EvilJunglist
Bluelighter
I've been meaning to write this for a long time, and now I have some free time.. so here goes. For those of you in the rave scene, you may or may not know how much goes into throwing and promoting these events. How much stress is involved, etc.. This is the story of the events leading up to and including the drum and bass club night I threw back in January in Dayton, Ohio. Hope you enjoy it.
It all started a early December evening while I was sitting at home bored out of my damn mind. When I'm bored, I'll usually crack open Photoshop and start designing flyers. Flyers for parties that are already happening, or I'll just make up my own. I began working on a club flyer for dnalabs' club night in Dayton, ACTIV8, and just for fun I was making it drum and bass night. The more I worked on the flyer, the more the proverbials wheels started turning in my head, and eventually I had a nice line up of local drum and bass talent put together. The more I thought about it, the more I thought it would be a great idea. That next Wednesday, I approached the club about it, and they gave me the night of January 17th.
I was so excited I could barely contain myself and I set out at that moment to work harder than I've ever worked before to do something special and give something back to the dnb scene.
The initial planning stages began, and I made phone calls to the local DJs whom I wanted to play. Most of the DJs are my friends anyway, and I wanted to give them a chance to have the spotlight. The local guys I had so far were all excellent DJs, best in Ohio in my opinion, but were being held back by politics, lack or promotion or what-have-you. I contacted Troll, as I wanted him to be the headliner for the evening, however the amount of money he was asking (as a local DJ) to play a Wednesday gig was ridiclious in my opinion. So I set out to find a new headliner. I had remembered having several conversations with Kid Entropy from Chicago a long time ago, and he always seemed to be a really chill guy, as well as a great dj, producer, mc and owner of his own record label. I e-mailed him inquiring about the night, and he responded within an hour saying he'd love to play, and his price was in my budget.
In a week I had gotten 90% of my line up contacted, 75% of them confirmed, and we already put some pre-flyers out at Bass Reaction 2 in Dayton on December 9th. I was pumped. Everything was moving really smoothly, until money came into play.
I had contacted a friend of a friend who said he'd be more than willing to invest the money that I needed to make the night happen, and it was time to call him back. I called the kid back, and he promised me he would call me back as soon as he got home from the ATM machine with the money that I needed. Well, he never called back. I spent the next 5 days scrambling around calling every person I knew that had money. Finally, in a last ditch effort, I called a friend of mine who is a well known promoter in Cincinnati and asked him if he could drop the $200 I needed to buy Kid Entropy's plane ticket. He said it was no problem, and I met up with him that evening and got the cash. *phew*
The club had also given me a $200 check to purchase full color flyers that would promote the rest of the ACTIV8's for January on one side, and my night on the other side. These had beed designed and sent to the printer and would be ready for me on the upcoming Friday, two weeks before the event.
I also mailed Kid Entropy his plane ticket, and since I got a deal on the ticket, I also sent him half his booking fee as deposit, even though he didn't ask for one. I felt it was a nice thing to do, and since he had never played for me before it would be a nice gesture. Friday came, and the flyers were finished. I went to the bank to cash the $200 check from the club, and the damn thing bounced. Fuck. That was all I could say. So I went to meet up with some friends who were going to go get the flyers with me and explained what was going on. Somehow, someway, between the two of them and a few other people they called, within an hour I had the money in my hands for the flyers. I couldn't thank them enough, as they had basically saved my night. Without flyers, I felt I would've been totally fucked. We went and picked up the flyers, and they looked great. Once again, I was pumped up.
That weekend I went to Louisville and Indianapolis to hand out flyers. The following week I hit Cincinnati, Columbus and Dayton. That weekend I hit Cleveland, Akron and Pittsburgh. I wasn't fucking around. I wanted this night be a success, and if I had to hit every city in the region (which I did, lol) then so be it.
It was now a week before the event. I made a trip up to Top Cats on Thursday to see Facs and Sparks play and to promote. I was hanging out with some friends, drinking a beer, when I was approached and told that the Invisible Sounds guys (half my line up) needed to talk to me about time slots, they had a problem with them because of sleep issues. That was cool by me, I went up to talk to Ron (head of IS) and got totally blindsided. Ron went off on me about how I couldn't put them in the timeslots I had them in (note: 11-12 and 2-3) because they had all been playing records for too long and it would make their upcoming night look bad if they got shitty time slots. To me, it sounded like he was backing out of playing. So I tried to negotiate with him, and I ended up cutting the two acts who had hour and a half slots to just hour slots and moved everything around so that the IS kids would be happy and would still play. I was pissed off. I had to re-arrange my whole night, half-way screw one of my best friends out of a headlining slot, and look like a total bitch just because they didn't like their time slots. But what else could I do?
