Just Because You Can, Doesn't Mean You Should ☑️

In this episode of the Grow My DJ Business Podcast, Cream & GaryW Discuss:

• Every venue has a staple person who adds to the atmosphere.
• Regulars play a crucial role in creating a lively environment.
• Trust your gut when making decisions about gigs.
• It's important to say no to opportunities that don't align with your goals.
• Learning from past mistakes is essential for growth.
• You can't please everyone; focus on your strengths.
• Finding the right venues is key to success.
• Constructive criticism can motivate improvement.
• Regulars contribute to the success of nightlife venues.
• Embrace your unique style and find your niche. Open format teaching allows for diverse musical experiences.
• Testing the waters with different genres can enhance a DJ's set.
• Finding a unique style is crucial for personal satisfaction as a DJ.
• Rihanna's music resonates across demographics and settings.
• Nicki Minaj's verses are often essential for crowd engagement.
• The ability to adapt to the audience is key for successful DJing.
• Both Rihanna and Nicki Minaj have made significant impacts in the music industry.
• Club hits often transcend generational gaps and remain timeless.
• DJs should strive to play music they enjoy to maintain authenticity.
• Engaging in musical debates can lead to deeper insights about artists.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome Back and Seasonal Reflections
• 6:05 Comfort in the Dance: The Regulars' Role
• 14:58 The Importance of Saying No
• 24:01 Finding Your Niche: The Right Venues
• 29:48 Embracing Criticism: Growth Through Feedback
• 36:12 The Joy of Open Format Teaching
• 42:47 Finding Your Unique Style as a DJ
• 56:12 Club Hits: The Power of Popular Tracks

Transcript

0:01

All right, what's up guys? Welcome to the 169th episode of the Grow My DJ Business podcast brought to you by the Grow My DJ Business Discord, Ferrari Production Academy and Digital Music Pool. My name is Kareem. Gary W here, thanks for having me back on your show. It's been a while. recorded. It's the only missed one episode in all that time. That's true Yes, I was away for a few weeks and then on the road to DJ up by you guys and all types of stuff so Been busy been busy but happy to be home. It's I spent four out of four and a half weeks away from here, so Nice to be back home. It was beautiful today 80 degrees Clear skies sunny. It's why you live here for November to March, you know prime. is this is the time where I want to fly down and live in the warmth for the next post post New Year's Eve. Right, we don't have a winter anymore anyways. It doesn't really matter. Yeah. This is a great time of the year to like, try and take a little time off, spend some time with the family, get prepared for next year. Like, make a little money because you know, we got New Year's Eve, you make a couple extra bucks. It's a good time of the year. It's stressful, but a good time of the year. This year's phenomenal. mean, but we have Tuesday money for New Year's Eve. So that's fantastic. And we don't. money, but it's going to ruin two weekends. So is it worth it? I almost would rather just make my money on a Saturday and it'd be great and then next Saturday, like still be okay. Well, the last two years we've lost Christmas weekends because it was Christmas Eve and Christmas Day on Saturday, Sunday in some form for two years. Same thing for New Year, so we lost all our football gigs and stuff like that. I still think those football gigs will happen two days before New Year's Eve. I think that'll be fine. So, you know, from our business perspective, We'll be busier than we have in the last two years. We'll make a little more money than we did because the holidays don't fall on a weekend. It benefits us 100%. So, I don't know, I like it. from a monetary perspective, it's great when the holidays in the middle of the week because you get your weekends and you get the extra day. But you're gonna go DJ probably to half empty or quarter empty rooms. So like, I'm just not gonna work because I'd rather just take the time off. I'm coming in to work that weekend before New Year's Eve for obvious reasons. mean, I'm going up there to work New Year's Eve, so I might as well work the weekend. So I'm flying up on the 26th, that's on a Thursday, and then hopefully, fingers crossed, all the gigs kinda stay where they're at and nothing gets canceled. But yeah, that weekend's rough. episode. think something that I've been wanting to talk about for like weeks and weeks and weeks, and I don't remember what DJ I was with. I was out of town and we were talking to some, I was talking to somebody, I'm like, yo, every venue that I work in has like a guy or girl or someone that is like a staple in that venue, that they're on the dance floor, that as soon as they open, by themselves, like staring at the DJ, dancing, no fucks, and like, they're either the super creepy person or they're the person that gets the party started, one or the other. But like, I'm thinking about all my places and I'm like, even dating back to when we first started DJing, I can think of like these staple people in all these different rooms. And if you guys are listening, like, do you have these staple random regulars that are just always there, like by themselves? I remember mine from my venue from 04. I remember mine from my main venue in 08. And then come again in 12 and then 14. mean, you're right. There was always someone there who was like, whether they're like a party starter, they're always just like on the dance floor dancing. Like whether they're having, they're probably not having a drink most of the time. Like they're having a water or something. it. They're always breaking a good sweat. And yeah, you're right. Like those people and no matter where it is, no matter location, demographic of people that are in the room, there's always someone no matter, you know, black, white, girl, boy, transgender, whatever it is, there's always someone. it's a, I've never thought about it until you pose this as a, as a podcast topic. Sona in Iron Bar in Morristown. I think about the pool in Atlantic City. Like I was just at Avalon Mohegan Sun in Connecticut and the same guy, this Asian dude, older guy, he wears a mask on the dance floor. He's there every single time I'm there. I'd like to think he's there because he likes me as a DJ and he comes to see my show. But I know that he's in the middle of the dance floor every single time that it's open staring at the DJ. I came down and gave him a pound before I went on this past weekend. Like I see you, girl. I see you every time I'm here. a funny story about there's a place down here, I don't even DJ at it, but like my sister goes and hangs out there on the boardwalk in Disney called the dance hall. And you walk in there every Friday and Saturday, like clockwork, there's this like 80 to 85 year old man and his wife, like also like 80 dances for like three hours staple. He has his dance moves. Everybody knows him. And person in there. He wears his high his high white tube socks and his shorts, you know, with