Is The Art of DJing Dead? ☠️

In this episode of The Get Down, Cream & Gary Duscuss:

• The importance of DJ skills has decreased in the current DJ landscape, with venue owners and bookers prioritizing factors such as ticket sales and bottle service.
• The rise of house DJs and the popularity of EDM have shifted the focus away from technical skills and towards other aspects of DJing.
• While technical skills are still valued in certain markets and DJ cultures, they are less important in mainstream venues and festivals.
• The financial challenges of booking high-profile DJs and the high artist fees make it difficult for venues to make a profit.
• The value of different DJs varies depending on the market and the specific needs of the venue or event. The DJ market is highly competitive, and DJs need to navigate pricing and talent selection carefully to succeed.
• Nightclubs face significant challenges due to high overhead costs and tough economic conditions, especially in major markets.
• To succeed in the nightclub industry, it is important to focus on local and regional DJs, try new strategies, and stay at the forefront of the market.
• Country music is becoming more mainstream, and DJs may need to incorporate country remixes into their sets to cater to a wider audience.
• The sale of music rights, such as Michael Jackson's, highlights the changing landscape of the music industry and the value of catalogs.
• Taylor Swift is currently one of the biggest pop stars, with widespread popularity and a strong presence in the industry.

Transcript

0:01

All right, what's up guys? Welcome to the 146th episode of the Get Down brought to you by Digital Music Pool. My name's Cream. Gary W here. It feels like we haven't talked in such a long time because the last time we recorded, we had a guest, Madison from 4AM, which was a great episode. And then we didn't record last week because guess what? I was sick again for like the fourth time since Thanksgiving. Shocking, shocking. Dude, I'm having a rough time out here. It's not good. Yeah, I don't know. I, I know that like sickness and whatnot has been kind of going around up there for months and months and people have been having certain things linger about for, for a long while. And I think that's what's going on there. just overworked, overstressed, not enough sleep. I had a, the weekend before I got sick, I like drank a bunch. I worked on Sunday for Super Bowl. It's just like a recipe for me not doing well. Yeah, you know kind of what works for you and what doesn't. And I think that you have to follow a better regimen. I think that goes for a lot of people. Don't overwork yourself if you know that things are, cause a negative effect on your life. If you do it, don't push yourself too hard. There's no reason to do it because honestly, what happens, it takes away from things in the long run. For that one day of work, it kills five days of work. Well, I DJed two nights, two weeks ago, with a fever. It was the most sick I've ever been while DJing. It was terrible. I was up in Mohegan Sun. There was no way I was canceling that gig. And then the next night, we were supposed to have Jake Shore at Birch, but we had weather, so we ended up pushing that event. Luckily, I had Solano come DJ with me, and I'm like, dude, I gotta go home. Like, I can't even, I'm like, I was standing in the DJ booth, and I thought I was literally gonna go down. Like I was like spinning. Like I gotta go bro, I'm outta here. and Yeah, I was excited to hang with Jake and kind of let him hear him play and, you know, setting up that special event at Birch with the DJ booth on the dance floor. Like, it was a lot of cool things that were supposed to happen. So we pushed that date to April. So it'll still happen. I'm just, you know, kind of bummed it didn't happen last week. But I guess being sick, it was, you know, it worked out for me, at least, selfishly. So I want to start this episode, I think. this might be a little bit of a controversial conversation, or some people might get upset or triggered about this, but I want to make the statement that I think right now, in early 2024, DJ skills have never been as unimportant as they are right now. And I don't say that because I don't think having a skilled DJ in a venue is important. I think... The people who are making the decisions, the venue managers and owners and bookers, just don't care about DJ skill and care more about a lot of other factors that they think are more important. Yeah, and that factor is making money, right? I think that it's kind of, it depends on the, you know, on that high end, on that higher end level is what you're speaking of, correct? No, just in general, period. because I had a conversation with one of the managers in ownership and then also one of our DJs about kind of being more technical because the venue wanted to have like a cleaner DJ, they wanted to have, you know, they were focused on one of the parts of the skill sets of DJing, right? That's transitioning and then flow of night, right? So like that... I feel like is not as important as ever, but more people know and are privy to what a bad mix sounds like, if that makes sense. So like, I feel like on the low level, like you still, you need to sound clean and you need to have a nice flow to your night, right? So I think that's important. Like the very basics. about high level. Like, I don't care about the like, whatever, the regular local bar where you just throw a DJ in there kind of thing. I don't, I guess that I'm not talking about that. Right, that's what I was asking. You're not talking about that. No, I'm talking about like the places that I DJ in or the places that, more club style places for sure, where there's potential for ticket sales and bottle service and less so like the local bar. I mean, that's the, you know, the percentage that you're talking about is like a 5% 10%. Like that's 10% of the market. That's not 90% of the market is your local place. 10% of the market is what you're talking about. Right? I think they're completely different. I think you we've gone. It's reversed from where it was 10 years ago. Right? 