On Djing...

Loose Joints - Tell You (Today) (Original 12'' Vocal)

I was just in H&M (I think for the first time ever) and this was playing. Maybe that’s fairly normal but it blew my mind a little bit.

I can't imagine that's normal! Wonderful times if it is.

my wedding foray was a time when I was freelancing part-time in the day job (print production) and refusing to take a full-time job because I still insisting on leaving time to work on my record label and later start my own printing business. Then I thought hey, maybe I can DJ weddings once a week for a few hours on a saturday and make a bunch of money. First it wasn't that much money, especially when I realized it wasn't just that saturday. I spent so much time during the week planning things, organizing music, preparing scripts etc. I also thought I'd just be hired to be a DJ and not have to get on the mic and the couples didn't want somebody always on the mic being cheesy, but I still had to make introductions while playing music and I hated that. Ladies and gentleman, we'd love to welcome the bride's parents! (cue James Brown I Feel Good).

Mostly though there was just this anxiety. I get anxious DJing any normal event though it comes and goes depending on how often I've DJd and what the situation is. Certainly there were plenty of times where I went into parties in bars/clubs/lofts etc with some degree of confidence. But weddings introduced this whole other thing. Gary from 74 Events knew I had a car so he always booked me for the events that required driving. Long Island. Staten Island Beach. Sandy Hook on the Jersey Shore. And I'd just be so worried that I'd be an hour into the drive and think "oh my god I forgot a crucial cable and now the wedding's going to be ruined".

My wife started to go out on friday nights because she couldn't handle being in the house with me, my anxious energy was so toxic! Saturday morning before having to leave I'd just put on Nick Drake and close my eyes and drink tea. I thought about being some kind of consultant after, I felt like I learned so much and had this great library and knew what to do but I just couldn't handle it any more. It's weird to work hard to try to become an expert in something and then move to a different career.

that's pretty anxious!!

i am very good at talking people who want me to DJ their wedding out of it, as 9 times out of 10 i know that what they think they want is just not what they will want on the day when the reality of the situation kicks in. there is almost no gig worse than a really tough wedding.

Playing my best friend's wedding weekend after next....ILM, is it corny to start the party with "Love's Theme"?

Nope.

Through corny out the window. It's a wedding.

what he said!

except spell it "throw"

the ladies who are bartending at the gay club on thursday night really liked the hour of darker house i played after all the kids left a few weeks ago. last night i rolled up and it was pretty much just them and me - they wanted to hear gothy so i went that direction. a group of girls showed up at 11:30 and asked if i took requests and for the first time i said no ("not tonight") and it went great honestly. i'm going to try and build on that i think.

tea dance bar owner is asking me to change my sunday 5-9 into a kinky underwear night thing in the basement from 8-12. i like it in theory but 1) i know he's going to drop the ball on promoting it and running it, so all of that would be up to me and 2) no one goes out in this city on sundays. i'm leaning toward just cancelling my sunday there. i'm feeling a little overextended. two weeklies is too much for me.

you should absolutely lean into that! two weeklies seems like a lot, yeah, and a sunday night underwear party strikes me as pretty optimistic lol.

had a pride gig at my usual spot last night that went really well, a number of strangers complimented my set and one guy even tipped me - that's never happened before lol. i was slated to go from 7pm til closing (1am) but ended up stopping at midnight because the bar was more or less empty by that point. got a "padam" request for someone's birthday - i played it two songs later but i think he may have stepped out for a smoke or something when i did, oops lol. a table of queens i didn't know came alive when i played the C&C club mix of "pink cadillac", it was very cute. i had my recording app going the whole set but unfortunately i had plugged my phone into the wrong port on the mixer and it just recorded all the noise in the room so it's unlistenable, doh.

have a few places i'm going to cold e-mail over the next week to ask about gigs, gotta spread my wings over here!

ah dr that's great, way to go! requests are so thankless ime. a few people get it and know how to make it worth your while but not many. interested to hear how your cold emails go.

you should absolutely lean into that!

