Vendor Spotlight: Milwaukee Airwaves!

Apr 17, 2019 | Milwaukee Venue Photographs | 0 comments

The Team

With over 15 years of experience providing entertainment for events, Milwaukee Airwaves knows now that professionalism and customization are paramount. They make every event memorable, understanding that their clients’ needs and preferences come first. They are true music lovers with an eclectic ear. Because of this, whatever you want your event to be, Milwaukee Airwaves will make it a reality. We had a chance to sit down with Alex and hear more about what makes Milwaukee Airwaves so special!

The Interview

What’s your adult beverage of choice? I don’t drink. Coffee!

What’s your junk food of choice / guilty pleasure? I love ice cream.

Do you have a favorite animal? My dogs. I’ve got a blue tick hound and a mutt. She’s just a shelter dog that we rescued. Her name’s Molly and his name is Theo.

What’s the best trip you’ve ever been on? I went to Scotland for two weeks and that was awesome. I loved it. I love Scotland, I just think it’s amazing. It’s so beautiful.

What music makes up your favorite playlist? So it’s funny because we play very happy music for people but I really love, not depressing music but, sadder music. Music that has emotion. So for me, it’s a lot of folk, singer-songerwriter kind of stuff.

What’s the best concert you’ve been to? My wife and I argue about this all the time, I think the best concert we saw was Volcano Choir at the Pabst, which is like a Bon Iver band. It’s like a side band he does.

What do you like to do with your family in your spare time? I just like to relax, hang out. We spend so much time throwing parties and high energy events that when I’m not doing that I just kind of chill.

Why are companies drawn to your business?

We provide a genuine experience. The older style of DJ’ing is something we are trying to get away from. That may have felt a little cheesy or hokey. We like to work with our companies and be collaborative, so we’re very receptive to any do’s or don’t play that they want. When you pair that with our ability to work with other vendors and being accessible and willing to help other vendors working that evening, makes for a very seamless experience.

When you sit down with a compamy for the first time, how do you start the planning process?

I like to start at the beginning of the day and work through a timeline. If they have one from a caterer or venue or they don’t even have one, we can just kind of talk through the day. For us, we’re very detail orientated and work progressively as the day goes on. A lot of companies think it’s just playing music that the DJs do and we’re involved in a lot more than that. Because of that, knowing what the plan is for the entire day is very helpful.

What is your favorite venue in town for a party?

Haha, Ivy House, of course! Obviously, I love the Ivy House, there’s a bunch of benefits just from a DJ perspective. Having the audio built in, having the audio both inside and outside without having to set up or tear down anything is very ideal. There’s a lot of great venues in Milwaukee though, and there’s plenty of beautiful spaces that have benefits for people. We love the Black Swan, they’ve got that beautiful lakefront access, Turner Hall because it’s kind of a classic, Milwaukee space. The Art Museum, the Grain Exchange, there’s just so many great venues. The Pritzlaff down the street… I think any venue that matches the company is a great venue for them.

What are the benefits to hiring you as a professional DJ rather than trying to do it yourself?

I think what’s obvious is that it’s one less thing for you to worry about. Having to worry about what song is going to play next or the feeling the music is or is it too loud is just another thing on your plate that you shouldn’t worry about. As a result, I think that it’s just so much more than playing music. For example, checking in with catering and seeing whether food is on time is just as important as the music. It’s those things that happen behind the scenes that are so much more valuable than just picking the song that’s playing at the current moment.

What’s the best thing about working with Milwaukee Airwaves?

We’ve got a great team. I love the team we have, I love the group of guys that work for us. I also love who we work for and I love working for Tyler and Ramsey. Y’know, we work very hard and we work a lot of hours and events but we have a great time doing it. I think that pours over into our work, I think people genuinely enjoy what we’re doing. It’s just a great atmosphere to be a part of.

How many people are on your team?

There are 22 DJs that work for Milwaukee Airwaves. If you factor in the Ivy House team, we’re a team of roughly 35 people.

We do all kinds of stuff. Obviously, we do all the DJ and emcee work, we provide uplighting, we can do slideshows on projectors as well as custom lighting experiences. This summer we’re doing a night sky lighting experience at Best Place for someone where the whole ceiling is going to be lit up like the night sky, so that’ll be a pretty cool event. We also do pin spot lighting and anything that is lighting in the aesthetic sense. Because of all this, we’ve started to kind of spread our wings a little bit and take on some bigger production stuff.

Do you have any special sort of packages for corporate clients?

Corporate pricing is all about what they’re looking for. I would say, let’s have a conversation about what your needs are and we can see what best works for you guys.

What makes Milwaukee Airwaves stand out from your competitors?

It comes down to our team. I always tell our clients whether I play Bruno Mars for them or another DJ company plays Bruno Mars for them, it’s still Bruno Mars. That doesn’t change, right? So, it’s the lead up, it’s being accessible, it’s the response time, the emails and phone calls. Because of this, having a venue where we can meet face to face is really great. All of those things really add up as you go through the experience.

Do you do corporate events?

We do! We do a lot of not for profit, fundraiser events, 5ks and run/walk events. Being a part of any event where someone needs audio, we are happy to help. We’ve done auctioneering, we’ve done all kinds of stuff so we’re always willing to give it a shot. It’s just fun to be involved in all of the things going on in Milwaukee.

For more information on Milwaukee Airwaves, please check out their website. Also, you can call them at 414-326-8273.

For more examples of our commercial work, please check out our blog!