10 years ago was like you want skilled DJs in the DJ booth in your nightclubs. You want technical DJs in the DJ booth at your nightclubs. And those are the people that are gonna sell tickets and whatnot. And now it's more like, well, whatever brand rep it is that might be some social media influencer or, like I said, somebody who came out with a brand and is now big on TikTok or big on Instagram and those people getting booked, yeah, that's where it's really not. You can stick anybody up there. They've been DJing for six months, and they're playing some of the biggest rooms in the country. Yes, that's, it's so backwards. And now, in the small places that you're not talking about, they're looking for people that are cleaner, people that can, that know how to build a flow to a night, that know how to not go too heavy too early. It's gone completely, completely backwards. I think it's rare for the person who's making the decisions in those lower level places to actually have any idea what any of that stuff means. But what makes you say that? Because what happened was in the last 10 years is that people that are even into local DJs listen to mixes, they'll listen to SoundCloud and different DJs' mixes, they're more privy to what a clean mix sounds like, is my point. You understand what I'm saying? There's a broader spectrum. as a professional DJ, like you gotta mix cleanly like no, is that not like a minimum? I think that, I think that we sometimes take that for granted. There's many DJs getting booked that sound like shit. I watched three DJs, I went and like, we're checking out some local guys to see like, you know, check out local talent. And I saw three particular DJs that played pretty good rooms that couldn't mix. Couldn't mix, and they were playing big clubs in New York City that most people would like to play at. And I'm like, how the fuck did this person get booked for anything, a bar mitzvah even? Terrible. And so you and I, I think, take for granted that clean mixing is, for you to get hired at a place, you should be able to mix two songs together. That's not the case across the board. It's just not. Because anybody can DJ right now. Right, and I know that's the old man thing to say, but I don't care, because that's the truth. old man thing to say. I think it's the barrier to entry and become a DJ is way, way lower. It's a good thing and a bad thing. I think it's a good thing because it allows more people to enter the space. It puts more of a light on what we do, even though the art form to me is sort of missing right now. So yeah, like it's a good thing, I guess more DJs are learning how to DJ, but it is, I say to people all the time, like I could teach you how to mix two songs together in one hour, but for you to be able to play a night and be successful and quick mix and move around and read a crowd, like that takes years and years of understanding and practicing and experience. And so many people have this like low level of skill and think they can DJ, but they really can't as a DJ that's out and working for a venue. A lot of the places that you're playing right now also are more artist driven, I guess, where you're getting away with playing 128 mostly, like in that realm 128 to 140, drop it to 70, it's not super, super open format, but that's what's popular right now, that's what's selling, that's what is selling tables and everything, and the battle style has kind of gone away. The... I know we bring him up a lot, but he is always the milestone. The DJ AM style has kind of faded away outside of the bottle service clubs that are selling big tickets, you know? And I think because there is such a far departure from that, and now we're into just like this, it's just a different world. It's just a different type of music. It's more EDM forward that I think the... Yeah, the art quote unquote is lost a little bit because I feel like there's such a departure between a big EDM DJ and somebody who's so technical like an A-Track. Am I gonna be a dick by saying like, it's pretty easy to be a house DJ? Like on the basic level, like it's way easier to be a house EDM DJ than it is to be an open format DJ that's dancing in and out of genres and BPMs and doing that smoothly than just playing 128 to 140 throughout your set. Like, listen, I do both. Like the nights where I'm just going one speed, it's like, you don't even have to think. You're just playing. I'm just playing. EDM and techno and house and bank like, it's one speed, I don't really have to think and I just kind of go through it. Whereas when I play open format, it's more of a challenge for sure, because you really are reading a crowd more so and you're understanding what's working in the room and what isn't. And you got to move around and you got to figure out how do I go from 130 BPM to 100 BPM? And then in five songs, get back to, you know, 140 or whatever, you know, like. It's easy to be a house DJ in most cases, right? Like the James hype level is a completely different thing. Right? That's bringing a technical aspect to DJing that most people can't even imagine doing. We're not talking about that. Or A-Track, right? like A-Trak was the DMC world champion and then also became one of the more, you know, he's a popular house producer as well. And integrates both of those things, excellent, like you know, probably the best of anyone in his sets. So yeah, completely different story, but, and that's what sets those guys apart. is that they do, they're able to integrate both styles. Right? Right? I asked this question on Twitter a couple months ago, and I still don't have an answer, but we talk to a ton of young DJs, right? We have DJs fill out forms so we can get a better idea of who they are and what they do. Like, 99.9% of the DJs we talk to wanna play and make house music. There's no open format DJs. There's very few DJs that wanna play hip hop. Like, I- it's very rare. Is there an up-and-coming open format DJ that you look at as like the next big thing? Because I can't think of any. Oh, man, I don't know. Listen, I'm sure there are but just like off the top of my head, like, the point I'm trying to make is there are very few DJs that are like, I want to be an open format DJ, I want to be more of a hip hop Latin DJ, it's more rare than I want to be a house DJ. because of where the fame and where the money has gone, right, and that's why, that's why. Like it's a great, you know, Rick Wonder's a great example of somebody who was amazing and still is an amazing open format DJ and has changed his brand to be a house EDM producer DJ and his career skyrocketed because of it. Well, because he transitioned with the times, right? Right, but Rick is also like the best DJ in our market kind of thing too. You know, it's not like Rick's a middle-of-the-road guy. He's one of the best DJs in the country. I think he went from one of the top 10 DJs in our market to being the top DJ in our market because he changed his brand, because he changed the direction he was going in. And then highlighted himself, hey, I'm the biggest New York City DJ and now I'm going to be able to travel because of that. And maybe if he stays in the open format world and he doesn't start to produce house music, he's still just in that top 10 conversation probably. He made a conscious decision. to get involved with what's popular, what's going to make money, right? I think he also he got more focused, more brand focused, you know, instead of being a generalist, he