You bring 50,000 songs.... but what if

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Papa Deuce

Mac Daddy DJ
Aug 8, 2006
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Valley Forge Area
we weren't in a digital age? What if we all still had to carry vinyl? How big would you library be at your events?

First off, even with mp3, I don't even bring 5,000 songs, I bet. If I can't do an event with 5,000, well, something is wrong.

I was just down in my basement, where all my 45's are collecting dust. I would estimate that there are 300 -500 45's. And I had 3 milk crates of albums back in the day when I DJ'd with vinyl. That was it. "Maybe" I brought 1000 songs that were useful to an event. Probably not even that, really.

I imagine I would still only be bringing 1000 or less songs to an event if I was using vinyl. How about you?
 
Right about the same as you Son... :)

That's why I spent soooo many hours browsing through vinyl and then CDs in music stores -- making sure what little money I had to spend, went towards stuff I would play.

I would easily say that I spent 10-15 hours per week browsing, and getting the music I needed.

I'd say without exaggerating, that I could do almost any gig in the world, with the top 20, and 500 other songs I have cherry picked over the years...
 
Great thread Papa. I have a total of about 12 crates and a couple of 45 boxes in the house from my vinyl days. The crates were broken up by genres, reggae crates, hip hop crates, house and freestyle crates. I never brought anything more than what the host of the party called for. If it was a reggae and hip hop party, those were the crates that came out and vice versa. Now back then if someone had a song on a cd or cassette they wanted to hear, I had no problem playing it.

These days it's the same thing. Now I just set up a playlist for the said party and rock out from there. Even though I have 20,000 plus tracks in the lappy and another 5 books of cd's with me, I will only use about 100 songs or less per event.
 
Papa Deuce said:
we weren't in a digital age? What if we all still had to carry vinyl? How big would you library be at your events?

First off, even with mp3, I don't even bring 5,000 songs, I bet. If I can't do an event with 5,000, well, something is wrong.

I was just down in my basement, where all my 45's are collecting dust. I would estimate that there are 300 -500 45's. And I had 3 milk crates of albums back in the day when I DJ'd with vinyl. That was it. "Maybe" I brought 1000 songs that were useful to an event. Probably not even that, really.

I imagine I would still only be bringing 1000 or less songs to an event if I was using vinyl. How about you?
Click to expand...

Not to de-rail your thread but, is it just possible you just tapped the primary reason for the wars on pricing? Nowadays, it's smaller, it's faster, and it's cheaper. Just saying.........
 
Since the music technology for us has changed, it has also changed for John Q Public with their I Pod collection.

They know an incredible volume of music is available (legally) via download, and their expectations of what we carry has expanded dramatically.

And since we are paid to produce, and because all this music IS available to us as DJ's, there really is no excuse for not having a vast library.

A 1TB drive weighs the same whether it has 100 tracks or 100,000.

Personally, I LOVE trolling through Amazon.com for music.
 
Yup, back then the expectation wasnt as high as as today. People were happy with what you had and if you had a particular request, it just made you great in their eyes.
Now, people expect you to have 5 bazillion songs and if you cant fill 1 measly song you are an a55hole. Back on topic, maybe 5-8 crates was what I used to haul for this guy I roadied for, typically sorted by genre but there were 2 crates that were just hits and crowd favorites.
 
We used to roll in with 4 totes, which is about 8 crates of vinyl. And then about a few hundred CD's. That was in the early 90's. Now I have alot more than that on my MacBook and HDD's. Amazing how times have changed.
 
rickryan.com said:
Not to de-rail your thread but, is it just possible you just tapped the primary reason for the wars on pricing? Nowadays, it's smaller, it's faster, and it's cheaper. Just saying.........
Click to expand...

All true, but also far more expensive on many fronts... back then, albums were $6.99 and $7.99... Now CDs are $12 and up. Most folks didn't use $400 turntables. But now people use $400 laptops - $1000 laptops, or digital controllers that cost $300 - $1500.