Their names were already on the flyers. They are great DJs. They were half of my damn line up. I really didn't have a choice. Right after that little fiasco, I grabbed (Green) Tara and told her we had to leave, ASAP.
Stress had been building about the night for a long time, and I had begun to worry about if it was going to be successful or not. Needless to say, the incident I had just gone through temporarily threw me over the edge. On the way out of Top Cats I punched a brick wall, splitting my hand pretty good in the process (I'm looking at the scar right now, which is about half and inch long. heh.) and scaring the crap out Tara. Tara is great though, as somehow she managed, as usual, to calm me down via some cigarettes and a big hug. If any of you know Tara, be glad. If you don't make it a point to meet her, she is, without question, my best friend and one of the best people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing.
The next day, I put in a call to my opening DJ, Spahn, to remind him of his time time slot. He assured me it wasn't an ego thing, but that he couldn't play 9-10. I sat there thinking: "Right. Not an ego thing my ass." He didn't know what I had gone through the night before, so I simply told him to forget about it, I'd find someone else, and that if he ever thought I would book him in the future, he could fucking forget about it.
The days passed, and I became increasingly worried about how my turnout would be. All my friends assured me I would do fine and that they would all be there to support me. However, needing 104 kids to break even, I was still skeptical. Finally, the 17th came.
I left work early and headed up to Columbus to meet up with Kid Entropy, as a friend of mine was picking him up from the airport for me. While on the road, I was still scrambling to find a DJ to fill the 9-10pm slot, and calling to ensure that I would have equipment for the evening. My source for equipment notified me that he had no way to the club and didn't want to ride with me because he had things to do the next day and couldn't crash in Columbus after we dropped Entropy off at the airport. Great. Now I've got no turntables, no mixer and no opening DJ. After an hour and 10-15 phone calls I had secured tables via DJ Danno and an opening DJ (and a damn fine one at that), Divine. I had drained a fully charged battery on my cell phone in less than two hours.
I arrived in Columbus around 5:30 and was to meet Entropy and his ride at her house at 6pm. I grabbed a quick snack and proceeded to sit at her house for 45 minutes. As each minute passed I got angrier and angrier and more and more stressed. We had to be the the club in Dayton, over an hour away, by 8pm and we still had to stop and get something to eat. Finally, they arrived and I was LIVID when I found out that the reason they were late was because the girl who picked Entropy up stopped along the way to "make a drug deal for a little extra money." HOW THE HELL are you going to take MY HEADLINING DJ from Chicago to do a FUCKING DRUG DEAL?! Moreso, HOW THE HELL are you going to invite him IN THE HOUSE WHILE you make the drug deal?! I was furious and stressed beyond belief, but I had to play it cool while Entropy was there, which was damn near impossible as the girl played the whole thing off like it was no big deal.
I took Tim (Entropy) in my car, as to avoid any further "side trips" and headed to the club. Along the way we stopped for some Taco Bell, and even though per his contract he was to paying for his own food, I still footed the bill for him to eat, as I felt bad about the whole drug deal thing. We arrived to the club around 8, losing Renee (the girl who picked up Tim) along the way, and to be honest, I didn't give a fuck. Danny arrived shortly there after and we got everything set up and finally I could sit down and relax for 2 minutes and scarf down dinner. I then went to talk to the club owners, who just a week earlier had it made perfectly clear to them that I would be working the door because well, I didn't trust them for shit and I needed to make at least my $400 dollars back to pay everyone. They still gave me shit and tried to add in a bunch of extra stuff I had to pay them for, including 2 security guards, one of which, regardless of what the club says, never fucking showed up, yet somehow I still ended up paying for.
