Will the Real DJ Hero Please Stand Up

I take pride in my talent of being a true DJ that can mix, scratch, read a crowd and do live remixes in front of 200+ people. There is no better feeling than when I pick the perfect song to play, tease it a bit with scratching in a lyric or two, mix it seamlessly so both songs are playing as one and then watch the energy of the crowd rise to a point it’s never been. Talk about an adrenaline rush. But try and do that 100 times in one night. That is the sign of a true DJ.

Last night as I was leaving the office, I received a call from a friend who bought the new DJ Hero game for PlayStation. I laughed, because I knew he would want to challenge me, and that's funny due to the combination of him having no rhythm and his love of video games.


After playing, and mastering the game, I realized the feeling that the game produces is similar to the one I described above. I have to admit that the game had its moments - I had to use the skills I have as a DJ and apply them to a character in the game - he was a 400 pound man spinning in a subway car in the middle of a rave in an empty parking lot. The eerie thing about the game that I noticed is when my friend would incorrectly mix a sequence the virtual crowd would boo him, causing him to lose points.

That is both exactly like being a real DJ, and nothing like it. Let me explain. In our profession, if the DJ cannot mix, fumbles the beats, or even selects the wrong type of song to play, the crowd will let him or her know. They will not boo like the virtual crowd in the game, but they'll stop dancing. The repercussions of being a poor DJ are having poor events and unhappy clients, followed by bad reviews and ultimately leading to no work. In the game, the worst that can happen is that you lose points and restart the game. As I was leaving his house, I thought about how distant the DJ hero game was to reality.

When it comes to DJing a wedding, it's not a game. A real DJ hero will show up, mix great music and get the guests dancing and having a wonderful time. Unfortunately, there are DJ's out there like I described above - the ones who fumble the songs and empty the dancefloor, and in real life, there's no restart button. There's no virtual crowd to boo and they won't be waiting with open arms when you show up again. At a wedding, the crowd from the game is your family and friends and they won't forget the music and the time they had at the wedding. If you fumble, they won't be waiting with open arms.

-Matt