The Clever DJ

Rise of the Bedroom DJs - Ep #36

• Ilia & Nino • Episode 36

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Ever wondered how a hobbyist DJ spinning tracks from their bedroom could reshape an entire industry? Tune in as Ilia and Nino unpack the seismic shifts in the DJing world catalyzed by digital technology and the pandemic. We explore the fascinating rise of bedroom DJs, especially those aged 30-50, who’ve transitioned from home setups to making waves on the big stage. This episode is packed with humor and keen insights as we dissect the differences between online and live DJing, examining how these new routines are redefining the landscape for both beginners and veterans alike.

Join us as we navigate the challenges and opportunities that come with this new era of DJing. Discover how to stand out in a crowded market, the irreplaceable value of live event experience, and hear inspiring success stories from those who've mastered the transition. Whether you're just starting out or a seasoned professional, our discussion provides actionable tips and invaluable perspectives on maintaining quality and value in an ever-evolving scene. Get ready to rethink what it means to be a successful DJ in today's dynamic industry.

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Ilia:

Welcome back. Welcome back to another episode of the Clever DJ. I'm going to give you a quick intro to those who are listening to us or watching us for the first time on YouTube or any of the other platforms. My name is Ilya. I've been DJing for about two years now. I was a bartender who then met this guy beside me and told him hey, man, just teach me how to DJ, I have the gear. I'm not really getting it. Come on, take me on and I'll make your business better and kind of became your photographer, videographer. But then we focus more on the dj stuff. Yeah, um and yeah and uh. I do a variety of events, um and uh, less, less of the stuff that nino does, but, uh, you go ahead okay, so I'm a professional dj, been djing for more than 20 years.

Nino:

Um started off with the live events, more like clubs and stuff bars. Now I'm doing more private events and weddings, primarily with a roster of 15 DJs under my company. So that's just a little bit about me.

Ilia:

Yeah, and once I get into the wedding stuff myself, I can take over and you don't have to do it anymore. Do you think you'll do it?

Nino:

forever? No, no, definitely not forever. But you know, I'll do it as long as I can do it. For Even then, if I decide to retire, I'll probably come back. Somebody will probably, hey, remember you used to DJ, can you DJ my wedding? I'm like, okay, fine, and then I'll probably come back. Somebody will probably, hey, remember you used to dj, can you dj my wedding? I'm like, okay, fine, and then I'll probably come back. Anyway, that'd be interesting. It's always the case.

Ilia:

It's usually like that so, if you didn't guess yet, this is the banter podcast. We just chill and talk, uh, about life, but everything is somehow tied into tied into djing. So we talk about djing, but we are just a plethora of subjects and it's to help beginner djs and to also entertain beginners and professionals, and we have just a bunch of different people listening to us and watching us, so it's for everyone well, the point of view of a beginner and a professional.

Nino:

If you guys have time, if you guys like our stuff, look back at our previous episodes to check them out. So there's a lot of good content that we've talked about in the past.

Ilia:

Definitely, today we're going to cover something that you know it's kind of old news but at the same time, the effect of it is still here and and it's just developing, um, and it is the fact that bedroom djs, pretty much, are taking over the scene. Um, and it's for just a variety of reasons which we're going to cover and just kind of how it affects, uh, the djs who started the way you used. You didn't you know?

Ilia:

yeah or you know, you kind of started live. Yes, practice at home, but but the main stage was going to gigs in front of like a crowd, right.

Nino:

So it's different when you're doing it in in the bedroom or uh, or doing it in front of people it's totally different, because you said it I couldn't.

Ilia:

I couldn't be adult, I couldn't be mature about that. I just had to check it.

Nino:

You thought about something you dirty dirty boy, you're a dirty mind, huh. But yeah, it's different Doing it in the bedroom and doing it in front of people. Yeah, I know what you mean.

Ilia:

I can't see it properly either, without laughing, but it is Most DJs oh, I'm not going to say most DJs. People are going to be like, oh, you said, most DJs, lots of DJs. Now they get the gear, get it from their computer unless it's an all-in-one and that's it. That's how they practice and that's how they perform for the longest time. Then maybe they'll go online and at some point, some of them decide to do live gigs. Right Now.

