"If You DJ Here, You Can't DJ There." ⛔

• Negotiate fair terms with venues that restrict you from playing at other locations.
• Maintain a balance between playing in seasonal markets and your home market.
• Create a buzz and build a name for yourself to attract the best venues.
• Don't get caught up in the obsession with going viral in the music industry. 
• Remixing viral songs has become a popular trend in the music industry, but it can lead to a lack of creativity and originality.
• Taking advantage of viral trends can be a strategic move to gain popularity and advance one's career.
• Female pop singers are currently dominating the music scene, and their songs are highly requested by audiences.
• Potential contenders for the Song of the Summer and highlight the importance of staying current with popular music trends.

00:00: Introduction and DJing in Seasonal Markets
09:52: Navigating Venue Restrictions
26:04: Building a Buzz and Attracting the Best Venues
29:30: The Obsession with Going Viral in the Music Industry
31:35: The Rise and Fall of Viral Hits
35:15: Taking Advantage of Viral Trends
37:31: The Dominance of Female Pop Singers
41:39: Contenders for the Song of the Summer
53:49: The Importance of the DJ Community

Transcript

0:02

What's up guys, welcome to the hundred and fifty fourth episode of the Grow My DJ Business podcast brought to you by Digital Music Pool and the Grow My DJ Business Discord. My name is Kareem. W here. Little different setup today. Little different setup today. Yeah, Gary's traveling. He's been up here in Jersey DJing. Guy had like the longest weekend that I've ever seen. Partly my fault, partly my fault. Yeah, I've been up here for seven days and I've done. A lot. Seven gigs already? Eight? Maybe. how long you here and how many gigs you're playing while you're here? I'm gonna wind up doing, I think, 15 in 10 days. I think 15 gigs in 10 days is what it's gonna wind up being, yeah. Saturdays that are like start like like 12 to 2 3 kind of thing was, that was a, I'm prepping for my, my set at 12 30 last Saturday and realized that one of the owners decided to text us at 12 30 at night the night before, you know, I'm just got done with a gig, you're gigging and booked a double for 1 PM to 9 PM and we didn't book anybody. So guess who was 15 minutes from the venue and I went and played that set and and it was about 100 degrees outside in the sun when they have a roof that they could just retract right over you. They did not. Big shout to Doug's spin coming out to cover me for two hours so I could so I could sit down and eat actually and have some water and relax for a second. Yeah, man, we've had like a little bit of a heat wave up here and it's just been it's been rough out doing day gigs. home. It feels like Florida, especially with the humidity out and the real feels been around 100 here. For us this time of year, it's usually about 105 every day down there, which feels very much at home. But I did the Brew at the Zoo gig last week. Big shout out to Bronx Zoo, big shout out to specialists. They do a great job, Phil and Fousey. their team's phenomenal. They're there for like two weeks prior setting up lighting and they make the, they make the zoo look beautiful at night. yeah, crazy, but their team's great. You know, I get a sound guy there and I get light people and they're phenomenal. I actually had an opener this year, which was great. Just keeps getting better every year. keeps getting better every year. And then, yeah, the, did that triple on, on Saturday and then Sunday back on 66 roof for their afternoon party, which is always a good time, but. a lot of rooftop parties. Last night, a hilarious rooftop story. We are, they do a really cool event. Yesterday is the anniversary of marriage equality and that's what 626 is named after. Obviously yesterday was June 26th and we're in the middle of the vow renewals. They do vow renewals to anybody that wants to renew their vows up there on this date every year. And in the middle of the renewal, which only lasts like 10 minutes, like, you know, the skies opened up and a storm just came across and we're trying to shut the roof and winds blowing the umbrellas over. I got my shirt off covering, covering my, my computer, which was hilarious. they wrap the, the, the renewals. I start playing it's raining men. It's just, everybody's laughing. We're having a good time. It was, it was pretty good. but yeah, that was fun, but a lot of rooftop gigs. It's been fun. Been fun. Like this time of year here. right? We just talked about it last week, how in New York, all the rooftop stuff, it's just like where people want to be right now. Yeah, it's been great. Great vibes. You get to switch up what you play. Usually people are open to hearing just feel good music, you know, whether that be pop, whether that be house and we're real. We'll talk about some of those pop records in a little bit here. Yeah, man, I had an interesting weekend as well. I was I was in Atlantic City and then I was at the Jersey Shore in doing a day party and a night party to different venues down there. I went to my first country music festival guys. Where's Pahrari sound effects? Yeah, one of our you know, big big country was DJing the barefoot. festival in Wildwood, New Jersey this weekend. Our boy TJ was down there too. TJ Bowman was DJing the other stage. So it was cool to just go check that out, show some love, heard some acts who I have no idea who they are. But you know, it was just cool to be in that scene and see what's going on. It was sold out and packed. It's a four day festival. And the video from countries like nighttime club sets in the tent and under the tent was like unbelievable. So it was cool. I wish I got to stay there a little longer, but I had to get out of there for my own gigs. But that was cool. that's a great festival because we're not oversaturated in this area for country music festivals, you know, where we do have a lot of electronic music festivals in the area at this point. And that's a little oversaturated and they're having more trouble selling tickets for