On Friday 8th October, after 18 months, I made it back into a real DJ booth inside a London venue to orchestrate a techno frenzy. I have been DJing for Sonance events, a techno party based in the capital, for the past couple of years. The event held on the 8th October was their belated 2nd birthday party, despite the brand NOW being nearly 4 years old, this party has been rescheduled due to the obvious lockdown that had prevented anything of this nature happening over the last 18 months or so. They kept the line up from the originally advertised event, Sonance are true to their word offering for many DJs on the line up, the first taste of real world DJing in nearly 2 years.
The venue was The Castle, in the centre of the city, close to Algate East station. Upstairs was a thriving bustling pub, with all the energy of a friday night, but downstairs was like entering a different world. A converted basement space, udnerground, the walls of bare brick and various little cubby-hole seating areas - almost like dungeon cells but with cushions. Very apt for a dark and LOUD underground Techno party. And it was free entry also.
The party was packed, and I'm not sure if all the party people there were techno fans, but just people who wanted to dance, wanted that underground rave experience, an experience we had been craving for many months. Many people said to me that night how much of a relief it was to be back in this environment again. During the absence, DJs and parties including Sonance turned to 'livestreaming', where a DJ will play their set down a webcam and straight into your homes via the internet and I feel although this was a 'make-do', nothing can replicate feeling the bassline rattling off your ribcage, no home soundsystem can do that unless you live at the Ministry Of Sound, inside one of the bassbins.
When it came to my set, the obvious nerves returned, right on time. 30 minutes before the start, i'll start pacing and I will switch off to normal conversation. My brain for some reason shuts down to normal social parameters and I become silent and deep in thought. I am planning my first few tracks in my head based on how the party is going and the vibe that is working. Sure, every DJ can plan their set in advance, but what happens if the tunes you were planning to play WOULDN'T work in that environment. Once, I planned a techno set for Dark Matter (another Techno night in London) but within a couple of tunes, I was reading the crowd and they were not feeling 'it' at all, and judging from the crowd and how they responded to Tech House, I ended up having to play a Tech House set off the cuff, and that's only something you will learn if you read the crowd.
This is something that livestreaming does NOT give you, you could be the best livestreaming DJ in the world, playing to no one but the virtual crowd down the camera - you can't see how they're reacting nor can you see who is logging on and logging off. When you're in front of a crowd, you can read their faces and you can see how they are feeling about your choices of music within milliseconds. So NO, being a livestream DJ is NOT even a patch on DJing in a real club, as judgements, crowd reading and micromanaging your set to keep the clubbers on the dancefloor, can ONLY happen in a live setting.
I was using an Allen & Heath mixer - and where I am used to Pioneer mixers (ones used in most clubs), it took a couple of tracks of absolute panic to get my head round it again - it had been about 4 years since I used one last! The cueing system on this mixer isn't one I will confess to liking. Its either channel 1 or channel 2..OR BOTH at the same time. No nice fading knob like you do on the Pioneer mixer. And the CDJs scrambled the folders on my USB stick so where I had highlighted a few tracks I really WANTED to play, those tracks were now tossed about like tiles in a scrabble bag. Although there was no breaks in the music and the crowd kept dancing, my DJ friends could see the terror in my eyes, especially for the first 20 mins of the set whilst I was getting my head around these little factors - thankfully only my mate Dan (Latex Zebra) highlighted how visible this was!
However, come the end of my set, it was like I had never been away, and I think mentally, every time I do a livestream set in my kitchen, I transport myself (inside my head) to a DJ booth. I have been DJing for over 20 years and much like riding a bike, after an initial wobble (mixer issues and song file reshuffle) I felt like someone else. Not James Black the person, but James Black the DJ, a hideously overblown 1000% version of myself where everything is exaggerated to diffuse the energy from the DJ booth across the dance floor. As even Paul Oakenfold has said, 'DJing is a performance'. You don't expect Dee Snider from Twisted Sister to actually LIVE like he does on stage do you? Or Ozzy Osbourne? Or Lemmy (RIP) from Motorhead - onstage, tearing shreds out of the audience with the music they perform, but at home, very different people. My 'spirit animal' is Fatboy Slim, I studied his performances whilst learning to DJ because in my eyes, he IS the greatest DJ, who wouldn't want to combine music and crowd interaction? It draws the whole clubbing experience together as a shared consciousness.
It was a real honour to be playing live again and a massive thankyou to Chris & Paul, the honchos behind Sonance for inviting me to play. This was a home crowd for me, and what a way to return to the world of real world Djing.
Tips:
Read your crowd - start taking the set in the direction in which you would like - intend - but if they're not feeling it, you'll be able to tel - dial it back a notch with the style of music, or the feel of music. If the crowd are not feeling dark techno, roll it back a bit to soemthing a little funkier - a heavier tech house track and try and build them up again, maybe throw in an acid techno track, see how that goes... Once you see what takes.. then thats the direction you should go. A crowd will give you about 2 tracks before it decides to stay or move on.
Go to a DJ equipment store and try your hands on both Pioneer or Allen & Heath mixers. Either one could turn up in your booth and you NEED to be proficient on both otherwise it'll be the worst gig of your life. There are too many DJs ready to step into your shoes, and if a promoter doesn't think you're ready or you absolutely ham your set up in a blind confusion, you wont be coming back for another set, as harsh as that is, its reality.
This point is an addition to the first. Only plan your first 3 and your final track. What happens in the middle is an organic journey between you and the crowd. The crowd CHEER because the DJ plays something they NEEDED to hear. simple as. If you follow the vibe and feeling of the crowd and their journey... they WILL be putty in your hands.
Next gig...
Thankyou for reading x