I suppose I should have written about this a while ago (closer to the event itself), but I was waiting for pictures with which I would accompany a post. As of yet, I have not received those pictures, so they'll have to wait. But regardless.
For those of you who don't know, Sugoicon is an annual anime convention in Cincinnati, Ohio. This year, I was on tech staff as a "sound guy" and a DJ.
I arrived on Friday around 10:00 AM and unloaded my DJ gear (two low-end turntables and a low-end mixer), then hung around with
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0ddj0b the rest of the day (he was the other sound guy). Friday was a moderately eventful day, the only real thing we did was the sound check for the Funny Stones (oh those Japanese!) and Mai. In the meantime, I played DDR and walked around the con several times, and 0J and I hung out in the soundbooth with our computers.
Later in the night, though (I want to say maybe 1AM), we were out in the atrium of the hotel and I met up with a few of the other DJs who were going to be playing at the dance (which was on Saturday night). We talked for a while and they offered to let me bring my turntables out into the atrium and play for a little bit, which I eagerly accepted.
I ended up playing for maybe 45 minutes out there as a few other people played Dreamcast and PS2. 0ddy was there and watched me spin for a bit, then watched the gamers. After the brief set, we locked all the equipment back up in the main room and hit the sack.
Saturday morning, 0J got up at somewhere around 8ish I think, I didn't drag myself out of bed until half past 10. Showered, shaved (just the moustache), and headed down to main events to hang with 0ddy. Nothing was really going on until the second Funny Stones and Mai concert, so I hung around with a few people in the DDR room and DJ Pandable, who unfortunately was not able to play due to a certain voice actor named Greg Ayers.
I'm going to take a bit here to explain this particular situation.
Greg Ayers is a voice actor who attends many, many conventions. He's also fairly well-known as a DJ (in the con scene, that is). This particular Sugoicon, he had arranged to play two sets at the dance: one from 12:00 AM to 12:30 am, and one from 2:00 AM to 4:00 AM. We (the DJs) all thought this was a bit ridiculous. He showed up a bit late for both of his sets (only by maybe 10-15 minutes), but still got to play for his allotted time. Sort of. But regardless, more on that later.
0ddy was supposed to be the first DJ for the dance, and I was to follow him. However, the set-up for the dance was so hectic and rushed that he wasn't prepared, and he told me to go on instead of him (he was going to follow my set). Now, I was a bit nervous. This was my first time playing out, and I had no idea what to expect. So, shaking slightly, I stepped up to the turntables wearing my suit, clip-on tie, and afro wig, and I played "One Man Army - The Anthem." It was evidently the right choice, the small crowd loved it (only about 30 or so at that point). Somewhere inbetween the next two songs, the crowd thickened to somewhere around 180-200.
I played for an hour or so, with the music building into some really nasty, techy trance, then mellowing out a bit into some proggier stuff right before 0ddy got on. He also spun quite a hell of a set.
I'd like to get back to the Greg Ayers situation, though.
DJ Maiku (who was playing from 12:30 to 2:00) let me have the last 15 minutes of his set. Now back in my normal clothing, I played a few laid back songs, definitely more of the "progressive house" variety. Greg was 10 minutes late, as was to be expected, and I ceded the dance to him at around 2:15.
After Greg got on the decks, 0J and I headed off to bed. We were chilling in the hotel room with our laptops and just generally being cool dudes when he got a phone call from Mike Thorn (head of live events). Apparently, the hotel said that everything was supposed to stop at 3AM, and Greg was pitching a fit. Really.
When we showed up to the main events room, Greg was yelling into the microphone through his voice processor (making him sound all scary and ominous) about how the hotel wanted the crowd to go to bed like "good little boys and girls." 0ddy walked up on stage, talked to Thorn for a short bit, then turned all of the amplifiers off. And that was that. We headed back to the room again and this time fell asleep for real.
Sunday was a pretty chilled day. I woke up at around 10 again and showered, then headed out to see what was going on. Played a bit more DDR and talked with friends, even had a few people come up to me and compliment me on the set I had played Saturday (which was unanimously excellent).
Even ended up playing another impromptu set in the hallway with Pandable and Hito.
Here's some pictures Oddy got of my later set.All in all, I had a great time. I hope to be back next year, hopefully with a better setup and DJ lineup. :P
Thanks again, Sugoicon.
-w
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