Nye How Was It For You

[MintyDave 0]

Well it was moderate for me, a sign of the times for sure.

 

The bar manager was celebrating her 20th year in charge at my local army welfare centre where i gigged last night. She reported the worst ever new year regarding attendance and takings - about 50% of what was expected considering previous years.

 

Not 1 person so much as even smiled at me as new year struck as they staggered round the floor snogging etc. In fact i could have left a playlist on auto pilot all night and nobody would have cared or noticed.

 

Mind you its not the nicest of places with the nicest of people. I was there out of gratitude to the manager who had sourced me quite a few gigs this year and it was 5 mins from home which meant i was at a party by 1.30, which nobody turned up to in comparison to last year.

 

Chins up for 2009 and may your venues remain trading :djuhi:

[Raymilkybarkid 0]

Well here we go again people have forgot how to let there hair down.

I had a night in with the Family having a traditional home NYE even my 2 (19 & 17) teenage sons and some of their freinds joined us wrinklies.

We spent most of the evening playing my old 12" & 7" singles as their mates were so interested in my DJing career. The boys refused to pay to go into their local pub.

[Steve_Mitchell 0]

Mine was pants also.. The venue offered a Buffet (decent one) a band (which were very good) and a DJ (which was excellent LOL).

 

They charged £45 pp. The venue was a hotel which is split up into, function room, bar, hotel residents and resturant.

 

The function room will house 200. The tickets went on general sale and only sold 53. So the early part of the evening was DEAD! At about 11.30 the people from the bar etc got invited to the function room. It was a little better then but not much.

 

So the moral of the story is people didn`t want to pay the £45 per head.

[McCardle 1]

£45 per head is a bit excessive. How much for an Arm?

[Robster 0]

I had a great one was at my local pub which charged £5 a ticket which you got your first drink free and at 10:30 hot roast pork and hot thick slices of beef on barms were served. I played till 2 but it flew by and i had only one request all night as they were all dancing and enjoying themselves , I had four pints and six drambuies bought me the locals ..luckily i can leave my gear there so i packed up today and started drinking when i finished playing music last night ,,the pub is five mins walk from my house and the drambuies made the journey seem even shorter lol

 

Happy new year guys!!

[Revelationroadshow 0]

We had two rigs out last night and I've just recieved the following email:

 

Hi Matt

 

Just wanted to say a big thank you for your help with the arrangements for the disco last night. Everything went really well and Ben was fantastic. I have had many good comments about the disco and Ben, and I have given your details to a lot of customers!

 

Know its pretty early but could I provisionally book Ben again for next New Years eve please? I want to make sure we get him! We would also probably be interested in doing some Christmas parties throughout December as well which I can discuss with you at a later date if that's ok.

 

Please also pass my thanks onto Ben.

 

Happy New Year to you

 

Katherine

 

My night was superb and great fun, so it seems we've had fantastic coments all round! I have to say, I absolutely LOVE doing new year. There's a certain "buzz" you get from helping people see the new year in. Once you've had it once you have to have it every year!

[davemoody 0]

I had a crackin night last night.

 

Played at a local village hall for a change with only about 50 - 60 people.

 

Only got paid £200 (the last few years got £1000 plus) but with this one got to spend the night with family and friends as most of them live in the area so it didnt seem like work really.

 

Played from 8.30 till 9.15 and then after buffet and raffles played from 11 - 12.30

 

Nice and easy. Nobody left and everyone and I mean everyone danced right till the end.

 

Miss the money side of it but got well fed and free drinks all night and thoroughly enjoyed myself this year for a change.

[Big B 0]

"Oh what a night"

 

my night went from being dam good to absolutly brill everybody up dancing and singing all night and when i stuck the new years eve countdown jingle on at midnight the room erupted with cheers and singing of auld lang syne.

 

what a great night looking forward to next year as i have been booked to go back for next new year.

 

here are the comments:

 

"Once again you did a brilliant job, all the staff and customers in our pub had a great time and we are looking forward to having you as our DJ again. Happy new year to you and once again many many thanks for a great time". Brian ( Landlord )

[Kingy 0]

I had 422 people sat down for a dinner dance faeturing 60's band, "The Fortunes", who were quite good.

 

It was a good night however the piper from 11.40 to 11.50 killed the atmosphere and I had to get it back up for 12. It was lucky I had a few floor fillers ready!!

 

Last song of 2008 was Gonzales "Haven't stopped dancin' yet", looped into 12.

 

12.05, fireworks, so all out into the cold!!!