those. And, you know, I think that's why them selling out is, you know, probably a little easier than something else that doesn't, that does have a little competition. Yeah, it's unique. It's literally on the beach. So, you know, you're on the beach for the shows and they have tents and obviously the main stage, but yeah, like different group of people out at those shows than the people that I'm used to being around in nightlife or at EDM shows. Yeah, I'm sure your age group very big time, right? Yeah, like more American flags than I've ever seen. More white people than I've ever seen for sure. Yeah, it's just that's the nature of the beast, right? But yeah, it was cool experience for sure. And you know, big country's crushing right now, man. This guy's all over the place. And getting booked for big venues, big shows, festivals. So shout to country and all the other country DJs doing their thing. Yeah, ride that country wave. So, you know, that was part of my weekend. Like I said, I had a kind of crazy weekend. I had multiple shows. I have a Tesla, right? So where I live, there's tons of superchargers. Driving down to the shore, there's a lot less. So I was running late. I was running late on Saturday for my afternoon gig. And I'm like, you know what? I'll be fine. I can get there. My car will be fine. And I'll just go charge after. I come back and my car is at zero. cheese. I won't get into why, but the battery got drained while I was sitting there during my gig. And like I had to get to another gig at night. And luckily I have the portable charger. So I was sitting at a gas station that was close to where I was, like for hours trying to get a couple percent to get to the next supercharger. I finally do. I get to the next charger and it doesn't work. Like the charger doesn't work. It's a charge point charger. It's not a Tesla charger. doesn't work. So I'm like stranded. My car's stranded. I'm at the police station trying to get them to help me. I had to literally leave my car, go DJ my gig, and then come back and sit in a regular plug outlet, sitting there for like three hours until my car had enough battery to get to where I needed to get to to supercharge my car and then get home. I was a good hour and 20 minutes from home. I literally didn't walk into my apartment until 630 in the morning and like My set ended at two. So tough, tough weekend for me. And I'm like waiting for all my electric car haters to start hating on me. But lesson learned, I made a huge mistake. It cost me a lot of time and energy. Yeah. So that charger that you got to it just it wasn't compatible with your car or just actually didn't work. It was working, it just wouldn't charge my car. It was a charge point charger, which technically I have the connector to charge my car, but it just didn't work. Does that happen often? Have you ever had to use one of those or no? No, because I'm usually close enough to a supercharger for Tesla and just do that. right, right. I was thinking about this when you got your car and I'm like, would I be able to have, because I still live in a pretty rural area, would I be able to have a Tesla? But I'd have a charger at home though, I guess, in my garage. a charger at home, I always have to use the supercharger. Right. So that'd be the difference. Cause a lot of people have Teslas by me, like most people, like it's my community's filled with them. but everybody must have chargers at their house and that's what makes it easily. man. get into our first topic here. I feel like we've been drawing on about nonsense for a while. So something that you and I have dealt with for a very long time and part of the reason why Get Down exists is because of bookers, venue owners, managers, forever telling DJs, if you work here, you can't work here. Or we don't want you to work in these other venues surrounding the city that our venue's in kind of thing. We even see it at a greater scale with some of the bigger acts. For example, DJs that are DJing in Atlantic City at certain venues obviously can't play the other venues in Atlantic City, but also have a 90 mile radius that they can't play any venues within the 90 miles without consent from the venue that they have the deal with. And I'm just hearing a lot of our DJs going through this. And if our DJs are going through it, and you and I have been going through it, other people listening to this show are going through it. So how do you handle someone telling you if you DJ here, you can't DJ there? Well, we could talk about this from a couple different angles, right? We could talk about this from a city angle. Like a lot of times if you're playing at one major spot in a city, let's say Jersey City, just for lack of conversation. A lot of times if you're playing in one big venue there, you can't play in the other big venue in that city. I sometimes think that that is okay. I think if it's like two rival places, I only have this happen when it's like a place that's right next door to each other, right? I had it in Morristown with the competitor that was literally next door, have it currently in Jersey City at the place that is literally next door to a place that we book at. It's annoying, but you have to understand that from the business owner's perspective, right? And I am understanding of that. It doesn't annoy me one bit. because like I don't always understand it. I'll be the I'll be you know, sort of the on the other side on this. I just think if I was booking talent and I think that you're bringing out a certain crowd and you play a certain style, I want that style to be the style of my venue. Right. I don't want that music to then translate next door because then why do I go to your venue? If the DJ style that you bring fits my place? Well, it shouldn't fit next door's place because we shouldn't have the same musical style because That's the differential in why people will come to my place and not the place next door. You understand? I do, I think from a DJ perspective, are you booking me every week? If you're booking me every week, I understand. If you're booking me once a month, book me more