Music Masters? Celebrities Step Into the Deejay Booth

Paris Hilton (Getty Images)

The next time you’re dancing at the club, you might want to keep an eye on the deejay booth.

Celebrities who are primarily known for other things, such as acting, singing, playing sports, or simply appearing in a reality show, might be the one playing the jams.

Basketball legend Shaquille O'Neal and Hugh Hefner’s wife Crystal Hefner both provided tunes for clubs on the Las Vegas strip over the summer. Orange Is the New Black actress Taryn Manning has been busy with gigs. DJ Pauly D, who audiences met on Jersey Shore, has had residencies in Vegas and Atlantic City. Former The Hills stars Brody Jenner and Audrina Patridge have both headlined clubs. Paris Hilton, Joe Jonas, Elijah Wood, Ryan Gosling, and even Kevin Federline — best known as Britney Spears’s ex-husband K.Fed — have all moonlighted as deejays, too.

Elijah Wood (PacificCoastNews)

Pauly D, who says he began deejaying at 14 and now plays a show every weekend, has a simple explanation as to why so many people want his job. “I really think deejays are rock stars and who wouldn’t want to be a rock star?” he tells Yahoo. “What I love most about my job is being up there in the booth with a packed house and getting that huge reaction when you drop a dope song or beat. I love continuing to keep them engaged the whole night and giving them a memorable experience that keeps them wanting to come back to your show. It’s not always what you play, it’s how and when you play it as well.”

Deejaying, of course, can be much more complicated than playing a song list at a venue looking for a full dance floor and, often, some press coverage. Someone like Pauly D can also use constantly changing technical tools to mix music in a new way or make effects such as record scratching, as long as they know what they’re doing.

Pauly D (FilmMagic)

‘True artists and music lovers should know better’

Taylor James, who works as DJ Tay James, is so skilled at what he does that he works as Justin Bieber’s official spinner at the “Die in Your Arms” singer’s concerts. James points out that technology has made it possible for everyone to be a deejay with their own traveling playlists, and the famous are no different.

“I think it’s great that celebrities are mixing and loving the arts,” James says. “I just want people not to disrespect the culture. So if you are going to be a deejay, take your time, practice, know your history, create your own style.”

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Not everyone has such a welcoming attitude. Deadmau5 — ranked by Forbes as the 11th highest-paid deejay in the world last year, earning $15 million from June 2014 to June 2015 — ranted specifically about Hilton in a 2014 blog post. He compared the hotel heiress’s spinning efforts to him competing in the Indianapolis 500 because he’s a race car fan and described her getting into the profession as “insulting."

"So Paris makes a billion dollars playing a CD at a club. thats great,” he wrote. “How is this news again? Personally, i would pay about as much to see her 'perform’ as Indy fans would pay to watch me struggle to get out of first gear and 20 feet off the starting grid in an Indy500 race without ending up in a wreck."

Hilton responded to the jab by tweeting, "I find it hilarious when others try to badmouth me in order to get attention. Sorry that I’m #Killingit while doing what I love & live for.” The former reality star is reportedly making big bucks and, for what it’s worth, has picked up an award for her work.

Still, L.A.-based DJ Michelle Pesce, who works at big awards shows such as the Oscars and the Golden Globes, says most professional deejays are frustrated with the celebrity deejay trend.

“Honestly, 85 percent of deejays shake their heads at actors, athletes, socialites, or other musicians suddenly becoming deejays,” she writes in an email. “I get it. Deejays are losing gigs to 'celebrities’ who usually haven’t spent time on the technical side of being a good deejay and get gigs simply because of who they know or the novelty of it all.”

“You hope,” Pesce adds, “that no one is out there just to make a paycheck or gain attention and faking it. True artists and music lovers should know better. And you hope that clients don’t hire these people based on the novelty or the press. That they hear the difference. But like any career, you have different types and levels of professionals.”

Taryn Manning remembers 'trainwrecking,’ then getting better

Manning, known best to Orange Is the New Black fans as temperamental, religious-obsessed inmate Pennsatucky, has encountered some skepticism about her deejaying talents. (She admits she was “trainwrecking” when she first began working a professional about six years ago.) However, she wants people to understand she’s not a music newcomer. Before she became known as an actress, she was one-half of a duo with her older brother, Kellin, called Boomkat that was signed to a major record label and released albums in 2003 and 2009. Her family is steeped in music and dance — she plays guitar — so deejaying was a natural fit.

Taryn Manning (Getty Images)

Manning recalls that she first bought deejay equipment at 19. It started, she says, with her frustration with Boomkat’s record label over money. “They always wanted to put us on the road… but, like, acoustically, and we were an electronica duo,” Manning explains. “So I learned a lot from that. My whole vision in deejaying was, you know what? You want to save money? Well, fine, I’m going to be self-contained. I’m going to be a damn deejay in a box myself. So that way I could go out, play my stuff, sing along if the room felt right, at least play my jams.”

A friend hired her for her first residency in 2009 at a Hollywood club, and today she feels “very confident” in her skills. She says she’s working as a deejay weekly, even though she can only pick up gigs on weekends while she’s filming.

“I definitely want to say this, with all my heart and sincerity: I love music, I love to play music, whether it’s on my guitar or in my car,” Manning insists. “I never signed up for this to make any type of career out of it, to be honest, it was very genuine and anybody who feels … not slighted by me, per se, but say their entire life and career is based around deejaying, I revere them.”

She adds, “I’m just doing what I love to do, and I believe that that’s what life’s about. Say you love to paint or garden. Why not? Yeah, there’s a better gardener and painter, but why shouldn’t you give it a shot?”

Earlier this month, actor Ansel Elgort posted a string of tweets defending his music career after it was announced that his deejay alter ego, Ansolo, signed with Island Records. Elgort explained that he began spinning tunes in high school, four years before he became recognized for his work in movies such as Divergent and The Fault in Our Stars.

Ansolo (Getty Images)

“Today a lot of press is making it seem like I’ve just started this,” he wrote. “My first indi dance record was signed b4 any movies came out. … I make music because I love to, I need too. It’s part of me, just as being an actor is part of me. We shouldn’t be confined to one thing in life. Why not chase every dream we have, as long as it’s with love and passion.”

Besides, a name can’t guarantee a long-term deejay career. It might get someone hired, as Pauly D admits it did him, but it’s talent that gets someone rehired.

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DJ Ruckus, who’s worked the deejay booth at clubs worldwide and at private parties for Oprah, Kanye West, and Jennifer Lopez, points out that there’s a big reason for celebs not to get into the deejay game if they aren’t qualified.

“Nobody that’s truly famous and successful in another realm wants to tarnish their image with something they are not good at,” he says.