Whistler Ski Resort, B.C. Canada!!

Had an awesome time at the Whistler Ski Resort -- ranked among the top ten Ski Resorts in the World! I was there for about a week and a couple of us checked out three of the clubs there. The one that stood out was Tommy Africa's (shown in the picture). They had a fairly large dance floor, and the DJ booth was covered in glass/plastic. The DJ had 2 x technics, a Numark (rack-mount) CDN 900 CD players (but later they seem to have upgraded to 2 x CDJ800's) and a laptop. The mixing on the night wasn't all that good, and the music was jumping between Top 40, House and RnB but the place was packed and the atmosphere was awesome!

Took a cable-car and went over to Whistler Blackcomb mountain to have a look at people skiing. The mountain was pretty big compared to Mt. Hotham here in Victoria. The Whistler Resort itself was enormous compared to the Hotham Resort -- Whistler had all sorts of restaurants with any type of cuisine you can imagine, plenty of pubs and nightclubs, lots of 5 star accomodation etc. But looks like Mt. Hotham is spending $500,000,000 on a shopping centre and some luxury accommodation on the Hotham resort, so hopefully, the next time I go over to Hotham, it will look like a mini-Whistler :-)

House Party

DJed at a friend's birthday party. I also bought a set of DJ lights from BigW for $45 on the same day. My friend had a good set of speakers at the house where the party was held (300 Watts RMS) to which I connected my equipment. The lights didn't work that well because the bass wasn't distinct enough (too much vibration), but I guess I shouldn't have expected too much for $45 anyway! Hopefully the lights should work better when connected with an RCA cable to the mixer.

I played RnB and HipHop for only about 45 minutes, but looked like everyone had a good time.

Lustre Lounge Function

My second major function at Lustre Lounge. A girl was celebrating her 21st birthday and wanted me to play RnB, but with a lot of JLo, Brittany, Beyonce and Madonna. I bought a couple of Brittany singles and I already had an old JLo album and a few Beyonce tracks so I thought I was prepared. At the actual function I realised that neither of the Brittany singles (Toxic and Me against the Music) mixed with the average paced RnB music so I ended up not playing them. I also avoided the JLo songs since it looked like everyone was enjoying, so why ruin it? :-)

Gemini BPM500

Spoke to Gary Couch (webmaster of RainbowRadio.com) about the Gemini BPM500 mixer. I asked him about how accurate the automatic BPM extraction was and he said: "I never thought much about the BPM display as I have been DJing so long that I can usually pick out the BPM within 5 beats of what it actually is and/or match beats while cueing within the headphones.". Hmmm, thats pretty cool. I also asked him about auto-start of the CD player (i.e. my Numark mixer starts the CD player on moving the crossfader) to which he said:"As for the question about starting the song on the fade automatic nothing I know will do this as that would be controlled by the cd player and not the mixer. It also would not be as acurate as simply starting manually.". This I thought was pretty weird :-/ I've seen at least one professional DJ using the fader to start the CD player and I was surprised that him being a professional DJ himself hadn't heard about it. Maybe it's rarely used then.

Denon 1800F

Started using the Denon DN 1800F twin CD player at Lustre Lounge. This needed a bit of practice (about 4 hours) because it was a bit different to my twin CD player in that no scratch support was provided, no looping, no manual BPM counting (which is useful for beginners) and no fader auto-start (which wasn't really needed). Also, the cueing in the Denon was a bit different to my Numark. The mixer (Gemini BPM500) at Lustre was old, but had automatic BPM detection. This was good for many House tracks but when it came to RnB music, the BMP detection went crazy. I had to get used to mixing using only pitch control which turned out to actually be the way to go!

My first major function at Lustre Lounge. I had to play during the week for an engagement party of one of the bouncers/owners at Lustre. I was asked to play House music at the start and play the odd 80's classic (Retro, Rock 'n' Roll etc.) so I had a difficult time deciding which CDs to buy at HMV. Finally I decided to ask one of my friends to lend me his music collection, which had a lot of Retro and Rock 'n' Roll. At the actual function I had more requests than I have ever had till this day, and they were all from the Fiance :-) I didn't have a choice so I had to quickly change from House to Rock 'n' Roll, to Retro and finally to RnB. Wasn't a pretty sound :-/ Everyone seemed to have enjoyed the RnB the most.

My First Gig at a Bar

I had my first performance (demo) at Lustre Lounge. I was nervous as hell, especially since I had never played for 4 hours before, infront of a manager and in a bar-environment. Although Lustre Lounge had their own equipment (Gemini BPM 500 mixer, two Technics 1200s and Dennon 1800F rack-mount CD players) I took my own equipment (rack-mount CDJs and mixer) and connected it all before I started.

I played RnB/Soul for four hours, most of them being music I had never heard before! I usually play RnB/HipHop but the stuff I was asked to play on the night was much more layed backthan what I was used to. The mixing wasn't that good since I didn't know the music well enough to structure the tracks well in the set.

But overall the manager and owner were satisfied with my DJing skills, but the manager said I'd have to play something a bit more upbeat from next time onwards -- i.e. he wanted me to play House music. So in other words, I was hired (with a constraint)!

I had no idea what House music was at that point, so I had a lot of catching up to do. From then on I spent about $50 a week on House CDs, and made myself a good House music collection (with quite a few dance/techno tracks as well).

I had my first performance at Lustre Lounge. Played RnB/Soul, but on finishing the manager said I'd have to play something a bit more upbeat and asked me to play House music from next time onwards. I had no idea what House music was at that point, so I had a lot of catching up to do. From then on I spent about $50 a week House CDs and made myself a good House music collection (with quite a few dance/techno tracks as well).

RMIT Computer Science and IT Orientation

I DJed at the RMIT Orientation BBQ for CS/IT students, in the Sunken Gardens next to RMIT building 11. I hired two JBL 15" Horn Speakers (300 Watt -- 900 Watt (RMS) @ peak) + AMP (2 x 620 Watt) from a place in Fitzroy for $85 (am I crazy? Let me know). It was a bit of a hassle to carry the speakers by taxi-van to the evenue!. I had to ask strangers to help me carry them to where they were to be set up. It was a 15 minute late start by the time I got them to work. Started with a bit of RnB, moved onto Reggae and back to HipHop/RnB towards the end. There was a complaint about the volume because there were interviews going on in a nearby building so I had to turn the speakers away from that building and reduce the volume a bit. I performed for about 1 and half hours and I think people enjoyed the music. In the end, one of the cooks at the BBQ spoke with me and asked if I would be interested in DJing for 21st birthday parties. Turns out that he's a professional DJ and he thinks he's a bit too old for 21st parties and said he'd call me if he was asked to do any :-) Despite the happy day, I spent 2 hours and 22 minutes waiting for a station wagon taxi to return the speakers, that never arrived. I returned them the next day.

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