got way more specific where it was like, hey, this is what I do now. This is what I'm about. And these are the style of rooms that I'm going to book based on the music that I'm making and the music that I want to play and That's, you know, that's hard to do. But I think Rick's not only skilled as a DJ, but he's also really skilled as a marketer and, you know, creating a brand and positioning a brand. And I think the combination of those two things have allowed him to really, like you said, skyrocket to being like the guy right now. Yeah, yeah. I think when you're coming over from being an open format DJ to trying to be a straight up house DJ, there are things that you can carry over that will keep your sound a little more interesting, keep your set more interesting. I'm sure you could speak to this a little more. Like are you using certain mixing techniques in your artist sets that you would use in an open format set? or do you kind of keep it pretty basic? Um, like what? I mean, yeah, like I'll use wordplay and I'll do some things. Like, I'm using loops and I'm not like the most technical DJ to begin with, as an open format DJ. Like, I could do some basic things and I have some like little wordplays and transitions that I've created that work. But I would never call myself like a technical DJ, really. Yeah, understood. But I was just wondering if maybe that's... is that something you think about like when you're doing a artist set that like, hey, like can I incorporate some more open format skills in here? I don't know, it's probably something that I would be thinking about if I was playing that set, that kind of set. coming from that open format background, like 99% of my sets, I'm going to bring some sort of other genre into my set, even if it's expected of me to just play four on the floor most of the night. Maybe that's trap, right? Maybe that's just like hip hop vocals in a Jersey club track or just like some way to sort of show, you know, that those open format roots, I guess you would say. Yeah. You know what's funny because we speak about how there is this huge transit, not transition, there's this huge push for just being an EDM DJ, EDM producer. I feel like that's very specific. I feel like that's going to be specific to different markets. Right? So like our market, that is what's kind of big right now. Right? But I think if you go down to Philly and you come down here to Orlando, like turntablism and battle DJing, like that's still the core of the people that get together for like a DJ meetup, that's the core of it. Like it's mostly people that are battle DJs and like are very interested in the culture of DJing. Right, so I feel like it's a very market specific thing. Though the overall landscape of DJing and nightlife across the country and across the world is really focused on EDM and house. There are still specific. places where like the art form is still there and strong. Now I'm not. I think we've done a bad job of like... pushing the culture forward as far as the technical side of DJing because you and I aren't in that world necessarily, you know? Not that we have done a bad job, but I think maybe that's something like we can try and create more of in our market, right? Like you said, Philly, like it's very Nico Oso and all the young guys like Nick Nak and all those guys are very skilled technically. And I think, like you said, it's just in the culture of that DJ. group in Philly, where, you know, they're meeting up for just like sessions, you know, and like K-Fry is another great example, like great, great skilled DJ. But there's a lot of there's a lot of those guys in Philly, there's a lot less up here in northern Jersey, New York City, I think. because that's the barrier to entry in their market. You have to be technically skilled. If you're not technically skilled, you're not getting looked at for a second. You could work a room all day long, right? And that's good for, if you're trying to get booked at a nightclub, you're trying to make somebody money. But within the group that might be putting DJs on at spots, you're not gonna get looked at unless you're technically sound. And that's why all those guys. I feel like they start technical and then they can learn the DJ side, like the DJ side of it, meaning how to build a room and how to build a night and all that good stuff. I feel like that's great for that stuff to come second. It's great to build those technical skills first. I feel like that's where I started in trying to build technical skills and setting up my turntables battle style and having battle style mixers and buying to... LPs at a time and I was something I was really interested in when I was 14, 15, 16. And then when I started to work out when I was 17 and play nightclubs and stuff like that, I learned how that wasn't so important. And it also didn't translate at that time, right? Because people weren't so privy to, you know, you had to be in the DJ culture to know what the DMC world championships were in 1998, 1999, 2000, right? Like because YouTube wasn't a thing and whatnot. So it wasn't so readily available for people. So. that's where I started, but I wound up being, I kind of left that by the wayside to make money. And so I felt like that's, I still feel like that's a really great way to start, like start with that, the technical stuff. And then. nobody's starting with that now. Everyone's just starting with like four on the floor house. You know? I'm plugging, playing John Summit. That's what I'm doing and mixing John, you know what I mean? And like, I'm just mixing house tracks instead of, instead of like really learning a lot of different genres. And, but that's okay. That's okay. Because if you have one focus and that's what you want to do, then you do that, right? Um, it's just things change. it's what's popular right now, right? Like, you go on social and you see the big festivals and you get the FOMO because you're not there and like, that's sort of this like the DJ dream now, right? Is to go play the big festivals and, you know, make that rise to traveling DJ and festival DJ. But I don't know, I started this whole thing and I wanted to talk about this just because I want to see more of the technical side of things. And it doesn't necessarily have to be in sets, right? Because I don't know if the technical DJ stuff necessarily translates in a nightclub, right? Many times the customers don't even know what's going on. The times where I find success, I'll literally get on the mic and like call out what I'm gonna do kind of thing. Or like be like... watch this or like you gotta like kind of like have that conversation with your audience. If you're going to do something different or weird or cool, whether it's, you know, a tone play or a wordplay or just something that's