Karaoke Forums

I wanted to say i love the forum, very cool colors etc and lotsa great threads!

i have been playing at the same place for almost 4 years, but working for someone else.
before i started running karaoke i went to various places and built friendships with most of the ones that do come to where i play.
i keep track of everyones songs, well regulars...
just starting out on my own this weekend. I had tons of songs before..admittedly most weren't sung, but i spent the last week up til almost 4am every morning going thru everyones cards and making sure i had their songs that were on their lists. and of course more...
but i dont have nearly what i had before. so that sucks. BUT i have subscribed to the top hits monthly to have all the newest and i am going to put back into it, disk wise til i get caught up.
im just worried that people will say, well she dont have "shyte"..
or do u think they might say, wow, she has the ones i always sing - cool beans! and just maybe keep an update page with whats coming, in regards to disks.  i can afford to buy at least 10 new ones a week til i get caught up and more, depending on how much research i do and comparison. To be brutally honest i have a little over 1700 songs, but was working with nearly double. I live in a small town.. so there isnt alot of big city competition.

I got all new peavey equipment, head, speakers, stands, new tv, new peavey mics and i do know how to make em sound good which is a plus, all in all they LOVE me ...they're like my weekend family, i tell ya and a great bunch of people.. i just hope they give me the chance to prove myself

Any advice?

My best point of advice would be to learn about custom burns AND FAST!  You really are sitting in an ideal situation the way I see it.  Almost all of the music I buy now is on custom discs.  They are a bit more pricey, but they are well worth it since you don't have that "Buy two songs and get a bunch of other songs no one will ever sing" problem that you have when you buy regular discs.

Be responsive to your customers and let them know that if there is a song they want to sing that you will go out and get it.  This will go a LONG way to making sure that you have a loyal customer base for years to come.  The bottom line is that we are in a service industry, and if the service we provide isn't as good as the service down the road, our customers will move on.

I was a subscriber to the monthlies for a while, and they are good for getting the newest, most popular music into your hands.  However, over time, I found that once the "popular" songs fell off the radio, so did the usage of that particular disc.  They are some of my biggest white elephants.

Good luck to you in your new business venture!

_________________
Spreading the karaoke gospel

Have a request sheet out for songs people want.  Be prepared to pick those songs up as soon as possible.  Don't settle for garbage manufacturers either, get quality music.  What is your "core" set?  If you just have a bunch of discs, you may consider getting something like the Sound Choice Foundation 1 & 2 set.  These are pricey but will give you a pretty solid set of music that anyone can find a song to sing.  When you start getting requests, you can either get custom burns or just buy the disc with those songs.  Often there will be other songs that people will be interested in as well, then other times you may be buying a disc for 1 song - the general locale will be the final determination of that.  What is one area's "treasure" discs will be another area "filler" disc - meaning these songs may never get sung, but they make your book grow.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Depending on what music you have sung most often I'd recommend the Sound Choice Foundations and the bricks.  If you have lots of country music then look at picking up some of the sets from Chartbuster.

Even though they're not always sung, having the 'core' songs like Sinatra, Elvis, etc at hand can make or break a good party that wanders in off the street.  Expect to drop $1000 - $1500 for the foundations and the bricks.

Even though they are not always the best quality you can flesh out a set quickly with a high bang for the buck using Sweet Georgia Brown.  I don't recommend them as your core set but they are ok in bang for the buck.  I'd pull a couple discs from the 66 disc set though as they're useless.  Especially disc 23.

Another good bang for the buck is discs from eBay.  If you KNOW what your'e buying you can often pick up discs there pretty inexpensively.  I've bought a large number of discs there - including my Foundations 1&2 brand new (for $550 no less).  Some I've really enjoyed and there are a few filler discs in what I've bought over the last 18 months but all in all I've got some really good deals.

