The Secret DJ on walking the fine line between cool and commercial

I’d just walked in to one of Ibiza’s coolest clubs, As usual, the gossip was about one of their manufactured crises. Rather cleverly each year there would be a story leaked about how the venue was being oppressed by The Man, cementing its imagined status as an ‘outsider’ while quietly being just the same ferocious business as everyone else, if not more so. This week ‘The Council’ had said there could be no DJs performing outside. So the famous terrace had the music from the indoor section of the club piped out to it. I emerged outside to see everyone pointing towards an empty booth. There was no one in it. Yet everyone faced towards it and fixed their adoring gaze on the empty air, without exception.

This is the power of cool: the fetishisation of the club had created the Emperor’s New Terrace. And a huge part of a DJ’s job these days is to navigate this line between style and substance – which can come as a shock to anyone who thought it was just about making people dance.

The thing is, cool doesn’t entertain you. Cool cares little about whether people are happy. Often it just means scowling, heads-down, crow-faced techno goths hammering a crowd full of equally uniform sourpusses. Indeed, I’d go as far as to say some of our coolest venues are sometimes almost entirely devoid of atmosphere. But many commercial venues are the opposite: full of bouncy, shiny, clappy-nappies boinging about mindlessly to a soundtrack of Barney The Dinosaur’s greatest hits, a DJ fist-pumping at the crowd like they’re mid-way through some kind of puppet-less Muppet show (personally I’ve always thought it should be the music that should get people punching the air. The DJ shouldn’t need to demonstrate how the human tricep works).

Both ends of the scale are as ludicrous as each other in their way; and naturally, the ideal lies somewhere in the middle of these daft extremes. To be trapped in either is as painful as the other. A true DJ has to be prepared to cope with the extremities, and everything in between. You have to ask in each professional situation: what is my function here? Amateurs only see DJing in mono. There is only one setting for part-timers, and that is the one where they do whatever they want, regardless. But professionals are called on to DJ in many types of set-ups, often with no idea what they are getting into until they’re pushed on stage, blinking their bafflement into the lasers.

Recently I supported a painfully hip mega-star at another club. The very large venue was programmed well for once, with a great variety of styles. The main guy was famously eclectic, which is how I like to play too when I can. The supporting acts were all playing precisely the sort of cool shit I usually play. Consequently I told the venue that I’d play some rare 80s pop records, because frankly, what’s the point of trying to compete with your peers in the same building? In short, I had a lot of fun. And so did everyone else in there.

But then, in the week, the inevitable online bitching began. The word was out that I was ‘cheese’. Lordy! If I had a dime every time someone said I’d been cheesy in a situation where some of the crowd were elderly DJs who’d heard everything and weren’t dancing, and most of the crowd were chuffin’ lovin’ it… well I’d have nearly three dollars.

When I’m being paid the big bucks to headline that main room (and I did, not long after), baby you will get all the far-out cosmic wonders I have to offer. I will play my way. But sometimes I have to do what I am paid to do in a specific situation. And so will you. You will fail if you don’t flex into what is asked of you. Don’t be the kind of DJ with their head down on the warm-up tonking out 135bpm to handful of oppressed early arrivals as soon as the place opens. Or indeed, that big star who parachutes in at peak-time and sprays their frosty-cool down-tempo on a hot room gagging to dance. It is never about either/or. It is always what the unique situation demands.

There were at least a thousand people in the venue that night who didn’t want to hear obscurities in every room. A smart promoter wants to keep all the people that come happy all night. So they stay. And play. And pay. And the key to that is good programming.

A pro is ready for anything; and on the surface, at least, is happy to do whatever is needed. Doing the job well means avoiding polarities and attempting a compromise. and it is always, always, about the crowd. One day in about 10 years’ time you may find that everyone is paying you to do whatever the hell you like; but frankly you will be truly lucky, and until then you have a job to do. Because ultimately this is a business that rewards professionalism – and all too often, ‘cool’ is just another marketing construct.

Not long afterwards I asked the boss of that Ibiza club if he’d ever considered putting on DJs who played dynamically, rather than a continuous minimal drone. He explained to me that they could never have anything that peaked or troughed musically, or people would get excited, then consequently and inevitably tired. So they would leave, which would mean less money at the bar. Now that, Pilgrim, is what we call ‘ice cold’.

This feature is taken from the February issue of Mixmag

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