» Listings for 2009

1. Twitter and Googley

   Posted on 12:00am Friday 14th Aug 2009

   Hi all,
            I've just realised today that My lovely lady Becky in Germany, shortly to be with me here at Cloud and Sun towers is following me on Twitter for the sole purpose of following me on Twitter. She doesn't post. She doesn't follow anybody else, just me. Sigh...how heart warming is that?...How could I have been so lucky? Do you know what the funniest bit is though? even though as mentioned she doesn't post, she already has 6 followers! Twitter. always an eye opener..
   
   Speaking of which I'm going to have to stop following Steven Fry. He posts so often, there's no room on the page for anyone else!
   
   I had a not-to-be customer tell me the other day after a bit of customer research type prodding that because I use "do your own site" online software that my site wasn't professional enough for him and that was one of the main reasons why he didn't go with me...I don't know. I personally would be more impressed with a tradesman that had built his (cutting edge thin client - latest way of using computers with online software) own site (if it was a good one) than a guy who had just bought it in as a service from outside. I have to say though, after having been constantly called up by companies that promise to get you up to the top spot on Google for £99 per month, I got a little curious about the professional web merchants side of things.
   How can they do this? Then I recalled one of my competitors who is always there at the top of the so-called natural positions on Google. I have a programme which I haven't bought yet but still gives me partial information on certain Search engine optimization methods etc. including competitors sites and what they are up to and low and behold this guy's site is as far as I can ascertain; "cloaked". This is a slightly questionable technique whereby the site you see is not necessarily what the search engine has seen on your behalf. It's usually designed that way for two reasons: 1. to fool the search engines into giving better results for your site and 2. To hide the efforts of the companies/web designers who have got the site up there by whatever means and don't want other optimization firms to steal their ideas! Fascinating stuff to all those who want the phone to ring off the hook! I spoke to a guy today from a media firm who promised to get my site up to the top of Google for 5 related search phrases (choose carefully eh?) for £99 per month and after researching the net for a while discovered that they have an identical sister firm also promising the same thing unless someone's ripped off all their text from the first website. Should I go with them? I don't know. I'm going to buy this software first and optimize the hell out of my site. It tells me at the moment that my site is only 18% optimized, so there's plenty of scope for improvement!

2. Love, champers and flashing

   Posted on 12:00am Monday 3rd Aug 2009

   Hi all,
              Sorry no blog last week but I was a bit busy entertaining the woman of my dreams! Yes, I flew out to Germany to meet her for the first time and we hit it off so well She suggested we fly back together. What a brilliant idea! I felt like we were such jet setters all be it on the cheap with Ryanair.
   If you ever fly with them and you're only taking hand baggage and you're a couple of kilos over, don't worry, don't do what I did and own up, get directed to one of their deliberately confusing extra baggage machines and get over charged on your credit card by some £40.00. Just take your pre-printed boarding card/ticket and go straight through to security where they don't have any scales and make sure you don't have a pen knife on your key ring or more than 100ml of any liquid and put your hair gel etc. in a plastic clear bag (why???)
   and you'll get straight through without losing anything like I did. £17 quid that Swiss army knife was. Torch, knife, nail file, scissors. All a traveling man could want, gone in an instant and all because the Americans invented Al Kieda to rob us of our human rights, not to mention aftershave and pen knives.. Of course I can't verify that fact but I've yet to hear a proper explanation for the pentagon hole on 911.
   Flying used to be a pleasure before the most suppressed and badly fed people on earth's government decided to do all this stuff to us. I really feel for Americans. Their government is run by a  bunch of private bankers and it loans them their own money under emergency finance conditions, using them as collateral. What a cheek! Only in America. Trouble is, our government do whatever they tell us to. Hence the ghastly experience of modern day flying. So many wasted penknives, scissors and toiletries!
   
   What has all this got to do with the life of a mobile DJ I hear you ask?..Nothing at all. except that I am a mobile DJ and this is my life.
   
   I'm loving the fact that my lady: Becky is not afraid of helping me with the equipment when I'm shunting it in and out of venues. In time she might take out another show under the Cloud And Sun DJ Services name.
   No promises though. First and foremost she is trained in estate agency type stuff and hopes to put her hand to it over here. In Germany I don't think they have quite the same reputation. You have to do quite a bit of official training in various property laws. Already they're sounding better than ours aren't they?
   
   Also this week after waiting some time for it to arrive, I got a new controller for my strobe light. Not many Deejays have these things these days. Perhaps it's the musician in me but I like to accent certain bits of the music with this type of lighting. I've been doing it from the start but I recall seeing "the Killers" do a set on the "Brit awards" a couple of years ago and they had a whole row of strobes which were used to great effect on at least one song at the peak of the main phrase (he doesn't look a bit like Jesus etc.).  Anyhow, the old controller started making a giant cracking noise across the speakers when you switched it on, so it had to go after nine years of good service, leaving my microphone stand as the only original remaining piece of kit. Talking of which, I can really relate to my microphone stand. Like me it's getting on a bit and to keep it working it needs it's nuts tightening every now and then.
   This new controller though is the dogs danglers. You can push various buttons with instant response (unlike the old one) and so create a much better light show. I'm guessing by now that you understand why I digress from the main topic so often...(yaaawwnn...)
   
   I must tell you about the Eric Cantona look-alike the other week (French as well) who decided that It would be a good idea to spray all the guests and the show with vintage Champagne, much to my annoyance and the poor bride and groom who lost most of it in the process. It's the only time to date that I have told a guest to stop spraying his fluid all over the equipment and piss off!
   
   You know what they are trying to signify in a James Bond movie when he pops a cork on a bottle of Bollinger 53? Well I was joking to Becky in my best "Clouseau" accent that he obviously loved the show so much he wanted to ...uh..... all over it even though he....uh.... knew it was wrong.......he just couldn't...uh...help himself!
   
   Here endeth this weeks blog.
   

3. Black list if you want

   Posted on 12:00am Monday 20th Jul 2009

   Hi all,
            As I sit in Beckie's office here in Bremen, so tired from staying up all Saturday night after the gig to make it to Stanstead and so relaxed with a change of scenery, it's hard to get in the mood for that of which I am about to rant.
   
   Fridays gig was wild and a "chandelier swinging" experience. One or two of the wedding party blokes got a bit too drunk and nearly sent my entire lighting rig crashing to the floor, all about £1,000 worth of it. But that, as crap as this is, (and boy is it!) is just a part of the job.
   No. Saturday's gig is what pissed me off. I'm not going to go into the technical workings of a a noise limiter here, as I've already covered it in another blog post. Suffice to say this one at the Brighton Hotel (Best Western) remains the most severe one I've ever dealt with. It's so hard to put on a show when you the punters are asking if you supply hearing aids help them to determin where the sound is coming from. I'm seriously considering starting a page of "venues to avoid like the plague" mainly to warn you poor happless clients before you commit to booking with such places. As I said before it's not usually the venue's fault that neighbours have moved in next door and ruined every future party until eternity; but that doesn't stop it from ruining your event now does it? If I got all the other deejays I know to help me compile a list of venues with these "evil", "party pooping" devices in then we might actually be able to be like here in Germany where no one seems to have heard about such attrocious aparatus....
   It's up to you folks out there. Email me and let me know if you think this would be valuable service...OR when booking, ask the venue if they have one.