his with his polo tucked in and he's trying it and he knows all the songs and the ones he does and he sits out. And then there's other people that come in that are also staples like that is like an epicenter of like definite weird people hanging out. And. Everywhere. and me and Pig Penner, he's like, yo, this woman comes here every time. And she just stared at me and was dancing and like was the first person on the dance floor. Why does every place have that person? Why is it? Is it like the older person that might be single that like used to go out and dance in all the nightclubs back in the day and like they're just coming to be social? Like, is that their way of being social? I don't know. I've never seen them really like talk to anybody though. It's not like they're there like flirting with the opposite sex or their preferred gender that they're trying to date or whatever. Now, they're there to dance. They're there for the music. That's it. Like that is, that is like, I don't, that's like, I don't want to go to the nightclub, but I can go to this like half a nightclub, you know, there's like a place that has a really good loud music and still dance and still get my kicks and then go home and not really bother anybody and not be bothered. You know, it's, it's a wild thing that I can't believe that happens everywhere. It's unbelievable. It's unbelievable. I think people have comfort shows and things like that. That's those people's comfort thing to do. That's probably where they feel the most, quote unquote, regular. It's almost like when I go out, because I went to the Dave Matthews show on Madison Square Garden on Friday, and I went out after to see a bunch of our DJs, and I couldn't. feel more awkward in every place because every place that I went to, except for the one place, the DJs were elevated and out of the way and I wasn't going to get up in the booth. That's their space and they're performing. And I said, what's up? And that was it. And then I get to stand there like with all of the other patients. And I'm like, this isn't comfortable to me. Like my, my comfort place is behind the decks, you know, and I'd rather be there. And if I'm not there, I'm at a cocktail bar instead, you know? So maybe that's these people's comfort place. Maybe that's where they want to be. that's it. Like, I don't have to be at the bar talking to the bartender because that might be awkward to them, you know? And they're on the dance floor and that's where they want to be. It's just funny to me. I wonder if that's gonna be generational. Like if in years from now, because dance clubs were such a thing for such a long time, that like, are people going out to just dance anymore? Like are they, or are you there for the extracurriculars, or are you there for the drinking aspect, are you there for the show part of the production part of it? Like, are people going out just specifically? Let's go dancing tonight. Like you don't really hear people saying that. saying, let's go dancing tonight. I don't think that's happening. I don't know, but I used to hang out with a crew and they we went out to dance. Yeah, but that was like OG Guido, house music dancers that like circled up and went to go dance. don't No? That's my question. That doesn't happen anymore, does it? there's no dance circles unless you're at like, classics party. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's kind of a, I wonder if the staple person, is that gonna go away? Because people aren't just going at two deaths, you know? there's just always there's always there's regulars that you meet right no matter what that are maybe they're not the weird person that's in the middle of the dance or staring at you but they're there every week and they know everybody and they know you and they come say what's up and like those regulars will be part of nightlife forever that's what like the regulars are what makes a business successful or not the places that are doing well have repeat customers and they have customers that are like die hard for that place. Right. Think about like DJs, right? If you go to DJs, you just go to DJs every night, really. Most people, a lot of people. Yeah, they're not going to Parker House and they're not going to columns like they're going to DJs. Right. Or they're just going to headliner or they're just going to wherever. I have a question, and this is probably not a great question because you can't really answer it, but do you have a favorite regular staple person that like stands out in your mind? you know, I've outlived my regulars in many cases, as far as my DJ career, because you know how it goes, like, you have regulars, and if it's a guy, like, they come hang out, you do shots, they're hang whatever, and then like, they get a girlfriend, or they don't really come out anymore, they just get older and settle down, and like, that's sort of it. No, but I mean like that number one person that comes in and dances in the middle of the dance floor, whether you really knew them or not. was my number one for a very long time. He's probably on the tail end of his career as well, but he's like more into like going to the bar and hanging out rather than going to like the club and doing that whole thing. yeah, but he's, you know, yes, he does like to dance and whatever, but like, he's at least social with all of our DJs and everybody else in the place. Yeah. in Hoboken on Thursday nights where like, he would get the dance floor going for me like every single week where he would just, I'd like throw Jersey Club on and he would get the party started for me. And it was like sort of part of the routine. Like, all right, let me hit the Jersey Club. Trix is, if people aren't dancing yet, I'm gonna get people on the dance floor. Trix will do a couple dance battles and then like that opens the floor for everyone else. Shout to Trix. Shouts or tricks for real. He did. He did. He did a great job for us. Yeah, he's very involved with get down. He was really involved, really involved with the DJ community in our market. Just a really good all around guy. Yeah, not a DJ, you know, not someone who works in nightlife, just someone that really enjoys going out, knows all the bartenders, knows all the security guards, like he loves nightlife or daylife. Yeah, I have one guy in mind that I really, really enjoyed, but from Sona. I can't even remember his name offhand. I'm sure he will never listen to this. So if I can think of his name, I'll say it. But a regular always was requesting, move your body, Marshall Jefferson was his track. Like I would play that for him every time he came in. And that's the other thing, right? You get to know these people's tracks. And to be honest with you, at the time, like, yeah, that Marshall song, was always big, obviously, but as a 22-year-old DJ at the time, or 23-year-old DJ at the time, I wasn't playing a ton of super classic house music, like the early 90s house music, and it opened my eyes to so many other records that were made around that time, because what I wanted to do when I saw him walk in was set up that record and then be able to come out of