Nobody had $5000 sets of speakers. Nobody had $500 mixers, let alone $1000 mixers.

45's were about $1 - $1.50.... same as an iTune DL.

Back in the day, my "hardware" probably cost $1500 including speakers, amp, 2 turntables and a few lights.

Today, my "hardware" is in the $10,000 range.

To get back to the topic, there is no way in hell I would DJ today with vinyl if I had to bring 3000 - 50,000 songs.
 
Papa Deuce said:
we weren't in a digital age? What if we all still had to carry vinyl? How big would you library be at your events?
Click to expand...

Um...by "vinyl" you are referring to the material construction of a CD wallet, right? :sqrolleyes:

My "core" collection of CDs was carried in a single 250 slot CaseLogic nylon CD case. The case was half full - every CD had a track listing in another pouch. So...it was less than 125 CDs...and was probably around 100-ish CDs work of music. So, that is somewhere in the 1500-2000 song range. This case went with me to every event.

The "core" collection consisted of a few different sets of CDs. I am a dance teacher and retired competitive dancer, so I had my own "essentials" collection for Country and Western dancing (popular line dances, two step, waltz, etc). I had a track listing of the Platinum Series and Mobile Beat Dance - and made my own versions of those two collections. I also had the Mobile Beat Top 200 list in that case as well. I remade the CDs every year as the list was updated.

All of those CDs were in a spreadsheet. I had a 1/2" binder with four different print outs of all the music in that case: by Disc, by Artist, by Title, and by BPM.

I had other CD wallets that had "extra" music - oldies, disco, Top 40, Promo Only Mainstream Radio, Promo Only Country, etc. I had two cases for country dance music, one for west coast swing dance music, one for ballroom dance music. I would take whatever additional CDs were necessary for the event. Typically, I had 3 to 5 CD wallets with me at any given event. So, overall, I had 3k-5k songs at any given event.
 
On occasion, I do all vinyl "Sock Hop" & "Oldies" parties (50's - 60's), and various Anniversaries and B-Day Parties (60 yr +). I have approximately 10,000 (original or double-sided re-issue) 45's that are mint or near-mint condition at my disposal. I also have two TTXI Numark turntables on which to play them.

It wasn't until a four or five years ago I was still copying from 45 to CD whenever I need a song that I did not have in my CD collection. Now, I've gotten lazy and just go to Amazon.com or Wal-Mart.com and download what I need to my Laptop.

Nevertheless, there is still a need once-in-awhile for Vinyl parties.

I also have an AMI-Rowe R-84, 45-Jukebox in my office/game room...and about 10,000 A- to C+ quality 45's for play in the jukebox. It's a PITA to always change out the 100 45's in the jukebox, but I still enjoy seeing people's faces when they see it.

Back in the lat 90's I was carrying one turntable and about 10 boxes of 45's with me to gigs...to make sure I could field all the requests. What a back breaker during that time period.

Laptop and CD's for me now.
 
soundinmotiondj said:
Um...by "vinyl" you are referring to the material construction of a CD wallet, right? :sqrolleyes:

My "core" collection of CDs was carried in a single 250 slot CaseLogic nylon CD case. The case was half full - every CD had a track listing in another pouch. So...it was less than 125 CDs...and was probably around 100-ish CDs work of music. So, that is somewhere in the 1500-2000 song range. This case went with me to every event.

The "core" collection consisted of a few different sets of CDs. I am a dance teacher and retired competitive dancer, so I had my own "essentials" collection for Country and Western dancing (popular line dances, two step, waltz, etc). I had a track listing of the Platinum Series and Mobile Beat Dance - and made my own versions of those two collections. I also had the Mobile Beat Top 200 list in that case as well. I remade the CDs every year as the list was updated.

All of those CDs were in a spreadsheet. I had a 1/2" binder with four different print outs of all the music in that case: by Disc, by Artist, by Title, and by BPM.

