Career Trek – The Mobile DJ Years

This is the first post in a series that will take you on a journey through the highlights of my working life. I have essentially worked my entire career without sight. A lot of that work was work I chose to do when no other companies would hire me after I graduated what was then called Ryerson University with a Bachelor of Applied Arts in Radio & Television Arts. Throughout my journey as an entrepreneur and as an employee with sight loss, I’ve had to solve problems in order to get the job done. I’ll explain how I did it as best I can.

Jump In and Figure it Out

I’ve always loved listening to the artful skill of a mix DJ at work. Listening to radio in Toronto while growing up, I was transfixed by DJs who could beat match, cut and scratch music from a wide variety of musical genres. I had a desire to learn, but figured the startup costs were too prohibitive for me to own turntables, a mixer, speakers and then amass a collection of vinyl LPs.

 

While attending university, my friend Rebecca introduced me to a popular night club DJ—DJ Thomas—who spun music for a Saturday night retro broadcast on a popular Toronto radio station. He used the denon unit week after week and pulled off flawless mixes from a giant case of CDs he traveled with for his DJ gigs. While in conversation with DJ Thomas and Rebecca, I mentioned that DJing was something I wanted to learn.

At the time, there were no courses or schools where you could go to learn to be a DJ. Everyone just “figured it out” on their own.

Rebecca told me to just jump right in and teach myself. I did just that. Thanks Rebecca!

DJ Thomas showed me his rig which held one of the first Denon twin CD decks built for DJs. The unit let DJS play CDs at variable speeds and precisely cue songs using CD frames. This made tempo synchronization and cuing as easy as it was on vinyl.

 

After finishing my first year of university, I rented one of the  Denon decks without a mixer. I learned to mix by connecting each CD player in the Denon to separate stereo systems and working the volume controls independently. My crude bedroom set-up was clunky and awkward, but I had enough to teach myself how to work the unit and get familiar with the controls as well as the tiny collection of CDs I owned. In under a month, I was spinning at my best friend’s 21st birthday party—my very first gig.

 

 

How I Adapted

Learning the controls on the Denon decks was not that difficult. There were few buttons and each one was sized and positioned in a way where I could memorize what each key did and where it was, so no need for braille labels.

One of the most challenging parts of being a DJ with no sight was selecting CDs. I had a standing rack of 200 CDs, plus 3 or 4 road cases holding many more. Labeling each one with braille was impractical, so I began memorizing the layout of each rack and case using cues from the spines of each case to guide me on which CDs were where. For example, an album in a cardboard digipack would break up the column of CDs and give me an anchor to chunk the order of CDs above and below.

Every so often, I’d grab the wrong CD during a gig, but have enough time to put it back and grab the correct one before the playing track ended.

After several gigs and some saving, I purchased an upgraded Denon deck with jog and shuttle controls along with a very simple DJ mixer. Friends would accompany me to gigs with a cash incentive. I saved money in the long term by renting the PA and lighting gear I needed for each gig. This allowed me to customize each event with the right gear so I wasn’t keeping massive speakers in my inventory if I was playing a small wedding for 50 people.

I spun weddings, first communions, fundraisers and a couple of night club gigs. Over the 7 years I worked as a DJ, the biggest gig I did was for 300 people for my best friend’s parents’ 25th wedding anniversary. I had also amassed a large collection of music and learned a few lessons along the way. 

Lessons Learned

• Be prepared for everything. Have a backup for your main DJ rig and be prepared to switch immediately to keep the party going.
• Know your music. Be familiar with your bar counts, in and out points and be prepared to mix disparate genres such as cultural music, rock and reggae. This is what sets you apart and develops your versatility.
• Know your tools. You should be an expert on how to set up and operate your gear and know every button and function. On the flip side, keep your tech load simple. Sometimes beat matching from song to song is more than adequate without adding a sampler, stutter effects and scratching.
• Practice and make your mistakes at home. When you’re driving a party at a wedding or night club, there are no redos for a poor mix, so be sure you know what you’re doing when the dance floor is open.
• Know your audience. Scratching and cutting means nothing if you can’t choose the right song to play. A fundraiser for executives in their 50s is going to be a very different mix than a high school dance, so play to your audience. Your personal tastes come second. 
• Carry yourself professionally. Use business and rate cards. Be clear with your contracts. Arrive on time for set-up. leave on time after strike. Clean up after yourself. Return calls and e-mails promptly.
• Perceptions matter. As a DJ with sight loss, walking into a venue with a cane can elicit non-confidence in people who don’t know you can do the work. Your job is to prove them wrong by exceeding their expectations. Use correct spelling and grammar in your correspondence. Make eye contact, shake hands firmly, be agreeable, apologize when necessary and take the high road if you’re dealing with a jerk. Address people by name and say please and thank you. These little things go a long way in building your reputation when you’re starting out.
• Build a great team. I succeeded as a DJ because I had great friends around me who were willing to drive me to gigs, set up speakers and tell me when people were leaving the dance floor. No one succeeds alone, so surround yourself with great people who are invested in your success.

I left the DJ world in 2005 after selling my DJ rig. If I do get back into it, it will be an expensive hobby.

Today, a DJ with sight loss can easily get set up with a Mac running VoiceOver, accessible DJ software from Algoriddim and accessible DJ controllers such as the Pioneer DDJ SX3. These tools can put you on par with your sighted counterparts.

If you’re going to venture into the world of being a mobile DJ, have a plan and set goals for performing a certain number of gigs in the first 30, 60 and 90 days. Build good habits for practice and be prepared to make sacrifices with your time. The DJ world can be fun, but it is hard work.

 

My Old School Mix

Here is a set of 80s and 90s old school hip hop and R&B that was fun to mix. The Denon DM2500 had a crude sampler which I used for parts of this mix. Enjoy!