it, right? So I kind of did some homework around it, and I felt like that about a couple of regular dancer type guys or girls that were in buildings that like I had to start to learn things around the song, the songs that they liked because I wanted to be able to smoothly get in and out of those songs, but I always wanted to play it for them and not make it sound awkward, you know? So it was definitely like a learning. I always use that as like a learning thing. It's like a little learning curve. Like okay, I have to be able to set this up in like three songs at least. So that's kind how I use it to my advantage, at least. Yeah, feel like most of those regulars all have genres or songs that they ask you for or you know that they really like. And you'll hit it at some point throughout the night, most times. Yeah, the more awkward I part, the more awkward times I felt when like I had a half empty room and like then those people wanted to hear their records and it's like, I have to play them, but I'm also trying to keep a room here. those records might hurt your overall flow if it doesn't match what's happening. And that's kind of why I would always try to understand great songs around those songs, because then you can do that in the middle of half empty room where you're not gonna lose everybody. I think the good regulars and the good ones don't ask you for anything because they understand that DJs don't want requests. They understand that you're gonna hit whatever they like at some point in the night and they just leave you alone and that's it. Like if your regulars are harassing you to play music, like how much do you like that regular? Yeah, well, I'm thinking I'm thinking like these people usually have like a song that is like their song to go off to. You're going to play it. Yeah, or like the same thing with like the staff of the bartenders, like you try to sneak it in and do it for them if they really like something. Love it. That's kind of Man, who's your regular? Part of the bar, part of the club. Yeah. Yeah. Don't call them out, but, or you can. not saying call them out. I'm just saying like everybody listening like I know you got somebody that you're thinking of right now. it's amazing. All right, so it's been busy time for all of us, right? And I think when we get super busy, sometimes things start to fall through the cracks a little bit. And I think we've learned some hard lessons in business lately. And, you know, I kind of want to share this with you guys, because I think it's okay to make mistakes, and it's okay to maybe make the wrong decision in hindsight. But I think what is really, really important is that you can learn from those mistakes, right? Or you can learn from, you can learn a lesson from something you did maybe incorrectly that you can use moving forward to make sure you don't make that mistake again. I think the number one thing is really, we talk about this all the time, but just saying yes to stuff that really doesn't help you, it doesn't push your long-term goals forward. and you just sort of get sucked in and say yes to it. That's a huge one. And for me, that's with private events, right? Like, I don't want to DJ them, I don't want to DJ your wedding, and I say yes because I feel bad or because I feel like the relationship, you know, I'm doing it because we have some sort of a relationship, but I'm finally just saying no to all that stuff. You are, are, but the gray area becomes where you're like, okay, this could help me somewhere in the short to long term, like in the midterm. And you're like, or maybe this won't. And is this something I really want to do? Not really, but can it positively affect my career at some point? Maybe. And then you're at this, then you're at this internal battle. It's like, I don't wanna do this thing. It's taking time away from the other things that I should be doing, but this might help me out, in six months to a year. it's what, being able to weigh the positives and the negatives of that, and then if you really don't wanna do that thing, are you really doing your best at it? You know what I mean? Like, if somebody asked me to do something, I really don't wanna do it, but I think it can help my, help my career. And I don't really want to do like, should I really be doing it? Because is it going to come out the best it could, you know? The answer to that is easily no. Right. I'm just saying scenarios that you and I have talked about are things like this. It's like I really don't want to do it, but it could be good. Right. I think a lot of the times you don't have all the information. So you just have to sort of make an educated guess on if this will or won't help you moving forward. If it does help your long term goals, if it does further a relationship. But I think what's important is after you've made that decision and you go through with it, afterwards, if it's something that didn't work out, use that the next time you're faced with a similar decision, right? And don't make the wrong decision because you've already done it once. You already... made this deal that didn't work out for whatever reason. And the next time a similar deal is put in front of you, you can think back to that time where you're like, something similar happened. That didn't really work out. So I'm not going to do this because it probably won't work out positively or to help me in the future. Yeah, that's kind of a simple thing to do in situations when you're dealing with the same client, right? Like if I'm dealing with a client, something didn't go well last year, well, I probably shouldn't say yes this year. It's something that we get sucked into sometimes where there was a change somewhere last year, something happened, but it's like, all right, well, the relationship is still good. maybe things will change and you know what happens? Nothing changes. Yeah, please. example. So, Gary and I have been working with a prominent hotel in New York City, hotel chain, whatever you want to call it, high end, and we've been doing some events for them. They asked us to provide a DJ, and instead of just paying our normal corporate event rate, they said, hey, can we pay you half cash? and barter and give you free rooms to our hotel as the other half of the payment. So, Gar and I had gone back and forth, like, I don't know, does this make sense? They were dangling the carrot of like making us a preferred vendor and offering us future bookings. And it was like, all right, well, I don't want to barter, but if this gets us onto this preferred vendor list and we're booking a lot of corporate events through this hotel, Hell yeah, I'll barter your, I'll do the next one just for hotel rooms if it gets me five or 10 corporate events in your building throughout the course of the year. So last year we did it, this year, their holiday party's coming up again, they asked us the same thing and we had this conversation like, well, we didn't really get any other bookings from it throughout the whole year. Not only that, we tried to go book the hotel rooms multiple times and we found out that it had to be like back to back days. We found out that