girls

Definitely a perk :p

the last band I was in, my drummer was trying to fuck my singer (male drummer, female singer), but she wasn't having it...he didn't let up. It was either start a one man band or learn how to dj. I chose the 2nd one....

Lmao! I'm sorry to laugh, but that's pretty funny!

you can laugh... it was really funny lol

Spoken words:
him: We should cover a Van Halen song. They're awesome!
her: Yeah, they're cool...but I don't think that would go over too well with our crowd...
him: what do you mean you don't wanna cover van halen? I agreed to do your stupid Lady Gaga song! You never take any of my ideas seriously....
her: I take your ideas seriously! You just can't take constructive criticism!
him: blah blah blah, Van Halen, blah
her: blah blah blah, no, blah blah

actual conversation:
him: You're hot and I wanna fuck you.
her: Watchwww.youtube.com
him: Fuck You! You must be a bull dyke whore slut!
her: Don't be such a dick! Fuck off asshole!

Then they both call me in turn after practice to bitch about the other one....

The funny thing was I started a cover band because I got tired of all the drama of being in an original band....
So that's my story of why I became a dj... I love music and got tired of depending on other people and dealing with their drama to make and perform it...

Lmao that's great! And a very good reason also, I definitely enjoyed that story lol.

I became a DJ after watching Pauly D rip it up on the tables...lol

Because DJ'ing was easier than making "pause" tapes. I have tons of pause tapes from back in the day.

1. I saw a local DJ come to my step brothers birthday party at the house when I was a little kid, and was impressed with what I saw and wanted to do the same when I got older.

2. Attention from females

3. Because I can't play any instruments, but I really enjoy music.

i didnt decide to DJ, DJ decided on me. pretty much how it went. just fell into it naturally through friends and the UK scene back in 95. just happened. wasnt a choice.

Nah true storey I started spinning when I got tired of local crap MC's spitting wackness over my beats. So when i discovered acapellas I started putting my beats over popular acapellas then I discovered what I could really do with a turn table from their it just grew into a serious music addiction.

Ahhhhhhh yeahhhhh.

Somebody had to play the music at all the parties we were throwing. ;)

Lol everybody has their reasons. A common reason I'm seeing is the attention from the ladies ;)

for the love of music

to spread my music knowledge to the world!

Entertaining the crowd. Always interested in anything that was music. Used to play musical instruments in school and also did a little a bit of choir. Also did some hip hop choreography classes. If I'm not Djing at a club, I'm at the club rocking the dance floor in freestyle.LOL

because i got high .... because i got high...because i got hiiiigh ...derum tum tum ..tam taaam taaaaam......derum tum tum ...taaaam taaaaaam

because i got tired of being in a band and dealing with people and everyone said i had awesome taste in music

now thats one shady lady:)

i became a dj mostly for the fact i love entertaining people at parties with music, used to just have the most extensive playlists of almost everyone i knew , but now mixing the music and being creative with it is a whole new level and im loving it

tried learning to play instruments as a kid but could never get the hang of them but this i can

I grew up around music...whole family is either sings or plays an instrument or even both...I've learnt 3 instruments while growing up...I love music...a simple kick and snare excites me...I've been around music ever since I was a child...had collected all the mixtapes from the local and International DJ scene...

My story is a similar story to Mix Master Mikes. My brother had a duel cassette player. It was in the same room we would play playstion or N64. I loved to bump music while playing video games and was lazy to keep going back and forth switching tapes of the music, fast fowarding etc so I would play the cassette tape right when the track starts and press "Stop." I would keep doing that for the songs I wanted to hear at the time and line them up like dominoes.

When the track on cassette A starts to fade, I will pause my game real quick press play on cassette B and the 1st track will fade out on its own. Ill pop in the next tape on cassette A and continue playing NBA In The Zone for PS1.

My brother noticed it and told me that his friends were DJs and had a pair of turntables they weren't using and asked if i wanted them. I said HELL YEA! Then I got home and saw a pair of Gemini BD-10 Belt Drive turntables and like 5 records. A year later I finally got my first mixer which was like a 4 channel rack mount gemini mixer. Thats when it all started.

cuz i couldn't rap!

To continue my story real quick,

I started scratching when I was around 9, 10 ish. I got a Dorchester turntable for christmas as a gift.

I was watching hip-hop videos back then and see the DJ's scratching and cutting and I would listen and try to find surfaces I could re-create the scratches I heard on the tracks.

When I got my turntable, my dad bought some 45's for me and he had a few old records that I used to listen to.