different. You'll have like a handful of people in the crowd be like, oh shit, I know what he just did there. But most people have no clue. But my challenge would be like, DJ is put out more content that is that is more technically driven or practice on some technical things. That's my challenge and it's sort of a challenge to me that I'd like to work on a little bit on my own is just kind of push this being a real DJ thing in what we do and not just like all the business stuff we talk about and growing your business and I don't know. It's honestly the, well, I can't speak for everybody, but it's the fun part of DJing, for me at least. That's what's fun to me. Like yeah, building a night's good and getting crowd reaction to songs that they know is fine. But like, when I, you know, I'm gonna call it Monopoly, actually did like a live Michael Jackson mix that like caught my eye on social media yesterday because he did this Michael Jackson event over in New York City. and he did this mashup live and I got super excited about it because I love to do that stuff. I like to surprise myself. And you can tell that he surprised himself while he was doing it. And because that's the fun part of DJing and I love that like Stems has been introduced because people can get more creative and get more, you know, I'm gonna bring this up too. Somebody did one of those live mixes and then they posted on social media. and every idiot in the comments like that's not in key. Like that doesn't work, it's not in key. But it flowed fine, like it doesn't have to always be in key, like it sounded good. You know, just because it wasn't technically, you know, both the same key, like I don't care, as long as it sounds good. I didn't hear it, but... No, no, not the, not the Michael Jackson one. I'm talking about it. There was a different mix that I really was into and I played it. like the only thing that I might push back on. But it sounded good, it didn't matter that like, oh, okay, like the hook and the beat, like where the beat was gonna go into that portion of their hook, like he was just looping the beat and then like the hook came on and like, yeah, it was okay and it wasn't like, but it's not supposed to sound like you're coming out of the studio, you're doing it live. I think that's a portion of what people, I think it's scared of too, is that people are so overly protective of being in key and. being really, really clean. And like, you're supposed to fuck up. That's the part of DJing and messing around. That's fun, right? Because now how can I go back and make that better, make it sound better, and maybe introduce an effect here or something like that, and it gets the wheels turning. That's all the fun stuff. Yeah. So I don't know. I think that's the fun portion of DJing for me is messing around. I think that's what's different for everybody, right? Like it might be the fun part for you, but some other people might not care about that at all and just wanna play house music and love tech house and like, that's it, you know? And maybe they just wanna be the best tech house DJ that they could possibly be and go the Rick Wonder route and be very focused, you know? Yeah, understood. I mean, yeah, different strokes for different folks. So I don't know. I just, I started that off with the comment of, I don't think skills matter. Or I, what did I say? I said, I think skills are like the least important that they've ever been in our industry. is it less important, right? And it is, it is less important. I think that's absolutely true. one of the reasons why I brought this up, I saw a video about people or DJs or someone killing Charlie Jordan for some Vegas set that she was playing. And like, the one video that I saw that wasn't very energetic or whatever. And someone was just like, they're really letting anyone DJ now, right? Like, I don't know anything about Charlie Jordan. I'm just using this as an example. But like... Owners and venues, like they could care less about skills. They could care less if you're putting a mix on. If the person that they're bringing in is selling tickets and making the venue money, that's all they care about in most cases. In most cases. Because this like nightclub high-end bottle service thing is hurting right now across the industry, at least in the US. And venues are looking for any way. to get their numbers up. And they don't care about DJ skill. They just care if the person they're booking has interest and people are gonna buy tickets and people are gonna come. That's all they care about. On the Vegas level and on a local nightclub level, because I have those conversations. And all they care about is, well, how many tickets are they gonna sell? How many people are gonna get in the door? How many bottles are we gonna sell? That's what they care about, that's it. Do you think it's acceptable to put a mix on? As a DJ? As it what if it's a DJ producer that sold a bunch of tickets and they you know, they have a couple hit records you learn how to DJ and get the job done at a minimum. That's just me. All right, so this might be a different conversation. So, but I'm going to ask, so how about when like Swedish house mafia puts a mix on. because people, people are going to a festival for not just the music, but for the production and the cryo and the visuals. And in order to do that the best way possible. Yeah, you're paying for a show like you're not paying to go to a nightclub to hear somebody DJ and curate a playlist of the night. Like they're planning their sets, the visuals match up the pyro matches up. And like you're going to experience that. Right. Okay. And I know Swedish House Mafia can DJ. So like. I just wanted to make the distinction there. But like, if you're a bedroom producer and you make a hit and all of a sudden you're getting booked to go DJ, yeah, you better fucking spend the next month learning how to DJ so you could DJ. Avicii used to get absolutely murdered when he first started, killed. Because he never wanted to be a DJ, that was not his intent, he wanted to produce music, right? But they made him go out on the road and play. And I remember seeing him a couple times, and like, oh my God, like he played surf club one day, and then saw him probably a couple years later, and he did the pier, and he had gotten way better in that... between that time frame, but he couldn't like, he didn't know how to build a room. He couldn't mix two records together. It was, it was a hot mess, but they made him get out there and do that. And he did get better, but he would get absolutely roasted for how unskilled he was as a DJ, but he was not supposed to be a DJ, right? a producer that had to learn how to DJ. And that happens a lot, you know? There's a lot of producers that just wanna make music that don't wanna go travel and