or pay me more to not do that. be every, every other week, right? Like you can't, you, you cannot tell somebody that they can't go play somewhere unless you're booking them multiple times a month, two to three times a month, at least, and at a good rate, right? Like you gotta be getting a decent rate. And that's where the important to your venue and your sound, then invest in me and I won't go play anywhere else. Take care of me kind of thing. the negotiation that I think DJs need to take to these places that are telling them, hey, you can't go play here. So, okay, well, I won't. I absolutely won't. But like my upcharge is going to be X amount more because now I'm handcuffed to only playing your place twice a month, whereas I could be playing your place two to three times a month and I can be playing that place two to three times a month. And now this is this much this many dollars. And then you got to make the dollars and cents make sense. Right. So it's like, okay, if it's $2 ,000 for the month or $3 ,000 for the month, well, you gotta match that, right? You're taking money out of my pocket. So you gotta go into negotiation and be like, well, these are the numbers. These are how many gigs it's affecting. These are what the numbers look like. And if you can match that, then I'm okay with just playing your venue, right? I think that's a grill. I was playing a little devil's advocate here, but I would I would agree. I think if there's two rival nightclubs that are doing similar bottle service style stuff with similar style music, I would understand how if you play it one, you really can't play it the other one. I get it. I do understand that. I think where it gets a little crazy is where, you know, venue owners are booking someone once a month. and telling them that they can't play venues that are like 10 miles away and 15 miles away. And like, that's crazy to me. That's crazy to me. And I think as DJs, we sort of, as a young DJ, you sort of just have to do what they're asking you to do, right? But once you start building a name for yourself, like you can start making the rules a little bit, right? Where it's like, you just do and you ask for forgiveness later, whatever that saying is, right? yeah. where like, I'm gonna do me and if you have a problem with it, we can have a conversation about it and then I can make a decision whether I'm not gonna do what you don't want me to do or not based on our negotiation because at that point, if you're calling me to tell me, hey, you can't, I don't want you to do this or it's not a good look, then okay, let's lock in the next, let's lock in the rest of the summer at this rate and let's pick the dates right now and I won't play over there. Like, I think these conversations you can use as a negotiating, negotiation. conversation as well. And like, yeah, as someone more established, you can sort of like, flex a little bit if they really want you. They're not going to care, right? As long as at the end of the day, you're staying at their place. So what happens if it's the flip side and you're not more established and you really want to play this venue, but you're having opportunities at other venues? I would say it's really difficult, but I will always say to a DJ, take the opportunity that's presented to you over the potential of another opportunity. And you taking this other opportunity, it's just gonna create more of a buzz around your name, right? And if that venue that you really, really wanted to get into wants you to play at your place and you're creating enough buzz and you're putting music and your socials are great, they'll book you. and they'll try to take you away from the other place. But if you're playing at neither, because you're holding out hope that you're gonna play at this best place, how does that help you? I think in very rare situations, you can go all in on a venue, but you have to understand that you're probably gonna get booked there in the next, you know, six months kind of thing. But most DJs take the opportunity that's presented to you first, instead of holding out hope for this other opportunity. Would you rather play at the second best venue in a market or not at all? Like, that's how I look at it. You could always make a move from the second best to the best, but that second best place will help your resume in getting booked in the best place, I think. So it's, it's kind of funny cause this is happening a lot at the Jersey shore and it happens every year at the Jersey shore because it is a shortened, it's a shortened season, right? People are only down there for like four months and there's a handful of places that everybody wants to play and people have their eyes on certain venues and they'll, they'll hold out in other venues. But what you don't realize those when the season's over, if you went and played that, your, that second option, you know, maybe not your first pick, but if you at least you went to go play your second option, it does improve your resume come fall when you come back into your regular market. Right. And I'm sure and I'm sure that this happens across the country. Like no matter where you are. Every. works for every holiday spot. Right. So, you know, go play that other venue and now you come back and you're like, well, I, I at least went and played X place and come September. It's like, well, maybe you could play the number one place in your market, in your regular market. Right. you're just making yourself look better. If you hold out and play nowhere, well, that's a whole season lost. Number one, a whole season of money lost and you got to wait until next year. And are you going to get that opportunity next year? Are you going to wait around again? You know, and this good be an endless cycle. Like you have to, you have to take the gig that's offered to you and to make the money and to put your name out there a little more and create that buzz. Like you said, because it helps it. holiday markets, no one's making decisions or it's very rare for venues to make decisions on DJs this season. Like those decisions are made last season and through