Just a query to you guys and gals around the world.....

In melbourne/australia the phenomena of the promoter/dj has gotten to epic proportions. my facebook is spammed with a billion invites a day from different djs for different nights.

these guys get booked because of numbers they may bring into clubs - not for the music they play.

people around the nation are really starting to get sick of these 'djs' that are a promoter first and dj a distant second.

a few months back it kind of came to a head when the warmup dj for dubfire/sven vath/digweed played some very dodgey tunes followed by a few dubfire ones (just before dubfire himself was on). melbourne has quite a pool of talented locals (some with some hefty worldwide reps) with copious amounts of experience - yet this 18 year old kid got booked because he is fresh outta skool and has a lot of friends that will follow him to just about anything...

im just wondering if this is just an australian thing or if it is as rampant around the world?

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Originally posted by Light The Fuse Just a query to you guys and gals around the world..... In melbourne/australia the phenomena of the promoter/dj has gotten to epic proportions. my facebook is spammed with a billion invites a day from different djs for different nights. these guys get booked because of numbers they may bring into clubs - not for the music they play. people around the nation are really starting to get sick of these 'djs' that are a promoter first and dj a distant second. a few months back it kind of came to a head when the warmup dj for dubfire/sven vath/digweed played some very dodgey tunes followed by a few dubfire ones (just before dubfire himself was on). melbourne has quite a pool of talented locals (some with some hefty worldwide reps) with copious amounts of experience - yet this 18 year old kid got booked because he is fresh outta skool and has a lot of friends that will follow him to just about anything... im just wondering if this is just an australian thing or if it is as rampant around the world?

Wow, I thought you were talking about Houston Texas till I read melbourne :X

its like that everywhere..

there might be a few cities where you can get away with talent alone..


but most places here wont book you unless you can bring in 15 confirmed guest.


some promoters here even go as far as...having a certain amount of facebook friends required before they give you a night...ie minimum 400 or something like that..

it might suck, but it makes sense. would you personally pay someone to play an empty room with your own money? this isn't unicef, it is a business.

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I am so happy i will be able trance very much agoon. I like trance with all you friends. We go to big clob and do the big line off each other pinis, then jono take me friend in big balloon 3 way fist pump but only in da but. If you not defecate when drop because me grandma carpet not make new but lots money like armin.

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Why you trance friends not like post? Make friends intention for fist pump but only in the but. We paint horse nice colurs put then pointy partee hat to make look like can fly. If take hose in spray towords light make rainbow too! Not like real, but if do pills i buy from bidor it look better and get lots of bifwurst in pants. I try get lazor, but grandmas no say no pew pew..but no care here..she die of concer hope soon. She eat lots so Tom Colontino make sex sometimes. When happen dance!

And this is the BIG reason why I don't bother to go out much at all these days. I still get spam from fuckwits in Melbourne to come to events even though they know I'm now in Brisbane. Business or not, I for one am sick of shit ****s with a massive following of retards with no clue. It's annoying as fuck when you get ignorant, self-absorbed bastards sending you useless shit.

actually if you can fill a club just with your own talent without having invited anyone and people come specifically to see you, you are probably better than most top 100 djs.

This industry is hard, better hang on with a club promoter one night and invite him to some beers and you'll have a residency in 2 months, if you give him a cd with your best mix it will be in the bin before he arrives home to listen.

Wow, that's pretty rude. He played dubfire songs before he went on? That's pretty rude!

But promoters are trying their best to break even at the very least, can't blame them I guess (maybe i'm being too optimistic) . I would like to see talent + unique song selection over a person who gathers heads.

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Originally posted by Goebbel Goebbel it might suck, but it makes sense. would you personally pay someone to play an empty room with your own money? this isn't unicef, it is a business.

it depends how you view your night.

If you just want to get as many people through the door on each occasion without too much effort then sure its a great idea.

However if you want to build your night around some kind of musical policy and grow a following then it can be counter productive. Consider that if your night is essentially full of the DJs mates then the chances are they aint coming back next week when their mate isnt playing. In fact the only time they spend on the dancefloor might be when their mate is playing, giving you a strange atmosphere which isnt always good. You may also end up booking really shit DJs.

Its pretty much the standard way things operate here in London, and I don understand why people do it. And if you want to run your night in that way then go ahead but I do think it has lead to the death of the small "family" club night. Rather than trying to build a club night around a certain musical idea and ethos by booking DJs that fit that, maximising profit in the short term by booking the DJs that can bring the most friends has become the norm.

The results of this in my view all pretty negative...

A lot of DJs are allowed out into the wild before theyre really ready and then have no driver to better themselves. Clubbers get stuck with a lot of nights that are very similar as none of them have a specific identity so clubland looks pretty boring, driving them away. And promoters get stuck in a cycle where they are unable to take risks in order to fill their venues.

Ironically, if promoters really wanted to have a steady income from running a night they would be better off building a night with a decent music policy. Getting trust from people who would come along every week/month almost regardless of who was playing because they love it.

All IMVHO btw

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It's a fact of life that promoters look for acts who will bring people to the night. Promoters are the ones footing the bill, after all.

With that said, there aren't too many problems around here with shit DJs being booked entirely to bring people through the door. Maybe I just get lucky with the nights I go to.

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The OP obviously has no experience when it comes to throwing parties.

happens everywhere! america the land of greed has it just as bad dude but some places have risen up against it. at the club where my residency is at we give a long hard thought to who should open for who, both style wise, respect wise, pull wise etc. A lot of the big DJs compliment us on it, we program things correctly. Now from the OP note i can only say that i think a lot of promoters who aren't DJs have no idea what they're doing when they book locals. They don't know that a tech house DJ would be good to open for a big room house DJ or that one style fits better before another. It's just igornance on their part but i've witnessed a couple realy big DJs complain to the promoter about the opening DJ being "out of line". Promoters have a huge responsability doing "artist releations" and keeping these big artists happy so they come back to them and want to play for them again, all it takes is for a few bad circumstances for that DJ to go play for the competition.

All you have to do is look at the twitter feed of a lot of these DJs, Dubfire played for another club in San Diego last year and on his twitter he wrote "the douchebag playing before myself & Davide [Squallace] is playing the worst commercial garbage ever". Show that to the promoter and they're all ears on how to correct and remedy it in the future.

In most places ticket sales>talent. It's sad but it's the nature of business.

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