DJ, you know? Which is opposite from a lot of the people that we talk to. Everyone wants to DJ and go out on the road and make a hit that allows them to go DJ a festival and play a big room and all that stuff. Yeah, it's just crazy how the art form has evolved in so many different ways, and there's so many different ways to go about it, and there was a time when you could just produce and just put out records. You didn't have to go DJ, right? But that doesn't exist anymore. Yeah, like. And vice versa, you could have been a big DJ and never put out a record. But that doesn't exist anymore. Right. So, you know, the landscape is quite unique right now and there's a million different ways to get into it. It's hard, right? Like, I think a challenge right now too is that some of the bigger artists are just so expensive. It's really hard as a promoter or a venue owner to make money bringing these people in, you know? Like, I know, I was talking to somebody who had, we had Tiesto in New Jersey at the American Dream Mall, and they sold a shit ton of tickets. But like, the event wasn't successful from a financial standpoint. because it's just so hard to bring someone like a Tiësto in and sell enough tickets and sell enough bottles where you can even out, you know? I think like, these, the prices are getting so extreme on the high level, it makes it really hard for anyone except the largest festivals or like Vegas or the largest clubs in the world to be able to even bring these artists in. Is this Vegas' fault? Is this where this started, you think? Is this the Calvin Harris X amount of dollars for a residency? Is that where it started, you think? I mean, I think so. Yeah, I would assume the festival circuits probably, you know, these guys are commanding as much money as they can and I don't blame them, you know. If someone's gonna pay me $250,000 to DJ, yeah, sure, why not? You know? I know that Tiesto, when he played like the Roxy and he played Exit back in the day when I'd go see him, he was getting 40K a night, which back then was a lot, but those were mega clubs. Exit on a Saturday night when he would play there would get 5,000 people. you know, and you're selling bottles and you're selling liquor and you have a big cover jar. It was $40 back then to get in. So like they were make, they could make their money then on 40K, but like now when it's 250K, like how do you even, and the ticket prices haven't moved still, right? You're still walking in for 40 bucks or 50 bucks or 60 bucks, right? Depending on what level of ticket you get. It, you're right, I think the artists have gotten too expensive. And, you know, I don't understand how anybody makes money in this landscape. I know how much money it costs to get John Summit to Atlantic City for a day party. And like, I don't think it's possible to make money on that event. But maybe you look at it like, all right, we're gonna bring awareness to our venue and we're gonna have a really successful day. We're gonna bring John Summit. We're gonna get incredible photo and video and use this to promote our place. And hopefully we bring new customers in and like, maybe. But you could only do that once, you know? Like. Like once a year. And then like... Like now you've set the bar of John Summit. So are people gonna get excited about like a $10,000 DJ when you just brought in someone for over $100,000 kind of thing Are those $10,000 DJs, is that the value? There's gotta be a value somewhere. There has to be. Is it the local DJ? I think the value is like the really high end travel DJ that can step into any room and make you money as a venue. And then you can position it as the DJ from New York City, the DJ from Miami, the DJ from LA. I don't know. I don't know if there's value. I don't think there's any value. Yeah. Well, I think that DJ that you're speaking of, like that's what I'm saying. Like what's the that DJ and the $5,000 DJ? They're all the same, right? what like the $1,500 $2,000 regional DJ, US DJ. Regional DJ is probably the best way to describe it. But like, is that regional DJ a better DJ than the $5,000 artist? Probably. I'd say 100% of the time. Yeah. It's just a tough, it's a tough, it's a tough market, man. And like, me getting thrown into this like talent buyer role, which I've never done before, right? And it's like, I'm sort of trying to figure this out, right? Like, at what price point does it make sense kind of thing? At what price point are we gonna sell tickets and still be able to make money kind of thing? Yeah, I would not want to own a nightclub. Not in this landscape. Nah, no way. for so many reasons. You know, like just rents are high and just the price of everything is so high. Like how can you, how can you profit? Yeah, it's tough, especially in any of the major markets where all that stuff is exacerbated even more, you know? That's why sometimes those smaller markets have fantastic nightclubs because the overhead isn't as crazy. the overhead's lower, and you could spend money on an incredible sound system and lighting and like really make a really cool place. Yeah. I mean, think about the fact that Danny Taneglia travels around with his stacked sound system for a show. Because those kind of sound systems just don't, they don't really exist anymore as good as that is. Because in our market, he can travel around with that and shit on any sound system in the market. And... I don't know, like, because our market is so damn expensive for rent and for, you know, you don't spend the money on that kind of thing anymore. Because does it really make sense to? Like, you can get by with, you know, you don't have to go half a million dollars or whatever it might be. Right. But I'm just thinking about just like the different, like, different things that have been taken away in the bigger markets that are more expensive for like rent and overhead. I don't know, just offhand, I was just saying. landscape right now, man. It's hard. And we talked about it previously, but like, yeah, and you just brought it up. I would not wanna be an owner in this climate, you know? It's just tough. It's a tough economic market, and then it's sort of like, we're in the middle of like a wave, right? Like what's, we don't really know what works for local right now, you know? Yeah. You know, I was listening to a financial podcast the other day and it's kind of funny because the ownership right now too, especially in our market, like everybody's waiting for the financial ball to drop and like nothing and like, you know, there's going to be this recession or whatever. Like we've been two years waiting on a recession. It's never happened, you know, and I feel like I don't know, does that have a mental effect on how these owners spend money? You know, and that's a huge part of it because you're expecting