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Mike Shiver + Taj (S.F. # 2 DJ) + Dj Blurr - Sat. Jan. 27th (pg. 10)
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| DaveT |
| quote: | Originally posted by Dj Blurr
Hahahahaha..
The critic DaveT is, I was expecting this.:rolleyes:
I only was there for like 30-40 minutes during Blurr's, but on three of the transitions the volume was just dipped and the next track faded it. It was beatmatched but it was whack. And someone else said this happened a bit before I got there. Need to work on that. No excuses. :)
I didnt get there early enough. I usually like to wipe down the mixer. I usually do, but for some reason the mixer was sticky on the bottom with something on one of the faders. this may sound funny, but my finger got stuck to the bottom of one of the faders, which dipped the sound out a few times during transition. What was funny was I was thinking the whole time "I wonder if DaveT heard that" so if you look back on the video, you'll see me look to my left and right looking for DaveT... Agreed no excuses for that Dave, I know your a stickler for transitions and sound. Good thing it was beatmatched or you probably woulda smacked me with a ugly stick.:stongue:
No worries will not happen again.
Yes, I started at around 132, and peaked at about 140-141, then brought it back down to around 137...134. Last track I believe was around 134. When I played the David Guetta track , I couldnt have it too fast or the track would have sounded like the chipmunks.
This time around I experimented with a few things, I didnt want to stick to my regular routine and threw in a few tricks with the mixer along side my transitions. If you watched most of the time, I looped a majority of the tracks, and faded those into the transition to the next ones... I did alot of beatmashing here and there too.
Agreed on the comment about K&A though, pure party. I did in fact see Ralph Kyau hit his head on the top of the booth tho, that man can jump.
You know how we do, DaveT, you and I are always like the ebert and ropers of the parties..:rolleyes: |
140-141 as an opener? Where am I, Club Heaven (down in LA - now dead)? :tongue3 :nervous: :eyes: :disbelief :whip:
Shiver played at 136 most of his set. Opener being faster than the headliner = improper!!! (to me at least). If it was some bigtime DJ, he would have shot you in anger, lol. I've seen headliner's being delayed because HOUSE DJs get too far into the 130s and the headliner wanting it to be brought down first. Oh well, at least you got it down to 134ish, better than ending at 140, lol. :)
DJs who are openers have to discover that fine line of what you want to play and what you need to do as a job as an opener. Know it's hard, if I was opening up with some trance most of the tracks I'd want to play are in the 134-138+ range, lol. But would have to bite the bullet and be proper with the night.
Now play after the headliner and you can go all out, lol. |
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| Dj Blurr |
| quote: | Originally posted by DaveT
140-141 as an opener? Where am I, Club Heaven (down in LA - now dead)? :tongue3 :nervous: :eyes: :disbelief :whip:
Shiver played at 136 most of his set. Opener being faster than the headliner = improper!!! (to me at least). If it was some bigtime DJ, he would have shot you in anger, lol. I've seen headliner's being delayed because HOUSE DJs get too far into the 130s and the headliner wanting it to be brought down first. Oh well, at least you got it down to 134ish, better than ending at 140, lol. :)
DJs who are openers have to discover that fine line of what you want to play and what you need to do as a job as an opener. Know it's hard, if I was opening up with some trance most of the tracks I'd want to play are in the 134-138+ range, lol. But would have to bite the bullet and be proper with the night.
Now play after the headliner and you can go all out, lol. |
actually, looking back on it i was wrong dave, i did stay within that range. :D
I checked the bpm monitor i had on my software, i peaked out a little over 138+.
I guess i thought it was faster because of the nick bennison track i played in the middle.
I did not stay at that speed for no more than a couple tracks!!
After the headliner??? uhm.. hmmm..wonder if I can... (wink):D |
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| rizen |
| quote: | Originally posted by Techno_Twins
Thank you Rizen for taking the pics we asked you to & being so nice about it.
Taj your set was spectacular, a perfect ending to our night |
No problem and agree. Taj's set kept me up :D
click on picture for full gallery
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| skwallie |
| quote: | Originally posted by Dj Blurr
actually, looking back on it i was wrong dave, i did stay within that range. :D
I checked the bpm monitor i had on my software, i peaked out a little over 138+.
I guess i thought it was faster because of the nick bennison track i played in the middle.
I did not stay at that speed for no more than a couple tracks!!
After the headliner??? uhm.. hmmm..wonder if I can... (wink):D |
You started off right, Blurr. He started off with progressive and worked his way up to a bit of harder stuff. I personally thought Shiver would have started where Blurr would have left off at. The crowd was into it and there were not complaints from anyone I was with.
