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Hi all. Just went to Portishead near Bristol the other day to meet a potential girlfriend. Sadly, though we had a great day out, it wasn't to be. What really stung was the price of the  diesel! Around £75.00 there and back! (and it's only 160 miles away). I guess it's time to intstall one of these systems.

This year appears to be one of the quietest Christmases for work. All my other DJ friends say the same. I guess it's because all our money's going to the government and oil companies. Never mind, It's still a great time of year for going mental on the dance floor! Surprising amount of people getting married this month. I guess it makes the anniversaries easier to remember?

Next year to raise money for a good cause which would take too long to explain here, I am going to host a large singles type disco night up in East Grinstead and it will cost around £10.00 per head. The first one is on January 28th so let me know if you're interested and I can supply more info for you.

Tonight I am doing a gig for someone else ie: not my own customer. The hotel has nowhere to park, is a bugger to get into and when you finally make it, there is a noise limiter device which cuts the power to the stage on all sockets within around 50 metres if you go above the level of a small kitchen radio. Some gigs you really just do for the money. Next week I have another one in Brighton and Hove with no parking. This is why I don't advertise in that area. All you Brighton deejays: You're entirely welcome to it!

I once used to have an agent send me up to a gig in Covent Garden just off the Aldwich above The Strand. You had to have your wits about you there. It was an 8 story venue with no parking and clamper vans and wardens circling like vultures right up until 18:00 hours on the dot Greenwich mean time. The first night I played there, I got all the equipment into the 6th floor which meant getting what then was around £10 000 worth of stuff into the front foyer and leaving it unattended whilst going to park the van in Drury lane NCP three streets away (Around £25.00 per night). You then had to walk 3 streets back and get all the stuff to the lift 200 yards away at the back of the ground floor, after which you had to take it up bit by bit in the under sized lift. The first time I played there I had some time in between starting, so I pulled the van out of said expensive car park and parked it legally (I thought) in a space out front. Turns out it was a residents bay or something badly signed and at 2am in the morning I come out and find it clamped. 1/2 hour later, £115.00 down and a bunch of Somalians are dissappearing with my denver boot in the back of their Campdon council van. I did that gig about three times after that, but I don't any more. Just not worth the stress....

On an up note I had a great gig last week in East Grinstead, thanks to my mate Andy from Foxrox discos. I hosted a big band night that they have there once a year. Great 20 piece big band and the crowd were really up for it. The place was pretty well packed out. I love those gigs where there are lots of people everywhere. It really makes it fun. I've done a few gigs this year where the attendance has been low and despite my best efforts, understandably, those that are there have a hard time getting into it.

Right now my landlord is digging up the front of the house and putting in block paving. It'll be great when it's finished, but getting the gear out today was a right sod. He helped me, but he wont be there at 2am tomorrow morning so like i say, tonight is just one to get through!

Sorry if this one was a bit of a downer. I'll try and make the next one better but hey, this is real life!  

Watch one of  my favourite comedians to bring you up once more!

Warning: This blog is more directed at deejays. It was something I posted today on a DJ Site for learners. If it's your cup of tea then fine. I'm just saying!

I burned a CD for a customer last night for their wedding ceromony. It was the first CD I've burned in 5 years and without anything but Windows media player it was a severe pain in the arse! I thought Itunes was un-user friendly, but that took the cake..

I have been using a Numark D2 and a laptop with OTS AV (super lightweight ultra reliable DJ Software) now for around the last 5 years. It all started when I was looking for one song and it took me the entire length of the gig to find it on the back of another consolidated CDR. That's what we used to do. When you had too many CD singles to fit into your boxes, you had to get a twin cd player and consolidate them down to one or two CDR's. Eventually I had too many CDR albums and that plus the former problem drove me to it! I think that being a mobile DJ and not a club DJ makes us more cutting edge in technology terms, for the simple reason that we have to hang on to all our songs and not just have a little box or these days, cd bag of the current stuff.

I decided to bite the bullet one January when work was thinnest on the ground. I had the help part time of my friend Melenie who was a trained typist and just happened to love my PC keyboard at the time. She enjoyed it and when she couldn't be there I soldiered on through it. I ripped all my CD songs (about 10,000 at the time) using yes..good old windows media player. I have to say it's a lot easier to rip than create some stupid bloody play list to burn etc. It took us around 5 weeks of all day and night ripping and typing! But boy, was it worth it. Now I don't have to carry loads of CD's around and it can all be found in seconds, which is great at a gig. Of course you lose the inspiration of looking through the physical media, but as Pete Tong says, your deejaying always goes down a bit when you change technology. Don't worry though, It comes back pretty soon in the heat of the night when you have to have that one great track!

I am one of those rare creatures who has to have two seperate systems in case one goes down. It's more to carry around but it's saved my arse on a couple of occasions and actually lends itself really well to the nightly environment. When things are not kicking off yet or I want to have a leak or a cigarette, I leave the Ots AV running and mixing by itself on the laptop. When the floor starts to fill, I switch over to the D2 and manually "mix up a storm" as they say. Check my website feedback page if you like. I must be doing something right....

My advice is, go for it. If you are a club DJ and you have limited space, Go for an apple with Traktor (industry standard) software. If you are a mobile like me, then I can honestly say that I haven't wanted to change what I have in 5 years. You can't get the D2 any more, but the mix track pro should be ok. You just may have to commission a larger console as I have, if you want it wired in and ready.

All the best,

Mike

Hi There. Just to let you know there are a few dates still available in December for your party. Please check here to see if I'm available..

Liking having a less hectic schedule in November. Went to the Theatre Royal Brighton last week with a friend and saw "An Inspector calls".

Great play but we were so high up in the "gods" that we couldn't see the top of the stage. Although I don't think we missed anything, I can't be sure due to the fact that we couldn't see it you see...A self perpetuating conundrum.

Just been checking out Wild Cherries back catalogue over the past few nights. They were famous for that song Play that funky music (white boy), but it would seem they have a few more worth playing on a particularly funky-assed evening. Did the same with Average white band the other week (famous for Pick up the pieces). It would appear that they too are perhaps, no definitely even more worth checking out. I'm always looking to increase my funk and (if there's any left that I don't know about and have) disco tracks. So if you know of any rare grooves, feel free to suggest and I'll give them a going over.

Just tried to launch a Google + page tonight and as happens sometimes could'nt get it up for love nor technical knowhow without the error massage coming up. Oh well, it's early days and if they want to compete with facebook it had better work. Do you know Facebook gets more hits than Google these days? No wonder Google want a piece of the action! 

Anyhoo, I want to catch that new Ricky Gervais - Lifes too short tonight and I just realised I've run out of prepared salad (gasp!) so I'd better get out of 'ere!

See you all soon,

Mike