the off season. And most of these places are booking their spots out well in advance, you know? Like there's places that I work at that book the DJs for the entire summer in April and May. So... If you're not in this summer, like you need to do all the networking that you need to do to be in for next summer. So who are those people that are making decisions? How do you get close to those people? How do you show those people what you're currently doing outside of their holidays, you know, seasonal area and go make the personal connection and let them know, hey, I understand this year's probably fully booked out. If you ever need somebody, I would love to be here. For next season, what do I need to do to be here? Like that's, you have to plant those seeds this year for next year. Now, could you get put on this season? Maybe, maybe. But I think your brain should just be saying, I'm putting in the work now for next year. how much importance are you putting on spending all of your time to network maybe in, for this conversation, in the Jersey Shore and taking your time away from your regular market? Like, should you be still gigging a little bit in your regular market? We see like an exodus of DJs up here and we feel it. You know, our company feels it because We still have the gigs. The gigs don't go away in the summertime. They don't leave and go down the shore like everybody else does. Everybody leaves and goes down the shore and we're still left with gigs. So how much importance are you putting on going to network down the shore versus still gigging up in your home market? Should you maintain a balance? Because if you don't maintain... If you don't maintain a balance, you're hurting one or the other, you know? we have we've had this conversation with our DJs a number of times. Sometimes we need to remind them like, hey, guys, our market is our home market is open 12 months a year. The market that you guys are all fighting to go DJ in is really open. It is open 12 months a year, but all the seasonal places are only open for three months a year. So like, as a young DJ, for me, yes, I was down the shore. Yes, I was Atlantic City. Yes, I was networking, but I never ever ever stop playing in my main places in my home market in New York City and in Hoboken and Jersey City. Because I knew I'd sacrifice these three months to be able to have the nine the rest of the nine months where it's peak up here in my home market. You know what I mean? So if I was playing it at my main club here, two to three times a month, I was giving them at least once a month at least just to get in the door. Say what's up, make sure I'm still playing, make sure they get to hear me DJ throughout the summer. And not for nothing, it shows that you care a little bit about the venue up here because they're hurting and they're struggling to book DJs too. So if their main fall and winter DJs still give them a couple dates, it's like one less thing to worry about. And you know, this for our DJs, it's the same thing. Like I get it, all you guys want to be down the shore and we've put videos in the chat about this. but we still need you up here to give us something. We still need you to book our gigs that are happening 12 months a year. And it might not be the best gig in the summer here. It might be slower, but you know what? We all sort of have to suck it up a little bit. I come from a different perspective. I was never a Shore person, right? Never went, I wasn't a DJ's regular, I wasn't a regular anywhere down the Shore. I had Shore houses, but I went down Monday to Friday, because obviously I was a teacher, and I gigged on the weekends here. So I treated my Shore houses like a during the week Shore house, not during the weekend to go party, because I was working. I was DJing. My favorite time of year to DJ up here is in the summer. I love being around New York city and, and up in Hoboken and Jersey city in the summertime. It's, you know, I do, I do. there to hang out. I don't necessarily like going there to DJ because the rooms are 50 % of what they normally are, if that. I like, I like it because the, sometimes you do have a little bit lighter crowds and there is more musical flexibility. I feel like I can get away with a lot more when, when there's a lighter room and tests things out and really. You know, find out what the staff's into and kind of lean into that stuff and discover new music. And I, I've always used this as a grow my musical knowledge portion of the year. You know, I didn't have interest in going to play DJs or headliner or any of those places. Like it just didn't interest me. I am. I am. But I knew I just wasn't my style of music. Right. Like when I played West five, that was but it was the the that was the peak time for EDM music. Like everybody was EDM DJ at that point. You know what I mean? It just was never my style. And like so I guess this really It is anybody who's an open format DJ that's listening to this right now that that thinks about North Jersey versus South Jersey, something to to kind of think about. And I always felt like this time of year, too, is it was great to go. I like to go out a lot on the weekends up here. If I had a night off, I can remember going to like see you at Teak. Right. And like I was able to then talk to the people that work there and get to know the people that work there because a little slower than it normally was. And it just gives you more networking opportunity up here so that when September comes around, like, all right, well, Gary came out a lot this summer. Like, let's get him in the, let's get him in the rotation for the fall, you know, and now it's going to come back big. Now I just padded my stats from September to June, you know, and it's a better, it's a better financial play longterm. Well, I think that's a smart, it's the smart move in order to create those relationships in your home market, like you said, to set yourself up for the future. It is a long term play and it's smart. And it's part of, right, it's part of the reason why DJs who are going to play in that seasonal zone still need to take