Tom Hades: “Baptism in front of 4000 Colombians”

Tom Hades and Marceline ADE 2015
Tom Hades and I have met several times since 2014. Of course, one of our interviews, was about his first gig. “What more could a DJ want?!"

This post is also available in: Nederlands (Dutch)

The Belgian Wim Verhoeven a.k.a. techno-hero Tom Hades and I have met several times since 2014. He even had an Indonesian-style dish at my very own dining-table. One of our interviews, of course was about the story of his first gig. “What more could a DJ want than a completely enthusiastic crowd when you play a live set that you put together in less than a month?”

“The first gig I did professionally was in Colombia. I believe I was nineteen. Marco Bailey had, without telling me, put me on a line-up as a live act. Until four weeks before the event, he had ‘forgotten’ to tell me.”

Portable studio

“On top of that, in those days everything had to be made with hardware in the studio. So, on short notice I had to achieve to bring a portable studio. I immediately bought a laptop and a flight case to take some material along.”

tom hades 2011 683x1024 - Tom Hades: “Baptism in front of 4000 Colombians”

Rake some tracks together

“It goes without saying that I was nervous. My baptism of fire was suddenly going to be in front of a mass of 4000 exuberant Colombians. I had little time to rake some tracks together that I could play. This was a very labor-intense job because I had to record everything from the hardware, track by track, on a DAT-recorder. Afterwards I had to digitally transfer this to WAV’s that I finally imported via a sequencer, Ableton 2.0.”

Less stage-fright

“Marco was a huge support for me because he was so self-assured which me gave me the necessary confidence as well. In the end it was one of the most memorable moments of my career. Maybe it even was the best baptism of fire possible: immediately standing in front of a huge crowd, because later, at smaller events, you will experience a lot less stage-fright.”

young mr Tom Hades 0 - Tom Hades: “Baptism in front of 4000 Colombians”

“The set went fantastic! What more could a DJ want than a completely enthusiastic crowd when you play a live set that you put together in less than a month? What I learnt that day, is that you can really handle everything as long as you have confidence in yourself and radiate fun when you’re on stage!”

This article is originally published in June 2015 on DJMag.nl.

More Tom Hades?

Don’t forget to check my feature interview with Tom Hades!

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