Then I got the idea to start scratching and replicating what I heard in the hip-hop tracks until I start making my own hand movements to create different sounds.

Now here's where things get crazy, I didn't have a mixer but the speakers connected to the unit with rca plugs.

Around 11, I had a couple older friends that talked about mixers, etc but didn't have crossfaders. I didn't have a way to get one so I used the rca plug as my crossfader.

I started transforming and doing all different cuts and my friends were like, how the heck are you cutting so clean and fast.

I simply said I'm using the rca plug. They were like WHAT? You come listen to this, so I would do different scratches over the phone and they would bug out.

I got my first job as a Pizza Hut cook at 15 even though I was underage, I would be 16 a few months later.

I used to watch DJ battle tapes when I could, listen to DJ's mixtapes from the US that would cut it up.

I would try and practice to get as fast as Mr. Mixx on those 2 Live crew albums.

Around this time the movie Juice dropped and it was alllllll over.

I worked and worked went and bought two direct drive turntables from a pawn shop and my first Realistic mixer, the 1200B. (People know this one, :D)

Then I started making mix tapes (when they were still cassettes), and selling them at school.

I was order records left right and center from Upstairs Records in New York, go to pawn shops, garage sales and bought records from a store called Vintage Vinyl in our city when I could. Bought lots of vinyl too and ended up working there for awhile years later. They are still open and going strong.

I had my debut when I was 16 in a place called the Black Market where they would throw these underground jams and an older DJ heard about me and asked me to come spin.

I was doing house parties to get my name out there at the time and stayed in the bedroom and practiced and practiced. I'm grateful though because it kept me out of trouble too.

There is much more to tell but that is how it all started. My dad used to DJ too so it was already in my DNA make up.

I wrote in another post how I came up with my name as well so I won't repeat it here.

i saw this..

Watchwww.youtube.com

Was your drummer trying to get in your pants lol?

Im a Deep House/Afro Deep producer, so i DJ to promote my music

That is an awesome story! I'd love to hear you spin one day!

I'm not a dj. But I'm here trying to learn because I saw Atrak at electric zoo 2 years ago and a few months later my friend bought an NS7. I used to just fuck with it but then I played a small house party at his crib and it was too much fun.

Now, I'm trying to figure out what I'm actually supposed to do.

Awesome!

I'm gonna attach 2 links to guys on youtube that taught me a lot when I just started. Johnathan and BrianSRedd. Johnathan is great with teaching mixing, he has a lot of great tutorials. He is the one who taught me how to mix. He also teaches a lot of everything else also, equipment related, mixing related/music related, and stuff related to the job.
Here is his youtube page link:

www.youtube.com

The next guy, BrianSRedd is a mobile DJ. His youtube page consists of a lot of gig logs of him actually taking a his video camera to gigs and shows what he is doing, then at the end of these videos, he talks about the gig. He also teaches a lot about the mobile business, clients and how to deal with them. I believe he even has a video on what to say when you receive a phone call from a potential client lmao.
Here is the link to his page:

www.youtube.com

Let me know what you think. Browse through their video's, there is a lot of awesome stuff to be watched and learned on both of their channels

^^^

thanks dude. I'll definitely check em out.

my boy drumline started djing with his roommate in college . he always said " you should try it, i think youll be good at it".

******WARNING! The story you are about to read is long and boring*****

The reason i became a DJ? Well it all started as a fascination by hiphop beats. I was a teen in the 90s, where most tracks had a dj scratching a sample through out the hook, and that caught my ear. I bought my first DJ setup in 1999 (Get ready to laugh) which was a Gemini scratch master box that had the XL500II turntables and "Skratch Master" mixer that had an extra slow crossfader (Ultimate newbie move). A few months later i bought a Roland MC307, (which I still use, but has seen better days recently) and an MPC 2000XL. So i made beats and scratched my 18 year old heart out. I hadnt heard of the concept of mixing and beat matching yet (as i thought a turntable DJ only did scratching tricks) until i went to my first rave in 2000 and actually saw djs in action and play sets, then that lightbulb appeared in my head. **OOOhhhhh*** I get it now!!! Then i wised up and sprung for Technics and learned to beatmatch by watching djs at a local weekly event. I Started off easy with House music, tried some jungle too, but found my main style to be hiphop (after hearing Clevelands hiphop DJs on 107.9 tear it up everyday and weekend nights at the clubs) I've been mixing hiphop/old school funk/electrofunk since 2001. I only do it as a hobby now though. But I guess my reason for becoming a DJ was to scratch for my beats, but then discovered, there's a whole lot more to it than what i thought... and I loved it. And they lived happyily ever after, THE END.