yeah i'm starting to pick up on a thread here. by far my most listened-to mix on soundcloud is one i helpfully titled "sex party sex club bathhouse mix" for the searchers and it has by far the most listens of anything i've done, even though it's literally all slowed-down techno, not really accessible stuff. i already have the muscle daddy look. there's an audience for both a kinky kind of night and harder dance music here. i want to see if i can get the gay bar to name my thursdays "thrust thursdays" or something. i wish our city had an eagle, that seems like it would be a good fit for me. but since that niche is absent here maybe i can try to occupy it.

for some reason the phrase “it’s serving closeted mormon daddy” just came into my head and i can’t stop guffawing

(not that you are that, map, but i imagined a potential partygoer)

back in the day, the weekly Honey Soundsystem parties were on Sundays in San Francisco. I didn’t work til noon on Mondays, so I’d always go and sometimes it was really packed! other times not so much. but i had luck catching some dick, and that’s all that mattered then, along with the music of course

"it's serving closeted mormon daddy" is an alive and thriving genre here. i'm just a little too grossed out by the real thing to enjoy it as kink. and honestly my kink life is pretty bland overall.

i'm sure any other city can do a sunday just fine. even slc could, probably. it's just a small town and there is one "dance music head" group here full of the same < 100 people who go see the same 2-3 djs and their friends. since i don't get along with some of those people, i'm on the outs there. and this particular venue just isn't the place to try and grow a queer dance night.

i would love to be somewhere with a larger dance music contingent.

Provo!

👀

Lol, this has been doing the rounds. Bedroom DJ badly dissecting a Ben UFO video.

Found a DJ nerd guy with the most annoying content on tiktok pic.twitter.com/IlVDvLSlKj

— 🌌 george.mp3 🌌 (@deejaygeejaygee) June 30, 2023

Lead to someone posting this “Beatmatch of the Day” parody video I had not seen before:

LOOOL this is literally this guy and his bedroom DJ post-match analysis content https://t.co/qCthtmvP2V pic.twitter.com/Fu3r5MRg1v

— Massie (@ComradeMassie) June 30, 2023

I did a Classic Pride Anthems set last night at the usual bar - the first Pride related event our little town has ever had, and as every business on our High Street has been displaying Progress flags above their premises for the whole month (about 40-50 of them in total), the time felt right. Fucking hell, it was fantastic. I put a huge amount of work into preparing the set, and it all paid off big time, epic scenes, still buzzing from it this morning.

Did you record it?

I'll take a setlist if nothing else :)

a) I did record it! I'll be putting it up on Mixcloud over the weekend.

b) Here's the set list:

Warm-up:
Lil Nas X - Montero (Call Me By Your Name)
Grace Jones - La Vie En Rose
Garbage - Queer
Suede - Beautiful Ones
Lou Reed - Walk On The Wild Side
George Michael - Fastlove
Erasure - Sometimes
Erasure - Victim Of Love (Extended Mix)
Janelle Monae - Make Me Feel
Mika - Grace Kelly

