delqom

Working as a mobile disk jockey (DJ) brings with it a number of challenges that a resident club DJ doesn’t have.One of the main issues is the need to carry all of that essential DJ equipment to each and every gig, wherever it is.

I’ve worked as a residential club DJ, radio DJ and these days I make my living as a mobile DJ and I love it. Every week I meet new people with diverse musical tastes in all sorts of locations. I’ve played in some fantastic locations including castles, stately homes, tents, gardens, onboard ships and yachts and even one night in a well known London museum. It’s the variety that I love about this work, but lets get back to those challenges.

One of the main problems we must manage as mobile DJs is carrying all the equipment we need to each gig. The club DJ only has to carry his records and maybe some CDs but I have a whole van load of equipment for every gig.

These days I have an assistant who is a great help in setting up and breaking down my PA and lighting rig at each gig. Only a few years ago I needed to do all the setting up and breaking down myself. The key to selecting equipment for mobile use is compactness. It should ideally be small and as light as possible.

The DJ speakers that I use are the powered variety. This means that I don’t need power amplifiers and my system setup is much simpler. Less leads and less to go wrong. For the past two years I’ve been using an excellent pair of active JBL PA speakers and they have proved to be a fantastic choice.

Another key consideration for mobile DJs is lighting and effects. Club DJs don’t usually need to worry about club lighting systems as these are often already in place and may have their own dedicated operators. Working as a mobile DJ means we’ve got to do it all ourselves. But luckily these days there are some compact DJ lights that use LEDs making them relatively lightweight, low power and cool.

But I think the most important piece of DJ gear is the music. That’s not equipment I hear you say, and you’re right. But I’m really referring to the medium which might be vinyl records, CDs, DVDs and increasingly MP3 files. This means I need to carry turntables, CD players, a DVD player and some sort of MP3 player. These days I carry one DJ CD player, a pair of reliable Technics 1210s and my laptop full of MP3 files. I route all of these through my excellent DJ mixer and I’m just about ready for any requests, from Mantovani to the Wombles.