huge amounts of ass and $$

before i discovered EDM i was listening to all kinds of music. i started with 80's rock ballads, then pop, hiphop n rnb, alternative, rock alternative. i then discovered and liked Indie music thru Pandora Radio then discovered Indie Dance, i fell in love with the beats and in no time i got introduced to EDM. i adored EDM so much i almost or probably did? mess my ears by blasting it on the car... =( now having finally found my music, i wanted to do something more. i wanted to share it... and thats how it all started!

oh and getting paid money to play music, instead of paying to play (like how it is for bands out here in LA)

@poisonous handz :)
@daktyl wow that post wasn't mine lol
but i have a funny story abt that for another time

I wanna hear the story :)

I know, it was mine about the last band I was in before I got into dj'ing lol

Around 9yrs old I discovered my passion for music. I used to record from the radio station to a cassette tape. Once full, I would use a razor and scotch tape to cut out the commercials and the DJ. I would play the tape on my boom box while in the neighborhood playing sports with others. I had no way to duplicate the tapes so people had to listen to my one and only copy because I did not sell them. Each week the neighborhood anticipated my next tape. At 13 I got a component system with 1 turntable and 3 albums. Stevie Wonder "Master Blaster" and Zapp, feat. Roger Troutman. I forget the 3rd album. But anyways with my allowance I collected records and recorded them. When attending b-day parties,track meets and other functions. I would play my tapes for all to hear on my boom box. At that point I was collecting hip hop that was never played on the radio. At 15 I was hired to dj a party for a 13 yr old simply because I had the music. At 16 the highschool I attended was 85% white. The dances were boring and they did not play music that blacks wanted to hear. Me and other created a non-profit group called esquire. We raised money by washing cars so that we could throw a party that we would enjoy and invite other highschools at the local community center. I was given the dj duties once again cause I had all the tunes. I started out playing on 1 turntable w/o pitch control and a tape deck. I attended another party that had dj's from NYC when I was 17and they had 2 turntables and they were mixing and scratching. It blew my mind. The very next day, I convinced Esquire to invest in two turntables and a mixer. I practiced and practiced and practiced. NO YOUTUBE vids back then to help you LOL. I learned to blend first, then scratching. I DID NOT scratch and blend in public until I was comfortable. (rule: don't practice at a gig). Esquire made tons of money from the parties and when we were seniors we paid for our own prom after party and graduation party. Rented out an entire hotel to blow the rest of the money but I GOT STUCK DJ'ing all of that. But anyways, here I'm today. Still at it.

I was a DJ before this video, but I wasn't into scratching until I saw this.
Watchwww.youtube.com

I had this recorded on VHS and would watch it over and over again. That video and "Live at Union Square" By Jazzy Jeff made me wanna DJ.

I just got in the wrong line accidentally, i thought it was the financial aid line since it was so long, now im a DJ....fml

You're supposed to buy a set of 1200's from Guitar center or Craigs List. A mixer. An SL3. And treat spinning like a sick @$$ drug addiction! : )

I got in the game playing parties with a dual casette deck when I was in 3rd grade. No lie. I'd pick up old stereo systems from yard sales and piece together systems. My whole family was into country and bluegrass and all that $#!t and I hated it! Hip Hop was just getting mainstream exposure and I LOVED IT. So I spent the next twenty or so years upgrading form there. So far made it to radio, club, and $100 per hour receptions. Still on the rise too : )

I was a DJ before this video, but I wasn't into scratching until I saw this Watchwww.youtube.com

STEVE D! godfather of beat juggling. fuckin beast!

I became a DJ because of Paulie D, dudes my idol!!

My fault Remy didn't see you used that line already

Can you pull that out of YouTube, somehow improve the quality, then re-post. Seems good but I can't see or hear it : (

i did it for teh lulz

when i was a kid the person with the biggest music collection was the dj

what does that mean "lulz"

nevermind I just googled it

RichardM who's the chick in your Avatar she looks like my wife...no bullshit she really does

OHHHHH someone call maury

Like BlackDevil, I was shy back in the day but I was born with the talent of singing. Music is me and I was pressured when I was younger to become a singer. My mother sings but she started to smoke cigarettes so her singing career died. LOL So she was trying to live her dream in me. BUT singing wasnt what I wanted to do all my life.

