DJING ISN’T HARD.

Defected is a media outlet.

Keinemusik is a media outlet.

Fish 56 Octagon is a media outlet.

Fabric, Amnesia, Watergate & that local nightclub you were in last month?

They’re all media outlets.

And you need to be a media outlet too.

‘But what if I just want to make music and have people enjoy it?’

‘What I don’t want to get caught up in the DJ influencer game, chasing likes and followers for clout?’

Well don’t then.

Fuck all of that.

Followers mean nothing in a world where tiktok style social feeds serve people content based on what they’re actually watching, rather than serving up another gravy-filled dinner photo from the weird lad you sat beside in school back when you were eleven.

And likes never meant anything, not really.

They felt good, but who do you know that ever did anything positive with a like after they got it?

Can you sell it?

Eat it?

Upcycle it into candles and sell them on Etsy?

No.

They’re an indicator of what’s working. Other than that, they’re useless.

And anyway… it’s the dislikes that we all remember.

The downvotes, the negative comments, the laughing emojis from people who aren’t really laughing.

You can have 500 positive comments on your posts, but it’s that one nasty comment that stands out the most. We’re human, we’re hard-wired to react to perceived threats.

Thousands of years ago it was a wolf coming in your cave to eat your children, now it’s Bobby the plumber with a union-jack wrapped van as his profile pic calling you a nonce for playing disco house.

Telling you “he’s gonna report ya to the filth” and to ‘stay away from schools with that nonsense’.

Ignore the dislikes – and don’t create content in chase of the likes.

The post engagements never meant anything.

Not really.

It was a way of keeping you on the platform.

It was a way to teaching the algorithm what popular content looked like, so it could serve it to others – before AI got clever enough to do the job better than we can.

So why are you letting your negative ideas around it hold you back from being as successful as you can be in music?

You don’t like the clout chasing, so you stop posting content – because the two feel intertwined.

Posting content = chasing likes = cheesy and inauthentic.

Was pirate radio inauthentic? Were your favorite albums? What about that documentary you loved? Or that interview you read that made you believe you could be a DJ?

If you make art, and you want to make that art as your sole means of income, then you need to find an audience for your art.

If that art is your music, then you’re in the music business.

You need the music element, and you need the business element.

Music, without business, is art.

Music, with business, is art.

The art part doesn’t change when we add music – or at least, it doesn’t have to change.

Art is art.

But… add some business skills and you might be able to feed yourself as well.

Profitable art.

Profitable art, that allows you to make more – while not having to sit in an office you hate listening to Julie from accounts drone on about the parking situation in IKEA at the weekend. (Which was a nightmare apparently… but that’s IKEA on a Saturday for you)

Because you don’t work with Julie from accounts anymore.

You quit.

So you’re in the music business.

And guess what?

You’re the product.

You’re also the salesperson of the product.

You’re the marketer, the finance department, and the guy who carries the DJ’s bags through the airport.

At the start, at least.

You are the business – and you are the one running the business.

And in music, you need to be in the media business.

Media businesses are all about having an audience (call it a crowd if you like), and they’re all about serving content to that audience – and doing it so well that the crowd keep coming back for more.

Sounds kinda like a DJ right?

Or a label, festival, club… you get my point.

The explosion of the ‘influencer DJ’ has clouded this point in the minds of a lot of people.

It’s that posting content = chasing likes thing again.

Don’t let their clout-chasing get in the way of your need to post content at a high-level.

Pirate radio stations in the eighties and nineties fought over the highest tower blocks, as the higher they placed their transmitters, the further their signal would reach.

A wider signal meant that more people could tune in, which meant more listeners.

Club promoters used to spend hours standing outside popular rival events handing out flyers, as they were the perfect audience for their event, and finding the right audiences was the key to filling your event.

DJs used to walk around events handing out mixtapes or CDs. If you wanted a certain corner of the world listening to your music, but can’t get booked for the gig – walk around the dance floor handing out CDs.

People in the music business have always pushing content and trying to build audiences. It was just harder, slower, and less effective.

Today, taller tower blocks don’t give us more reach, feeds do. If we want to find specific audiences for our event, we don’t need to freeze to death standing outside rival clubs, we just run targeted ads. And sharing your mixes doesn’t involve camping beside your PC for the day burning CDs, we can just share to Soundcloud.

If 100 people took a CD from a DJ back in the day and played it at home – that was a result.

These days, 100 plays on a mix feels like a flop.

Because the game has changed.

It’s easier to create music, so more people are doing it. It’s easy to create content, so more do it. It’s easier to build audiences, so… you get the vibe.

If you intend on winning the game of music, you need to play the game of media.

‘Sticking up a few posts’ isn’t enough.

Music is entertainment, and so you need to entertain.

How do you do that?

You become a media outlet.

Stop dabbling with your mix series. Make it weekly. Invite on some guests, let them help you promote it each week. Turn it into a radio show, and submit it to a few radio stations. Let them deliver you their audience, it’s already built for you. Break the mix down, share it on stories and tag the producers and labels, let them repost it for you.

Even better, record it on video and post it on Youtube. Make it look nice. Give it some love.

Start an email list, send them some tunes each week. Don’t try and sell to them, or bore them by talking about you and your gigs all the time. Curate for them. Teach them. You’re the DJ. You’re finding the good music every month, right? Share it. Build a following.

Jump on socials. Do the same. Tell some stories. Document your journey. Share some music – old, new, unfinished, rare, cheesy… it doesn’t matter.

You’re the DJ.

Do your job.

Set up a label if you want. Run some events if you like. Set up a merch range if you’re feeling it, just put some love into it.

Make it art and make it fun, and make it make sense.

DO. SOMETHING.

That girl from your home town that just starting blowing up, and played Amnesia this summer?

She is a media outlet.

Charlotte De Witte is a media outlet.

Printworks was a media outlet.

Solomun is a media outlet.

And you.

You need to be a media outlet too.

And you get to decide what that looks like…

Because that’s how art works.

So go and make some art.