I even had people coming up to me and saying that I did an awesome set. I had to tell people I wasn't him, it's DJ BLURR!!! :crazy: |
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| DaveT |
| quote: | Originally posted by skwallie
You started off right, Blurr. He started off with progressive and worked his way up to a bit of harder stuff. I personally thought Shiver would have started where Blurr would have left off at. The crowd was into it and there were not complaints from anyone I was with.
I even had people coming up to me and saying that I did an awesome set. I had to tell people I wasn't him, it's DJ BLURR!!! :crazy: |
It's not Shiver's job to start off where the opener leaves off. It's the openers job to finish off where the headliner likes to start. :) |
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| Dj Blurr |
| quote: | Originally posted by skwallie
You started off right, Blurr. He started off with progressive and worked his way up to a bit of harder stuff. I personally thought Shiver would have started where Blurr would have left off at. The crowd was into it and there were not complaints from anyone I was with.
I even had people coming up to me and saying that I did an awesome set. I had to tell people I wasn't him, it's DJ BLURR!!! :crazy: |
Haha.
Thanks Skywallie...
I see some awsome videos and photos thanks again to Rizen. I crashed out last night around 12. I so gotta get you the rest of the stuff so you can up it bro.
Suprisingly, I saw the first track Mike threw down. He started at 137.
he exploded when he came on, If you watch back on some of the video when he first came on, everyone went nuts!
DaveT is just too hard to please...:rolleyes: |
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| Heylook_itsGreg |
What an amazing weekend of music for me. Some great trance from the good ol days of 2004 (lol) and new stuff I hadn't heard yet. Speaking of which, when this song came on I was wondering what it was, since Gilbert caught it on vid I was wondering if anyone knew....
http://www.nextlevel.ws/rizo/070127/target41.html
There were others I can't remember now, but overall what a sick weekend :D |
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| lex400sc |
| quote: | Originally posted by Dj Blurr
DaveT is just too hard to please...:rolleyes: |
yes but i believe what he says is true :) the opener's role is to set up the headliner, that doesn't necessarily dictate that you have to play specific music, but the one thing you don't wanna do is hand it off too fast. i don't even think there's such a thing as ending your set too slow as an opener. even if the headliner has to jump the bpm more than usual, it'll only make him look better when the energy in the room fires up that much more. on the other hand i've seen some headliners get very upset over an opener handing him the decks even just a *little bit* too fast. fortunately shiver isn't one of them. being an opener isn't a glorious role as you aren't able to really rock the crowd like every dj wants to, but the key is being good at what you're there to do, which is set up the main act. :) |
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| DaveT |
Look at when Jerry opens for PvD. Dude plays like 118-123bpm all night. Drives me nuts sometimes, cause that's too slow for me, lol. But more appropriate than ending at 140 before PvD comes on. :)
I'm easy to please, trust me. But it's a matter of doing it right.
A lot of times the problem when an opener finishes too fast isn't a matter of whether his set was great on his own. I've seen some amazing opening sets where it just ended too fast or if not too fast just too hard (more in the prog realm where the opener plays too hard and doesn't end proggy enough).
Where it causes suffering is when the headliner comes and either 1) drops the BPM down to where he or she likes to start. This kills the energy in the crowd, or 2) the DJ starts of fast and then drops it down to his comfort level. So the energy in the room kinda goes down as the set moves along and it can also sometimes frustrate the headliner.
Perfect example of #1 was Friday night. I thought Shawn and Turbine's tagteam set was awesome (better than any set I've heard from them individually) but when KnA came on they started at a lower BPM right off the bat the crowd just haulted for a little bit. When Shiver came on, I'm not sure what BPM he started at, but if you say 137 then he did indeed slow down a little as his set went along. When I looked at his CDDJs a bunch of times throughout the set it always said 136.
And this is an area where I've always talked about SF openers vs LA openers. In my times, it seems as if the SF openers for the most part have a better understanding of the progression. If they want to go for it they will speed it up to about the level the headliner will play at but slow it down well before the headliner gets on. But faster or harder or edgieer than the headliner? No way! That's stuff you see at raves or at Skills club events (which generally have the worst flow ever throughout the night, no offense to them. Love what they have done for SF, just have had a hard time enjoying some of their club nights because the music is all over the place. :p). LA openers just seem to play what they want most of the time and it's really frustrating and makes for a crappy night sometimes. Maybe that's why we constantly hear about these superstar DJs just not doing well in LA in general compared to their SF nights. Maybe because the openers here are smarter, the headliner shows up and just feeds off it making for an amazing night. I dunno if that's why, I just know in general SF openers are smarter than LA openers and headliners tend to have better SF sets than LA sets. Just how things seem to be and I think there is a connection.
Oddly, all the DJs I know who have become new openers on a regular or semi-regular basis over the past several months/year have indeed had nights (most more than one or two times) where they have struggled with setting the night up really well. Great sets on their own but playing too hard/fast and some being forced to really take it down a notch at the end of their set, sometimes even delaying the headliner.