Ilia:

That's really affecting, uh, the industry because it's, um, affecting the quality, uh, the, the whole sales process. You know and how you know how it devalues, uh, some of us, uh, and you know and how you know how it devalues, uh, some of us, uh, and you know I'm not really talking about myself as much because, uh, I'm kind of in between. You know, I, I, a lot of my djing is at home because I'm practicing, but I'm not a bedroom dj, right, I did it to get out there. Yeah, yeah, it's been really affecting you and people like you. Well, maybe not you, because you already have an established business, but people who have been there for a couple years, or four or five, ten years, a lot of and I think a lot of the club um uh scene is affected, especially because, um, these bedroom djs do a lot of.

Nino:

They realize that they practice at home and then they can do like routines and stuff. And then they get online and they do routines and then people are like oh, so great, so great, amazing, and then they get recognition for that right um, and then they start getting booked like people are looking at their followers and just all their comments and they're like whoa, this guy has a following and whatever is popular online. And that's the thing. Now they're getting a lot of recognition from that stuff. Exactly, it doesn't translate well when you go online live Right Online is different. There's nobody around you. Right um on online is different. There's nobody around you. You can be recording um on like, like twitch, and then you'd be doing it. It doesn't even feel. It feels like people are watching you potentially, but it still doesn't feel like you're doing it in front of people. It's, you're still nonchalantly just djing right stick to the doing it.

Nino:

There's no pressure. Pressure like with people watching you right like djing, you're gonna the doing it there's no pressure, pressure like with people watching you right like djing.

Ilia:

You're gonna say doing it all the time. No, no, I, I, I. I agree with you. Uh, to some extent, because I don't know if you remember, if you remember what it's like when I went on instagram for the first time live, I was djing and I knew that it wasn't like you know the best back then, and then I saw two people start watching and, man, I started sweating.

Nino:

No, to some extent you'll still get.

Ilia:

You'll still get whatever they think I'm really bad, right, yeah, and just so happens, one of them was a DJ who has a huge business in this in the U? S and then the other one is uh is a DJ that's local here and uh, you know I, he knows I started DJing, but he didn't hear my stuff before. And then the first time, two years ago, it goes on, goes on Instagram and that's that's the first impression. So you know, I, I was, I did like four or five transitions and then I just ended it. I ended stream like okay, let's, let me quit on a high note here. So, but but you're right for the, for the most part it's, it's gonna be you. You have somewhere to. You can quit, you can, you can close it, you can come back.

Nino:

Yeah, turn it off, right, and then you can choose not to let them watch or whatever right you have to control. But when you're there, live in front of people, you have no choice but to show up right, and sometimes your nerves get the best of you. But you know, you have that live experience already. It's totally different.

Ilia:

And I wouldn't say it's just nerves. It's just like you lack some of the core skills that are required to run such an event, to make such an event successful. Yeah, so if it's like um, more like an electronic or like night or something like very like, very niche based, you know something like maybe a rap night and you're just very good at it because you've been doing that for a while and you know the sea, like the scene, that people yeah, you're comfortable with it, you'll probably be fine. But if it comes to a wedding or some other more intricate gig, even if you've done all that type of music, you have no skills of dealing with people unless you have it from somewhere else.

Nino:

I've seen bedroom DJs who do cool transitions online but then when they do it live, get no reaction. So it's like online they're like everybody's like fire emoji, fire emoji. But then when they're on live, live, it's like there's no reaction, so it doesn't translate. Well, it's a different crowd, right, sometimes they don't appreciate stuff like that. Right, you got to get more. You have to play what they like, right, and make it more obvious. Sometimes the transitions go over their heads, right, because they're just normal people, so people want to hear the song as it was originally played or made.

Ilia:

Yes and um, or or maybe they're just not. There's just a certain type of Twitch, uh like a stream crowd who will react different. It's a different community.

Nino:

Yeah Right, yeah, so a lot of them are DJs too, right, so they, they, they relate to to that stuff, those transitions, because they want to do stuff like that too.