care of their home market. You still need to play those residency spots that you play the rest of the year. whether it sucks or not. You just have to do it because the venue's appreciated. The venues want you there, you know? And like you said, maybe if there's a venue in your home market that you aren't playing in, it's a great opportunity to go and try and get in there for peak season, which would be the fall and winter. So yes, super smart and super strategic and going against the grain because All the DJs are at the seasonal venues trying to get in right now, which is most likely not going to happen. A handful of DJs will. I'm trying to think, offhand I can think of six different places that I gain residencies at because of doing this. Over, you know, over a. City for me. I always made my New York City connections in the summer where I'd make my move into a club that I was trying to get into in the summer because those bookers were really looking for good DJs to play their room and like, I would do it. Whether it was everyone was at the Hamptons or not. It was just good for me because I wanted to be there in September, like you said. Right. Yeah. So just a, there's different ways to look at it, right? And I get those people that want to go play the biggest places down the shore. I understand it, right? But you got to remember those places still got to feed that their local guys that are there all year round too. So you're not only are you competing with every other DJ from up here that wants to play there, but you're competing with a really good DJs from down there that deserve to play down there too. Right. And I know we're talking Jersey Shore, North Jersey right now, but this goes for anybody's, you know, it goes for your market with your vacation spot, right? Yeah, because everybody has it. New York has Hamptons. You know, Chicago has the lake. Like, it just, it is what it is. I would say... This is hard guys, like making these decisions, working through this strategy and like, it's very, very hard. It doesn't get easier as you continue through this. It just doesn't. And you can't always make a right choice, right? But I think it is important to make a decision, right? And take action and make a move into doing something. Maybe it turns out that it was the wrong decision. Or maybe it turns out it was the best decision you ever made. You're not gonna know when you're at that point, but you just have to do it, right? And hopefully, more, you make more right decisions than wrong decisions and you set yourself up. And you can't kill yourself for right or wrong decisions. I've made a lot of wrong decisions that have, in retrospect, they're like, damn, I kinda wish I didn't do that. But you know what? Like, you gotta just keep moving forward and work out of it. And if you create a big enough buzz, and you create a big enough name, the places that you want to get booked at will come to you. And I think that's something that's really important to think about. If you guys create enough buzz and you're playing enough good places and you're doing what you need to do on social and music, the best venues will come to you. Definitely. That's it. It's not easy. It's not easy. And it's all preference. It's all preference, right? Like your preference is different than my preference, but you know, and we've, we've both had different successes, right? And you have to, you know, it all is dependent upon what you want and what the end goal is. Right, and this is why having a game plan and goals and a list of venues that you want to get into, like, that's why it's important to have this stuff. So then you can kind of take action on some of these things that you want to make happen. Yep. All right. If you guys have questions about this stuff, like I just talked to a couple of our DJs in the last week about this type of stuff. Hit us up. You know, we're here to help. We've been through a lot of this shit, so we can sort of help you work through it and... It's not easy, like we said, so hit us up. All right, I wanna talk about something, and I hate to even bring this up because it's super cringe to me. I fucking hate it. But, like, the virality of some of the stuff that's happening with nightlife and with music, for example, the man in finance girl, the Hawk 2 -E girl, like, It just drives me crazy and it gets blown out of proportion. It goes viral and then everybody's trying to get a piece of it. DJs are making a hundred edits and remixes of it. Everybody, all my group chats are talking about it. I'm like, shut up. Shut up, please. I fucking hate it. I hate it. NY Mag just posted an article today on like, get to know the Hawk2ie girl. And it's like, are you fucking kidding me? Like, NY Mag, are you guys kidding, posting this today? Like, who cares? But people. not just our industry, but we're talking about music and then DJ industry and music industry. And like, it's a major problem for us. It creates this like, go viral and you make it. And that's the only thing that you should care about. Like it creates that in our industry, in our culture, and I fucking hate it. I hate it. Yeah, it's and it's all by chance, right? Like it's just by chance. Like there's no rhyme or reason for any of this. And for there to be this much attention put on this is ridiculous. Just to be plain and simple, it's just ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's what reminds me of when we were younger, like one hit wonders, like the people that made that one song that happened to go number one on the radio or wherever it was getting played. And then that person never made another song that anyone ever cared about ever again. And like that's sort of what going viral is right now. It's like a one hit wonder you get lucky. The viral remix trend has been around forever, right? It's been around since YouTube became a thing, you know, back in 07. I remember the first couple, because I would play them. I would, 100%, I would play them, right? And people got a kick out of the method. in many cases. I don't do it anymore. I gotta draw the line somewhere. But I used