DJ Gig Log: Awesome wedding party! + Bulgarian traditions + son plays cello + “one more song" chant!

Content provided by Kevin Summers, owner and DJ at Smilestones DJ Services (www.smilestonesdj.com).

[@DIAZAL23]

Great job my brother. 👏👏

[@SmilestonesDJAdventures]

Thank you!!

[@stayhappy9893]

That was some good mixing my friend, looked like one of your best gigs. Happy New Year from Nashville TN 🤩

[@SmilestonesDJAdventures]

Thanks!! Happy 2022!!

[@jtm71]

Nice to hear some different music at this wedding compared to all other weddings on YT playing the same old mundane songs.

[@SmilestonesDJAdventures]

@@jtm71 hey thanks! I have an ongoing goal to mix up and dig a little deeper for the dance floor bangers. There is literally sooo much great music!

[@djvb1234]

Hey man, another great gig log! I'm sorry that happened to you at the end - dead air is the worst feeling ever! Looking at your taping of the wires at the beginning of the video... I don't know if this is how the unplugging happened, but for what it's worth, I always gaff tape all the way down the length of the cord (lengthwise). I think just doing little strips leaves too many spots where feet can catch on the cord

[@SmilestonesDJAdventures]

Hey thanks man, appreciate that. Yeah actually I had a run of 2” tape lengthwise and then on top for reinforcement, I had the small strips running perpendicular. I also heavily taped the floor outlet but my guy still punted the plug right out! 🤪

[@djvb1234]

@@SmilestonesDJAdventures yeah even when you think there is no way they could, they will still find a way to do it!

[@SmilestonesDJAdventures]

@@djvb1234 lol right!

[@craigparry282]

Hey Kevin, another great gig vlog. A few Q's from me if you don't mind 1. lighting, The room looks really big and so why did you choose just 2 main lighting effects? The room's main lights seemed on throughout was it not possible to get the room any darker? Who provided the digital monogram? 2. I thought something had happened as I noticed the lighting not working for a part of the video and then you explained at the end. Do you think maybe having a separate backup system running from a separate power point would help in case of emergency situations like you had here. You said it took 10 seconds to get the music back on - can you provide more details. 3. Any chance of more details about how this system is wired particularly the booth and speakers as I couldn't fully follow in the video. Did you consider any subs for this event? 4. I would have been a bit frustrated being positioned to the side of the dancefloor when there is a big stage in front of the dancefloor. Wasn't there any possibility of you being allowed on the stage and then your speakers could have been either side of you? 5. Awesome tunes as always. Any chance you would be able to kindly provide the playlist for this event via personal email (as you have kindly done before)? Finally, I know we all do strive for perfection but Weddings are the most unpredictable of events. You did Awesome as you always do. Don't beat yourself up over a little technical thing or a slip on words. You exude passion, care and dedication for what you do. The clients and guests see all this. We see it in the videos. Keep doing great things and keep that head up high. Can't wait to hear and see more gig vlogs + info on your channel in 2022. Happy New Year! 👍😀

[@SmilestonesDJAdventures]