there was a bunch of days that were blacked out. The one day that I went to go use it, I couldn't use it because they didn't have rooms. So like it just sort of didn't work out, right? Yeah, yeah, it didn't. It didn't. a unique one, but I think that's just like an example of some of the things we're kind of trying to talk about here. But those are like, and those are the things that we didn't think of. What are the stipulations that go along with these rooms that you're bartering into this into this deal? Right. We didn't ask any questions like, yeah, it's fine. Let's do it. And then like went, went to go book it. Like you said, and like, obviously there's two of us. So we each went to go wanted to split the nights and cream and have one night to the other night. And they're like, no, you got to do back to back nights. It's like, well, I'm not even ever in the state or he's not ever in the state to do such a thing. It just doesn't, it just doesn't make sense. Now used it over the weekend. Cause my sister was in town very, you know, it was awesome to be able to do that for her and her boyfriend. And it was like, they were incredible. They were incredible, right? There was a, they were great. That's a great hotel group, but, from a business side of things, just, didn't do our due diligence and had to. And this is one of those situations where you need to think through and ask as many questions as possible because all that's going to happen is something can come and bite you in the long run, not having all the information needed. So. Yeah, I I can give you another example. I was asked to create mixes for something, a prominent something. And, you know, I asked some questions, but I did not ask enough questions. When I created the first mix and submitted it to get some feedback, the feedback was, well, we want it more in this style, where it was like 30 songs mixed in five minutes, which was like, so much more work than I actually thought this was gonna be. And if I just simply dug deeper and asked more questions, I would have got to the bottom of really what they were looking for. And then I could have said, you know what, this is gonna take me way too much time, then it's probably worth, I'm gonna pass. But I said yes, and then got all the information. And I was just, like I spent an entire day last week, miserable, staring at my computer, making mixes and... It was just awful. I didn't know if you wanted to tell a story, but that's what I was alluding to before, like saying yes to something that you really don't want to do. This goes, and this has been happening since the first week I ever started DJing, right? Not getting enough information. Excited to go play a gig, saying yes, and then all of a sudden it's I'm six hours for 100 bucks. It's because I didn't ask questions, was just excited to play. and then bummed about the money after the fact. Like from a very basic, very young DJ point of view, this has been happening since then. And it's still happening just on a different scale. Yeah. Trust your gut. 99.9 % of the time, your gut is gonna tell you whether you really wanna do something or whether it makes sense for you. And I think a lot of times we get caught up in the fact that we're gonna do stuff to try to make other people happy when, sure, you might make those people happy, but you're not, you're taking away from your bucket, you know? You're doing something that doesn't necessarily fit into where you wanna be in your career or what you wanna do. And I think it's really important to say no and think about these things and really think about it and really ask the questions like we've been saying before you make a decision to do something. And I think your gut will tell you whether it's something you really wanna do or not. Yeah, what I've learned over the years is you have to at least sit on it for a few hours, if not a day. you feel like there's a little indecision and you don't need an answer immediately, sleep on it for sure and talk to somebody about it and really talk it out. You'll figure out just within the conversation on how you deliver the information, you'll know if you want to do it or not. There was a quote that I used to put above my computer that said, if it's not an automatic yes, it's a no. So if an opportunity is presented to you and you immediately are like, yeah, I want to do that, absolutely, that's a yes. Those are the things that you want to go do. But if someone offers you something, you're like, I don't know, does it make sense? I'm not sure. Like, it's probably a no. I think I might put that quote back above my computer because we can all benefit from reading that on a daily basis or just having that thought process. especially in times where you're trying to grow in an area, like let's just say you're trying to grow in a specific area, well, you're like, well, I'm going to grow at any expense. Sometimes you can get blinded by that thought process of like, I'm trying to grow, this part of the business that we're trying to grow really bad. like, so we really want to book every single one of these things that comes across the table where, we want to, but it doesn't always make the most sense, right? And if you just can glance at that, vote every once in a while and it bring you back to perspective of, yeah, I want to grow, but I don't want to grow at the cost of my misery, you know, or my cost of my happiness. You hem and haul over something, you finally say yes, and then while you're in it, it's just the worst. And the whole time you're saying to yourself, why did I do this? I should have said no. And use that, right? The next time that similar opportunity comes up, think about that time where you hated it or you said you would never do this again, and just don't do it. Yeah, I agree. I'm like thinking of instances where it's like you say yes, you deal with a client, you know the client's gonna be a pain in the ass and you say yes because the money's good and then you deal with all the bullshit because you know, because that client really does become a pain in the ass and it's like, well, this really wasn't worth the money in the long run because now I just have a headache. I have extra $500 in my pocket, but I have a headache. You know what I mean? Like not worth it. that I DJ that I tell myself and I tell you every time I'm never DJing there again and then I get sucked back in every couple months and I'm like, fuck, why am I doing this? We all go through it. We all go through it. It's just making the adjustment and putting your foot down and finally saying no and sticking to your guns. Right. It's a lot harder to like rip that bandaid off. But once you do, you're going to say to yourself, like, why didn't I do this a long time ago? Like, it's not a big deal, you know? And we always talk about if you're removing certain things, it opens up time to work on things or opens up time for opportunities that actually do fit with what you're trying to do, what your goals are, where you want to get to. So think about that. think trying to remember to think longer term and not super short term can help as well. But