something to happen that never happened and like maybe you didn't spend money in places that you could have to make your venue better. There's so many different effects and this is why you don't want to own a place. Right. It's so hard though to say, I'm going to spend $50,000 on a sound upgrade right now when you're looking at your year over year numbers and they're down, and you're looking at the number of bodies that are walking through your door and maybe they're down a little bit, and you're looking at the average spend per customer that walks through your door and it's way down. So how do you, how do you justify like a huge purchase to improve your place? Yeah, you almost can't. It's really hard too, you know? Yeah. It's tough, man. It's tough. So like, is it just like buckle down, rely on your like solid local regional DJs to come in and put on the best performance they can, you know, keep those extra bodies at the end of the night and like, is that the recipe for success right now? I think, I believe in that wholeheartedly, obviously it's what we do. But I think it's doing that and then doing your regional to next level up DJ twice a quarter, something like that. And so you do your big spend, whether that's maybe every other month, that's probably a great way to go about it, or once a month on a... on a Friday, if you think that you can generate some bodies through the door on a Friday, because Saturday's gonna be good anyway, you know that. So you wanna do it on a night that your number's gonna be down a little bit. And do that spend on that Friday and blow it out and make sure that your marketing's good and make sure that you're promoting it far enough in advance and you're putting a little money into social media ads. Because anybody that's had to scroll through anything in the last. couple months like you can't get past three, three posts without hitting an ad like be on that, be on that shit. You got to be and you got to be on it in advance. Um, I just think putting the right tools behind the party and especially doing it on, like I said, like a Friday, I think those are the, those are the things that are going to make you a little bit more money. Right? I think just trying new things, you know, and like trying to stay at the forefront of your market as a venue, right? Like, just trying to do something different than what everyone else is doing. And, you know, whether it is spending more on promo, right? Like maybe the ads and because people are living on socials and like, that's where you're going to find new customers. Maybe that's just the recipe, part of the recipe, right? Yeah. But I think like, you gotta try, you gotta put the effort in and attempt different things. Some of them are gonna work, and some of them aren't. And I think that's okay, you know? It's okay for stuff to fail. But I think it's important to at least try and try and push the market forward and try and do something new and different. And your customers will tell you if it's a success or not. And if it is, you keep doing it. And if it's not, you try something else. Yeah. Agreed. All right, we should probably talk a little music. Yeah. Getting to her. So we've been seeing this now for the last year or so, I'd say, but I think the country music going more mainstream is sort of starting to reach its peak. We have a Beyonce album, we have a Post Malone country album coming, we have a Lana Del Rey country album coming, we see the rise of the EDM artists, guys like Vavo, shit. They're at the forefront. are a lavish life disco fries artist? You're seeing more and more of it, right? You're seeing younger country stars emerge that I think are connecting to a younger crowd. So, I don't know, what are your thoughts? How do you think that's gonna creep into our DJ life? If at all. Oh gosh, okay. I play and have played very spectrum country for a long time, right? And I think a lot of people have without even really noticing it. This stuff that's super duper popular. Country music is and always will be the most popular music in the United States of America. Bottom line, hands down, whether you like it or not, because you go anywhere outside of the metro areas, that is predominantly the music that's listened to, right? I live in an area that everybody listens to country. There's gotta be 12, 10 country radio stations just where I'm at, right? Like it goes country, I get country, Latin, country, Latin, pop, and that's how, when you go scroll through the radio, that's how it sounds. It just so happens, and Beyonce comes from a place where country was the number one type of music, right? She's from Texas. That is the heart and soul of where she's from and the musical landscape of where she's from. So it does make sense that she delves into this, into this genre. Where it has gotten popular across the board with like Alana Del Rey, Post Malone has always tickled the surface with. country music, right, with his guitar. He's always had a country sounding guitar on records, you know, from day one. So that's also not shocking. I like the fact that they are trying to push it forward into extreme mainstream pop, right? It's been pop forever, you know, Garth Brooks. And I mean, if you don't remember growing up, like you always had. country music award shows felt like it was on every month. Like it was always consumed by many people. It just so happens that it's hitting that super pop. I mean, Taylor Swift's a country music, she's a country star first, you know? So I think, I think it's, how do I think it's gonna creep into what we do? I just think there are going to be more remixes and there's going to be more playability. within the country landscape. And the big songs are gonna be remixed and made into big EDM tracks or drummed up. Morgan Wallen's song is the one that comes to mind because like, I don't play, I play zero country. I am on record for not being a fan of country music and like, even that song was, EDM, like remixes were creeping into my sets because it got so big. And was requested and good reactions every time I played a version. It's unavoidable and you can't not play it. If you wanna be a good DJ that's playing two crowds, right? Yeah, I mean, I, you have to, right? You don't, I guess you don't have to, but like, there are certain songs that you just kind of got to fit into the night. And for a while, that song was sort of one of those songs where you kind of just got to fit it in. I like the fact that the availability of different type, different sounding remixes are, they're at your fingertips. You just have to find what your sound is, the remix that fits your sound, your DJ sound. Because you can find them. Yeah, I would say how we might see this creep into our world as DJs, I just think there's going to be more country spots, venues or