I had other CD wallets that had "extra" music - oldies, disco, Top 40, Promo Only Mainstream Radio, Promo Only Country, etc. I had two cases for country dance music, one for west coast swing dance music, one for ballroom dance music. I would take whatever additional CDs were necessary for the event. Typically, I had 3 to 5 CD wallets with me at any given event. So, overall, I had 3k-5k songs at any given event.
Click to expand...

:sqerr: I believe this is what he means.
Gramophone record - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia@@AMEPARAM@@/wiki/File:Vynil_record.jpg" class="image"><img alt="" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c8/Vynil_record.jpg/325px-Vynil_record.jpg"@@AMEPARAM@@commons/thumb/c/c8/Vynil_record.jpg/325px-Vynil_record.jpg
 
Hmm my numark mixers would run from 300 and up. The 1200 Turntables with proper stylus etc consumed around 400 each. Cerwin Vega Speakers were around 600 bucks a pair and my amps were around 300 each. along with some enhancement components provided by ADC. I had roughly 3 grand in my setup or a bit more. My vinyl like my CDs and now like my files I brought in excess never having a stump the DJ experience. Its just how I roll. Having attempted on occasion to slim down the load in. Inevitably I would get bit by that one request. Needless to say it only happened once or twice and I would bring all my party albums to each event all genres. I would travel with no less than 6 crates and on occasion more. I have my collection tucked away in my bedroom and now have a USB turntable which I can snag a few hard to find gems. I will never get rid of my vinyl. I just moved up to a 1TB HD and wont need much more space than that anytime soon.
 
I used to carry 4 or 5 cases of albums and around 2000 45s. ( about 1/5 of the collection at the time). I now carry about 7500 songs on the lappy and rarley get asked for something I don't have
 
Is anybody interested in purchasing a 1200? I have already sold one but I am looking to sell the other one now!
 
Thunder said:
Is anybody interested in purchasing a 1200? I have already sold one but I am looking to sell the other one now!
Click to expand...

What year was it manufactured and what cartridge & stylus does it have?
 
Geesh. I may be showing my age here but I used to bring like twenty Cassette tapes.
The quintessential push play dj!
I was scripted by the company I was working for. Two dinner music tapes and rest of the music was FF or REW to on a couple more.
I would bring some of the top hits mostly various artist cassettes which I typically broke into if I went over.

Those were days of queing brother!

Paul
 
DJ Paul...I remember those days too! Had three cassette decks (Teac, Pioneer, Merantz (I think) and one turntable (Dual). Those were interesting days; cassettes and vinyl 45's and on occasion a few LPs. Of course my eyesight was much better back then.
Heck, I recall that at one event when I was doing this for pay, I even brought a Reel-to-Reel for Cocktail Music. What a load-in that was back then. Whew!
 
Every event I've done to-date (CD based) I have been able to fly through without issue on a collection on-hand at all times of 5k-6k, probably only about 25% of that ever used, and supplemented by specialty (think themed, holiday, etc) music I take to the event because I know ahead of time.

While I do get the points of those who talk about the ready availability of storage space now, having 50,000-100,000 songs is STILL unnecessary and absurd, compounded by the fact that dj's with these collections have not just the hits, but complete albums of filler that are nothing but wasted space, and many have literally GIGS upon GIGS of dupes that they can't justify the time or effort to weed out because the space is so cheap.

Its not about having the most songs, its about having the right songs - which touches on what Rick said - no one doing what we do needs to buy albums. Especially not any more.

Individual tracks, or box sets/compilations/best-of's.

Nobody cares that you have the entire Tom Jones Discography on-hand because all they're ever going to want to hear are "Whats up pussycat," "it's not unusual," and "green green grass of home."

You show me any dj on Craigslist boasting 100k+ songs, and I will show you an ILLEGAL library that I can whittle down to 2k-3k songs (being VERY generous) that will EVER get played at an event.

End of story.:sqwink:
 
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