Yeah, man. Take your lumps, but learn from them and make sure you don't make the same mistake a second time. I think that's the best advice that you're gonna get from this episode for sure. All right I think this is sort of like a sub conversation right now, right? Yeah. Yeah. So along these same lines, right, when you're dealing with a lot of multiple venues that you're working at, or you're trying to grow your name and you're saying yes to certain things, I think it's important to also remember, you just can't make everybody happy. You're not gonna be someone's favorite DJ every single time you play or every place you play. And if you are, you're probably not gonna be a local DJ for very long. Yeah, that's the truth. It's the hardest thing to accept coming up as a DJ. It's even hard to accept as an established DJ that you're not the favorite, you know? or they didn't like your set that much. This goes with some negative feedback stuff too. So, but this also can be very, this could be a positive thing, right? Once you do accept that you're not everybody's favorite DJ, or if you get knocked down a peg, let's say. For example, I asked a venue, said, would you rather me or would you rather this other DJ? I was like, tell me the truth, then I can hurt my feelings. And they said, we'd rather the other DJ, like he plays the crowd every week to this point right now. he really feels the crowd out. And was like, you better believe I went in there and did my thing the next time I went in there. And I actually had one of the best DJ weekends I've had in a long time because of that, because of having that fire lit under my ass a little bit. And I think it's really important to take those criticisms. And when you find out that maybe you're not somebody's favorite DJ to... go in and do the homework and do the reorganization of your Serato is one of the main things that I did and really focused on, I wanna be the best version of the DJ who I am this weekend, right? And take that best foot forward. I think sometimes as young DJs and you're coming up, you can put your head down and sulk about it a little bit. Be like, I got really bad feedback. I'm never gonna be able to play there again. That really sucks and you can kind of put your head down and really sulk, but like, you gotta kind of flip it around and do the opposite. And be like, all right, well, you know what? I'm going to improve. What can I improve upon? And talk to people and see what you can improve upon. And then if you're a decent DJ and you understand your library well, you know that like, I have holes here and I have holes there and I have to fill those holes and I have to fix these little things, whether that's reorganizing crates or establishing new crates or whatever it might be and just be a better DJ the next time you step in the booth. It's very fulfilling. I felt very fulfilled after the weekend and really thought I executed my sets well, whereas I could see where I was lazy the last couple. couple months maybe, right? And I think... you need that little fire under your ass to kind of motivate you to kind of get back to what made you successful in the first place, right? And that is music curation, organization, preparation, right? Like those are the things that are gonna get you through the night successfully and do a really great job. Figuring out those motivating points is important. Michael Jordan was the best at doing it, like the littlest thing. Somebody said something about him in the paper and it was like that motivated him. Find what those things are for you, whether that's criticism, whether that somebody thinks they're better than you, somebody thinks that you don't belong in that room. Just figure out what those motivating factors are and use it to your advantage. Something else is you can't play everywhere. You can't play everywhere. And no matter how many venues there are in your market, like it's okay to not be everywhere. Maybe you just get in with three or four venues or ownership groups that like really fit your vision and what you're trying to do and your personality. And it's okay to not work with the other five or six. You don't have to be in all 10 places. It allows you to sort of find what fits best for you, right? Find your home, find your niche. Go play your style in a place that says, hey, Gary, I want you to come play here and just do what you do. If you can find three of those places instead of 10 places where half of them like tell you throughout the night, like change up to this and do this and play this song, like fuck that, you know? Give me the three places that let me go be me. I don't care if it's less bookings. I'd rather play less in the places that make the most sense for me. And it took me a really long time to think in that way. A really long time. And that's why I'm telling you, because I know we have a lot of younger listeners and I know you want to grow your name, but if you're a house DJ, you shouldn't go play the hip hop Latin room. Like even if you can do it or you might be able to do it, why? It's not going to help you. further yourself in the lane that you want to get to. Or if you're an open format DJ. Like, find the places that your style works the best, right? You don't always have to be a chameleon to what the venue wants. Find the places that work best for you. Just because you can doesn't mean you should. Right, why is DJ Cream playing fucking the Latin spots? I mean, I'm not gonna do it anymore, but for a time I did do it. Because I can, exactly. you're competent enough. But are you giving the best DJ cream set? No, of course you're not. Because that's not really, that's not truly the DJ who you are, right? And that's a big portion of, like, a lot of our DJs can play everywhere. But should they? Is the real question. I think it's okay too, like when you're first starting out, you don't necessarily know. So it's all right, go do all this stuff, figure it out. But like if you leave a set and you're like, wow, that was awesome. That's how I want to play. Like where else can I play like that? That's how you start to figure out where you fit in. You can't play everywhere. You don't have enough open dates. And in the long run, you're going to hurt relationships more if you're trying to do everything instead of finding the places where you fit in. You know, coming up, we used always complain like, this nightclub won't let me play at the competitor nightclub. But you know what? Maybe that's okay. You know, maybe you find one place where you get to figure out your sound and they trust you and they believe in you and they give you opportunities. And that allows you to then move on and grow and do the next thing and move to the next city and do whatever the next goal is. It's sometimes hard, especially for open format DJs, right? It's sometimes hard to find exactly what that lane is. Well, as an open format DJ, your lane is different every night or can be, you know? That's what makes it difficult sometimes, but that's what also makes it fun. Yeah, well that's what makes open format teaching as fun as it is. Right, because one night maybe you're