Main set:
Diana Ross - I'm Coming Out
Lizzo - About Damn Time (Purple Disco Machine Extended Remix) << just the "I'm coming out tonight" section
Lizzo - About Damn Time (original)
Sister Sledge - We Are Family
Madonna - Express Yourself (Non-Stop Express Mix)
Gloria Gaynor - I Will Survive
Chaka Khan - I'm Every Woman [The Reflex Revision]
McFadden & Whitehead - Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now [The Reflex Revision]
Deee-Lite - Groove Is In The Heart
Scissor Sisters - Let's Have A Kiki
Rupaul - Supermodel
Steps - Tragedy
Kylie Minogue - Can't Get You Out Of My Head
David Bowie - Rebel Rebel
Gossip - Standing In The Way Of Control
Frankie Goes To Hollywood - Relax (New York Mix)
Erasure - A Little Respect
Scissor Sisters - I Don't Feel Like Dancin'
Aretha Franklin - Respect
Ike & Tina Turner - Proud Mary
Elton John - Are You Ready For Love
Elton John & Dua Lipa - Cold Heart
Pet Shop Boys - West End Girls
Madonna - Like A Prayer
Queen - Another One Bites The Dust
Queen - I Want To Break Free
Freddie Mercury - Living On My Own (No More Brothers Radio Mix)
Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe (Almighty Club Mix)
Pet Shop Boys - Always On My Mind (Extended Dance Version)
Pet Shop Boys - It's A Sin (Ian Levine remix)
Eurythmics - Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This)
Donna Summer - I Feel Love (Patrick Cowley Mega Mix)
Communards - Don't Leave Me This Way
Elton John - Your Song (Almighty Mix)
Jackie 'O' - Whatever (Rippin' It Up Mix) << yes, the Oasis song
Cher - Believe (Almighty Definitive Mix)
Indigo - Perfect Day (12" Mix) << yes, the Lou Reed song
Belle Lawrence - Hallelujah (Almighty 12" Anthem Mix) << yes, the Leonard Cohen song
Deja Vu - Somewhere Only We Know (Almighty 12" Anthem Mix) << yes, the Keane song
Lady Gaga - The Edge Of Glory (Cahill Club Mix)
Lady Gaga - Born This Way (Bimbo Jones Club Remix)
David Guetta - When Love Takes Over (ft Kelly Rowland)
Ultra Naté - Free
Aretha Franklin - A Deeper Love [C+C Radio Mix]
Nicki French - Total Eclipse Of The Heart
Weather Girls - It's Raining Men
Sylvester - You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)
Girls Aloud - Jump
Elton John - I'm Still Standing
Culture Club - Karma Chameleon
George Michael - Faith
Giorgio Moroder with Philip Oakey - Together in Electric Dreams
Donna Summer - Last Dance
Diana Ross - Ain't No Mountain High Enough
George Michael - My Baby Just Cares For Me

"Almighty 12" Anthem" is one of my favourite phrases in the English language as it always sparks a particular kind of shameless joy within me

Hell, yeah! I've not had the chance to play Almighty Anthems out before, and it was the section of the set that I was looking forward to the most. The reaction when I dropped "Whatever" on them was a joy to behold.

god mike that looks amazing

smh at djs

Here's the live recording of last week's Pride Anthems set.
https://www.mixcloud.com/miketd/strut-ya-stuff-56-classic-pride-anthems-special/

Then there's DJ Balearic, which for me is balearic but also Cosmic and Loft classics. I actually put that into one giant playlist on spotify for listening pleasure and kept adding and adding:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4bv9Fa4IfStJNwZW282yjb?si=77d1a3c868634c36

Just popping in to say that I've listened to this playlist loads; it is an absolute banger.

Thanks

I Djed my dad's celebration of life party after his funeral service (well, I made a playlist and thought I would make decisions on the fly but I did not) The whole experience from start to finish was much less fraught than I expected it to be. Just popping in to say that DJing is fun even when it's after someone passes!

Glad it went well LL! What sorts of things did you play?

WELL since you asked:
I had to be very methodical about it because I needed reassurance that I had a methodology and it wasn't just a bunch of random songs I chose. So I started with songs that reminded me him or that I remember him singing/enjoying/whistling. Most of my memories are pretty old because I left home ASAP and that marks an end to the musical memories. That was about 2 hours worth.
Once I had those in the playlist (I used spotify for my ease and the venue's ease; I am not a DJ), I peppered my own era-appropriate faves in there so that I would feel supported by the music that has always kept me company when I needed it. The result was a playlist where only I know which is which and therefore I am ultimately in control of ths situation.

Here's the funny part: the playlist was 4 hours long (just in case; I could have kept going but had to stop at some point) When the party was coming to a close and people were packing up stuff and leaving, I turned off the music at what I thought was the perfect and most appropriate place, at the end of a sentimental Beatles song. If I had waited just a few seconds, I could have ended the party in an unforgettable fashion with the song bearing the same name as my dad, the ultimate send off. But I cut it off early! I think I did what he would have wanted, but in hindsight, if the party had to end when it did, what I would have wanted was to end the entire endeavor with this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auLBLk4ibAk

i love that, LL, what a sweet tribute <3

just wanted to note that last night was a good night. feels like it's been a while since i had a good night. i did my 'no requests' line again and played a lot less pop, more deep and adventurous. a handful of cool people who wanted to dance to house music showed up. thank you for being there cool people.