Military Brat so we moved alot and I was born in VA but i was raised everywhere so I didnt get exposed to club scene until I was 18yrs and the first time I went into the club, I kept asking, "how is the music played" ( I was one of those kids that was locked in the house until I was 18yrs lol ) So when I seen the dj, it just clicked. I said " I will learn to do that"

I Loveeee music and I was raised all around it so since I wasn't continuing my career as a singer, I found djin. Thats how it allllll started and now its my love and I wont let it go.

Meisa Kurokawa - don't let your wife see you googlin dat ass

Wow. It's funny you mention that. I had a decent singing voice as well, but started smoking about 2 years ago and my singing ability is starting to decline :(

smoking made my singing voice better lol.

Lmao it makes my voice to raspy with high notes and falsetto's. Its like I constantly have to clear my throat but no matter how much I do, it does no good

Guess alot of us have alot in common lol

You all need to quit smoking!

I became a DJ by accident. My floormates in college wanted to throw the biggest parties my school has ever seen. So one of my roommates got his dads old DJ equipment from home and brought it to school, and it randomly was a really legit setup. So literally hours before a night my friend was like SHIT I don't have any music. He taught me how to use everything and I made some cds (I was using CDJs), and I DJ'd the party. By the 2nd party everyone thought I dj'd for clubs and shit. After that year of partying people were yelling at me to get out to the clubs so I did, and apparently I was pretty good compared to most other club DJs. Then a friend of mines got me into Ableton to make mashups like Girl Talk, then I began using the program for club mashups etc.

And boom I was born...that was 2 years ago and this was actually my first year in the club/mobile scene. Hopefully by the end of 2012 I will be doing it full time

I got into VJ'ing because I loved videos and pre-youtube one of the few places you could see interesting stuff was in the club, especially explicit videos!

The guy who mentored me was looking for a greatest hits collection and I was able to dig a copy up in NTSC from Japan and we became friends and the rest is history.

Because i want the bitches and a cool name like DJ 5 dolla holla and my mom bought me serato today.

hmmm... Well... I guess : /

listening to this dude on the radio..... DJ BEE

Watchwww.youtube.com

Met that guy in October when I took a trip to VA Beach. He was spinning at Voodoo on a Sunday night. He was on point. I had to go up and give him props. He was spinning everything, even some funky James Brown and stuff like that

Regular DJ at roller rink I worked at didn't show up for Friday "teen night". The boss threw me in and I played tapes all night. "Rump Shaker" Nothin' But A G Thang" and "Get Ready For This" were the latest cuts!

Worked there a year and the boss started selling me all kinds of old gear... including a Radio Shack mixer and a tape deck. Add dad's home stereo speakers and wallah... I'm a DJ at a church party.

Off and running!

because of the music let me express how fell are what goes on in my life

kismet, destiny, all that stuff combined into a enigma rolled into a mystery.

to entertain people and add a glimmer of happiness to their lives

tits. ass. beer in glass.

Be cause of Sync












Classic

Love of hip hop
My highschool crew were bboys, graffiti artist and emcees
We tried to do it all, slowly we saved up as a crew and got a turntable and mixer. I took to it more then the others

In my city growing up and loving hip hop was considered to be "fakes"
So we didn't do it for girls or respect
But came grade 12 when hip hop was OK amongst the majority we were high school super stars haha

For The Girls... Now for my Ex Wives because I owe Them $$$

I love music, & making people happy

lol

nm

I got introduced to DJ,ing by Grandmaster Flash as a kid.
He did a party in the community ctr of my projects. I LOVED what he did and how he controlled the crowd through his music selection.

He did a few tricks that impressed me too like spinning behind his back and spinning handcuffed.

The next week was Cool Herc and he KILLED IT!!!

My very first exposure to the art was a dude in my bldg. He set up outside one night for a jam. (Thats what we called outside parties held in school parks or anywhere we could make it happen).

I was about 5 or 6 for my first JAM and it had an influence on me.

What REALLY got me to be a DJ was this…
I used to be an MC.
My DJ was good as shit!
I used to ask him to teach me how to DJ and he always said no.
I said Fuck you then! imma learn on my own and then battle you.
He said that he could not teach me how to DJ, not that he did not want to but he just could not do it.

I went out and picked up my 1st DJ set. A pair of technic B1's and a Gemini mixer with pickering needles. No amp, no speakers.
I just plugged straight into my very large boom box.

I learned pretty quickly how to scratch and catch the beat. I taught myself how to DJ with breakbeats.

