What do you like to play before people come to the club? Like from 9 - 11
when the place is empty and there's six dudes drinking at the bar. It always
feels real uncomfortable to start playing bangers when nobody is drunk
enough to dance or anything. But then I also feel like I'm bringing the vibe
down when I play mellow/obscure stuff. Plus, if I'm djing for six hours
straight, I always worry early on about running out of jams. Do you care
about playing repeats when djing all night? I guess that's more than one
question...
Thanks!
Some Dick Head
Dear Some Dick Head,
If you've spent any time as professional DJ, (not many have) you'll know how quickly these hours become the highlight of your work night. Forget the screams you hear when you drop "Pon De Floor" at 1 am; anyone can drop "Pon De Floor" at 1 am. A skillfully crafted opening set is the quickest way to to my, and many other djs hearts. Everything I'm about to expound on is rooted in the assumption that we are talking about djing in commercial venues and not opening up for Diplo or DJ Harvey. If you find yourself in one of the latter situations, just play good music and don't try to hard to kill it until your last couple songs. Leave the headlining to the headliners even if you think you are better (obviously you do, your a dj it's what we do). Take the shit I'm spitting and apply it to whatever kind of djing you do. If you master the art of opening you can outshine big dogs without playing any obvious bangers.
I could physically dj before I moved to New York, but I couldn't really DJ; I learned more about it my first year in New York than the 8 years prior. Djing is unforgiving and unpredictable and you are almost never at your very best, but if you can learn how to open well you'll be much more likely to have a magic night. There are a million ways to open but for me, I keep it as simple as possible. I have two major threads I chose songs from and weave the rest around them both. The first is a play-list called Openers Hip Hop. I know, who'd have guessed! The second, wait for it....Openers non-hip hop. Lets look at this first, here is a random screen cap of my play-list:
Openers Hip Hop
Basically all you need to know about Hip Hop openers: Bad Boy R&B. Beginning with Mary J Blige's first album and the subsequent remixes all the way up to "Last Night." Like him or not, Diddy has been making the songs you need to start out your night for over two decades. My personal favorite: Marias Carey's "Honey" Bad Boy Remix. Two classic old school samples combine to make one of the best opening songs of all time. Other faves worth mentioning to give you a clearer picture of what I'm talking about: Mya and Jay-Z "Best of Me", Fat Joe "Whats Luv", Nelly & N'sync "Girlfriend", R Kelly and Biggie "Happy", and who could forget, Jagged Edge Featuring Run DMC "Lets Get Married Remix". Newer songs are great too but a lot of them don't have the lasting power that the old stand bys do. But there are some, like Usher "Caught Up", Timberlake's "Rock Your Body", Or any old Missy Elliot track, that are perfect to take things up a notch before you start unloading clips on em. Don't just play the ones I like, find you own. There's a gold mine of amazing hip hop and R&B songs to play, try out different stuff and have fun. When is doubt, think Trackmasters, nothing beats Triton strings over old school drums.
So let's be honest, in this day and age how often are any of us really doing a party where we're only going to open with hip hop? Next to never obviously. Sometimes it's better not to play any hip hop at all in the opening set. In the vinyl days, this was kinda standard. Old School, and 80's until 1am then go in strong with the hip hop. New york has changed a lot in 6 years and more often than not I open with a hybrid of these two styles. This is where list number two comes into play:
Openers Non Hip Hop
This is where things starts to get fun. Make a play-list of the all your favorite 80's, pop, older R&B, danceable rock, and more obvious hipster and alternative tunes. Here is the tricky part: leave off all the heavy hits. No "Sweet Dreams" or Salt n Pepa "Push It" you want to get people going not hit them over the head. This is vast and open ended but for me it's important to draw lines so First Choice's "Love Thang" has always been a good barometer. It's not a deep record but It can easily be lost on a mainstream crowd. I don't put any R&B/Classics deeper than that on this play-list. The pendulum swings both ways so songs like "Love is the Drug" or Siouxsie's "Kiss Them For Me" are the deepest I'll go in the opposite direction. (Eli Escobar is rolling his eyes somewhere, he loathes this kind of underestimation, BUT H. L Mencken said it best: "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public."
OK so now you've got these two massive play-lists with all types of songs at a wide variety of BPM's. Now make fucking magic. Weave the hip hop into the 80's and the Prince and the Cameo and The Cure. You can do this all without playing any of the major, major hits because you've got those on another play list. To give you an idea here's something I've been doing recently: Mariah and ODB "Fantasy" into the drums from the Tom Tom Club track it samples, into that, I mix Morrissey's "Last of the Famous International Playboys". From there, we go nuts! And yes this is not a joke, this is the kinda shit I dj now, parties with actual girls at them. To sum it all up, what your really trying to do is play two hours worth of music that if you shortened to 3 minutes would sound like The Roots' "Seed Pt 2". Does that make sense? Thought so.
One last thing, nothing and I mean nothing leaves a bad taste in peoples mouths like big hits before it's time. No matter how much some girl begs for it, do not fucking cave. Prime time songs are for prime time. If a record is legitimately big enough (see Rihanna's "Rude Boy") it is almost your duty to repeat it. In cities that end early like 2 am it's less important but in NY where we go till 4 am, I can't stress enough how good it feels to get the fuck over yourself as an "artist" and just play the shit people want to hear at 3:45 in the morning. Nothing sends the crowd home happy and gets motherfuckers laid like a quick re-cap of the biggest songs out, followed by some sexy R&B or Reggae. if you are a working dj, it's not about you, it's about them. This is easier said than done because by 3:30 all I want to do is go the fuck home, get on Facebook chat, and start "hey-ing" girls. BUT if I can get over myself and do the job to the best of my ability, everyone wins, and I can still holler at your girlfriend on Facebook chat while you are in the studio trying to perfect that dubstep bassline sound.
— Roctakon
Is your life a mess? Need advice? Tell Roctakon.
Email: HelpMe@Maddecent.com
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