Dj'ing At Local Tavern

[Vaughn]

Hey guys

So,

Ive got a gig at my local tavern on Thursday nights, Thanks to my Dad who is a duty manager at the place

I have already had 2 gig's and its been good.... But the place is dead on a Thursday night and i was just wondering how i should go about getting more people to come and advertising. I tryed making a Facebook page and it didnt do that great. How else would i go about getting people to come?

Also im mainly playing house and top 40 hits, although sometimes a heap of older people come in (40-50yr olds) and i dont always really know what to play

Any suggestions of what you play in these sorts of situations?

Thanks heeps

Vaughn

[Jaz]

For mid week cheap drink prices are your best promo, only reason people go out here on Wednesday n Thursday is cause of $3 drinks

[yizzle]

i dont know if im directing this more to you or your dad, but..

there is a pub down the road from me that is a dump and the new management is working their ass off at making it somewhere people want to go. 'Thirsty Thursdays' something they recently added which includes:

- $2 schooners (from 4pm-10pm)

- $8 parmigiana & schooner (dunno times, wouldn't eat there)

- free pool (8 ball)

- Themed cover band night eg (Cover 'this band' night)

- beer pong with prizes

- meat raffles etc.

anyway, im not sure if that helps but that place went from pretty much a pokie dump out for grannies to a Thursday tradition recently.

[yizzle]

For mid week cheap drink prices are your best promo, only reason people go out here on Wednesday n Thursday is cause of $3 drinks

In hobart its $10 steins, $5 basics & $4 pots. its nicknamed 'Uni Night' and its more off the show than a weekend.

purely because a pub started a trend, nek min, BANG its huge.

off the show actually...

[andyman]

Play gabber

[andyman]

But srs, cheap piss will get the punters out.

Play as MUCH cheese as possible (if you like it, they wont), and as long as there are 4-5 sluts on the dancefloor they will come.

[Vaughn]

Yeah my Dad has only started at the pub like 4 months ago,

and quite frankly its a bit of a bin.

I can safely say my Father working his FUCK ring of for that place.

He organizes all the music and gets great bands threw and he doesn't get payed a cent more then the other guys who just do the norm. He works like 24/7 getting shit done for them

Its a pub owned by ALH..... as allot of you should know them

Im not allowed to advertise drink prices and there not allowed to advertise me as a Dj

stupid policies

But yes we have $4 basic spirits on Thursdays... But know one knows because im not allowed to advertise

..........

Ahhh haha

Anyways on the music side of things what do you guys and suggestions for pub gig's?

[andyman]

I think user Addi might be able to help you on this one bud.

Is he the one that plays in Wagga or some shit?

[Vaughn]

For mid week cheap drink prices are your best promo, only reason people go out here on Wednesday n Thursday is cause of $3 drinks

In hobart its $10 steins, $5 basics & $4 pots. its nicknamed 'Uni Night' and its more off the show than a weekend.

purely because a pub started a trend, nek min, BANG its huge.

off the show actually...

Uni night and thursy Thursdays is erry were now haha

[yizzle]

Play gabber

!

[Vaughn]

I think user Addi might be able to help you on this one bud.

Is he the one that plays in Wagga or some shit?

Should i shoot him a PM you recon?

[andyman]

See if this has answers first viewtopic.php?f=72&t=8140

[Vaughn]

Play gabber

UMADBRO

QLD not VIC haha

[crundyy]

Play gabber

took the words right out of my mouth

[Gandy]

mid week tavern/pub gigs are honestly one of the hardest gigs to do, not only is it hit and miss on the nite, you get a variety of age groups and you can never win with song selection.

best thing you can do is do a headcount of the age group every now and then, play to what holds the majority, its the best you can do.

As for what to play when its the majority of old whales, no idea, check with the venue owner/manager to see what he wants, ultimately hes the one paying you and if he tells you to play certain shit and it sucks then its not your fault.

also to the guys who suggested commercial/cheese are on the money as well, try going to a pub midweek and see what they are playing on there nightlife system to get some ideas, im assuming the place you play for doesnt have that otherwise they would be using it for mid week stuff

[Addi]

I think user Addi might be able to help you on this one bud.

Is he the one that plays in Wagga or some shit?

Should i shoot him a PM you recon?

Yeah dude I had the same gig. Though I have been playing on a Friday night for 3 hours (9-12) every week.

Pretty hard gig to be honest. Very inconsistent in terms of people that are there and knowing what to play.