Then there was Frency le Freak, who when he opened for Dave Seaman a few months ago played like straight up trance and never bothered to do it right and wanted to throw a brick at home, lol.
Don't feel like anyone in particular is being picked on here. I think the opener is just as important as the headliner so I'm just as critical. And as I've told all the other people who have started to open on a regular basis, it's about just getting experience and becoming educated on doing it right. But unless someone has the balls to tell them how they could improve, they will never bother doing so (there are a lot of people who notice the same things I see about the various openers but don't have the courage to say anything :p). Not in one case have I ever told them they should stop or even thought they should. Hell, I envy you all! I wish I had the money to buy CDDJs and a nice mixer and studio monitor speakers so I could get into it more. Or even just the speakers and maybe a good little amp so I could practice with Ableton more. And the money to buy tracks. Then I wish I had the time to dedicate myself to practice more. I'm decent with Ableton, but still too error prone. If I practice a lot for a week I do really well and make almost no errors by the time I'm done, but then don't have a chance to do a solid practice for a few weeks and then get a little rusty. It sucks. |
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| lex400sc |
| another thing is when you slow it down towards the end, it's important to give some significant lead time. hitting the brakes towards the last 5-10 minutes isn't enough time for the crowd to acclimate to the pace and will probably still make the headliner nervous. the headliner isn't impressed by how pumped you can get the crowd with your own set, i think they are more impressed by an opener who can play to his style without walking all over his cd binder, and one who can really really make him look good the moment he steps up to the decks. this is why i think progressive material is better for an opener than big anthems. and usually not a good idea to play the headliner's productions before him, that tends to take the wind out of his sails. i would even avoid playing tracks you know the headliner likes to play, either based on his radio show or recent mp3 sets you've dl'ed. like dave said, i'm not criticizing anyone specifically, just offering general tips for what i see in a good opener. |
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| Dj Blurr |
| quote: | Originally posted by lex400sc
yes but i believe what he says is true :) the opener's role is to set up the headliner, that doesn't necessarily dictate that you have to play specific music, but the one thing you don't wanna do is hand it off too fast. i don't even think there's such a thing as ending your set too slow as an opener. even if the headliner has to jump the bpm more than usual, it'll only make him look better when the energy in the room fires up that much more. on the other hand i've seen some headliners get very upset over an opener handing him the decks even just a *little bit* too fast. fortunately shiver isn't one of them. being an opener isn't a glorious role as you aren't able to really rock the crowd like every dj wants to, but the key is being good at what you're there to do, which is set up the main act. :) |
I agree on some level of what your sayin bro. but not everything. On both occasions, Mike Shiver and when I opened for Sean Tyas, They both stated to go ahead and play what you want. Simply for the fact that they knew they were going go rock when they got on. No complaints from either Mike or Sean on my sets.
I dont pre-create my sets, so I always try to find things that people want to hear. Ill check on the crowd to see how everyones doing, if they are standing around, ill find a vocal track to throw on, or throw down a banging track to see if they will dance. Ill keep it there at that level for a while, then bring it down.
there is also a threshold I will not crosss when ending my set though, leaving it anywhere from 134 on is what I aim for. For my set I fumbled more looking for different tracks than just playing through.
Being an opener to me is in fact a glorious role Lex. Reason is because of the talent you have behind you, expecially when you have a good night, and the room is packed. wading through the crowd on a saturday night after my set, and having people pat you on the back and tell you that your amazing is truely an experience I will never forget. After all, I came from that crowd. Letting people know that Im one of them is always a trip.
Im sure I'll perfect this over time. Its not something Im going to be able to remedy over one night of playing. Its cool you guys are giving me feedback too and its appericated. I do not take it in a negative way, because everyone has opinions, and I do want to hear everyones thoughts. This is part of my journey I have to make as a DJ... |
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| Dj Blurr |
I remember growing up watching all my favorite Djs rock it. I remember that I wanted to create the same energy they did behind those decks, and that when my moment came I would do my best to show what I was capable of.
I still strive for that, without overdoing it. Granted when I played for my birthday last year I went all out, but the show of force I had that day allowed me balance as a Dj now.
DaveT an Lex it is good that you guys are bringing this up though, so others can see where the boundries lie between an opener and a headlining Dj. True, if no one tells them how they are doing, they will never know. Thats why constructive criticism is important. but our conversations and watching Djs behind the decks has always been something of politics.
Thats what makes me love 1015 and the crowd. Is they come there for one thing. To dance. Even Mike told me that the crowd seems like they could not get enough of the music we played this night. I've heard this from alot of Djs who have graced the decks at 1015.
Thanks for your input guys.:thepirate |
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