to do it back then because yeah, I'd be playing an open format set and then you'd play whatever the viral thing was at the time and people would love it. And I guess people still do love it. I think it's just being exposed to it for such a long time that I think it's tiresome. It's unoriginal. And I just feel like in our industry, originality is starting to fade a little bit. I'm not talking about battle DJs. I'm not talking about, you know, scratch DJs because that's, that is all a very original, artistry. But I mean like this, this need to try to create another viral hit out of something else that's viral is ridiculous and unoriginal. What are you listening to? I was pulling up Shout the Chumpian digital music pool. He has like the Hawk 2E edit that's going viral right now, 3 .2 million views. And it is, he takes the sound and then chops it up over, give me everything. That build and it goes into something else, but like. DJs are taking advantage, right? Like, you get 100 edits and remixes of these various viral people. Yeah, you know, you have to and we're sitting here being the like, you know, I'm tired of it. I'm sick of it. It's it's unoriginal. But like, I guess you do have to still do it right because there is demand. There's a lot of demand. the problem. Other DJs are seeing that, I can make an edit of this and it's gonna go 3 .2 million and it's gonna help me in my career. So I'm gonna do it. And I totally understand it. I get it. Because it could be a jump the line type thing, right? This person went viral for her thing, maybe I can go viral and take advantage of this crazy popular thing that's happening. Right. the disheartening portion of it, but for somebody trying to make it and trying to become the next big DJ, it's important to get involved in this stuff, right? I know I'm playing both sides of the fence here, but like it is important. Like if I was younger and I'm trying to be a producer, this is a great way to kind of break through in an easy way and in quote unquote easy way. Right. jump. Like this is a strategy. Ian Asher took this strategy, right? Other DJs are taking this strategy and like it paid off for Ian Asher for sure. Yeah. Now there, now there is a, there is one gentleman on social media that I follow that I absolutely love that I feel like has used social media and virality in a positive way. And I feel like it was not even original. It was just very easy. And he was just this guy called fish 56, 56 octagon, fish 56 octagon. an email and I'm like, who the fuck is this? I never heard of this person. Dude from the UK, right? And he's just pure entertainment. All he does is play a record. He's like he just wants to expose people to good music. That's all he was trying to do. He wasn't trying to become viral. He wasn't trying. I don't think. I think this is just a guy that genuinely loved house music and all different types of house music. UK garage drum and bass, future rave. Definitely not future rave, but like something that was future rave 30 years ago. Ha, yeah. you know, and just every trance, like he does a lot, a lot, a lot of really amazing trance music, but then he gets super like happy hardcore and all of these like older genres that have kind of been put to bed and he's kind of reintroducing people to where all these samples that you're hearing in production now, he's not showing you the new production. He's just showing me what the old production was. Right. And he's doing it all on vinyl and he was, he's like a vinyl junkie. Now he's gotten so big. He was doing like six to eight videos per day at one point. But like he's like, I kind of started to run out of records. So like he would do MP3s and things like that. But now people are like sending him records to play on his on his Instagram. He does it in like a bathrobe. Like he's just chill about doing it. He's like eating a snack while he's doing it. Now it's it's just but it's all really amazing music and it really features where a lot of the house music that we know and love right now kind of where it came from. And now he's getting booked. all over the UK at every festival. And, you know, he's playing festivals with that Carl Cox is headlining and, you know, he's getting to meet all these different people. And I think here's somebody who kind of went accidentally viral and accidentally got booked at all of these festivals because of social media, but like in a good positive way in my mind. Yeah, I think this is just someone who takes something that they love and puts it out into the world and people appreciate it, you know? Habibi Beats, like he sort of did the same thing a lot during the pandemic. He was doing like the sample thing, which was pretty cool. And now he's like throwing his own parties and playing all over the country and getting books. So like, I think these type of people are an example of they love the music. they're doing something for the music and for the culture and putting something into out into the world that they really love and care about. And in turn, people recognize that and they get popular. And I think that's like everything that's good about social media and virality and people getting booked because of something they're doing on the internet. Whereas the girl in finance has a song with David Guetta now and is getting paid$5 ,000 a show in Vegas to go jump around and Whatever. Yeah. I don't think there's two sides to every, to every story, right? And not that the first thing that we talked about is all bad, but it is annoying at the end of the day. listen, how many people are going to ask you to play like, Yo, can you play that Hawk to edit remix at your gigs this weekend? Probably a handful, you know. Yeah. It's a great way to connect with your audience as well, right? Like, it's what everybody's talking about. You come out to a man in finance or a Hawk 2 intro, like people are gonna be like, my God, I can't believe he did that kind of thing, you know? as much as I can hate on it, I can also pull from it and use it to my advantage in my shows, you know what I mean? Did you download the Man in Finance