more venues that are doing like a country night, potentially. Will there be more country DJs? Something that we struggle with. I don't know. I mean, I've been the last few months I've been mining for country DJs, or at least DJs that like know the music and are willing to play a country venue once in a while. Hit cream up if you guys are country DJ you want to get. Listen, we're testing out DJs at a venue, you know, we just need, we need more on the roster, just have more options. Yeah. I think it's interesting. I like that it's gotten a little more mainstream. I like that there's country bars popping up more and more in those metro areas. We actually don't even have them too many down here. There's a few, but nothing crazy. Yeah, I mean, I said if I was opening a place, I'd probably look to open a country place just because I think there's opportunity. And with all of this push to the mainstream with the music, it just makes more sense to me in my brain. Maybe I'm wrong, but to be what? away? No, I mean, I think country music is gonna be popular no matter what, but just like every trend in music, like certain genres get popular for a time. I think we saw like when Bad Bunny first got popular, we saw a big push of Latin music into the mainstream. I think right now we're seeing a little bigger push of country into the mainstream and like, just like anything else, there's waves. And this will be a wave for a little while and we'll see how long it actually lasts, but. When I was bringing up those artists and like in no way was I saying like they're trying to take advantage of a trend But I do think there are gonna be artists that try to take advantage of the trend for sure I think those three artists that we that I brought up earlier like for sure fit into creating country music Based on their past and where they're from and you know, they're the music that they've already made so But I do think there's gonna be artists that are gonna try to jump on this wave Just like artists try to jump on every other wave Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's the smart thing to do if something's trending. Like, you know, you have to try it out, especially if it's something that you're familiar with. And like I said before, so many, so many artists are very, are intimately familiar with country because not everybody's from these, you know, New York city, LA, those areas, you know, so just get on it. Wow. You and, you and country have already made a couple now. no, I'm gonna be a singing artist on the track. Ha! I know what it's called already. I've been known to freestyle a country song or two. Heheheheh I won't do it for you guys right now, but if you guys see me out and I might have had a couple cocktails, ask me to freestyle Country Track and I'll do it for you. You better believe my pickup truck's gonna be in it. A six pack, my dog in the back. the Shout to Big Country, hold down the country music forever. Yeah, man. Big respect. edits. He actually hit me up about doing a remix for a song. He's built some really strong relationships over the last few years, and he had an artist reach out or a label reach out to do a remix of something, so he had hit me up about it. I don't know if Country's on my resume though. Ha! You don't want to hit Nashville? Do a Nashville stint? Like, I haven't been putting out a ton of original stuff, but like the one track that'll go big will be the country thing, and I'll have to play country music. And that'll be like the, that'll be like my internal battle of, ha ha. That'd be hilarious, amazing, and terrible all at the same time. Ha ha ha. So all right, so one other thing I want to bring up music wise. Michael Jackson's estate just sold 50% of his music rights to Sony for $1.2 billion. And that broke the record by double of Bruce Springsteen. yeah. 600, right? Which I thought was big for Springsteen, 600. But he wrote, and just like Michael Jackson, actually was this, were the Beatles, was the Beatles catalog part of this as well? Or was this just Michael Jackson's music? Because Michael Jackson was known to, he bought rights to everybody's music for a long time in the 80s there. He was just like, going out there and snagging people's catalogs. And he was ahead of this, it was just his own music. Because he had owned the Beatles' rights, but I know there's a timeline on owning the rights to certain things. So I'm wondering if that was part of it. But it would make sense if it was just his. Because Springsteen's was just his catalog. And like I said, written, performed. You know, that's all, that's their music, right? I mean, this is sort of getting more kind of more standard where these artists are selling their catalogs. It's such a huge. It's such a huge amount of money. Yeah, I mean, at what point are you like, well, I don't care if Chevy uses any of my songs for an ad, you know, and that's why you hold onto them, right? well, I think it was more because, you know, in perpetuity, you're getting a percentage of plays from the radio and streams, but I think there's less, you know, albums and CDs and all that stuff is not really existent. I know there's a little bit of a rise of people buying vinyl right now, but the it to make an impact. are making from streams is so minute that it's like, it's not even worth it. You're better off just selling your catalog, you know? Especially if you can command crazy hundreds of millions of dollars. Yeah, agreed. I mean, I think that, you know, Springsteen had made his money over and all of these artists that have. So, I mean, look at Katy Perry sold hers, right. And she's and she could still create, you know, she's still creating music. She's still she's not like she's outside of this conversation of like an older artist. You know. All these artists make their money touring. Like look at the prices of concert tickets right now. Like that's how they all make their money. Like lower bowl, lower bowl bad bunny tickets, $800 a ticket. Drake and J. Cole, like similarly crazy expensive. Like, yeah, you can get in the building, but it's gonna be 250 bucks easy, easy 250 just to get in the building. Crazy. I mean, we talked about the Beyonce and the Taylor Swift tours and the crazy amounts of record breaking revenue that those tours brought in. That's where artists are making their money, right? DJ, we just talked about DJs commanding the more money than ever as artists getting booked to play in different cities and festivals and stuff. Like, that's how all of us are making our real money. It's not from music streams, that's for sure. everybody wants that experience. So Michael sets the record. Is Michael like the number one? Is he the number one all time? I think so. I don't think. I think for record, like for just sell your rights to your music. Absolutely. Is