 

1 am finish and a chinese buffet for all!!

 

tickets £75 each.

[Danno13 0]

I don't think £45 a head for a hotel is excessive at all! With a band and a DJ, its pretty cheap!

 

I was doing a pub/restaurant that was £40 a ticket with a buffet (although decent food..) champange on arrival and little old me till 4am and they had 120+ people in, dance floor (well, actually its a carpet!) holds about 25-30 but at least 50 odd were rammed onto it and more on the surroundings for the countdown!!

Edited January 1, 2009 by Danno13

[vokf 0]

Mine was good. It was in a Restaurant, charging £75/head for a 5 course meal.

This was in the pretty well-off area of Epping.

 

Due to space, I had a minimal rig, with a 2' wide stand and speakers on the floor either side, and a t-bar behind me (also had low headroom) -nice and easy set-up. I also ditched the LED lights and went 2 x moonflowers+dynaroll.

 

 

I also brought my LED message display. This was pre-programmed to a schedule to display different messages. I'd spoken to my client, and she was keen to promote her cocktail menu - so this was also included in the text.

 

I was pre-warned that no-one would dance until midnight, so background music only - the tracks I'd selected were pretty varied, nothing too recent (I guessed the age group would be 35+) - and tracks like "Iko Iko" etc had people singing along.

 

At 11pm, we were playing by some older ones.. I nipped out for a comfort break and when I got in, most people were up dancing, to the supposedly background tracks!

The client waved for us to turn it up, so lights on, and from then on, it was a cheese fest.

 

Carmen took some good photos of couples and handed out cards that showed the gallery url, with a 10% discount for bookings on the flip-side of the card.

The last song was going to be "Time of My Life" (requested), but the owners parents arrived and were very sweet to me and Carmen and asked if we would play some Chuck Berry for them.

Extra brownie points, and Carmen and I had a brief boogie!

 

I didn't see any hint of people worrying about 09, these people were out to have fun - judging by the many bottles of wine of each table, I don't think they were worried about money!

 

 

[glenn knights 0]

Happy new year everyone.

 

My gig was fantastic - it was for a residents association at a local town hall with about 160 guests.

At the request of the organisers I spent the first hour entertaining the youngsters then kicked off properly at 9. I rekon about 90% of the people there spent 100% of their time dancing.

 

Big round of applause and cheers at the end and a thankyou speach from the committee chairman. And a booking for next nye !!

 

Thats more like it !!!

 

All the best,

 

Glenn.

[trebor171170 0]

NYE started off slow but got better

 

THEN

 

found to my dismay that my Auld Lang Syne was damaged beyond repair

 

Started getting grief :nono: from a few people. nothing I could do really. Tried to explain BUT alcohol makes people say silly things like "I'm going to trading standards and the CAB"

 

Cost my part of my fee to get them off my back.

 

In 15yrs plus I have never had a NYE turned sour

 

 

[Dukesy 0]

NYE started off slow but got better

 

THEN

 

found to my dismay that my Auld Lang Syne was damaged beyond repair

 

Started getting grief :nono: from a few people. nothing I could do really. Tried to explain BUT alcohol makes people say silly things like "I'm going to trading standards and the CAB"

 

Cost my part of my fee to get them off my back.

 

In 15yrs plus I have never had a NYE turned sour

 

Amazing how the perception of the public changes when they have a complaint about a service, but don't want to pay a sensible service fee for any other night of the year?!

Tip - have lyrics on hand - just in case you have to sing it next time!

I dare you to tell us how much you coughed-up for this 'indiscretion'?

 

Cheers for the pics Jas!

[Kingy 0]

NYE started off slow but got better

 

THEN

 

found to my dismay that my Auld Lang Syne was damaged beyond repair

 

Started getting grief :nono: from a few people. nothing I could do really. Tried to explain BUT alcohol makes people say silly things like "I'm going to trading standards and the CAB"

 

Cost my part of my fee to get them off my back.

 

In 15yrs plus I have never had a NYE turned sour

 

Even though I don't have a very good voice, I would have told the crowd I was going to creat the atmosphere and cajooled them to sing along with me.

 

Trading Standards, ridiculous comment to make, typical drunks!

[trebor171170 0]

 

I dare you to tell us how much you coughed-up for this 'indiscretion'?

 

 

It was 10%

This year going to have 5 copies of it.. lol

[RobbieD 0]

I do NYE in a restaurant. This year less tables were booked, then they had some cancellations, and two tables didn't turn up on the night (despite having paid a deposit). So we had around 50 people - half what we had last year.