going heavy EDM and the next night you're playing more like reggae and afro or R &B or whatever the case may be and like it's like two different things that two different styles something different. Yeah, I find that like I rely on all genres, right? I'm like the truly I'm true open format no matter what room I'm in. Like I'm I'm always falling in somewhere else. like if that's why I don't play some of our spots in the city, because it's like I can't play Latin. I can't play throwback reggae like dance or reggae like I can't play. So like a lot of things that I always thought I feel comfortable in in falling back on, and I think that's a good way to sometimes look at this is like, all right, well. Am I able to offer everything that I can offer in the venue that I'm looking to go play? And if I can't, well, I shouldn't be playing there. Because you're gonna have a hole in your set somewhere where it's like, all right, well, I wanna hit Latin right now. It's like, well, shit, I can't here. And I don't like to feel that way. I don't feel like like to feel, yeah, I don't wanna be handcuffed. If I wanna go and play like a, if I wanna go play like a, pretty back wall, bad bunny track, because I feel like it fits where, where, what I'm playing. Like I want to be able to do that without getting reamed out by the management or the ownership, you know? Do you feel that way ever? I don't really feel that way ever. I think in when I was younger for sure. No, I mean now though. Now, do I think that I can get away? No, I know that the crowd won't go off to certain things and I will then feel like I can't play them. I'm like, in this spot, this works. I know this song works, but maybe this demographic of people doesn't work for. So that's not a good spot for me. Because I'm not being able to do what I do. I have to go kind of like, all right, well that was. that's A and B option. Now I gotta go find C and D option. And now instead of just being flowing, I'm veered off and now I'm playing two verses instead of playing a verse in the get now, you know? So I've felt that way in a couple spots in the city and I'm like, well, I don't fit in here. And that's why I don't book myself there. Yeah. I sort of look at it like I'm going to find a way to go one track too far just to see how far I can go. Because sometimes I go one track and they like it. I go a little the next track they like it. I go even deeper than I'm like, man, I could play anything here. And like, I think that's exciting and interesting, interesting to me. And even like when I was going to play those Latin forward sets, I would always find a way to fit something in that's you know, and maybe it has a Latin vocal to connect to the audience with me, right? I always find a way to connect who's in front of me with something that I want to do, right? I'm doing a lot of like bassier, heavier stuff, faster stuff right now. Well, maybe I play the bassy heavy version with a Taylor Swift vocal that connects the crowd to what I'm trying to do. I don't, that's probably a bad example, but I'm trying to just give you an idea of like sort of how I approach it. And you have to realize, all right, that didn't work. And then you get out of there and that's it. But because if you go try to do your thing in a room where it's not working and you just keep going, that's when you don't get booked again. But it's okay to be like, yo, I can't believe, Kareem, I can't believe you played that Taylor Swift techno remix at the whatever spot, the bartender will come up and say that to me. And like, sure, why not? I'll try it. Maybe it'll work and then I can play more techno or I can play more hard dance or whatever I'm trying to do that night. Yeah, testing the waters is always a good way to kind of push the envelope, play a little different. going and playing bigger shows and coming back like local. When I'm local, I just gonna play whatever the fuck I want. And yeah, I'm gonna play your room, but I'm also gonna play what I want. Yeah. Sometimes that. I'll come back in certain bartenders who I only see once a month or once every other month and be like, Kareem, I love when you're here, you play so much different than everybody else. And that's because I'm not playing the room, I'm playing more my style, you know? Yeah, don't, not every gig. I don't do that every gig. There's probably like two rooms that I can really play what I want to play. I did have a couple instances this weekend and last weekend where I looked over to, I had a lot of DJs come and hang out with me the last couple shows, the last couple places I played. And I looked over and I was like, several times I said, this one's for me. Like I don't really care what they do. This one's for me. I've been going hard, like whatever. And like, I don't know, think eight out of the 10 or four out of the five times that that happened, like it went very, very well, you know? So yeah, I mean, sometimes you do just have to play that song and be a little selfish and it could work out, you're right. And you can kind of propel your set off of that. Sometimes it's just finding a version of maybe a song or like just finding what fits with you, right? If there's a pop track that comes out that every girl wants to sing that I have to play or like I should play, well, if I hate the original song or I hate the version that everybody likes, I'm gonna either make my own or go find one on SoundCloud that fits my style or one that I think is good, you know? I don't like playing music that I don't like. For example, like the Hot To Go track, I just don't really like it. It's not for me. It's not my style in any way. But like, I have like a Hot To Go fake out track that goes into like dubstep and it's like, they sort of get their fix. It's sort of a fake out. I get a laugh. I'll say something on the mic or like I'll play the regular version and the second part of it, I'll play the dubstep drop and just like fake everybody out and do something different and change it up. And at least I feel better about playing a song that I don't really like. Because yeah, you're right. mean, there's certain songs that you do have to play. Yeah, find the way to do it your way is definitely more satisfying as a DJ. So, I don't know. I know this sort of went on a rant that I didn't expect it to go, but... All right, so this weekend, we always tell you guys, me and Gary, we're traveling out at gigs, things are happening, we email each other ideas for the podcast. So at some point, I was with RM all weekend up in New England, and we got to talking about Rihanna, and I'm like, bro, I can play every Rihanna song, and it hits every fucking time. I think Rihanna is the number one. puts out the best, most popular, amazing tracks that everybody likes. A day later, you sent something about Nicki Minaj saying something similar like, you have to play the Nicki verse. If there's a song that she's on and you skip it, like the crowd's gonna get mad at you, like Nicki's the number one. So let's have a little debate here. Let's have a healthy debate. I'm gonna tell you where my, where that thought came from. Number one, I