Ilia:

Yeah, you're in different field now, so it's a different playground, so you're probably going to get different reactions and uh, yeah, so really this is. There's so much more we can say as an intro to the situation. This is this still feels kind of like an intro, because the details are why is this happening, like why, let's get into why is this happening, and it's obviously covid pandemic was a big part of it yeah, we were forced to go online, no live events at all, for like what?

Nino:

two years almost.

Ilia:

Yeah, give or take, you know there were some you could do, I was still doing gigs. I can't believe that people said back in the day I remember going to my friend's a close friend of mine she was getting married and at her wedding we couldn't dance more than a certain number of people on the dance floor. Yes, yes, and if you came without a significant other you'd have to sit somewhere else. Yes, yes, it was so weird Bro.

Nino:

There was one gig where I was DJing at they had bubbles of circles, like only the person that you came with can be in the bubble, and they had like five bubbles.

Ilia:

Wait, actual bubbles.

Nino:

Yeah, like they made a tape with the circle around it, oh I thought it was an actual no, no, no, no. I mean, you can only dance in that area. Don't go close to other mobiles, right?

Ilia:

That's crazy, I would wait and get married later, but nobody knew Wow yeah, Nobody knew how long this was going to last right.

Ilia:

That's the first reason. Now, why is it so easy for them to actually do? It is because lots of people had nothing to do during that time. People were unemployed, or people finally had a lot more time to do other things because they weren't in traffic or doing something else. People just took on two hobbies. So a lot of musicians were like, let me become a dj. Yeah, and then here here you are 50 million new djs just got created overnight very accessible for people.

Nino:

They wanted relief, right, and they kind of missed those events, those music, so people would watch those DJs online and the DJs would go online because they had nothing else to do alive right. So it was like a kind of like a give and take sort of thing. Like the people would want to watch someone.

Ilia:

DJ. Oh, so you're talking about actual people who were already DJs. Yeah, I'm talking about people who became. Yeah, that too, and I'm talking about, like the crowd.

Nino:

People were craving music around that time, like live music, so people would watch them and support the DJs.

Ilia:

There were so many like gigs raided right by police and stuff but right by police and stuff, but uh, because people like it's it's tough to contain people for so long and tell them not to do something right and the other thing is a lot. I'm not saying it happened overnight. Even before covid the stuff wasn't that expensive if you want to get into it, but it became more, like you said, accessible to people. Even the gear it's not that expensive if you want to get into it controller literally like 200 bucks, less than even like smaller ones.

Nino:

Uh, music is everywhere online. Yeah, very accessible, even if you pay for.

Ilia:

It's really cheap. It's yeah, um and um.

Nino:

You should be paying for it now uh speakers are very inexpensive as well yeah, I can get like the cheaper kind, right you? Don't even need to buy them. You can rent them.

Ilia:

So and lots of uh businesses clued in on what people are doing, so they created an easier way to rent or obtain through like free financing, I mean like zero, zero percent financing and just other, you know, promotional methods of how to get people into certain industries.

Nino:

One of them it made it easier for for yeah, for djs, but then at the same time, a lot of big companies, big dj companies, actually closed down at the same time too, because of the lack of uh live events yeah, lots of businesses not just djs, a lot of djs. A lot of companies had to pivot right, close down and do something else.

Ilia:

So this led to market saturation. There's so many DJs out there and, once again, if you're good like that's what I'm going to say now before we get to the end of the podcast If you're good, then sure it's challenging, but you're still going to get your work right, maybe even more than before. It really challenging, but you're still gonna get your work. Yeah, right, maybe even more than before. It really depends, right, like for me, the covet years like when, when, when it just hit uh, from 2020 to 2021, 2022 yeah, were a couple of the best years in my life of my life from in some like professional perspectives.

Ilia:

Right, I got to uh get into certain like hobbies. It wasn't DJing exactly yet, but you know I got more into like production and stuff like that and you know I improved myself in so many ways and then I got promoted at work and I got better positions and stuff Like I got paid more. So it just I was like you know what? I have all this extra money now Let me invest into something and I'm home like all the time.

