Confidence.  The sort that can be seen by others, but not to the extent that it becomes arrogance.  Just confidence.



An after thought: I was just thinking about AK1200.  He's from the same suburb of Orlando I live in (Apopka).  If you read a recent bio on him it might list his 'credentials' somewhere and will sometimes say something like: "Residency: No thanks."  First time I saw that I thought to myself, "Yeah, easy for him to say."  But it wasn't always like that for him.  That guy, whom I have mad respect for as a DJ, started out spinning in the local mall.  Yes, that's right, I said mall.  As in shopping mall.  How's that for a 'residency'?  And he was spinning DnB when no one around here knew what that was.  People outside the EDM scene still don't know what that is.  My point is this: He started out small, but he married his genre, supported it, worked it, networked, and held down his residency--or whatever else it was he was working at/on at the time--with excellence.  Now, I don't agree with the man's spiritual views, but he's got the humble thing down better than most Christians do, and that's a shame.  It's worked to his benefit, too, as I'm sure you can tell.  I bet there isn't a single DJ on this board who doesn't know who AK1200 is--now.  A lot of headliners have devoted their lives to their craft (even if they are holding down a job or running a business "on the side", which many are).  AK1200 is no overnight success.  It took him years of really working hard, not just at DJing, but at networking and supporting a genre no one even seemed to know about at the time.

If you look at most successful headliners, they started out as awesome openers.

Keep opening.  Be the best warmup dj out there.  Set an atmosphere that sets up the headliner to succeed.  Eventually headliners will request you to be their opener.  As your name starts to spread around you will get your break. 

Ive been warming up for people for ages - im only now getting the headline bookings : )

for some reason ive always found the challenge of warming up more interesting.............

the other question...

why do you want to be a headliner?

Its DJ Reborn Hi from Reborn hahaha

The ONLY way to become a headliner is by opening.....Unless it's your event and you don't care about making money...LOL!

The story about AK1200 reminds me of D:Fuse...He started as a mobile DJ...In fact,  Dustin Fuseler was nationally respected for being a high quality interactive wedding DJ way before he gained any success as D:Fuse.

Every time I think about Jimmy Joslin though...I'm reminded of this one time at Vinyl in Huntsville,  AL.  it was the owner's,  Danny C,  birthday.  Jimmy and I were standing in the DJ booth with Danny,  pouring vodka into people standing below the booth mouths.  Fun times!

another thing to think over is making sure that you have the crowd really bouncing when you had over the reigns. that way the promoters know that you can get the crowd going.