David Guetta? Yeah, I've had it. I mean, I played a version of it before the David Guetta one came out. I won't even download it. I won't. edit yet, but I'll probably get it just to have it in my back pocket. Like I'm playing at a venue on Friday that's very, it's young, like it's super young and like I know that it'll work. Yeah, I guess the venues that I picked to play are not young. So like, not only will it probably fall flat, but I'll sound cheesy at the same time. You know? I really believe that and that's why I won't even put it in my computer. Like there's just no way. But I also play our venue, so I'm not going to get in trouble for not playing it, you know? Right. I just have to put my foot down somewhere and that's where that's where I'm drawing the line. and I do play very different places, right? And it's just like something that could work for me in a bigger room, bottle service, young situation won't work for like the super open format, older crowd. Like it just won't. They won't connect to it. It doesn't make sense. And it will, it'll make you disconnect from your crowd more so than anything, I think. Yeah, I'm playing probably more 27 and over crowds more than anything. Yeah, yeah, right. that's viral that they know, you know. No, I understand. I understand that. Definitely. think that's a good transition, right? Like, we were talking off air and we were kind of talking a little bit in our Discord about how the pop scene right now is in a really good place and it's kind of driven by these female pop singers. It's all of the requests I'm getting are for these female pop singers. It's huge right now. I mean, I just Yeah. my number one requested, I would say. Well, not only that, but it's the biggest, the biggest track out period. By far, not even close. Please, please, please. Please, please, please, yeah. I couldn't believe it. Somebody asked me for it last night. I couldn't believe that I didn't have the original. Because where I was at, I was like, I have to play the original. I can't, just the room that I was in needed the original. Didn't want Charlie Lane's remix, you know? Which is excellent, that's the one that I play, I think. And... So I went, I had a download on the spot and it's, that's not like a very club friendly track, but like all the remixes are, are, are, are better, but, just all of those, you know, Chappelle Rhone and Charlie XCX, which I didn't realize how big all of this was until I started to prep for my sets this, for these two weeks. Cause I've, I've been off for about a month and, I feel like it's just been like an explosion in June of all of these female singers that are just like taking over the pop world again. Like we've saw how big country got for a little bit. Now it feels like, okay, now we're going to lean into this female pop thing for the summer because it just feels summer. It really does. Like, and it feels summer up here specifically. It's just really good for everything that's happening in the city right now, especially surrounding Pride and having Pride month in June. And these are all very LGBTQ friendly artists that are just heavy. Like it's all that's being played in those venues and will be remixed a million times by, you know, all the all the DJs that do run that circuit. And I feel like it's also maybe timing, like was this record label timing that, or is this just by chance that all of these female pop vocalists are coming out and hitting really hard around June, around Pride, where they can hit all the festivals and they can hit all of the musical things that happen around all the Pride festivals around the country, you know? Because there's just dollars in it. There's so many dollars in it, like showing up to these festivals and performing for all of these artists, because you're just not doing it right now with just streaming anymore financially as an artist, right? You have to show up and you have to play live, live shows. And I just feel like it's a really good time for this to hit. I love it. Yeah, I don't I don't mind it. I mean, I don't mind it. I think the songs are fine. I think I don't have like the best go to remixes or edits of them yet. I'm going to probably make my own this week because they are so popular and I there's a gap, right? I always tell you guys like I make edits when there's a gap in my set. I have a gap in my set with some of these vocals on. You know, not I need something to play at that 11. PM midnight time with these vocals and I just don't have them I have like the new disco house version and like the the 10 p Versions of these songs which is what they're made to be right, but I think as a club DJ It's important you need to take advantage of these popular songs and make them work in your set, right? I'm not playing 10 p Open sets in most cases. So I need the I Need the the peak hour with that with these vocals to connect with my audience somewhat Hey, hey DJs wanna like make it in the remix world right now like any Chappelle Rhone remix would be amazing at this point because there's a lack. There's a lack and especially like this weekend I'm like looking at it. I'm like I really need something for the peak hour sets for all the pride events that I'm doing and I don't have anything right now. And I'm like digging. couple, give it about six hours and I might have some edits for you. That's on my agenda for the day. But yeah, like I think we've seen this, some waves, right? We've seen different waves happen. We had the Latin wave a couple years ago, Bad Bunny driving that. We had the country wave, which is still going. On the dance music side, we've had the techno wave. Now it's like, we've had the female rapper wave, which is still going, right? So I think right now it's this like pop vocal female singer wave and it obviously Taylor is like the kind of at the top of that and sort of drives that ship as well. But I think these young artists are really coming in and making music that really connects to audiences in the summer, you know, feel good, chill, good vibes type stuff. Yeah, your girl Taylor. I set off air like I don't know I don't