realized that I was playing so many Nicki Minaj records this weekend. So, so many. From old to new and everything in between, from like her island Caribbean vibe stuff that's a little more back wall. Like everything across the board, every BPM you could think of. Right? And then I was playing songs that she was featured on. And I went to like quick mix out of like three different ones. And I looked over at Doug was with me, one of our DJs, and I'm like, I can't mix out of this right now. I was like, this crowd will turn on me immediately. And it has happened to me. I shut her verse. I shut her verse off on. my gosh, I can't think of the I can't think of the song. I should pull it up anyway. Shut her verse off and the crowd lost it. They just like, got booed, like everything. And I was like, it's made me way more cautious when she's featured on a track, because she's usually the anchor verse, right? And like I said, I was playing so much of her stuff that everybody was rapping that like I can shut the volume off completely. I actually did for like almost the full verse this week, just shut the volume off and let the place just sang. And I was like, this is... pretty incredible like for 20, 25 seconds that a place with absolutely zero music on was just rapping a Nicky verse. like, is, I hadn't seen it in a long time, but I guess I set the song up right to where people were primed for it. But then I took notice after that and I'm like, wow, like everything, everything hits, everything's got a lot of energy, everything's very club ready. And then after you had put that in the, in the email, I really, was thinking about, I do play a lot of Rihanna records, but I feel like that was me 10 years ago, playing all those Rihanna records. think Nikki's kind of become the modern version of what Rihanna was 10 years ago for me, when she was making all those 128 records with all the big house producers. then you can kind of go back and do the Jay-Z stuff and all the stuff that she was doing earlier in her career. So I feel like Nikki's definitely just a more modern. version of a Rihanna. I don't know. I don't know. I think Rihanna songs, you can play no matter the age, no matter the demographic, no matter the location, and they'll work and people will know them. Whereas I think Nikki, she has some of those for sure. I think Rihanna has more, and I think, I don't know. I have some stats to back me up. In fact, I personally think that the debate should be Rihanna versus Beyonce instead of Rihanna versus Nikki. And I'll take Rihanna over Beyonce all day. I just like Nicky for the club. Now is that because I DJ in a more, you know, urban forward rooms? Probably. That's probably a portion of it. And I definitely play in more girl forward rooms, where Rihanna does hit there as well. But I feel like that there is a... I don't know, like women get amped when like Nikki comes on, like real, like real excited and like, you know, I'm looking around and girls are like rapping hard. could think of like three. Where like you have to play the Nicky. Like the Nicky on Bottoms Up, the Nicky on Monster. Those are two that I can think of easily. Like Super Bass is a mega hit that you could play anywhere. I play all, I play so much, man. Like, I'm just looking through right now. and I play a ton of her music. I just think Rihanna is the top of the top as far as hit records, stuff that you could play anywhere. Like I said, grandma's gonna know Rihanna where I don't think she's gonna know Nicki Minaj. As far as if a song comes on. I agree. Geez, but like then I, but I think it's just, I like Nikki for being in like multiple genres almost like I like her reggae stuff. I like the Caribbean vibes stuff. I know that's where she came from.&B, Caribbean, hip-hop, dance. She's hit everything. Yeah, I mean, guess they both hit everything, right? They both have reached across pop and Latin, right? has Rihanna's had a little Latin stuff, not a ton? know, Nicky's definitely in some. Like, I'm just looking at like the Carol G and Nicky track. And then, I played Needle a couple times this week, which was kind of interesting. Starships. the house music, pop vocal house remix, Rihanna is just rinsed. All her songs are edited and remixed. But I think that says a lot because it works. Yeah. I guess I'm just playing so much Nicky now because it's, there is stuff that is in the last three years that's just more current and just that works in all the rooms that I play. Can you look up Nicki Minaj number one songs? How many? I'm sorry, yeah. I'm gonna give you some Rihanna stats. So Rihanna has 14 number one songs. The Beatles have the most ever with 20. Wow. Okay. Rihanna's sold more units than Beyonce, meaning CDs, Spotify, all that. Beyonce has nine solo number one and 13 total number one. So Rihanna's got more total number ones than Rihanna. She has 16 songs with one billion or more streams tied with Drake for the most. So that's my numbers to back up my argument right there. I'm trying to see, because I'm seeing all types of numbers that don't seem... You know how they have all different types of charts? Yeah, well type in like Nicki Minaj, how many number one songs? That's what I know. Yeah, that's what I put in here and I see six number one hits on my note that I had. Yeah, 17 is not right. Second most winners of all time. No, see this so like specific like these some of these some of these charts they really like get. is like one of the best verses that I can think of. It's so good. I mean, moment for life goes off like huge. That was actually the song that I just dropped the verse out. Just they just went on it. Like huge. was right. features? I think features matter because if you're carrying a track solo, I think that's more impressive to me than if you're on a track with Drake, the biggest artist ever, or of our time. I mean, it's a lot of features, right? Beauty and the Beat with Justin Bieber's remix, like, you know, till the cows come home at this point. Anaconda, don't play. Super Freaky Girl. all the Wayne, Nikki Drake stuff is like potentially arguably my favorite like hip hop era or one of my favorites for sure. The Young Money era was unbelievable. The mixtapes and all the hits that came out during that time. I don't know. Like I said, these are ridiculous numbers that I'm looking at that are like, you know, whether it's a pop billboard, whether that's hip hop. I just want to know overall number one. I guess probably not. You said about seven? 