Thanks for sharing that LL, glad that music helped you through it in some way. And map ♡ always

I had a great night last night as well. Incredible energy and connection during the second hour, just total euphoric frenzy.

I'm very lucky to have a Friday night residency in a bar which is a) three minutes walk from my front door and b) the only bar in town where a night like mine could possibly work. If you want to go out dancing in this town, then (apart from a monthly Northern Soul thing, which I used to play at) I'm the only option, so I'm proud of having held the residency for 5½ years and counting.

Yes, I have to play a lot of obvious stuff that people know, but I won't do it in a way that totally sells me out. Playing the hits is as much of a challenge as any other form of DJ-ing - more so when you're playing to a crowd that ranges from late teens to late sixties, and all points between - and I'm tempted to say that it's an underrated skill. I can't rely on well-worn, tried and trusted sequences, as I have a lot of regulars who would spot the laziness in an instant, so every set is constructed from scratch, and every set contains some tracks that I've never played before.

I mainly stick to pre-planned set lists, with very carefully pre-planned transitions (set prep takes me a whole day per week); I think that's essential when you're mostly playing vocal-led three minute pop songs. Sometimes the planning has to go out of the window, but not very often, as I know from weekly experience what works. I'll occasionally slot in a good request, but in general I favour the security of always knowing where I'm going next, over the risk of making panicky and over-safe choices on the fly.

This is last night's set list. People are rarely ready to dance in the first half hour, so I get to warm them up with deeper cuts, which is every bit as enjoyable as what comes later, albeit in a very different way. One track was a request; one transition was a big risk, but fuck me it paid off BIG time.

Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway - Back Together Again
Trussel - Love Injection
Ned Doheny - To Prove My Love
Patrice Rushen - Number One
G.Q. - Disco Nights (Rock Freak)
Lonnie Liston Smith - Expansions
Light Of The World - Time (Remix)
Chicago - Street Player
Candido - Jingo (Shep Pettibone 12" Remix)
A Taste Of Honey - Boogie Oogie Oogie
Brothers - Are You Ready For This
The Trammps - Disco Inferno
The O'Jays - I Love Music
Billy Paul - Only The Strong Survive
Gonzalez - Haven't Stopped Dancing Yet
Musique - In The Bush
Azymuth - Jazz Carnival
Blondie - Atomic
Pointer Sisters - Jump (For My Love)
Wham! - I'm Your Man
The Clash - Rock The Casbah
R.E.M. - Losing My Religion
Tears For Fears - Everybody Wants To Rule The World
Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
The Stone Roses - Fools Gold
Indeep - Last Night A D.J. Saved My Life << request
Young MC - Know How
Michael Jackson - Thriller
Eddy Grant - Electric Avenue
Pet Shop Boys - What Have I Done To Deserve This? (Shep Pettibone Mix)
Madonna - Music
Crystal Waters - 100% Pure Love
Robin S. - Show Me Love << this is where the bar just totally exploded; it's always a popular track (obviously!), but the timing was somehow just right for it to have maximum impact
K-Klass - Rhythm Is A Mystery
Xpansions - Elevation
Bobby Brown - Two Can Play That Game [K Klassic Radio Mix]
Brothers In Rhythm - Such A Good Feeling
The Supermen Lovers - Starlight
Fred again - Billie (Loving Arms)
D.O.D - So Much in Love (Extended Mix)
Kylie Minogue - Padam Padam (Jax Jones Remix)
Scissor Sisters - Filthy/Gorgeous
The B-52's - Love Shack << risky transition...
AC/DC - Thunderstruck << ...that paid off big time (never played Thunderstruck before)
The Undertones - Teenage Kicks
Mark Morrison - Return Of The Mack
Shaggy - It Wasn't Me
DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince - Summertime
TLC - No Scrubs
Blue - One Love
Toto - Africa
Ace Of Base - All That She Wants
Grace Jones - Pull Up To The Bumper

Do you ever play remixes/remakes of classics or stick to “only originals”?

