Spin city: a story by Dave Lindquist

DJ Limelight

Courtney “DJ Limelight” Chatmon works about 200 nights a year, filling his schedule with nightclub appearances, corporate functions, out-of-town dates and wedding receptions.

So when someone asks, “Is DJ-ing all you do?” he’s not ashamed to answer, “Yes.”

“I get to have my passion as my job,” says the graduate of Ball State University and Northwest High School. “It’s pretty cool.”

It’s also a fast-moving profession that challenges him to stay on top of future hits and new technology.

Musicians, promoters and record-label executives e-mail Limelight as many as 20 songs every day in hopes of making his playlist.

The era of lugging crates of records from nightclub to nightclub has ended for most DJs, thanks to computer software made by New Zealand-based company Serato.

With the Scratch Live application, MP3s and other digital files are manipulated as if they were vinyl spinning on turntables.

“It allows me to DJ almost as fast as I think,” Limelight says.

The 29-year-old estimates he has 10,500 songs at the ready when he DJs in a club.

People want to hear the latest and greatest tunes, but Limelight says pacing is an important skill for DJs to master.

“You can’t play the 10 hottest records before 11 o’clock,” he says.

Limelight cites hip-hop from 1989 to 1996 as his favorite. He says the heyday of acts such as Public Enemy, N.W.A. and De La Soul boasted a purity that’s missing from the efforts of today’s chart-toppers.

“I don’t mean goodness, because a lot of not necessarily great things were talked about in the music,” he says. “But it came from a raw and genuine place.”