6. Six. I thought AI would do a better job for me here. has several number one songs. Come on now. before when we on our Zoom. I was prepping for my argument here. you know why, you know why I didn't look up the the numbers is only because I'm going off of like club reaction and what I'm using, what am I, what am I using these records for right is is to use them in the club. You know how they're perceived outside of the nightclub like I don't listen to this stuff and you know I don't think you do either so like I don't really care about those numbers I get it that does. give you an idea of their general popularity. But maybe the biggest song that's going off in the club right now isn't something that's generally popular. the Rihanna songs are all club bangers. Every one of them. All the hits are bangers. I, I probably played the most Rihanna out of anybody you know. I think we as DJs we all play Rihanna all day because her music translates to most rooms and it also translates to opening sets or peak sets so so her music you can spread throughout your entire set if you're playing a full night Yeah, I'm looking at her top, Nikki's like top 20 songs, like moment for life was peaked at number 13. I play Moment for Life a lot earlier in the night when I'm starting to like pick up the pace in an open format environment. you'd be shocked what that does at peak hour. Yeah, I'm sure it would crush. kills. Rake it up, peak to number eight, dance. forgot about rake it up. 10 Barbie world number seven girl on fire with Alicia Keys number 11 I played that this weekend as well. Wow, motorsport number six. Features, features, features. Yeah. and David Guetta featuring Minaj, Pee-Bur-Exa, number eight peak, Anaconda, number two peak, super freaky girl, number one. Fifi, number three peak, another feature. Fifi Yes, 6ix9ine. Beauty and the Beat, number five. I was thinking about that this weekend and I was like, why the hell was that ever a thing? I don't know, he's terrible. So the world ends another feature number three, turn me on to David Guetta number four, bottoms up, it still goes off, played it this weekend as well. Number six. Bottoms Up is probably one of my most played songs in the last like three years. Yeah, it just works, another one that just works everywhere, no matter what time it is, you gotta play the Nicky verse. I usually like scratch into the Nicky verse after the first part. just re-arrived in my sets. Side to side with Ariana, number four, Peak, Say So, Doji Cat, it's all features. Number one, Bang Bang, Jessie J and Ariana, number three, Starships, number five, so not like, there's been like one number one. Super bass. the Rihanna solo tracks. okay. S Don't Stop the Music, Pond the Replay, Disturbia, Rude Boy, Diamonds, which not necessarily a club track, but at one point was a big track. But every one of the other ones is so far. Every other one of those tracks is big club, big club tracks. I mean, and then you get onto all the Calvin Harris, where have you been? This is what it came for, We Found Love, those are what, Geta and Calvin tracks. Can I interrupt and ask is where have you been like a top five club track of all time? I don't know, I don't really play it that, I don't think I play it that much anymore. For a period of time, it was huge. but for like 10 years, the thing had to run. The had to run. This is fun, maybe we should do some more like matchups with artists. I don't know if you guys like this or not, if it's me and Gary rambling and you guys are like, what the fuck are these guys talking about? Right, right. think any track that you can play in the club for 10 plus years is like a staple, gotta be a top five. Even the Fat Man Scoop track kind of went out of style for a little bit. It had a small lull where people were of tired of it. I'm gonna die on the Rihanna over Nikki Hill all day, like heavily. just, reading through this list, I'm like so, so behind that stance. Yeah, I think she leans to, if you lean an EDM fan, I think Rihanna's your girl. If you lean as a hip hop fan, I think Nikki's your girl. wait to do this poll when we start releasing the content around this episode. But I really, I'm gonna, I think that is part of it. think if you, if you really, if you, cut it. If you really, if you're a house DJ and you lean house music in your DJ style, Rihanna's it. Really? hip hop and R &B, Rihanna has to be your guy too. I think for the club, I think think Nikki's better in that if not genre. Does Rihanna have better 128 records off thousand percent? But Rihanna didn't make no Jersey club style shit though. But she doesn't make music anymore. either. That's the other thing. Like Rihanna only made music for a pretty short period of time. I think it's longer than we realize. Probably like 15, 20 years. And now Nicky's been out for about 15 years now, I would say. Like, eight, right? Around Drake time. Yeah, probably around there. So yeah, about 15 years, I would say. I, yeah, Rihanna, I think it was like 97 and then she stopped making music a little while ago now. Drop it in the comments. Rihanna versus Nikki, who you taking overall? I know I'm losing this one, all you fucking house DJs out there. Dude, I think you are strongly underestimating the 100 and under BPM Rihanna tracks. There's so many. There's so many. There are. But I think just the way I'm thinking, think the relevancy of it has been far gone. Right. Right. Rihanna's not making... She can't make hard tracks when she's singing, pretty much. I'm not going, like not just off BPM, but like, know, Nikki is a hip hop artist. And Rihanna's a pop artist. Though Nikki has a ton of pop records too. I don't know, you could argue this all day long in every aspect of, you know, pop versus hip hop versus BPM versus club sets versus radio charts. There's a lot of different angles on this thing. We'll have a little better criteria next time, think. How about that? I'm interested to know. You don't even have to drop a name, just the name. You can give us a whole explanation too. I'd like to hear what kind of criteria people would like to hear in a head-to-head matchup. Like, do the charts matter? You know? What are some of the things that you'd like to say or hear about? All right, guys, I think this is good place to wrap. I want to do a little promo. We haven't done this in a while. YouTube, if you guys are just listening to this show, please go follow us on YouTube. We're really trying to put out a lot more content there. We've been putting out stuff beyond this podcast on our YouTube page. Search get down DJs. You can also click the link in the bio here. Like, subscribe, comment. That stuff really, really helps us. We're really trying to grow the show and all that stuff is super important. It takes very little time. would greatly appreciate you guys could go show us some love over on YouTube. The other thing digital music pool right now is doing a special to become a member. There's a I don't know the exact number. I probably should have come prepared with this, but there is a year membership right now that is drastically discounted. We'll put it in the show notes. I'll probably also I think I just put it on my Instagrams, but I'll blast it out there a few more times as well At DJ cream NYC if you want to jump on digital music pool, you know tons of great exclusive artists there myself I'm not gonna list them all because I don't want to throw shade at anybody but there's a lot of great ones on digital music pool, so This is a great opportunity to go check it out You can get the full year for like the cost of like I think three months or something super cheap We'll throw it in the notes. for sure. All right. All right, guys, thanks for listening. We'll talk to you guys next episode. Peace out. Peace, guys.