Nino:

Just joking, give me some money. Yeah, give me some money.

Ilia:

Mister, I have 50 gigs a month or I don't know how many. Give you some money and that also pretty much is the rise of bedroom DJs created. How do you say this Democratization? It's pretty much a democracy of if you want to get into this, you can, because everyone's allowed, everyone has the access to it.

Nino:

It's a good thing, right? Because you know, honestly, I've read some statistics.

Nino:

We're really struggling that democratization statistics that a lot of um, um, uh, what's it called? Uh, 30 and 40, 50 year olds are starting to get into djing for the first time. Like this was just from the past, like couple of years, like, and the pandemic I I'm sure the pandemic really just fueled that a lot faster. But the statistics are great, like that's good thing, that's a that's amazing thing for for the dj community. Right, more people will appreciate the craft and they're starting to like what they do. Right, so it's a good, it's a good thing. I I. I think it is right. But at the same time, you want to stand out from the rest too, right?

Ilia:

but that's what I like about this. This also led to diversity. Yes, that's one thing that that I I'm all for, because now djs like all these no names, who got to practice for two, three years, yeah, behind closed doors, decided hey, hey, you know what, I'm going to take my skills live, I'm going to take it outdoors and kudos to them for actually doing it. It's not easy to do right. It's not easy to do so now, because of their specific kind of skill set and how they saw DJing is and how they did it. They brought in other skills to the, to the, you know, to the field and and they're doing things differently, shaping it differently, yeah, which is affecting everything and everyone. And if it's good, it's great, right.

Nino:

If it's not, it kind of dies out you know it's, it's, it's a revolution like that. This, um digital aspect, now it's showed that, uh, that, that it's, it's going in that direction right even as, as club djs, um, like they had the recognition from before, they're getting on twitch now, too.

Ilia:

They're getting to to do uh routines on instagram now, too, it's it's just the way it's evolving the actual industry, so it's a good thing yeah, lots of success stories, like I, actually I, when we were writing this podcast uh episode, when we were preparing it, I was thinking let me see how many people actually became popular before they were, before anyone knew about them, because they were just bedroom djs, producers, just like. Dozens of them, dozens of I'm going over all the names and and you can just write it down Uh, bedroom DJs, um, who became popular over the recent years, and there's so many that I don't even know about and and it. It shows their, their career and they're telling their story. I went on Reddit and the. You know the. They have the ask me anything um, uh thread there and they're talking about how they mainly had the chance to get into that industry because they had a lot more time during the pandemic. So it happened before, but there was a huge rise during the pandemic because you were literally home 24 7 at some point, literally took advantage of it, right, yeah, so that's that. So when you think about the same quality over quantity, you realize that it doesn't matter how many DJs are out there. It doesn't matter At the end of the day, like if you can prove that you're the quality DJ that that client is looking for. It doesn't matter how many people just like got into the industry, the saturation and everything right. Like you have a strong business, you know, but if you're just building for the first time, you have to show why you stand out live, why you're different, and that's that's kind of it might be in the future outlook I have on this, where if a client reaches out to you and you're lucky enough to have someone kind of solicit you instead of the other way around you have to explain or whether you are the one you have to explain why that person who's charging them 400 bucks, who has no, you know, online presence presence of him actually being at gigs or her being at gigs, but you can see them that they are streamers or whatever um may not be able to bring the quality to their live event, like especially a wedding or something as intricate as that.

Ilia:

It doesn't have to be a wedding, but we usually talk about that. Now again, I'm sure a lot of bedroom DJs are listening to us. Nothing against that. But if you don't have the skills of doing a live event, you can't charge the skills of doing a live event, you can't charge as much right, and on top of that. If you do have it, it's easy for you to prove why you should be the one taking that gig, and that's, I think, what you, what you, should focus on.

Nino:

Kudos to you for for building those transitions and gigs online, but the fact of the matter is you need to be doing live events for to to actually level up your djing, because it's all about playing in front of people. Djing is is literally reading people and playing them, playing for them and making them dance. So that's what you got to do, right. It's a's a totally different thing, but you know, I know a lot of club DJs that are griping on bedroom DJs saying why are these guys getting all these gigs? Now? They can't play live, but you know they're making transitions. When they get on live, the club DJs are like they don't really understand a lot of okay.