Some weeks were awesome, but there are a lot of shit things to deal with! It was sick when there was a big crew of young people (18-30yr olds) who would like the house/electro music I would play. But in saying that, there was also a decent number of oldies (40-60yr olds) who wanted to hear country and western music...

So anyway, just gotta be prepared for both. There is a lot of genre changing within the 3 hour set. If the oldies outnumbered the young people I would play more rock hits (ACDC, Cold Chisel etc), but also chuck in a few club hits/top 40 songs especially if it was earlier in the night. Visa-versa, if there were more young people, I would play more electro and club tracks.

I actually had my last gig on the weekend at the place. Was good money but I have other shit I gotta deal with and lack of time on a Friday night so had to call it a day! Probably gonna play on bigger occasions if they know there will be a big crowd. And I also got sick of all the oldies being rude bogan whales when I didn't play country music haha. What 21 year old actually listens to/has any country music?

So to sum up. Be prepared and have a wide range of music from Country and Pub Rock, to Top 40, House and Electro. Good luck bro!

[Gandy]

quoted for second page

mid week tavern/pub gigs are honestly one of the hardest gigs to do, not only is it hit and miss on the nite, you get a variety of age groups and you can never win with song selection.

best thing you can do is do a headcount of the age group every now and then, play to what holds the majority, its the best you can do.

As for what to play when its the majority of old whales, no idea, check with the venue owner/manager to see what he wants, ultimately hes the one paying you and if he tells you to play certain shit and it sucks then its not your fault.

also to the guys who suggested commercial/cheese are on the money as well, try going to a pub midweek and see what they are playing on there nightlife system to get some ideas, im assuming the place you play for doesnt have that otherwise they would be using it for mid week stuff

[Addi]

^ Good advice too.

And here is what I ended up roughly following during my 3 hour set. Mind you, I would mix it up a bit depending on the night and what people were into. Sometimes people wanted to hear electro pretty early so I would play an electro track and if it got people on the dancefloor I would keep playing that genre.

9-9:30: Current and old popular songs from Triple J etc, some of them remixed, but most just original tracks. Some old pub rock etc.

9:30-10: Disco/House, such as Yolanda Be Cool, DCUP, Riva Starr etc etc. Usually try to still play tracks people know, but the odd track which they wouldn't know.

10-11:00: Electro originals and remixes of current top 40, top club hits etc, plus the odd hip hop or old school pub classic.

11:00-11:30: Progressive house tunes, like Sam La More, Aston Shuffle, Calvin, Presets etc

11:30-close: Generally keep the last bit energetic, but slow it down to some progressive house tunes again

[Vaughn]

Thanks a million guys

Big thanks to Gandy and Addi

Yeah i know what its like its my third gig at the place and you get some really druck old fuckwits (excuse the language but has to be used)

"Whats this fucking shit your playing, WTF? can you put some fucking real music on.... some (insert old bogan music here)"

Fair enough, i respect peoples taste but some people ask for the randomest old music that not even night life would have.

There isnt much i can do about it but yeah i try and put some chilli peppers and some Fatboy slim and a bit of prodigy and what not in the mix as much as possible.

Going to try and pull a younger crowd this week but there are no certainties

Thanks

Vaughn

[GREMM1S]

End of the day between you and management you have to decide if youre going to be a pure crowd pleaser and play everything or if you want to push the place in a certain direction.

Good to remember that you cant please everyone so go with the majority crowd.

[Vaughn]

End of the day between you and management you have to decide if youre going to be a pure crowd pleaser and play everything or if you want to push the place in a certain direction.

Good to remember that you cant please everyone so go with the majority crowd.

Yeah well as cheating as it sounds my dad is a manager at the place, but yeah its my rep and i just played to the mood but with my own style. Someone approached me when i was at the bar and gave me a card and said he might need me in like 6 months and said i was doing a good job. So i followed up this morning with an email

[GREMM1S]

End of the day between you and management you have to decide if youre going to be a pure crowd pleaser and play everything or if you want to push the place in a certain direction.

Good to remember that you cant please everyone so go with the majority crowd.

Yeah well as cheating as it sounds my dad is a manager at the place, but yeah its my rep and i just played to the mood but with my own style. Someone approached me when i was at the bar and gave me a card and said he might need me in like 6 months and said i was doing a good job. So i followed up this morning with an email

Well thats good, but yeah just treat it as like paid practice, play some different genres and work on your mixing only up from here man.

[Vaughn]

Yeah that's what my Dad said its pretty much paid practice, but yeah just got to get my mixing down pat. Yeah hopefully it's all upwards

Cheers