The psychological effect of music and what we play can have some very interesting effects on the people we play to. Do a Google search for the term "Psychological Effect of Music" and there are lots of listings on the topic. Supermarkets play canned music to make people shop faster and buy more. A restaurant discovered that playing music with a deep beat made customers eat more. It is claimed that playing Mozart to unborn baby increases brain power. Who would ever of thought that the humble DJ needs to be a bit of a psychologist.

An article I was reading was mainly about modern RNB and the way it insights violence through two different ways. The first is the lyrics and second is the beat, it is not a constant beat but a broken one. You are more likely to have something kick off a a function where there is a lot of RNB played.

Looking into it further, some of the effects that music can have are:

Motivation - some music is motivational
Relaxation - Chillout music
Aggression - http://www.apa.org/releases/violentsongs.html
Happiness - Music can stimulate your body to produce serotonin (the happiness hormone) and so elevate mood
Boredom - often caused by a track that has been heard too many times and you get bored of it

In order to have the maximum effect, the same type of music needs to be played i.e. playing a mixture of relaxation, aggressive, happy and boring music will leave a person in an emotional mess and they won't enjoy themselves. Hence why I stopped playing chillout/relaxing music at the beginning of a function as background music.

So as a DJ we need to play happy music that gets the serotonin pumping but the problem is finding tracks that give the feel good factor. Through trial and error, I think I now have a pretty good list of tracks that work. Through experimentation, I get less empty dance floors, less people going out for a fag break and lots more appreciation at the end. But I am concentrating more on mixed family functions/weddings/30+ birthdays where you can play more tracks from different genre and avoiding younger parties where they want more modern music played as most of the current chart stuff does not give a feel good factor. There is enough to include as part of a mixed genre function but I haven't identified enough to do a whole evening yet. Teen parties are not my area of expertise so I don't do them.

A track that gives the feel good factor has to have positive happy lyrics. A lot of the tracks that have stood the test of time and get played again and again to give a feel good factor fall under the category of cheese and that is why they probably still get played.

It also explains why sometimes if you don't have many people dancing, you get thanked at the end for a good night and people enjoy themselves. You have probably played the right music to create the happiness factor.

This all came about because I think I got into a rut, playing what I thought should work and it wasn't always working so I decided to find out why. It is easy to get into a routine of doing the same sort of thing at every function and sometimes hard to accept that what you are doing is wrong because you have always done it that way and it is your perception of what a DJ should do.

Now I have got my whole CD collection ripped to a hard drive, it is easier to spend some time listening to tracks and pulling out the one's that I had forgotten about or that I didn't think of but are worthy of inclusion in a set.

Thats my Sunday morning waffle and a little research project that has kept me quiet for a while.

Feedback/comments greatly appreciated

Excellent comments and a good "review" there.

Well done Mr Tony B

Great Read!

I wonder about the psychological mood of the person/s before they hear the music at a gig!

We do a lot of work with a local disability group, where there are a number of autistic people.

We have noticed that reggae music does get through to them more than other beats. So much so that one particularly affected member has now begun to be more social. His helpers and family are now playing the music to him and he has started to integrate with others a whole lot more.


Music is a wonderful thing!

Fascinating - recently I have tried to stay away from really slow background music but didn't really analyse why. What I did notice is that people start to 'chair dance', tap their feet etc before the evening has really begun.

Using some of the more upbeat swing songs, motown, reggae & pop between 80 to 110 BPM seems to go down well. As you are now our psychological expert (and you can spell it ) what particular songs/genres have you identified.

Having said that some of my most memorable weddings are where a song or dedication has made everyone cry - this has sometimes been planned/expected (eg special song for a deceased relative) and the 1st time I was asked I did it with some trepidation but taking people through this emotion at what should be a happy event is not as bad as it seems.

I'll have to get the lists when I boot my laptop up as I have divided the folders up into "feel Good" and "Other".

Its difficult to give an example sitting here on a quiet Sunday afternoon as you would have to take the normal factors into account, e.g. pre gig requests, type of evening the client wants, first impressions by looking at the guests, the way they react to tracks played and requests on the night.

But an example, and this is where the artist can come out in a DJ, you can paint a happy picture:

Start with Mr Blue Sky ELO - give the image of a summers day with blue sky
next, Madonna Holiday - goes with blue sky and sunshine
next, Its Raining Men Weather Girls - what more do the girls want on holiday?
next, I Wanna Dance With Somebody Whitney Houston - blue sky, sunshine, men, now they want one to dance with
next, Girls Just Wanna Have Fun Cyndi Lauper - Got their man, having a dance and want to have fun
next , Dance the Night Away Mavericks
next, Grease Megamix as hopefully the floor is full and you have them where you want them so for a bit of fun
next, Can't Get You Out of My Head Kylie - got the man
next, Walking On Sunshine - happiness of a holiday romance

A bit of a cheesy example of painting a picture of a holiday romance and its more targeted toward the women to start with are they are more likely to get up and dance first. Once you get the ladies up, the men will follow.

You can then follow on with anything that is popular, has an upbeat danceable rhythm and has either positive or neutral lyrics. By positive I mean anything that relates to happiness such as holidays, having fun, getting together etc opposed to negative which is about fighting, falling out, splitting up. Neutral are neither and are songs for example like Barbie which don't really mean anything and are a bit of fun.

very interseting, how about you post some songs, not a whole playlist just to give people an idea of a mini set they could play to perhaps change the mood if the gig isnt going down to well

You've just reminded me of a function I did a few years back where the dancefloor remained subbornly empty so I played lots of songs with 'dance' in the lyrics - You should be dancing, Dance the night away, I'm in the mood for dancing, Dance, dance, dance etc

Didn't work though

Unfortunately there isn't a one size fits all answer. It depends on the crowd. As Paul mentioned, you can have gigs where the floor remains stubbornly empty no matter what you play but they are enjoying themselves and getting the feel good factor from the music you are playing.

Don't get disheartened if you have an empty dance floor all night. It happens.

But we will have to delve a little deeper into you mind

Are you sitting comfortably?

Now tell me, what type of functions do you mainly do?

What is your favourite genre of music i.e. what do you feel most comfortable with?

At a typical function, what do you play while the guests are arriving i.e. as background music while they are settling in, having a chat and a drink?

Great Read,

I prefer to do the 30th 40th parties myself.

Seem to always have a better night

Get to play more upbeat music

What are you finding for dinner music at weddings etc?
Do you try to still keep it upbeat?