Karaoke Forums

Cueball, you talk about this kid like ya know him.
OBVIOUSLY if he talks about the world record attempt to a lot of folks there's a likelihood he could get support, interest, and offers from friends and/or professionals that MAY help him out in the name of "helping someone out".

Some of the responses here makes me VERY GLAD i'm NOT OLD-MINDED, BURNED OUT, OR SELFISH to the point i'd have to screw the kid over....

I'm happy i would be able, if i still lived in Jersey, to help this out, although NOT for free, but would not be a ruthless "undercutter" like has been suggested. 12 years as a pro Dj/Kj and I WOULD help the kid out by not robbing him blind. ALL OF THIS suggests that MANY kjs are in the business strictly for the money first and may not know the value of GIVING-BACK, HELPING SOMEONE OUT, or HAVING FUN for a ONE-TIME-GIG for a world record attempt!

Tim, i DO understand your point. If he agrees to use a professional, he should be prepared to pay for one, yes. I think the chances of that is unlikely unless the kid has a big bankroll for this attempt.

Steve(cue), It STILL DOES NOT require the skills of a pro to push buttons, and WHO said he would be using a home-system? It was mentioned he could BUY a decent system for under $1000. It wouldn't MEAN it would be a home system.

You usually POST thoughtful optimistic responses from what i've seen on here and in JOLT... NOT emotional and pessimistic ones. Oh well........have a better (nice) day dude and lose the NY- attitude on this one. Alooooooooooooha.

No, I don't know who the kid is. As for being pessimistic about this one, I'm sorry.... I can't help it on this one. I just don't think that kid will catch much of a break where he might be able to afford to do this. Hey!!! if I'm wrong, I really wish him good luck in breaking that record.
As for the NY attitude.... I didn't realize I was giving off attitude. If I did, I'm sorry.

....my apologies as well if i sounded out-of-line. I hope this kid gets a lucky break as well. Anything promoting karaoke is a good thing IMO!

Aloooooooha Cue and glad to see you here on the 'scene!

I didn't read all the posts, and it may have been mentioned already, but there may be some sponsorship opportunities from local business to offset your time.

It seems that it should not be that expensive.

$75 an hour
$40 an hour???


But really what kind of karaoke are we talking about. It is not really high effort karaoke on the part of the host.

Basically it involves hitting the go button 15 times an hour.

No dealing with loud drunks, or worrying about the rotation or all of the other problems with a regular karaoke show. No working the crowd and using personal skills it is just an excercise in endurance, and once the show is set up the input from the KJ is practically zero.

The equipment will not be stressed. I cant imagine your singer would want 40+ hours of 100dbs karaoke....

In my experience almost no problems happen in continous play unless the gear is being abused (most problems occur in setup/takedown, or when the sound is near the max volume). Someone doing 40 hours of karaoke is not going to be rocking out and doing headstands on the speakers or throwing the mic against the wall (as some drunk singers might).

All you have to do is set up the gear and set up a list of 3-4 hours worth of the songs and rotate through the list. Any competent KJ who uses a computer could do that in 45 minutes or far less. After that it is just hitting the go button every 3-5 minutes depending on song length.

Show up and run the show for the first two hours, and train a few friends of the singer who can hit the "go" button for the next 38 hours.

Even if I was going to put in a 6 hour shift of hitting the go button I probably would just bring a book and some ear plugs. Not exactly work that deserves $40 an hour or even 20.

Sure it may be worth something to rent the gear, but it should not cost the singer more than a $200 or $300 for the setup and takedown, plus $5 an hour for the practically zero stress KJ activity (beyond the first hour included in the setup), and that is best farmed out. The singer can press his own go button if he needs to once the playlist is setup.
If I was attempting such a record, I could easily run the rotation myself and sing.

It may be worth it to look if there are any software programs that just do an autoplay of the next song on the playlist with a 30 second delay.

Now I know that (good) KJs have a skill but this gig requires practically none of those skills once the setup is made. Why charge for it, especially if the person doing the request is already a friend/regular.

NO COMMENT!!!!!

DR. Fred.

A professional should get paid what they are worth and for their time as well.
I'm hoping you are not a real M.D. talking like this....