Check local stores and KJ's that might be looking to drop some discs and don't discount the local department stores.  If you need a song check the Karaoke Bay discs for possibilities.  I'd avoid most other brands because of quality issues (other than the Motown original series) .  I have a number of Karaoke Bay discs and the overall quality isn't comparable to Sound Choice or Chartbuster's country selection but they are easily an 8 out of 10  (with most SC and CB CNTRY being a 10).

The DK Millenium set is pretty good but the pan flute can be annoying in a quiet room.  If you start the night with the bar pretty full no one will ever know but if you start the night with 2-3 people and build from there they might notice it (but most don't).  I find it annoying when I'm recording or practicing but in a crowded bar no one notices.

That's some basic ideas to start with.  I check my local stores first if I need it quickly.  Often they will cut me a deal because I buy lots of stuff.  If not be sure to hit the sponsors here as they often have excellent prices and a great selection.

Here is a suggestion.  I'm not sure if it is new.

I used to drink with a rock and roll star.  He always told me to play Foreigner on the juke box cause the ladies liked it.  I started doing it and he was right.

I started singing "Urgent" and one woman in the audience was singing the words along with me.  She was in her early twenties.

So when guys want to sing rock and roll, always suggest Foreigner.

well, i started bidding on e-bay for the foundation 1 and foundation 2, but it go so out of hand i started spending endless hours looking for a site that would let me listen to just about every song they sell and brand if it didnt have samples i didnt mess with it.
i wound up getting into phonglekaraoke.com and they did offer samples that worked thru my itunes player as opposed to karaoke.com's site who used a real player and well my speakers on the pc suck, so itunes' format worked best for me.
i had went to prosing but they didnt offer much in the area of samples after examining their big *(@$%&#!) paper front and back( the guy where i purchased the machines n speakers, etc, from gave me that, a peavey book & a big book for every song imaginable)
anyways, i wound up getting alot of Monster's. now i have seen crappy monsters n decent ones, the ones i purchased sounded good to me. i even found some music maestro - and to be honest alot of those even sounded better than SOME of the (some) of the chartbuster brands and i even nailed a huge amount of disks for $2.50 each on that phonglekaraoke site. all of them that i was interested in had sound clips and some sucked, i passed those by but wound up with alot of great stuff, but the real test will be once it hits my real system!
i am fully prepared to go thru every ones list and give them the best sounding choice i have and jot it down for them BEFORE i hit the bar, ill be prepared.
i did go buy ONE custom cd. there was some(and is more though) that just wont cut it - that i have the "opportunity" to hear about 5 x's a nite such as kansas city, can't help falling in love with you, one i couldnt find - dont make me beg, well that is just three out of like 10 i got, fourteen carat mind..damn i couldnt find a decent one of them at all. they sing alot of older songs there like hello walls, he'll have to go, kansas city, green green grass of home and i know that the majority of those are on the foundation's mostly the first one i think..
anyway, what i done was take all my cards and go thru and the ones they have sang in the last 4 or 5 months i made sure i had and the ones they sing the most i made dang sure they were the best i could find that wasnt a sound choice (right NOW) i personally adore sound choice over just about any brand out there - but right now i cant afford that. $3000 was the spending limit and i spent it wisely i feel.
after playing this weekend ( they didnt advertise - they put in a new bar - but they want me to come in if i want and get my system set up and play - my choice.,.which im going to do if everything comes in , in time, even if its just sat nite)
this will give me some more spending money on disks and im going to put back x amount of $'s til i get enough to get the foundations next month on ebay most likely (that place is addicting) i found some great deals but wound up being a bad ebayer when i found the same disks on phonglekaraoke that wound up being cheaper than ebay due to shipping per disk! plus i had a large amount of other disks.
i appreciate the responses and some of the other threads like rules ,etc, im def including the rotation rules in my books this time around. i been letting them sing 3 songs each til it got busy, but i believe i am going to change that to 2 each now..since there has been a break due to the bar building thing and i hadnt played for a little over a month n a half. i've never went to just one song each, my god that would just kill some of them and well i dont like it either, but it does make wait time longer, but i figure if im going to have to wait an hr to sing i wanna do 2 as opposed to one. any thoughts on this? going down to one, would probably not be a popular decision with my crowd, at all.
okay enuff rambling