9pm came and Divine took to the decks in front of about 3 kids and I was starting to get really really worried. I think Entropy has too, as he kept hanging out up at the door, talking to me, but all the while eyeing the door for people coming in. Slowly but surely, more and more kids started filing in. I took a couple of breaks during this time away from the door, and mysteriously when I would come back, there would be 10-15 more kids in the club, but the hand counter remained the same as when I left, and the amount of money in the drawer remained the same. The fucking club was letting kids in for free. They fucked me. HARD. By 1 am I only had 75 kids in that had paid and I was an emotional wreck, which I'm sure was painfully clear to anyone who talked to me. The Invisible Sounds kids tried to cheer me up, and actually ended up playing for free and telling me to not worry about paying them, because they knew what I was going through. Plus they all bought me beers. Everyone was buying me beers. DJ Danno took me outside and I smoked up with him and his tag team partner Derek Johnson. By 2am I was *SPLIT*. I dont think I can ever recall being so fucked up in my entire life. I went walking around the club looking for my friends to see if they showed up. Some did, but the majority, who just earlier in the day SWORE up and down that they'd be there.. didn't fucking show up. I broke down and went in the sound booth and started crying. I was losing my ass, I was ridicliously fucked up, I was stressed out beyond belief, and I felt like all my friends had screwed me over. I straightened out a little bit and made my way back to the door, just in time to have the kid who invested money, basically grab it out of the drawer, leaving me with.. nothing. I still owed Entropy $100 and I didn't have it. A few more kids came in and I ended up kicking Entropy $50 of the $100, which he was more than cool with, and he explained to me that he understood what had happened.
From a DJ prospective, everyone was really cool and I can't thank everyone enough who played, in most cases for free, and for talking to me and assuring me things would somehow work out and that I'd be ok. From a friend perspective, I had never felt so let down in my life. The people who did show up would hardly talk to me, I guess they didn't like seeing me down, I don't know. To this day, I'm still rather salty about those who swore they would show up and didn't. Maybe that's crappy of me, but oh well.
We left the club at the end of the night, I was totally broke after using money out of my own pockets to pay Danny and Derek, as Derek had come from Columbus and Danny had brought his equipment. Renee ended up driving my car back to Columbus, as I was in no shape, physically or emotionally to drive and we dropped Tim off at the airport and then I crashed.
I woke up later on Thursday feeling like complete crap, as expected, and for some reason, I didn't feel like doing anything. I didn't feel like driving home so I could go to work the next day, or eating or smoking cigarettes. I just wanted to lay there on the floor and stare at the cieling. Eventually, I did make my way up and home, and explained everything to my parents, who were less than pleased. I hopped online and thanked everyone who came out and emailed all my DJs, thanking them for playing and for their support.
I was in the dumps for several weeks afterwards, and just within the past couple of weeks I've finally started feeling better about it. That night made me even more jaded and bitter towards the scene and the kids than I already was. I've decided to take a break from partying, and a permanent break from promoting. I learned some valuable lessons from it all, mainly, to me.. all the stress, rushing around, letdowns, heartache.. it's not worth it.
Anyways. That's my story. I just felt the need to get all that out into words.. sorry if the formatting is fucked. I just did this all off the top of my head.
Thanks for reading.
Peace.
Dave
It all started a early December evening while I was sitting at home bored out of my damn mind. When I'm bored, I'll usually crack open Photoshop and start designing flyers. Flyers for parties that are already happening, or I'll just make up my own. I began working on a club flyer for dnalabs' club night in Dayton, ACTIV8, and just for fun I was making it drum and bass night. The more I worked on the flyer, the more the proverbials wheels started turning in my head, and eventually I had a nice line up of local drum and bass talent put together. The more I thought about it, the more I thought it would be a great idea. That next Wednesday, I approached the club about it, and they gave me the night of January 17th.
I was so excited I could barely contain myself and I set out at that moment to work harder than I've ever worked before to do something special and give something back to the dnb scene.
The initial planning stages began, and I made phone calls to the local DJs whom I wanted to play. Most of the DJs are my friends anyway, and I wanted to give them a chance to have the spotlight. The local guys I had so far were all excellent DJs, best in Ohio in my opinion, but were being held back by politics, lack or promotion or what-have-you. I contacted Troll, as I wanted him to be the headliner for the evening, however the amount of money he was asking (as a local DJ) to play a Wednesday gig was ridiclious in my opinion. So I set out to find a new headliner. I had remembered having several conversations with Kid Entropy from Chicago a long time ago, and he always seemed to be a really chill guy, as well as a great dj, producer, mc and owner of his own record label. I e-mailed him inquiring about the night, and he responded within an hour saying he'd love to play, and his price was in my budget.
In a week I had gotten 90% of my line up contacted, 75% of them confirmed, and we already put some pre-flyers out at Bass Reaction 2 in Dayton on December 9th. I was pumped. Everything was moving really smoothly, until money came into play.
I had contacted a friend of a friend who said he'd be more than willing to invest the money that I needed to make the night happen, and it was time to call him back. I called the kid back, and he promised me he would call me back as soon as he got home from the ATM machine with the money that I needed. Well, he never called back. I spent the next 5 days scrambling around calling every person I knew that had money. Finally, in a last ditch effort, I called a friend of mine who is a well known promoter in Cincinnati and asked him if he could drop the $200 I needed to buy Kid Entropy's plane ticket. He said it was no problem, and I met up with him that evening and got the cash. *phew*
The club had also given me a $200 check to purchase full color flyers that would promote the rest of the ACTIV8's for January on one side, and my night on the other side. These had beed designed and sent to the printer and would be ready for me on the upcoming Friday, two weeks before the event.
