), and by time I came down, the pitta bread that was under the recently switched-off but still-warm grill had got slightly burnt, but it was a pretty good breakfast.

It did take a couple more mixes until I finished eating it.

I mistakenly took a phone call with just 3 minutes of a track left, and had to call back the person on the pretence that someone was at the door.  I then had 6 minutes before the next mix to discuss the room that I was looking to rent.

Later on I then started cleaning my kitchen.  This wasn't so successful as I would lay the spray and then go upstairs to mix, then come downstairs and scrub - I cleaned about half of the work surfaces and also did the washing up - two loads.

I did manage to arrange going out for lunch and a few other bits and bobs.  I had intending on doing my ironing but I unfortunately plugged my decks to the only plug socket where the iron and board can fit in the room.

And I think it is my best-ever DJ mix.

I would be interested to know what you can do whilst having a mix.  Apart from the obvious like drugs and blow jobs.

Not Enough Friends On The Dancefloor

Friday night DJing was fun, as always, but there was one thing missing:

Friends.

I don’t like hassling friends to come and see me DJ – I know most are not that interested in my music, though sometimes they are interested in a night out.

It was a quiet night in general – the Turtle was never that busy even in the garden, which you’d normally expect to be very busy on a reasonably warm night.  It is a tricky time of year – students have mostly gone, it was Royal Ascot week and of course festival and holiday season.

I had that slightly sinking feeling that all promoters get when it looks like it is going to be a quiet night, though for us without any financial outlay to recoup, it is only a matter of personal pride and wanting the night to be busy for our own personal enjoyment and that of our guests.

It did still get reasonably busy, particularly for when I was DJing and I feel that I was much better this time, back on form – one totally cocked up mix but plenty of good mixes to compensate.  Musically I had absolutely no plan, not even the first track, but I did play a fair few tracks from my latest mix, which went down particularly well.  I did kind of run out of ideas towards the end though - the problem of taking roughly 1 million tracks with me.

In fact, one thing that I noticed which really pleased me was that the more underground I played things, the more reaction I seemed to get.  When I played something verging on crowd-pleasing (for my standards!) or something rather tough, I’d lose people.  I still think I am a long way from being able to read a crowd properly.

The main difference between this night and others was the lack of that little group of friends – even having 4 or so makes all the difference, as they tend to be close to the dancefloor, which encourages others to stick around and helps build a dancing crowd that little bit easier.

Oh and not to mention – no Ian Hills.

There are a couple of regulars though, including a young lady from Syria who spoke to English who danced for 4 or so hours solid, along with another young lady who seems to barge into me on a regular basis, especially when there are any other girls near me.   Hmmm.  We also had quite a group of Spanish people down there.

Next time we have one of my really close friends DJing, Ben Zagorski, which I am really looking forward to.  I always say that, of course, but I am.

I assume I will be doing a minimal-laden warm-up, hopefully with a few friends in support this time.  Or at least a few friends hassled/guilt-tripped/blackmailed into coming.

I Cannot Think Of A Title For This Superstar DJ Update

I was back in my favoured warm-up slot on Friday night.  Why is it favoured?

Because I can play my favourite music.

So I started off which some melancholic dub techno, at quite a slow BPM, I think it was around 118bpm.  Far too underground for most people but considering there were about 6 people there, it seemed mood-settingly appropriate.

30 minutes later, despite there being just a couple of dozen people there, one lady kept asking me if I could play something banging, just for her.  Or some jungle.  I deflected her requests but I did relent and progressed smoothly into deep house – the gorgeous sunshine-filled deep house, not the anti-deep house of the charts.

As the second hour of my set commenced, I changed track into playing minimal, but quite twisted minimal – definitely tracks you could dance to.

It was filling up nicely by time midnight approached, and I played increasingly dancefloor-friendly yet still underground tracks, and finished off on this beauty, it still sounds so good.

Musically I think it was the cleverest set I have played live.  There was little planning, as usual I had practiced my first two tracks and little else.  Though there were more slightly-off mixes than I would have preferred, and one mix that just sounded awful.  Every month I say it, I need to practice more.  I spend more time DJing live then practicing.

A wise man one said you can only become an expert at something with 10,000 hours practice.  Maybe I am at 300 hours in total.

The night itself went really well, with two masterful DJ sets that followed me.  And it stayed busy right until the end, people kept dancing.  I am hoping this is a sign that word is spreading of the night as it seemed busier than the rest of the Turtle.

Next up we have the charming Terri headlining on Friday 19th June.  Otherwise known as TAB.  There are a couple of items on the agenda in the coming months that could be very special if they come off, but you won’t hear anything from me until and if they are confirmed.

I will also be recording a house mix too.

Not My Sister's Taste In Music

I spent years trying to convert my sister to the charms of house music when we were growing up.  I even made her a couple of tapes when we were young.

I think she coped with the house music but was particularly put-off by my jungle phase, her walls being adorned with Spice Girls, Westlife and Steps.

Thankfully she made it out of manufactured music but ended up an indie kid – so we pretty much have diametrically opposed music tastes.  I failed in my childhood conversion attempts.

So a few months back, I set myself a task of trying to design a mix that could be influenced by her music tastes but yet still be music I love.

Appropriate tracks were few and far between, but eventually I collected enough track ideas – a lot of male vocals that could have been stripped from indie tracks, with guitar licks, and often deep trance melodies.

Upon the first attempt, I realised that there was a big problem.  Too many of the tracks sounded the same.

So I went back into research mode – this is a mix that was well-planned, unlike some other mixes and all of my live DJ sets that are pretty much off the cuff.

It needed to be well-planned for there really wasn’t a whole load of tracks that would fit the rather tight criteria.

Eventually I found some tech-house which fit the mood, and some more guitary kind of tracks.

The mix isn’t going to win any underground awards.  I doubt I will listen to it more than a few times.  The levels on a couple of the early mixes are slightly off, and on the last mix I clearly lost concentration.  But I didn’t fancy recording the whole mix again.

Not My Sister's Taste In Music by James Winfield on Mixcloud

I have accomplished what I set out to achieve and I think most people will enjoy it.  As always, I would dearly like your thoughts, good or bad.  Feedback and practice are the two ways I will improve.

Next up I will be DJing at the Purple Turtle on Friday 15th May which I am looking forward to having nearly burnt down the place last time.  It was rather busy last time and there were a good few close friends there which is always touching.

Except when I cleared the dancefloor by playing heavy duty techno.  And then again when I started a small fire.