It's not hard to paint a house ..yet painters get paid good money, so do Landscapers , carpenters, DJ's and specially KJ's .

It sounds like you think KJ is a simple task ? --- and once you get the hang of it and with the right experiance and equipment ..It is !!!

But still a value that needs to be paid for...... The question is How Much without asking for TOOO much

No apology necessary. BTW... thanks for the welcome. I'm also over at Lonnie's forum.

Has anyone thought about what would happen if ur PA went down r something failed...here u have all these t v reporters and news paper reporters, and then something goes wrong....if you don't have it fixed and going in 30 sec r less ur reputation is shot....that's alotta stress on you as u leave the job to one of ur friends to handle while u sleep.... HEAD LINES..... CAN'T STOP KARAOKE COMPANY JUST STOPPED AND IS TOTALLY TO BLAME FOR RECORD "NOT" BEING BROKEN..... would you hire this guy? would anyone ever hire this guy again? just something to think about... u will have MAYBE 40 hrs to think about Newtons law....

I think you mean "Murphy's Law."

no...newtons law ...what goes around comes around....isn't that it? ...land yes ur right....

2

Have him come to Wisconsin, you come to Wisconsin and we alternate equipment so no excess stress happens to either KJs equipment.

The point is with a pro in all of the trades you mention it is often the case that the PRO hires out the less skilled task to a non-pro (but does the overall quality control etc). THe non Pro can do most of the dirty work in this case.

Im not a MD but if I were, I would use the analogy that this is a job that could be done with 1 hour of Doctor time and 41 hours of nurse or nurse's aid time for a more cost effective solution.

Most skills of a karaoke DJ are not what are really needed here. Sure the singer may want a big songlist with many choices of songs to sing, hence the need for a pro (not home) setup. But what are the other skills needed?

Working the crowd.... No
Sound quality... (not to crucial I imagine anyone will sound horrible after 12 hours of constant singing, and no sound tech is gonna be able to fix that).

What is needed?

Endurance... And for the regular KJ that is not the same kind of endurance. I just did a 6 hour show last night, and that is endurance KJing. For this it is totally different kind of endurance... Just staying awake...

Now this guy may be really popular and have 30-40 or even 10 friends out there watching the karaoke for big blocks of time, and then that would require many of the skills of a KJ to run the crowd. But I seriously doubt that is the plan.

Essentially the guy is asking to rent a karaoke for two days and have it setup for him. My quote of $200 seems reasonable for a pro in that case.

Now the KJ may be going for a record of the longest continous KJ set by a single KJ, and that is the KJ's choice and his/her own obsession. If that is the case it is just a mutual "fun??" thing to do and little money should change hands.

But when it comes down to it, does he really need a PRO KJ there at 5am when he is the only other person in the room. Cant a low skilled sub (or volunteer do the job then).

If you are really worried a pro is needed to make sure the equipment does not fail, set up two rigs with a couple extra mics each (and charge an extra 100). It is unlikely that they will be needed. I have never had any equipmet fail mid show except a mic cable in 200+ hours of KJ shows. Sure sometimes a piece may fail at setup (I had a tv die, and a loose wire in a speaker) but that is more of a problem with the wear and tear associated with moving/setup of the gear than the use.

There is no argument -Any idot with a cdg player and a pa system can run a karaoke rig. This topic wasn't about if a Pro Kj was needed or not. But started as an UNUSUAL gig topic and a discussion on Fair and Reasonable compensation. I'm not even sure if this kid is for real. And I'm sure he won't want to spend the kind of money is needed to HIRE anyone for that period of time.
I'm am still trying to discuss this directly with this kid and will post more info as soon as I can

Well this subject sure spawned some good conversation ..
I found out last night (before even giving this kid/guy a quote) that he has decided to "do it all himself" The manager of the bar told me they are scheduled to begin next Wed at 8am for non stop karaoke singing . I don'y even know the kid but I do wish him well.

The only wrinkle is ....He will be going for his record at the same time the REGULAR THURSDAY KARAOKE SHOW goes on at 9pm. I was told that they will move him out to the patio bar where he can keep singing. This in itself is a dilema??