Reply to Am I Totally out of my mind thinking this is total garbage

Okay so this is a post off a different community . People actually believe this post is considered "VALID" Djing. I'm sorry but its shit like this that pisses me off...and further more people actually consider this being a DJ...Fuck me if this is what it has come down to i may as well throw away all my gear.


"I'm a Virtual DJ program DJ. I line up songs and let the program do a 4 second automix. On most evening s, the most I'll do is change the automix points of songs, so that it comes in when I want it to and cuts off any unnecessary intro's and outro's. I do it for a living, it takes care of me and my wife, and we live pretty comfortably. I have 4 guys who work for me, and last year my company had almost 700 shows. Everything from 12 year old birthday parties to Weddings, plus, mostly, a lot of bars and restaurants. In any given evening we can go from top 40, to old school hip hop, to 90's rock, to country... Whatever seems to fit the mood of the crowd. I charge about $50 per hour with a 4 hour minimum for the basic shows, obviously, much more for Weddings and the more complicated gigs. If I've got a dance floor slammed, and I'm playing a bunch of songs that would go well mixed together, I'll usually do some basic beat matching and mixing within Virtual DJ and throw in a few effects sparingly, but nothing fancy, and frankly, usually people don't know the difference between my beatmatched mix, and virtual DJ's quick automix. In a way, I do it just to look busier. Also, some of the area DJ's that mix give me shit because I'll "press play, and walk away"... But I'm usually off engaging specific people in the crowd. Checking in on the different groups of people, cracking jokes, getting to know the newcomers, basically trying to make damn sure that everybody is having a good time and that they know who I am and that they can and should come up and engage me.

I often shake my head when I go on DJ boards and hear people bad mouthing program DJing. I can believe of a bunch of DJ's off the top of my head in my area who mix and work really hard at it, and are pretty damn good at it. But they don't make good and consistent money or get consistent shows, because they don't adapt to different crowds as well. With that said, there are also a few DJs in my area that mix top 40, are really good at it, and are like local celebrities. I'm happy for their success. I would never bad mouth mixing, but there is more than one way to skin a cat. We're all supposedly about the music, I'd rather play 50 random incredible songs that fit my crowd, in their entirety, than 100 similar styled, pretty good songs, that we're beatmatched and cut up.

Now, I'm here because I'm trying to teach myself to mix a lot better, and I'd like to start using my NS6 out once in a while if the show seems to call for it. But I definitely wanted to chime in to say that plenty of people out there in my fairly affluent Chicago suburbs have a blast getting drunk while I DJ, and I usually don't mix at all. Song selection is the key for me, I love it when at the end of the evening , the hipsters, dubsteppers, country girls, and top 40 fans are all leaving happy. I love it when I play a track and people go apeshit because it's an awesome song that they forgot existed and they still remember every word... that's my favorite. I love being a DJ, I just haven't needed to mix to love it, or to profit from it. "