I learned to mix after I did my 1st party and realized that I had not taught myself how to mix yet (lol).

I understand what my DJ was telling me when he said he could not teach me how to DJ. He learned the same way I did (Self taught).
He did not know HOW to teach me because he was not taught.
I understand this because I really can't teach someone either.

I think I became a DJ because I was born to be a DJ.

Yea what he said^

I was made in an underground DJ factory from old springs and scraps of vinyl. I have to go in regularly to get my bolts tightened.

You've got some solid background.

Technics B1's....

Cats just don't know....

BTW, I did that "Breaks" mix, (actually did two 80 mins apiece), but have to do them over again, because the Realistic Mixer that I happened to have hooked up, had bleed over from the Headphone cue into the main output...

Stay tuned....

I saw this:

Watchwww.youtube.com

I'm still learning and I'm no where near where I want to be as a scratch DJ but it's an everyday thing.

Keep rocking folks!

Girls and money...










I'm still waiting for either one....




Lol!

I was just kind of always around it (family) and just was always helping out with shows, until I eventually started doing them myself.

Exact same for me, except friends instead of family.

yeah i been there. still do it sometime off my fav radio station.

I started djing for the love of the music, My dad had a bar with and we lived in a house on top of it. When I was 12 I used sneak down and play the jukebox and I liked what it made the customers do and act. When we had people over Id play music for them. Then my mom let me spin our house parties.

I speak on it here:

t.co

Cool man! Nice accomplishments.

Thanks for that!

Pops had a belt-drive for his vinyls (the era of cassettes). Busted his needles the first time scratching with it...got my @55 whooped after he found out. Never touched a turntable for few years after that.

Later on had friends with older siblings that did mobile gigs and also threw their own events. They usually took us along to help set up and carry crates. That reintroduced me into the world of DJing...but I didn't really get hooked until someone showed me a DMC video tape with Cash Money. After that I just couldn't get enough of it.

These days DMC doesn't do it for me anymore. I've got nothing against dicer's/pads being used in Threestyle but I don't accept it's use in DMC.

Still remember when I found my dads 1200s sitting in the garage many years after he'd switched to CD. Still with the thick rubber mats and heaps of vinyl.
Before I knew what it really was, he gave it away to a friend.

High school years working at the roller rinks started it for me.

He gave it away free? That's one lucky friend....wonder if those records got warped during summer time.

Because my 5th grade teacher told when when finding a career find something you enjoy doing then find a way to make money doing it.

I asked myself this very question while cooking breakfast this morning and Google brought me here.

I've been asking this question of myself a lot in the last five years.

I've been DJing for twenty years. My story is very different from any of yours. A lot of you seem to have come from the Hip Hop tradition while my roots are in the Techno scene of the early 90s.

I was dropping acid and going to 4th World - the first electronic dance music club in my home town of Johannesburg, South Africa and the music - and drugs were blowing my mind. Because of the drugs and my unruly behavior as a teen, my mom suggested I get involved in Scientology as she had been as a teen and it had helped her. It did in fact help me clean me up in terms of the drugs and my general outlook on life.

By the time I was 21, my musical tastes had transitioned into Jungle and pretty much as soon as I got my first real job and consequently my first credit card, I bought myself a pair of Gemini XL-10 belt drive turntables, a Gemini 676 mixer (with 4 second 12 bit sampler) and some records.

I got reasonably good at mixing but like everything in my life, I abandoned it, sold my equipment and went to try my luck living in London.

Fast forward some years and I was back in South Africa and had again gotten involved in Scientology - this time more seriously. First as a partitioner, but it wasn't long until I got recruited to staff. Now staff pay is an absolute joke. I was lucky if I made US$20 a week. A friend of mine - Steve - who wasn't on staff had a mobile DJ business and to help me (Scientology public often try help staff make ends meet because they know the sacrifices they have to make to be on staff) and offered me some gigs. Soon I was playing weddings and birthday parties every weekend for the money so I could survive. From there I met a guy through Steve who had connections in clubs and soon I was playing all kinds of clubs gigs from House to Rock music. I'd gotten back into drugs - after being clean mainly due to Scientology. So Scientology fell by the wayside as I was making good money and having too much fun. It was around this time that I realized just how many girls I could get because I was a DJ.