get the Taylor thing like her music is depressing and slow and boring Who wants to listen to that? unless it's like First Dance at a Wedding or something. And I don't do those. Eh. Like just boring, depressing music. It's not for everybody. It's for a lot of people though. It's for every - it's for everybody except me apparently. You're the only one. You know, you know, it grinds my gears. Like I see Travis Kelsey, like he don't like that music. Shut up, Travis. You don't like that music. Give me a break. Travis is listening to Gunna in the car. He's not listening to Taylor Swift. Give me a break. Man, poor Taylor, she just gets it. Shout to Taylor Swift, biggest artist in the game. Yeah, seriously. Generational. Yeah. Alright. Hold on, hold on, before we wrap, I just wanna talk a little more. So what, it's early in the summer, right? We're almost in, we're late June here. What is, do we have candidates for Song of the Summer? Do we have? I know we talk a lot about dance music here. I have a couple in dance music, but like is Sabrina Carpenter like the song of the summer right now? I'd like to say right now, please, please, please is, you know, is, is, is up there. by far for that and actually the Kendrick, Not Like Us is probably the number one. After that, it's Sabrina Carpenter. We sat at dinner on Monday with a bunch of DJs that said that they don't play not like us, which was. I don't like it, so I try not to play it unless it's like I have to kind of thing. I play it like I like the beginning of it. I get out of it pretty quickly, but I just play it to kind of scratch everybody's itch, you know, that needs to hear it. have a cool intro that has like an OV Ho chant that goes into it that's pretty good. And it sort of like sets everybody up for what's coming, which I like. But like unless I'm not playing it unless I have to play it. And for a while I sort of had to play it because it's just so big. Still is. It still is. It still is. Is that gonna be the song of the summer? Still? Is it just gonna hold on? Nah, I think. for sure. That would be my song of the summer. As far as popularity and working kinda everywhere. But like, I don't always play those rooms where I can play the original of that, so. As far as dance music, I posed the question on Twitter and threads. I've been like trying to be way more active on those spaces guys. So if you want to throw me a follow, it's just at DJCreamNYC. Just like posing questions like song of the summer type stuff. You know, what, how many hours is the perfect set? Like very, like just random stuff like that that sort of gets a conversation going that I think is always up for debate. So follow me there. But the song and dance music that I... me that I just love and want to fit into every one of my sets is Disclosure, She's Gone, Dance On. It's just like the perfect end of night, feel good, great vibes track. Or rooftop stuff. been playing a peak. Like I've been working at peak at points because it's just so feel good. And it kind of perks everybody up a little bit, even though like my, my that's, that's what peaks doing anyway. Like I just, I see such like a happy reaction to it when I play it. And it's just, I didn't know if anybody would be like, would know it. I don't think everybody does know it. I think it's just that good that even if they don't know it, they're like, this is great. Like, what a track this is. with you. It's just good vibes on in a track. Like it's just good vibes in a track. Great song. Love it. not a lot of tracks that have come out in the last couple years that I can think of that just give that vibe where like it doesn't matter who you are in the room, you're affected by it, by this song being played in some way. And then I think a couple other songs that are very popular and maybe in contention here early in the dance music world would be Dom Dala Girls and also the the Luffy Last Night, the ANMA remix, which is like dark and dirty and doesn't necessarily translate to every room, but it works for sure. It works. I'm just shocked because it's a ditty track. Yeah, you know, I was thinking the same thing. Like, I can't believe this song got so popular with everything that was happening with Diddy. I just don't think people know that it's a Diddy track. I won't, I love the song. I won't, I just, I can't bring myself to do it. Cause I feel like somebody's going to yell at me. hope somebody yells at me and I'll laugh in their face. I don't feel like dealing with it. It's not making any kind of statement. We're playing music. And Diddy's not even on that track. The Luffy last night. realize that I realize that but Am I shying away from Diddy? Yeah, yeah, like songs where he's actually on it? Yeah. In this case, no. Definitely not. Yep. Alright, I think this is a good place to wrap, right? Definitely. Anything we want to promo. I would say guys, if you want to connect with us, join the Grow My DJ Business Discord. We've been really trying to grow this out and get a ton of DJs in there. And we're just really trying to create this cool community. Gary's sharing curated playlists. We're putting exclusive edits for myself, Two -Face, some of the other Get Down DJs. It's just a great place to connect with DJs. We're putting a bunch of gigs in there now this summer because we do need help on bookings.-hmm but yeah, like Gary and I are in there. It's a great place to connect and talk with us. Ask us questions about the podcast. You know, if you guys need help, it's a great place to connect with us. So, the link for that is in the discord. It's also in all of our profiles and, we hope you guys join that. Other than that, man, Gary and I have been sort of taking a T O here in the summer. We know how busy we get in August and beyond. And I think it's just been a great opportunity to kind of take a step back, assess. the business, pull back on some things that maybe aren't necessarily growing our business and enjoying the summer a little bit, man. It's been nice. So, all right guys, thanks for listening to this episode. We will talk to you guys soon. Peace. Alright guys, peace.