I do play a few Dave Lee / Reflex / Late Nite Tuff Guy / Psychemagik remixes from time to time, but I'm not massively into remixes of classics. The two I play the most are the Reflex revisions of "Got To Give It Up" and "Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now", as they're excellent, but a lot of his other stuff is hit and miss. The Psychemagik mix of Fleetwood Mac "Dreams" is also good, as are the Dave Lee remixes of "Ride Like The Wind" and Fatback "Bus Stop".

LL I just wanna say that sounds really fun and also therapeutic, nice

mike do you play this stuff from vinyl or is it all digitized?

All digitised, but quite a lot of them are rips from my vinyl. I played vinyl from 2018 to 2020, then sold it all off during the pandemic.

Mike, a few of us are are listening to your mix post-gig tonight and you are absolutely nailing it, these transitions and drops are god level.

Wow, thank you so much!

Had a gig tonight at a brewery. Had anticipated that it was going to be scorching and smoky, so I put together a set that sounded like a JWM Turner painting: oppressive and druggy.

It turned out to be a beautiful perfect fresh evening, not at all the kind of night when people are going to want to be assaulted by their soundtrack, so I panicked and threw a bunch of jamz in a box.

I’m 2 hours in out of 3. Cyndi is singing “Money Changes Everything”. It’s going pretty well.

Five and half years in, my Friday night bar residency seems to have exploded in popularity; it’s been immense for weeks now. Curiously, the bar next door has now installed their own DJ, whose set bizarrely starts at 6pm; I popped my head around the door while setting up (9pm for a 10pm start) and he was playing generic current pop-dance, to an older bunch of drinkers who didn’t look like current pop-dance was their thing at all. Meanwhile, I had fun mixing Aqua into AC/DC into The Specials, shortly followed by Panjabi MC - a first time play which sent them so crazy that I wondered why I’d been holding back on it for so long. My partner unexpectedly wandered in at the end of the night - he almost never attends - so I treated him to “Dance Me To The End Of Love” as the final track of the night, after the house lights had gone back on. He was thrilled that it cleared the remaining stragglers, but that’s introverts for you.

He gets to pick the music when I get back, so we are now chilling to Bitches Brew on the good speakers, at some considerable volume, while the adrenaline subsides.

congrats, sounds awesome

that's really amazing mike - you're doing god's work.

meanwhile i've backed away from the vocal-heavy dance pop i used to play more of and i'm indulging in my taste for weirder, darker, heavier dahnce, kompakt-adjacent stuff, dark disco, stuff released by the likes of *ahem* optimo. it's very refreshing. i still mix in vocal remixes, more soulful house stuff, a lot of soulwax remixes and that sort of thing. the ladies who bar tend my night like the darker sound, and i was more than happy to be given permission to go there. i'm still saying no to requests and it's fantastic, i don't know why it took me so long to get there. last night i had a couple of dancers who went for it for an hour or so, even though i could tell that they weren't exactly familiar with zillas on acid. i feel like after years of trying to back away from my predilection for heavier or weirder dance music, i'm rediscovering my voice and finding support for it - feels very encouraging.

I haven’t had a dj gig in ages, but damn this thread makes me happy.

map that is so awesome, happy for you!

I don't think I updated on my Saturday opening gig but I made $100 for a 1-hour early set (this is entirely due to the draw of the headlining bands) and got to play shit like Amon Duul II's "Archangel's Thunderbird" (the musician who got me on the bill loved it, he came up after and was like "what was that tune that sounded like Rush", it took me a sec but uh yeah)

Haven’t djd in ages but my next gig is pretty exciting. A good friend rented out the El Dorado bumper car space in Coney Island for his 40th bday. A few years ago it was discovered that the sound system is a vintage Richard Long system. The guy behind Paradise Garage, Studio 54 etc. I went to a New Year’s party there djd by Nicky Siano and it was a blast. They just park the bumper cars off to the side and the djs take over the system. So I’ll be playing there for this bday party next week as one of 4.

I haven’t had a dj gig in ages, but damn this thread makes me happy.