DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
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DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
Not been here for a while, but thought this would be the best place to ask.
Been DJing for a long time, and today I done my first set in a club. Oh boy, what a difference it is from playing in the house. I've been doing CD's and mixing online for as long as I can remember. I'm always tight with mixes, always on point ... but on a PA system it all went to shit.
I don't know if it was nerves, or a poor PA system. I really don't know. But it makes me feel like all those years have been wasted.
To me, even with a monitor speaker in the booth, the sound sounded dirty. I thought fuck this, I'm using the headphones to monitor both tracks ... couldn't hear a thing. Even that sounded messy with the headphone volume full.
My first couple of mixes were awful. They wasn't complete pots and pans, but because I couldn't monitor the mix it wasn't tight at all. One of the DJ's even gave me funny looks.
After the first few mixes I got used to the system and was on point, but it was a struggle. Compared to mixing in the house it was much harder. There was no clarity.
Is mixing on a PA system always more difficult than mixing on a home system - or at least until you get used to it?
I'm not sure if people noticed, but I certainly felt like shit. Didn't help that one of the CDJ's decided to totally cut out in the middle of a mix.
Been DJing for a long time, and today I done my first set in a club. Oh boy, what a difference it is from playing in the house. I've been doing CD's and mixing online for as long as I can remember. I'm always tight with mixes, always on point ... but on a PA system it all went to shit.
I don't know if it was nerves, or a poor PA system. I really don't know. But it makes me feel like all those years have been wasted.
To me, even with a monitor speaker in the booth, the sound sounded dirty. I thought fuck this, I'm using the headphones to monitor both tracks ... couldn't hear a thing. Even that sounded messy with the headphone volume full.
My first couple of mixes were awful. They wasn't complete pots and pans, but because I couldn't monitor the mix it wasn't tight at all. One of the DJ's even gave me funny looks.
After the first few mixes I got used to the system and was on point, but it was a struggle. Compared to mixing in the house it was much harder. There was no clarity.
Is mixing on a PA system always more difficult than mixing on a home system - or at least until you get used to it?
I'm not sure if people noticed, but I certainly felt like shit. Didn't help that one of the CDJ's decided to totally cut out in the middle of a mix.
Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
There is a huge difference DJ'ing in a club than at home. Wait until you start playing at multiple clubs with different soundsystems and you never know what the condition of the equipment is going to be. You are dealing with the volume of the soundsystem and hopefully the equipment is set up properly. I've been in situations playing at more of a rock oriented club and the monitors were not set up properly, I'm right next to a speaker tower and bass vibrations were skipping the needle off the turntable. Couldn't hear shit. Most clubs weren't that bad but you have to prepare to adapt and learn the system fast, with different mixers, different equipment etc.
Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
yeah what mks said. you are used to your home set up so anything else will throw you off to begin with. once you get through your first two or 3 mixes you'll be fine. i remember playing at Venus in Manchester and the soundsystem echoed its way back into the booth so i heard the main system maybe half a second after the sound being played on the booth monitors. proper distracting. with all things the more you do it the better you become and the easier it is to acclimatize to new sound systems etc
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Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
I have my first gig next month. I know it will be a different beast. It's pretty low stakes so I'm not too worried. Luckily I'm friends with a lot of local comedians so I can do afterparty shows and shit until I feel comfortable shooting for the club residencies or whatever.
Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
I've always gotten the tip to practice mixing both channels on the headphones (like you tried to do as well, good move). Did you turn down the monitors when you did that?
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Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
First time I played out in a club I was terrible compared to at home. You get better at it really quickly though so don't worry
Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
I didn't no. Which is probably why I couldn't hear anything. I don't think they had the monitor going via the mixer didn't want to fuck with anything.AxeD wrote:I've always gotten the tip to practice mixing both channels on the headphones (like you tried to do as well, good move). Did you turn down the monitors when you did that?
I might have managed to get a few gigs at the local pub which is a + for practicing on a PA system. Not sure when my next gig will be at a club. Hopefully the put me on the next one tho

Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
As AxeD said I'd definitely get your mixing down on your headphones, first few gigs I did didn't have monitors and my mixing was balls. No I just use the monitors for my own pleasure and turn them down a bit when I'm in the mix
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Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
My first set at on a real PA was similar, i had not mointors and teh headphones were not cancelling any noise on stage... so i kind of just sucked it up and learned my lesson, thankfully a few decent song selections can make up for the train wreck of a set it was
.
Now when i go perform i use headphones (usually in ears) that cancel alot of stage noise and i mix all in the phones. I Cue and monitor in them and then flip to the master mix and mix using them... sometimes if the minotrs are good i can get away with out using them but i always have a back up plan wheni show up to a venue.

Now when i go perform i use headphones (usually in ears) that cancel alot of stage noise and i mix all in the phones. I Cue and monitor in them and then flip to the master mix and mix using them... sometimes if the minotrs are good i can get away with out using them but i always have a back up plan wheni show up to a venue.
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Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
I played my first club set recently as well. Was shitting it when i stepped up because I could literally only hear the snares through the headphones and there weren't any monitors. Surprisingly though I managed to get all of my mixes locked in and got a lot of compliments when i finished my set. It was different to my mixes at home (mainly because I was using CDJs rather than vinyl) but I think the pressure made me step my game up a bit. Can't wait for my next set now.
Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
Clubs always sound different to your room. I used to do things like rolling off the high end on my speaker playback to make it harder in my room so when I went out I would be a step ahead
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Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
using ur mixer well also helps with any monitoring difficulties
having ur headphones relatively loud on full cue and then as ur beatmatching gradually bringing up the amount of master in ur headphones means that u get pretty accurate information no matter how shit the pa in my experience
having decent headphones is an underated point too imo
having ur headphones relatively loud on full cue and then as ur beatmatching gradually bringing up the amount of master in ur headphones means that u get pretty accurate information no matter how shit the pa in my experience
having decent headphones is an underated point too imo
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Re: DJing - Club Vs. Bedroom
blinx wrote:Now when i go perform i use headphones (usually in ears)

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