Craig, happy 2022! Thanks for your kind words and encouragement! At the end of events I always reflect on any issues or lessons learned, and probably tend to focus on the mistakes. Curse of trying to continuously improve. :) here’s a few thoughts - 1. The lighting is kind of a strange situation at this venue, because it is controlled By venue staff. I requested for the lighting to be lowered during dancing but they did not oblige. It’s my opinion, probably not shared by all DJs, that subtle lighting is better than over the top lighting. I’d actually rather have a somewhat illuminated area versus having straw being and moving had affects all night. I think it fits the aesthetic of a wedding better. Unlike a club, we’re not trying to keep everything shrouded in darkness and in fact the reverse is true. I find that my to chauvet wash FX lights are the perfect complement to my thoughts on this. So they are most commonly my go to for wedding dance floor lights. 2. A back up system for lighting control is not a bad idea! My control unit is the myDMXgo from ADJ. If that were to drop out, my back up is to put my wash FX lights into an auto show. So far, I’ve had a few outages that required me to reboot or reset my control unit and or iPad. I was able to recover quickly enough and did not have to resort to my auto show last resort plan. But having a hot swap lighting control wouldn’t be a terrible idea. About the 10 second music outage… I just meant that after the power was kicked out of the outlet, It took a moment to plug things back in, and for the laptop and DDJ 1000 to communicate with each other, for the music to come back on. 3. Sure I can talk through it a little bit, and also on my channel I have a good walk-through video of my booth configuration that shows in detail how I wire everything. Essentially I have a Furman power distribution unit inside of my booth. I bring external power from an electrical outlet at my venue to the power distribution box. From the Furman, I power up everything in my booth and have external power available in the leg of my booth for speakers. In this event, I powered one of my speakers from my booth. The other speaker I simply powered directly since it was so far away and there was power available nearby. I typically like to power everything from my Furman because it is a power suppression box in addition to a power conditioner. The power conditioning piece is not as important at large well-established venues like this with strong infrastructure. And I totally do not need a sub with these JBLSRX speakers, my brother. I selected the speakers for this fact, unless the event is very large or the event is a school dance, my SRX is push enough bass to feed the party with no problems. They’re quite impressive. In fact when I have smaller events and smaller size rooms, I’ve been using my EV evolve 50s, and I kind of miss the extra bass from the JBL’s. 4. Yeah I totally get your point however my biggest concern for placement of my booth is that I want to be directly on the dance floor, which in this case I was. I absolutely hate being in a corner a table or two away from the dance floor, as I feel detached from the party and I don’t feel that I can connect as well with guests. Being on the side is not 100% ideal, but the stage was used for the bridal head table. I am definitely OK with this placement as it satisfied my number one concern. Often in mobile DJ events, I find, which may be different from other DJs, that often I do not get input into where I am to be placed or staged. Most often the venue makes a suggestion or sometimes a mandate to the couple as to “where the DJ goes”. If I am put in a very undesirable spot, I will try to work with the venue or the couple and rectify it. Which often works. 5. Of course! Can you hit me up at mobiledjremastered (at) gmail? Thanks brother, great questions! Appreciate you

[@craigparry282]

@@SmilestonesDJAdventures thanks for the detailed response. Let's go in reverse - I take it the balcony events you are not liking as much then being so far away from the dancefloors? Can you provide a link to the Furman that you use and also what do your non booth fixtures plug into? I will also have another look at your booth setup video. Very wise about the speaker choices - I'm still on the lookout for a pair but sadly the money I was going to put towards decent ones for large events is on hold as I now need to get a new motor. Never ending frustrations and priorities of the mobile dj! I will send you an email about the the gig playlist log and also another Q about you lighting choices. Thanks Kevin

[@SmilestonesDJAdventures]

@@craigparry282 my Furman: www.proaudiostar.com/furman-pst-6-power-conditioner.html I typically plug all items including light fixtures like wash fx’s into the booth’s Furman. I just split the power feeds to the speaker with a multi outlet splitter

[@craigparry282]

@@SmilestonesDJAdventures thanks Kevin. That Furman looks good. It's strange as it seems not as many dj's here in the UK use them and are happy with just surge protected power strips. Guess we are more happy with the mains power. Do you or have you ever used other power strips. I have previously used an IEC switched power panel to connect lighting fixtures. The wash light at the other side of the dancefloor - where was this plugged into at this event. Also are 6 sockets on one Furman sufficient as you will surely need power for the laptop, mydmxgo, ipad, wireless mics, dj controller, mobile charger etc and that's before connecting the lighting and loudspeakers? (I might have missed information about this in this gig log or the booth setup video). Thanks again 😀

[@SmilestonesDJAdventures]

@@craigparry282 6 is enough for me but they also make an 8 count box in this same form factor. i just split into a couple multiple outlets if I need. . Here’s what that looks like: cable from mains to my booth’s Furman. Cable from Furman out to an IEC splitter to power both speaker and wash light