Right at the end of my time in Scientology, I met my wife-to-be. She opened my eyes to just what a crazy cult it was. We got married too quickly and after about a year, things were falling apart. She was originally from Germany and as our marriage was a mess, she decided to move to Hong Kong. She had been gone just a few weeks when I thought to myself, "Hell - I married her for a reason. I have to give this one last try". So four months later I was living in Hong Kong after having sold every last possession in South Africa.

Two weeks after moving to Hong Kong, the relationship was officially finished. I was teaching English to make ends meet and got a job teaching pre-kindergarten. Let me tell you, it was so fucking stressful that I would spend my weekends getting hammered and was out at bars and clubs all the time. Through my Japanese girlfriend at the time - who knew I was into music and had been a DJ - I met some other DJs and then did a gig at a bar where the "prize" was a residency at this bar. I won and have been professionally DJing in Hong Kong ever since - the last 8 year. It was awesome in the beginning. I could play whatever I wanted, which amounted to Tech House, House, Funky House, Deep House, etc. I got a few more residencies including at one of the top clubs in the city. It was incredible and I know now that it will be the best period in my career as a DJ. The focus at the point was all about the music. I would spend hours preparing my sets - finding new music. It was awesome!! I have no other words for it. Another big part of the draw of DJing for me at this time was also all the sex - girls just loved sleeping with the DJ - and the free drugs and free alcohol. It was a blast.

Then about five years ago the club decided to change direction and decided to do more Trap and Hip Hop - not my styles at all. I said I would give it a go: try play this kind of music. After one night I told them to forget it: I quit.

I found other gigs, my taste changed to more Disco and Funk and Indie Dance, but it was never as intense or exciting as it had been.

Slowly over the last five years, the scene has changed a lot. People are just more and more into pop music and have shorter attention spans (due mainly to social media in my opinion).

Work started drying up and for a period of about three months at the end of 2016 I had absolutely no work. Then I got a gig at a new club. I was free to play whatever I wanted again - within reason. And around this time I stared really getting into Synth Pop from the 80s. Because of the mix between 80s and House, the management pegged me as "versatile" and about four months ago they offered me a contract. They are part of a big company that has about 30-40 restaurants and bars (only 4 of which require a DJ). It would mean that I would get a handsome salary for working four nights a week. I jumped at the opportunity as it would allow me to finally save some money and escape this vacuous superficial shit hole that is Hong Kong.

So now I play whatever the fuck they want including Despacito about three times a night. I absolutely hate my job. All the joy is gone and I wish that I had studied something so that I could pursue a different career. But alas, DJing is the only discernible skill I have now.

I'm just DJing for the money now so that I can save and leave.

So while initially I had become a DJ because I loved music and wanted to share the music I loved with other people, it became about other things: drugs, parties, girls and alcohol. And now it's just for the money and is just another job that someone hates.

My advice: DON'T FOLLOW YOUR PASSION!!! Do a job for the money and keep your passion as a side project - that is if you want to keep the passion for that thing. Make sure they if you do decide to become a DJ, study something else as well so you have something to fall back on.

All the cautionary tales your parents told you are true.

Completely agree that you need other skills to survive in life but to be honest people prone to drinking and drugs in excess can and will be missrable in any job or location. Plenty of people work a job they hate their whole life just to make a living. If your lucky enough to make a living as a DJ I would highly recommend following that passion. Just be realistic about it. Know your not going to be one of the millionaire celebrity DJs and that the music of the moment you're into will have its run and become another old school niche and that you are an entertainer not a prophet. That being said if you can bring joy to people for a living you should consider yourself very lucky.

Drugs and alcohol don't make you miserable, they make you pretty damn happy. Why do you think some people become addicts? It's certainly not because they're horrible. Of course there are drawbacks - like anything. I'm completely sober at this point in my life and when I look back, the times I was drinking, etc were some great times. But this is not about the drugs it's about the reasons throughout my life that I have DJ'd.

Doing a job that makes you're not passionate about is what makes one miserable. Looking back, it would have been better to keep DJing as a hobby - hence the cautionary tale.

As someone who has DJed as a hobby for decades and taken it on as a full time job I agree, most people should keep DJing as a passion / hobby. You have to be sure it's your calling and that you approach it as a business not a lucrative hobby.

Let's be real drinking and drugs are fun in moderation but that's not how it goes down when your young, especially if you have an addictive personality. It's a fucking cliche watching people succumb to that at this point. I have way too many friends who burnt the candle at both ends and they look, act and are washed up as a result. I have other friends who have enormous regrets for not pursuing their dreams who could have written the same message you did in reverse.

At the end of the day it's a job like many other jobs. It's for some people and not for others.