Ilia:

So to make it clear, we're not talking about all bedroom djs and streamers. We're talking about the ones who kind of just use it, do it as a hobby, and they they don't know the etiquette, you know, and you know. They don't know how how things are done, live, how things are done when you're djing with other people, all that stuff, they just there's no knowledge of djing other than the actual playing the music and then they get booked for a live event and then they they bomb pretty much whether it's their client relations or you know, the other djs they're dealing with.

Ilia:

That's what we're, that's what. So there's that, because I feel like the crosshairs is on me. Are you speaking against bedroom DJs, like we're? Like, half of your listeners are bedroom DJs. But I'm talking about the fact that there's a clear divide between people who do it as a hobby and then decide let's go live, let's make money yeah, let's go. Let's, let's go live, let's make money, yeah. And people who actually practice to be live djs, to go and play in clubs like those bars yeah, weddings, birthdays, etc they have the, that knowledge to play in front of people.

Nino:

So they, when they see a, a bedroom, dj crash and fail, they're like, yeah, inside. They're like, ah see, I knew it. I knew it, you're evil.

Ilia:

I would never feel like that, but then now no, no, no, no.

Nino:

But veteran DJs are like these bedroom DJs are taking their work Like literally, so that's why they're kind of like hurt you took my job, you took my job. But now you know it's the wave of the future. Man, you got to be doing online stuff, so it's, and club djs are doing stuff like that, now getting getting more online marketing and stuff. So, hey, time to wake up. You have to have a little bit of both online and live stuff, so, yes, learn both.

Ilia:

Learn both skill sets. Learn, I mean, continue practicing at home, I mean, that's very necessary but learn what is required of you when you actually go to a live event, whatever venue you're interested in, whatever type of gigs you like to be a part of, there are lots of things that are important to know aside from playing the music. So, yeah, lots of things have changed uh, in the last five years. Can you believe it's been five years, been five, five plus years. The the covid cases uh start kind of like uh, going up in 2019, end of 2019, right, yeah, um, but uh, like we said, it's not just covid, it just there was always the whole bedroom.

Ilia:

Dj phenomena. Where, know you see, people are showing up in the industry in live gigs with zero experience, at a pre-big gig where it requires a certain type of a doing this as a hobby and you're treating this as just something you know to play music for fun and you're not focusing on all the skills of being a dj and dealing with the crowd, dealing with the clients, dealing with running the business then you're up for a rude awakening, yeah make sure, if you're doing live, uh, online stuff and you have success online, make sure you try to get at least a couple of live gigs right.

Nino:

Yes, exactly, at least a lot, at least with your friends, right, just just to get it playing in front of people right because that field, you know that a person coming up to you interrupting, telling you certain things, requesting, songs for me.

Ilia:

Requesting a song with with their, their phone in your face or getting drunk and just deciding. You know what. This is a good time to talk to you. You need that live, live, aspect.

Nino:

Man for it to translate. Well, live right yeah.

Ilia:

So if, let's say, you're a bedroom or whatever DJ like you, you do on, you stream and you never really had the live aspect, uh, you never really experienced a live aspect of the job, uh, of the of this career, but you have it from other kind of um experience, uh, in the past. Or you know, you've been, you haven't been doing it, but you've been theoretically, you've been like learning about it. Then, yeah, that's, that's a different, that's a different thing. Then that's pretty much what I've been doing, right, I've been learning, practicing, taking a couple of courses, but then the whole goal was to end up doing live. Doing it live, yeah. So how, how did you get affected, uh, by the whole last four or five years of COVID and the surplus of bedroom DJs coming to the market and the oversaturation?

Nino:

Let us know your experiences in this past couple of years and what your take is on this actual subject, If you have anything to say. Did you think we're spot on, or you?

Ilia:

know All right Well, have a great one. Thank you for joining another episode of the Clever DJ.

Nino:

See you, guys, in the next one. See you in the next one. Peace, we'll see you next time.