I also mailed Kid Entropy his plane ticket, and since I got a deal on the ticket, I also sent him half his booking fee as deposit, even though he didn't ask for one. I felt it was a nice thing to do, and since he had never played for me before it would be a nice gesture. Friday came, and the flyers were finished. I went to the bank to cash the $200 check from the club, and the damn thing bounced. Fuck. That was all I could say. So I went to meet up with some friends who were going to go get the flyers with me and explained what was going on. Somehow, someway, between the two of them and a few other people they called, within an hour I had the money in my hands for the flyers. I couldn't thank them enough, as they had basically saved my night. Without flyers, I felt I would've been totally fucked. We went and picked up the flyers, and they looked great. Once again, I was pumped up.
That weekend I went to Louisville and Indianapolis to hand out flyers. The following week I hit Cincinnati, Columbus and Dayton. That weekend I hit Cleveland, Akron and Pittsburgh. I wasn't fucking around. I wanted this night be a success, and if I had to hit every city in the region (which I did, lol) then so be it.
It was now a week before the event. I made a trip up to Top Cats on Thursday to see Facs and Sparks play and to promote. I was hanging out with some friends, drinking a beer, when I was approached and told that the Invisible Sounds guys (half my line up) needed to talk to me about time slots, they had a problem with them because of sleep issues. That was cool by me, I went up to talk to Ron (head of IS) and got totally blindsided. Ron went off on me about how I couldn't put them in the timeslots I had them in (note: 11-12 and 2-3) because they had all been playing records for too long and it would make their upcoming night look bad if they got shitty time slots. To me, it sounded like he was backing out of playing. So I tried to negotiate with him, and I ended up cutting the two acts who had hour and a half slots to just hour slots and moved everything around so that the IS kids would be happy and would still play. I was pissed off. I had to re-arrange my whole night, half-way screw one of my best friends out of a headlining slot, and look like a total bitch just because they didn't like their time slots. But what else could I do?
Their names were already on the flyers. They are great DJs. They were half of my damn line up. I really didn't have a choice. Right after that little fiasco, I grabbed (Green) Tara and told her we had to leave, ASAP.
Stress had been building about the night for a long time, and I had begun to worry about if it was going to be successful or not. Needless to say, the incident I had just gone through temporarily threw me over the edge. On the way out of Top Cats I punched a brick wall, splitting my hand pretty good in the process (I'm looking at the scar right now, which is about half and inch long. heh.) and scaring the crap out Tara. Tara is great though, as somehow she managed, as usual, to calm me down via some cigarettes and a big hug. If any of you know Tara, be glad. If you don't make it a point to meet her, she is, without question, my best friend and one of the best people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing.
The next day, I put in a call to my opening DJ, Spahn, to remind him of his time time slot. He assured me it wasn't an ego thing, but that he couldn't play 9-10. I sat there thinking: "Right. Not an ego thing my ass." He didn't know what I had gone through the night before, so I simply told him to forget about it, I'd find someone else, and that if he ever thought I would book him in the future, he could fucking forget about it.
The days passed, and I became increasingly worried about how my turnout would be. All my friends assured me I would do fine and that they would all be there to support me. However, needing 104 kids to break even, I was still skeptical. Finally, the 17th came.
I left work early and headed up to Columbus to meet up with Kid Entropy, as a friend of mine was picking him up from the airport for me. While on the road, I was still scrambling to find a DJ to fill the 9-10pm slot, and calling to ensure that I would have equipment for the evening. My source for equipment notified me that he had no way to the club and didn't want to ride with me because he had things to do the next day and couldn't crash in Columbus after we dropped Entropy off at the airport. Great. Now I've got no turntables, no mixer and no opening DJ. After an hour and 10-15 phone calls I had secured tables via DJ Danno and an opening DJ (and a damn fine one at that), Divine. I had drained a fully charged battery on my cell phone in less than two hours.
