Post Jazzanova DJ'ing Rant

Well its taken quite a long time to upload this one, I started last week with a draft and have only just got back to it. It’s been quite a hectic week.

Music with no boundaries. (After Jazzanova – Sunday 30th April 2006 @ Audio Brighton)

Monday 1st May.

Well the suns shining as I sit here basking in the aftermath of a full fried breakfast with J&H and a truly superb night out.

I left the club for once last night with no real desire to go away and play records, as I sometimes do when not totally satisfied with what has been offered. I know it sounds snobby but along with being a geek, I am a bit of a music snob. Last night I left totally satisfied, the bloke from Jazzanova having played a superb selection of stuff and I danced my arse off. It was a wrench to leave the dance floor on those necessary trips to get a drink or go to the loo.

Added to that it was also the first time in ages that nearly the whole of our group of friends were out together, and it made it one of the best nights out I’ve had for a long time.

It always amazes me that so called music loving DJ’s allow themselves to get stuck in a musical cul-de-sac. There is so much superb music out there and often DJ’s end up playing similar tunes for hours on end.

Shame more of it doesn’t get played – Deep Detroit techno, deep house, broken beat, soul, funk, boogie, jazz…….whatever it’s called - It all needs to be played together. As Kerry puts it, ‘putting peaks and troughs’ - or creating dynamics within a set. The music should take you on a rollercoaster ride of emotion, dancing through an emotional journey with the joy of discovery in each new tune. No sub standard fillers just put in to get somewhere else. The DJ needs to work, taking you on a magical mystery ride.

Personally I don’t believe sets like these can ever be planned. True you may have small groups of records that you know fit together. But a set should be a fluid organic thing. Evolving with the dance floor. Leading it and responding to its needs.
And it has to be a balance. You can’t dictate to a dance floor and you can’t slavishly obey. In the former case if you turn up with the intention of playing some pre-prepared artistic masterpiece you may well find the atmosphere is wrong and you succeed only in boring the pants off of people.

You need to be adventurous. If you just cater for what every one wants to hear exactly, you may as well go home and give them a juke-box.

Unlike playing live, where you are presenting something of your own artistic creation. When DJ’ing you are playing other peoples music, and what you are trying to create is sound-scape which an audience can emotionally respond to and be entertained by.

Step outside genres, if its good music that will fit the atmosphere then play it.

Of course I'm just as guilty at times, letting my nerves get the better of me and playing it safe rather than pushing it..... but thats a different rant, and right now I'm hungry!!