On Thursday night, CiTR shook the Pit Pub with their annual That DJ Competition. The competition, kicking off of the station’s ongoing FunDrive fundraising effort, featured eight DJs and attracted dozens of eager-to-dance students.
The night’s lineup included DJs J.D., Autonomy, Vinyla Xtrax (a DJ duo), Treble Rebel, Roy E Biv, Renger, Chano, and Oker Chen. The crowd chose the winning DJ by submitting voting slips throughout the competition, and awarded DJ duo Vinyla Xtrax the top prize: the two will be paid to perform as an opener for the AUS’s upcoming Mardi Gras party.
The competition was the public debut for several of the DJs, and a stepping-stone for many of them to perform in front of larger crowds.
“It went really well, better than I had expected,” said Autonomy, whose music, before the competition, had never strayed far from the confines of his room. Vinyla Xtrax, who seemed to attract the most fans, had never performed outside the comfort of UBC Housing’s dormitory events and dances.
“We’re looking forward to performing in front of an even bigger crowd at Mardi Gras,” they said.
Some of the competition’s other DJs, such as J.D., are performance veterans, and have played at Vancouver night clubs and other, larger venues.
“I’ve been playing for quite a while… I started on my dad’s old DJ equipment. It wasn’t digital, so I really had to train my ear to help me sync the tracks. Nowadays everything is easier—digital- and visually-assisted,” said a sweaty J.D. after his energetic performance, which opened the show.
Indeed, most of the DJs used turntables linked to laptop computers to mix, but DJ Roy E Biv surprised the crowd by shunning such technology and using vinyl records on two turntables. Instead of using a digital song library on a hard drive, Roy E Biv flipped through two large bags of records during his performance.
While waiting for their turn to perform, the DJs sat around at the back of the improvised DJ pit with headphones, and a few even joined the crowd to dance to their competitors’ music.
Due to time spent fixing technical glitches on house equipment, the DJs had to cut their performances short by a minute or so. Most of the DJs had prepared to play longer sets and couldn’t end with the bang they had hoped for; many of their sets seemed to fizzle to an end, mid-song. During the downtimes, the competition’s MC cracked jokes and played songs off a lackluster playlist. Despite the hang-ups, the crowd was buoyed by the energy of the DJs and their music, and CiTR managed to pull off a successful event.
(+3 rating, 3 votes)
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