I arrived in Columbus around 5:30 and was to meet Entropy and his ride at her house at 6pm. I grabbed a quick snack and proceeded to sit at her house for 45 minutes. As each minute passed I got angrier and angrier and more and more stressed. We had to be the the club in Dayton, over an hour away, by 8pm and we still had to stop and get something to eat. Finally, they arrived and I was LIVID when I found out that the reason they were late was because the girl who picked Entropy up stopped along the way to "make a drug deal for a little extra money." HOW THE HELL are you going to take MY HEADLINING DJ from Chicago to do a FUCKING DRUG DEAL?! Moreso, HOW THE HELL are you going to invite him IN THE HOUSE WHILE you make the drug deal?! I was furious and stressed beyond belief, but I had to play it cool while Entropy was there, which was damn near impossible as the girl played the whole thing off like it was no big deal.
I took Tim (Entropy) in my car, as to avoid any further "side trips" and headed to the club. Along the way we stopped for some Taco Bell, and even though per his contract he was to paying for his own food, I still footed the bill for him to eat, as I felt bad about the whole drug deal thing. We arrived to the club around 8, losing Renee (the girl who picked up Tim) along the way, and to be honest, I didn't give a fuck. Danny arrived shortly there after and we got everything set up and finally I could sit down and relax for 2 minutes and scarf down dinner. I then went to talk to the club owners, who just a week earlier had it made perfectly clear to them that I would be working the door because well, I didn't trust them for shit and I needed to make at least my $400 dollars back to pay everyone. They still gave me shit and tried to add in a bunch of extra stuff I had to pay them for, including 2 security guards, one of which, regardless of what the club says, never fucking showed up, yet somehow I still ended up paying for.
9pm came and Divine took to the decks in front of about 3 kids and I was starting to get really really worried. I think Entropy has too, as he kept hanging out up at the door, talking to me, but all the while eyeing the door for people coming in. Slowly but surely, more and more kids started filing in. I took a couple of breaks during this time away from the door, and mysteriously when I would come back, there would be 10-15 more kids in the club, but the hand counter remained the same as when I left, and the amount of money in the drawer remained the same. The fucking club was letting kids in for free. They fucked me. HARD. By 1 am I only had 75 kids in that had paid and I was an emotional wreck, which I'm sure was painfully clear to anyone who talked to me. The Invisible Sounds kids tried to cheer me up, and actually ended up playing for free and telling me to not worry about paying them, because they knew what I was going through. Plus they all bought me beers. Everyone was buying me beers. DJ Danno took me outside and I smoked up with him and his tag team partner Derek Johnson. By 2am I was *SPLIT*. I dont think I can ever recall being so fucked up in my entire life. I went walking around the club looking for my friends to see if they showed up. Some did, but the majority, who just earlier in the day SWORE up and down that they'd be there.. didn't fucking show up. I broke down and went in the sound booth and started crying. I was losing my ass, I was ridicliously fucked up, I was stressed out beyond belief, and I felt like all my friends had screwed me over. I straightened out a little bit and made my way back to the door, just in time to have the kid who invested money, basically grab it out of the drawer, leaving me with.. nothing. I still owed Entropy $100 and I didn't have it. A few more kids came in and I ended up kicking Entropy $50 of the $100, which he was more than cool with, and he explained to me that he understood what had happened.
From a DJ prospective, everyone was really cool and I can't thank everyone enough who played, in most cases for free, and for talking to me and assuring me things would somehow work out and that I'd be ok. From a friend perspective, I had never felt so let down in my life. The people who did show up would hardly talk to me, I guess they didn't like seeing me down, I don't know. To this day, I'm still rather salty about those who swore they would show up and didn't. Maybe that's crappy of me, but oh well.
We left the club at the end of the night, I was totally broke after using money out of my own pockets to pay Danny and Derek, as Derek had come from Columbus and Danny had brought his equipment. Renee ended up driving my car back to Columbus, as I was in no shape, physically or emotionally to drive and we dropped Tim off at the airport and then I crashed.
I woke up later on Thursday feeling like complete crap, as expected, and for some reason, I didn't feel like doing anything. I didn't feel like driving home so I could go to work the next day, or eating or smoking cigarettes. I just wanted to lay there on the floor and stare at the cieling. Eventually, I did make my way up and home, and explained everything to my parents, who were less than pleased. I hopped online and thanked everyone who came out and emailed all my DJs, thanking them for playing and for their support.
I was in the dumps for several weeks afterwards, and just within the past couple of weeks I've finally started feeling better about it. That night made me even more jaded and bitter towards the scene and the kids than I already was. I've decided to take a break from partying, and a permanent break from promoting. I learned some valuable lessons from it all, mainly, to me.. all the stress, rushing around, letdowns, heartache.. it's not worth it.
Anyways. That's my story. I just felt the need to get all that out into words.. sorry if the formatting is fucked. I just did this all off the top of my head.
Thanks for reading.
Peace.
Dave