 

At 10.30 they were on the coffee, but no sign of anyone getting up to dance. The previous year loads were up dancing before coffee was even served. Then I spotted a table of 10 getting up and putting their coats on to leave! I was thinking that it was going to turn in to a very poor night.

 

But then a few got up to dance and by 11 I had nearly everyone up dancing (leaving the rest of the venue empty) and it turned in to a great night.

 

Due to the poor bookings this year, the management had changed the end time from 2am to 1am a week ago. This was a good move - at 1am (with 20 customers left) they still wanted more, but I think it would have been hard work going on until 2am.

Edited January 1, 2009 by RobbieD

[milhouse 0]

Mine was pretty good! One of my resident city centre bars I did 8pm-2am. At midnight we were full so the countdown and auld lang syne sequence went well. I was dreading us being empty at 12 as everyone goes to the clubs but it wasn't the case.

 

Free beer from the management and a party at mine afterwards. Which I have just finished cleaning up from. :)

Edited January 1, 2009 by JonWhittaker

[TonyB 0]

Posted my NYE playlist http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/index.php?s=&amp...st&p=230590.

 

Already been booked for NYE next year plus another gig in March and one other for which I am awaiting details smile icon

[vokf 0]

Posted my NYE playlist http://www.dj-forum.co.uk/index.php?s=&amp...st&p=230590.

 

Already been booked for NYE next year plus another gig in March and one other for which I am awaiting details smile icon

 

Congrats Tony!

[brokentoenail 0]

great night for me.

done a local restaurant, early sitting a few stayed on, second sitting they all stayed at the bar. last sitting we had a party.

 

place was crammed, the management seriously underestimated numbers and ran out of some food choices.

 

asked me to do a weekly on saturdays, but the lift in was a nightmare. up the back flights of stairs and through the kitchens.

 

might do a monthly special or similar.

 

got 6 bookings for this month and 2 a week for the year.

[YourBigEvent 0]

Good night for me, a murder mystery dinner, which finished about 2200hrs, I was already set up, and played to just under 100 people from the first record to the last song of the night.

 

£95 per person, so no riff raff.

 

Apparently for the last couple of years the 'entertainment' didn't have any chimes, so management happy with the night.

 

 

Know its pretty early but could I provisionally book Ben again for next New Years eve please? I want to make sure we get him! We would also probably be interested in doing some Christmas parties throughout December as well which I can discuss with you at a later date if that's ok.

 

What does provisionally book mean, they either want to book Ben, or not. Nothing is booked provisionally with me, get the paperwork done, and the paperwork signed, it is then booked.

 

 

 

You may laugh, but I do have a few copies of it, and tested it, along with Big Ben at the beginning of December, surely you didn't leave the CD to the very last minute to check if it worked OK ?

[Kingy 0]

 

What does provisionally book mean, they either want to book Ben, or not. Nothing is booked provisionally with me, get the paperwork done, and the paperwork signed, it is then booked.

 

Good point, "provisionally" lasts for 7 days maximum with me.

 

[superstardeejay 0]

Went to the local nightclub where the idiot DJ played hard house all night and forgot to count down to midnight, with the result that we were all left rather confused. AT 12 o'clock someone detonated the pyro's which were barely audible above the stressed sound system and that was that. He eventually mixed into a trance remix of auld lang syne then mixed out and into hard house again. No it's not a hard house club its a commercial town centre place.

 

:poo:

 

 

 

 

 

 

[fozzzy2003 0]

:djuhi: New years eve was a belter for us, 260 people in at £26 a ticket wich included hot savoury buffet,this was at the the chesterfield borough council building The Winding Wheel,this venue has three rooms available for hire,fuction room,ballroom, and the auditorium wich we were situated,we played from 8 till 1 am having a break at 9-30 for hot food,very nice too,weve played at this venue all over xmas doing all the dinner dances with cabaret ( cocktail ) duo,these have all been sold out, started the night with some old tyme ballroom dancing ( check our videos ) waltzes,quicksteps,barn dances, dance floor was packed,then straight into 70s with abba filling the floor again,basically this crowd was up for anything,after looking around at the public what was in the building,the majority of them were here last year and the year before,so we must be doing something right,been doing it now for the last 4 years wich takes care of all december for us,good little number if you can get it,beauty about this gig is we can leave the gear set up so we can walk in switch on and switch off and walk out,very nice, anyway all the best to everyone on the forum,hope you all have a cracking 2009, theres plenty off work out there for all of us despite the credit crunch as they keep drilling into us.

cheers

fozzzy