Getting a GOOD core set is essential , They usually have the standards , oldies, partys songs and hits that most people sing. Although Soundchoice and PHM and THM are Great manufacturers don't count out some other mfgs for great discounts .
Sometimes you are able to pick up some older discs for $1-$5 .  Look for the SALES when just starting out and filling up your library.  Given a choice most people will choose Soundchoice over Sweet Georgia Brown ..But chances are many KJ's including myself have the SGB set because it was a great deal and had some good song selections in it. Shop around - There are some websites offering great deals on cdgs.  Check out some "packs" from Sound Choice  , Top Tunes, Chartbuster. Music Maestro, Karaoke Hits, Monster Hits.   Good Luck

Wow, the songs you mentioned that get done all the time......I haven't heard any of them in years.  MAYBE He'll Have to Go.

Anyway, on the 1 song vs 2 song, there are pro's & con's to each.  Pro being the singer gets a little more time on stage at 1 time, the cons are mainly the wait time till the next song.  Once you get over a certain amount of singers, the wait time WILL become rediculous.  Say you have 10 singers @ an avg 4 min per song, 40 minutes to your next song isn't really that bad, but an hour & 20 minutes to wait through 10 singers is a little extreme.  Singers are going to be waiting either way, but if you spread them out, most of the time they will STAY - which is what you are hired for to keep people there.  If they do their 2 songs & know they have another hour or more wait, they may just be happy they got their 2 songs & hit the door, possibly finding another club.   I know I would....

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

well, i think what im going to do is calculate it from now how many singers i got, then cut em back to just one. they will prolly go into shock
i play at an american legion, and most of the singers are older. some of them, their daddy's sang with them, the older songs, one guy was in a band about 15 years or so ago. so ..and to be honest, its rare to hear a rock n roll song unless its a classic like seger, marshall tucker or blackfoot. damn that reminds me i dont have train train and thats my favorite song to sing
course i am lucky if i get to sing a duet with someone    
they do alot of new country though..and of course Picture. not rare to hear that sucker couple a times a night, it has cut back some, thank goodness. heard a great version of holy water from big n rich, a couple came in and sang it.
im hyped, my man is going to pick up my cdg player n some cords, they just came in cuttin it close

Sound Choice 8146, reminds me I need to get another copy myself.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

oy! is that one of the bricks? or is that in the foundations? im thinkin its a brick.? u cant buy those seperatly can u? curious. be aware, i tend to edit my posts

oh and any recommendations on book creation softwear? i made my books from a spreadsheet, they look really good, but god it took me forever to do it! saved a lil bit of money though from doing it that way, but in the future i would like to have the software spigot or something.

Sound Choice 8146 is a Spotlight.  A single disc.  $22.95 & very worth it - at least in my show it got used several times a week.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

i can see why! nice selection on that one. i looooove ozark mountain daredevils. has anyone had any experience with phonglekaraoke.com ? im anxious to get my disks from them that i ordered..they say tomorrow, but i  havent heard anything back from them, if they are good though..which ill soon find out...ill keep shopping there, cuz for some reason they seem to be offering disks just a little bit cheaper. btw they have that disk for $20 only thing i dont like is i have to email for prices of Sound Choice products, but its like an autoresponder set up and u get the pricing as soon as u hit the request button

Never used them.  Kind of leary about stores that have never gotten any kind of review or even been mentioned before in any of the forums I frequent.  
Although with 100% feedback rating on E-Bay, chances are he is a good seller.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

well please keep your fingers crossed for my sake, i spent a good amount of money there over the weekend. and if i get em as promised i will be posting about it on here