Hi all. Haven't posted for a while as this winter has been pretty quiet to tell the truth. Never mind. Had an 80's party on Saturday hosted By Stuart Duff from Megafan records for his wife Yolanda's birthday. I had to increase the size of the already large show to accomodate the main attraction Ben Volpeliere-Pierrot from 80's number 1 selling album band Curiosity Killed The Cat. Not that Ben is large physically, I mean I had to dig out the old CDN88's (twin CD player - one of the best in it's day) to play the backing tracks for the act. This made a large disco set up as you can see below:

Ben sang well and got a great reaction from the ladies:

Also a really nice guy and a fellow Level 42 fan, so that means he can do no wrong in my book..

Also, at some point in the night, one of Stuarts other artists (he actually has Chaka Khan on his books amongst others!),Robbie Craig from 2 step garage act Artful Dodger sang "Woman Trouble" with his lady support vocalist joining in on the choruses. Wow! what a voice that bloke has..And his lady too! every bit as good. I must say although I loved Curiosity and bought their debut album on cassette, I had a special place in my heart for  the Artful Dodger track. I was just starting out as a DJ early in the naughties when this track appeared on the scene. It never got a huge reaction on the dance floor at the time, but you know what? I loved it and I was behind the decks, so on it went gig after gig. I don't often make exceptions like that, but this song was funkeeeee!

You can just see yours truly looking much more serious than I actually am as usual..

All in all a great night and Beckie I have to say got right into th idea and dressed for the part:

This picture doesn't do her look justice but it's the best I've got on this camera.

Well hope you enjoyed this blog at least a little as much as I enjoyed doing the show. Check out Stuart and Yolandas review

Ok see you next time and have a great week.

Cheers,

Mike.

Hi again everybody. I have an idea which I've bored others with from time to time over the years but never really voiced in the broad spread that this blog no doubt achieves!

Ok actually I've no idea how many folks read my humble thoughts other than a few definites but anyway, what do you think of this...

I nearly always do gigs which start at around 7:30 pm and end at around midnight.

That's a long time isn't it? do you think the crowd dance attentively for all that time? Mostly no. I mean there's usually upwards of two or three at least on the floor for most of the night but the main rush comes at around 9:30pm to 10:00pm and then again in the last 45 minutes. This isn't because I'm a bad DJ. Read the reviews yourself.

Just occasionally or at Christmas functions I come on late and play for 2 to 3 hours. This has the effect of concentrating everyones attention and the shows can't help but be more snappy and a little bit more exciting. In fact I've had some of my wildest gigs and best crowd reaction in this shorter format. This, I'm guessing is why most concerts are around this length. Just immagine if I came on at 9 or 10pm and everybody just went for it big time on the floor.....This is why I charge a set fee now and not so much an hourly rate, as I believe after many years of exprience that it's quality, not quantity that counts and let's not forget the oldest rule of entertainment: Always leave 'em wanting more...Not for nothing was that saying a cliche long long ago.

If your another DJ reading this or another customer or a friend, I'd really appreaciate your view on this. I'm genuinly interested to know what everyone else thinks.

Not a lot to say other than that rather important point, except that spaces are filling up for the summer now so please don't miss out on the wonder that is the Cloud And Sun funky-assed disco in 2011!

Take care and I'll leave you with something to cheer you up in this incessantly rainy January.  This is one of my favourite clips from last year:

Take care and see you soon..

Mike.

Hi everyone! Hope you had a great Christmas. I thought we had a quieter one than usual work wise, but I've totted up the income and it's almost exactly the same as last year. Not only that, I've discovered that I made a mistake in last years final gross profit figure and I've paid too much tax as a result! Bugger! Never mind. I guess they need the extra money after the last lot ballsed up the economy so much - with help from the bankers but not exclusively of course.

Anyway, talking of ballsing it up. I got a last minute New Years Eve gig and the host told me to set this confetti cannon off at midnight. I say to him: "Do I need to take this polythene off if the tube first?" "No I think it's fine" he says. So come midnight I play the new year chimes (which last about a minute). All this time I'm trying to twist this ruddy cannon tube open and not getting anywhere. Finally the chimes end and ...well nothing. Dead air as they say on radio. I rush over and start Auld lang Syne on the other decks (it's complicated but the start of the chimes needs cueing out as it goes on forever - other wise I'd have programmed it up on the laptop) and a cheer goes up. I realise that this ruddy polythene needs to come off so I'm about to set fire to it with my lighter (for speed - used to do this with CD covers) when Becky clocks whats going on and comes and rips it off in one surprising and slightly annoyingly smooth and efficient German movement, thus enabling me to fire off at last the confetti on to a now Auld Lang Syne swaying Audience. I told the host what happened after and he was cool about it. "Oh yeah" he said, "we had the same problem earlier in the car park". At first I thought; Why were they setting confetti cannons off in the pub car park? And then I thought; why the hell didn't you come and tell me that before midnight????

Then there was the girl on the dance floor who had a dress on so short that every move she busted, it rode right up over her bum. My god this job is hard sometimes. You just have to grit your teeth and get through the night as best as you can....

Sigh....Anyway, things are filling up up nicely for 2011, though I'm determined to find out why if you type "mobile disco Sussex" into Google, I don't appear anywhere...Try it. You'll see.

Have a great new year and see you soon,

All the best,

Mike.