________ ________ ________
2018-09-10 / \/ \/ / \
/ __/ /_ _/
A little over a week ago, after an / _/ / /
especially good OpenMic session it was \_______/_\___/____/\___/____/_
suggested that I start my own regular show / \/ \/ / \
on aNONradio and who was I to argue? To be / _/ /_ _/
honest, I'd been thinking about it for a /- / _/ /
little while but was being really wishy- \________/\________/\___/____/
washy about it and not really committing.
Off of the feedback on the OpenMic though I committed to have something up and
running by the end of September.
So I started pulling stuff together with a view to having my first show on
the 15th but they had my login and mountpoint set up really quickly so
everything was ready to go from their end and figured "Well, I'll just strap
together a quick playlist and it shouldn't take much to get my side to get up
and running!"
I was wrong.
I'm not familiar with DJ software at all, there's a lot going on that I
just don't understand and I really only needed something simple. Everything
was doing half the job, I could get music coming through nice but the mic
wouldn't work or the audio was low or I had the mic ducking in and out
prefectly but getting the music playing was awkward, etc. And then on top of
that I was really struggling to get our audio interface working, it was so
quiet. Microphones hate my voice in general because I'm quite soft-spoken but
the interface was ridiculously quiet, even with the gain right up. Dani
shifting in her chair on the other side of the table was coming through louder
than my voice right in front of the mic. Yes, I did check to make sure I had
it facing the right way.
A massive anxiety attack, a lot of troubleshooting and some old-school
hardware voodoo later I did get it all running and had a playlist so my first
show was this past Saturday. It didn't go too bad, all things considered.
There's a 20-ish second delay between me and the stream which threw me at
first so I've got dead air a bit at the start and then again when I was
listening to what was happening on stream instead of what was happening in
real time. Also had a bit of a hiccup with some of the tracks not loading but
I worked around it so I don't think that even came through on stream, all
good.
Hardware problems solved, I think I'm in a good place for future shows;
just gotta work on playlists and my own confidence and I think I can handle
that.
The show itself is an attempt to honestly answer my least favorite
question: "What kind of music do you listen to?" - with each show based around
a genre or a mood or a theme but no over-arching rule for what I'm going to be
playing. I'm really approaching with a "gloves off" kind of attitude, dving
deep into the broad spectrum of stuff I listen to. Some of the playlists I'm
sketching out will go over really well but, I dunno, some may alienate a few
people.
I suppose that's me to a t, haha.
The show is called LOW WIRE. Tune in to hear me live every Saturday at
21:00 UTC on aNONradio.net or you can grab a recording from the archives on
the website, either way I hope you enjoy!
