No music in this town..

pantycontrol · Post by **pantycontrol** » Mon Jun 09, 2008 10:02 am

yeah, i laughed pretty hard once their music came on. then i went down the street and drank their money.

shypht · Post by **shypht** » Mon Jun 09, 2008 7:06 pm

You know, after reading this thread - I'm feeling pretty lucky for living in Toronto.

Weekly events that are free/cheap and play descent music. It may not always be to my 'preferred' style (seems to be more on the tech-house/get physical style of things, not my fave - but still listenable), regularly get some pretty solid names passing through - a mix of some of the bigger names like Beyer, Leibing, Speedy J, Hawtin, etc, to some other great acts like Apendics Shuffle, Stewart Walker, Tractile, Alex Under, Damien Schwartz, Tony Rohr.

It's no Europe, but it's a pretty enjoyable scene all around. Promoters like Platform, Tempo416, Fukhouse all throw solid events (each having different types of bookings generally), and some quality local talent that have upstaged headliners more than once for me.

stevësto · Post by **stevësto** » Mon Jun 09, 2008 8:40 pm

i had the same problem, minimal would clear the floor. hard to get people to come out to your small free/cheap events. then i figured it out, minimal is too underground to start off the night with and play the entire night nothing but minimal. if you have trouble getting people to come out to the good music, i have the answer for you because i figured it out.

PLAY OTHER STUFF BESIDES MINIMAL.

there is so much great party music that isnt minimal that i recommend you play to get things started. here is an example of how i move from max to min, i played almost this exact tracklist and lit the place up and stole the show, the person on before me was playing minimal tracklist extravaganza (another common problem you minimal djs out there have, tracklistitis, like that promotion video posted by n-jay above):

http://youtube.com/watch?v=TYX58gmKcO8
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Edykp_tRqUc
http://youtube.com/watch?v=PZtiblDbDEI
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Hy-GkSN7_-g

once you build a crowd, THEN you can play minimal. stop trying to force your music on people, you need to work with them, that's called djing. you dont start right out into the peak of dancefloor hypnotism with the most intense stripped down mindfuck music, and you dont try to half ass way by sticking in disguised prog like get physical and kompakt trying to hybrid the whole thing and make both crowds happy, you do it with variety. theres two types of djing as i see it, a dj who stretches his own tastes to accomodate other peoples tastes to make as many people happy by being a bit flexible and not being selfish by playing only what he/she likes but makes a few sacrifices by playing some things he/she is not completely into but everyone else is. the other type is a dj playing 100% what he/she is into, presented as an artistic expression, this is like the john digweeds and richie hawtins of the world. the problem is everyone wants to be the big top guys like the 2nd example and they jump right into that without learning how to do the 1st example.

victorgonzales · Post by **victorgonzales** » Mon Jun 09, 2008 9:23 pm

stevësto wrote:i had the same problem, minimal would clear the floor. hard to get people to come out to your small free/cheap events. then i figured it out, minimal is too underground to start off the night with and play the entire night nothing but minimal. if you have trouble getting people to come out to the good music, i have the answer for you because i figured it out.

PLAY OTHER STUFF BESIDES MINIMAL.

there is so much great party music that isnt minimal that i recommend you play to get things started. here is an example of how i move from max to min, i played almost this exact tracklist and lit the place up and stole the show, the person on before me was playing minimal tracklist extravaganza (another common problem you minimal djs out there have, tracklistitis, like that promotion video posted by n-jay above):

http://youtube.com/watch?v=TYX58gmKcO8
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Edykp_tRqUc
http://youtube.com/watch?v=PZtiblDbDEI
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Hy-GkSN7_-g

once you build a crowd, THEN you can play minimal. stop trying to force your music on people, you need to work with them, that's called djing. you dont start right out into the peak of dancefloor hypnotism with the most intense stripped down mindfuck music, and you dont try to half ass way by sticking in disguised prog like get physical and kompakt trying to hybrid the whole thing and make both crowds happy, you do it with variety. theres two types of djing as i see it, a dj who stretches his own tastes to accomodate other peoples tastes to make as many people happy by being a bit flexible and not being selfish by playing only what he/she likes but makes a few sacrifices by playing some things he/she is not completely into but everyone else is. the other type is a dj playing 100% what he/she is into, presented as an artistic expression, this is like the john digweeds and richie hawtins of the world. the problem is everyone wants to be the big top guys like the 2nd example and they jump right into that without learning how to do the 1st example.

You can get away with easing into it at the clubs here in scottsdale but only if its late and everyone is drunk.

At the raves here though which we have at least two every weekend it wont fly in any shape or form. If its not going over 140 bpm the crowd clears.

It is very frustrating.

JCH · Post by **JCH** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 12:36 am

How are you supposed to expect people to like "mnml" straight away? It can take a long time to build up a crowd. Consistency and you need to convert the girls (the guys will follow after the girls). As a DJ you need to have a strong vision and "charisma".

Examples:

D. May at MOS, ripping it up with the "glamour kittens"
Richardo and Luciano dropping all kinds of sh!t in their sets
Dixon and the Innervisons boys

PsyTox · Post by **PsyTox** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 9:57 am

stevësto wrote:i had the same problem, (...) the problem is everyone wants to be the big top guys like the 2nd example and they jump right into that without learning how to do the 1st example.

This post is so true it hurts

completely agree with you. That's why I like playing long sets too, it gives you the time to "search" for a connection with the people in front of you. I prefer being a bit less purist and having fun over doing only my thing and having to go home with a bad taste in my mouth and moaning that people didn't understand my music blahblah.

(and if you play your cards right, you can sneak in your favourites anyway, I ALWAYS play something of Villalobos and "Panic In Detroit" on Aesthetik also gets played even when I'm in a bar filled with elektrohouse fans).

shypht · Post by **shypht** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 3:57 pm

You know, I'm not all that surprised that if/when you drop an all minimal-set in a normal bar/club that has regular patrons that are NOT techno/minimal fans would clear the dance floor.

Minimal is not exactly the most accessible music in the world. It's one thing if you've already established a name for your self / promotion company and people are coming out to support YOU.

But, if the bar/club already has it's set of regulars, who would there if you were there or not, tossing in stuff that they don't know / like / expect isn't going to be winning over coverts in large numbers.

Unless your city already has a somewhat established set of promoters / clubs / etc that you can start to align yourself with, you'll need to really start at a grass roots level, and hope to start building up enough of a name for yourself that people are coming to Bar XYZ because YOU are playing, not because its Bar XYZ, and that's the bar they always goto.

pantycontrol · Post by **pantycontrol** » Wed Jun 11, 2008 2:24 am

JCH wrote:How are you supposed to expect people to like "mnml" straight away? It can take a long time to build up a crowd. Consistency and you need to convert the girls (the guys will follow after the girls). As a DJ you need to have a strong vision and "charisma".

Examples:

D. May at MOS, ripping it up with the "glamour kittens"
Richardo and Luciano dropping all kinds of sht in their sets
Dixon and the Innervisons boys

mnml is not nearly as accessible as other forms of EDM but i think we all know that. i'm all about getting the girls out on the dance floor first. the guys will come eventually and if they don't, i'm fine with that, no one likes a cock forest. mnml can be sexy too.