Michael the greatest pop artist of all time? He was, I said this actually to my dad and he yelled at me the other day. I was like, Michael Jackson was like the first huge, big pop artist and he's like, the Beatles? Did you forget about the Beatles? always talk to me about like the crazy fanatical actions that people took to see the Beatles. they just celebrated down here 50 years of the Beatles or 60 years of the Beatles coming here to Central Florida. I didn't realize how big impact they had. Somebody wrote a book about it. So they had just celebrated 50 or 60 years of the Beatles coming to Central Florida and it's like, I'm thinking about it. I'm like, these guys haven't been relevant or whatever in such a long time and still people are talking about them coming here. 60 years. years ago, like writing books about it and. will still sell out. crazy. Their impact is crazy. So like, they and Michael Jackson are huge, huge pop stars, right? And probably the top two. And it's just ironic that Michael Jackson owns the rights to their. What about current artists? Who do you think would be the number one? If every artist put their music rights up for sale right now, who would sell for the most? Taylor Swift would be. Taylor Swift, if she sold her music rights tomorrow, she'd double Michael Jackson's. Because of just how hot she is right now. And she's on this Michael Jackson run. Like if you remember Michael Jackson back late 80s, early 90s, and you would buy his concert on Pay-Per-View, it was like an event, and you did it. You know, and my family would buy it every every year that he was on tour. It'd be like 30 bucks, it wasn't cheap. It wasn't cheap. I would love to look at the numbers in that and see how many pay per views he would sell back in the bad tour or whatever tour it was. She's on that kind of level. You know, where she is putting her tour in the movie theater and it's selling big numbers. You know, everything she touches, she can sell for a lot of money. Yeah, she's one of those people that has kind of transcend and is now beyond just like a music star also. She's just a, she's just a pop star, you know? I think I posed this question a year or two ago. Is there ever going to be a pop star as big as Michael Jackson? And here she is. That might be controversial, but I don't- but I don't know if I disagree with it either. I'd have to really think about it. It's hard comparing the different eras, right? Especially because we're living the Taylor Swift thing right now. And also, we're living in a social media era, which is... which makes it easier, for sure. But that's what I was saying, because everything is so fat and so fast, and so we consume it and throw it away, consume it and throw it away, it's easy for pop stars to be consumed and thrown away. She is just stuck around. And this is an incredible, like meteoric rise to like this super stardom. Like she's always very popular, but now she's on like a completely different level. Yeah. Like, think about the Grammy where Kanye got up on stage and did what he did and disrespected her. Like, that just seems like such a different time, and she was so less popular then than she is now. And that was like winning a Grammy. I think her popularity, when I was thinking about this question a year and a half ago, is completely on a different scale than it is right now, even a year ago. Right? Who else would even be in the conversation with Taylor is Beyonce in the conversation is Drake in the conversation is bad bunny in the conversation. This is one of those things to where it's like the opportunity to make this purchase comes around once in a hundred year span. So it's like, if there's one person that's willing to spend a crazy amount of money because they just want the catalog, it's like when a sports team comes for sale, right? Like the Yankees are valued at let's say$5 billion, but how often are the Yankees coming for sale? Like if they came for sale, they might sell for 20 million, if there's, or 20 billion, if there's two, if there's two competing billionaires that wanna buy the Yankees, you know? Yeah. I just think about Taylor Swift's popularity in the scope of who would know who she is that she's not supposed to appeal to, right? So like somebody's grandma, somebody's great grandma, you know, everybody knows who Taylor Swift is. Everybody knew who Michael Jackson was. Does everybody know Drake? They might have heard of him. They don't know what he looks like, right? Does everybody know Beyonce? That's probably a close one. She's been in movies since 1998, 1999. So she's been popular for a very, very long time. So she's a close second, I would say. Who else? Bad Bunny, like people know loosely who Bad Bunny is. He has rabid fans. It's a little different. His fans are like super fans. Well, I think also if you talk to someone from South America or the Caribbean or a Spanish speaking country, the conversation's a little different with Bad Bunny where like grandma's gonna know who Bad Bunny is kind of thing in those households, whereas my grandma might not, you know? Right, that's what I'm saying. I think Taylor Swift transcends nation and sex and age and everything. I think that's why she's so big. It just reminds me of Michael Jackson at his peak. Right after Bad, right in between, right before his Super Bowl appearance. Like, she's like that big right now, in my opinion. And I thought literally a year ago or two years ago, I did not think there would ever be another pop star as big as Michael Jackson, because of social media, because of how fast we consume and throw away. So. It's interesting. I mean, guys, if there's any other artists you think are even in the conversation, like comment, let us know. Because I'd loved I can't think of any others at the moment. But I'm sure there's probably one or two others that maybe might enter the conversation. I think it's a good point to wrap. Is there anything that we want to promote and what anything we got going on? Guys, if you a couple things number one, if you haven't watched the show on YouTube, go Give us a subscribe on YouTube. We're really trying to push more video content and push more people over to the YouTube. So that's first and foremost, you could search Get Down DJs or click the link in the show notes. The second thing, if you listen to this show, we would greatly appreciate you guys to throw us a review, hopefully a five star review if you enjoy the show. That only just helps us get, you know, in front of more people and helps us grow the show. and get more listeners. So both of those things would greatly appreciate and thank you guys for supporting us and listening to us. All right, good stuff. Alright guys, thanks for listening to this episode. We will talk to you guys soon, peace. Peace, guys. All right.