Focusing on your community is the key to becoming a DJ in 2023! James ‘Detox’ Dietrichson is a successful DJ located in Long Island, NY. He shares his secrets in this interview!
The main takeaways are:
FOCUS ON YOUR COMMUNITY
HAVE A PURPOSE & LET IT BE KNOWN
GIVE PEOPLE SOMETHING NEW
ALWAYS CREATE NEW MUSIC
LESSON 1 – FOCUS ON YOUR COMMUNITY
Becoming a successful DJ in 2023 requires you to connect to your audience and create a community. Creating and uploading music is of course step one, but if you don’t follow up in person with performances and through social media you may not connect to the audience you’ve grown. Creating that connection will kickstart your community of loyal listeners who will support your music, no matter what you release.
It can be argued that this can be accomplished just by releasing high-quality music, but if that isn’t the case for you in your journey to becoming a successful DJ then the question you must ask yourself is:
How can I create that connection with my audience and grow a community?
LESSON 2 – HAVE A PURPOSE & LET IT BE KNOWN
Let’s put this simply – your purpose cannot only be to make good music. Think about a big business or any big artist, they are a brand. For example, my mother’s favorite rapper Rick Ross, and his boss persona. You will never see Rosay not being an absolute boss because that is his brand. James’ brand is more just than that in his pursuit to start a community of successful artists while using music to promote positivity and uplift his listeners.
His purpose is his brand and he lets his community know through his music and even his name – Detox – his mission is to cleanse his listeners of any negativity. Although many musicians out there have a very similar brand, James separates himself from the rest through consistency and creating great experiences with his performances.
Give people a reason to listen to you and watch your next move.
But how can you keep people engaged?
LESSON 3 – GIVE PEOPLE SOMETHING NEW
A key to becoming a successful DJ in 2023 is breaking the mold. Give people something new that will shatter their shortened attention span. That doesn’t mean spam synths and samples in the first 10 seconds of a track but just give them something they haven’t heard before. How can you do that? The answer is easier said than done.
Be original aka be yourself.
Do not replicate your favorite artist or the music that inspired you to create. This next line will sound cheesy as hell but it holds weight. You are one of a kind. Now, you may not be anything special, but you are damn sure one of a kind, and if you decide to sit down right now and make a song from your imagination without any references or inspiration rather than what’s on your mind at that moment than that song will also be one of a kind. You may have subconsciously made a song similar in vibe and rhythm to what you love but rest assured, the chances that someone made that same song with the same message is monumentally low.
Give people something they’ve never seen before. Give them your original self.
LESSON 4 – ALWAYS CREATE NEW MUSIC
One thing James didn’t mention in our interview was how hard he works. Becoming a DJ in 2023 is more difficult than ever considering the amount of competition and the algorithms controlling streaming recommendations. James didn’t find success just making quality music – he matched quality music with quality performances and a high level of consistency.
It’s way more than just uploading.
He’s released over 50 high-quality tracks and a long list of performances to grow his community. This year he is releases tracks weekly.
