I know some DJ’s who need assistants to help them through a four hour gig. Well, I’ve got two words for you from now on. ‘DJ Obi’. Yeah man, ‘DJ Obi’.
DJ Obi spins at the SAO Cafe in Lagos, Nigeria as their in-house DJ. He set out to break a World record set by Polish DJ, Norbert Selmaj in November 2014. DJ Nobert played a marathon set at the Underground Temple Bar in Dublin, Ireland, which lasted 200 hours. Damn!
DJ Obi was determined to break DJ Nobert’s record by a great 40 hours. Hell bent on playing continuously for 240 hours. Now that’s 10 straight days of non-stop music for you. Crazy, isn’t it! Read on to see if he did.
Obi began his gig at 11:30 on 22nd June 2016 by spinning house music for his family, friends and known celebs who were there to support him for his attempt. On the following days, people turned up in large numbers to witness this historic event unfold in their town, and to shake a leg to his awesome music.
Even high school kids came to lift his spirits.
He played a mix of house from around the world.
To go sleepless for 10 days is a great feat in itself. But what’s more amazing is how DJ Obi managed to keep the mood up and kicking even when he was fighting sleep deprivation and literally putting his life on the line. Nobody screws with sleep.
So what were the conditions set by the Guinness book to stamp this event as a world record? Was he allowed to take any breaks at all?
As told to BBC, he could take a five minute break every hour or a 20 minute break every 4 hours. He was also allowed a short one hour break every 12 hours.
There also had to be people dancing to his music continuously and he couldn’t repeat any track in 4 hours. I’m sure this wasn’t a problem, Obi might’ve rolled out a major chunk of his stock in 10 days.
While people danced to his tunes and clicked their selfies with this sleep deprived hero, it was anything but a party for this young DJ.
He acknowledged that he found it really difficult to go on after his fourth or fifth day and was on the verge of giving up, if it wasn’t for his friends and family who reminded him to go on to honor his father through this event. He said he had started hallucinating but kept to his word after getting load of encouragement from everybody around him.
He was allowed medical check ups and massage to help him sustain the challenge.
DJ Obi ended his 10 day DJ marathon on 2nd July 2016. He shattered Norbert Selmaj’s record and managed to take it to 229 hours but had to stop due to medical reasons. The Guinness Book is still scrutinizing the event and haven’t yet made an official announcement of this record.
Official or not. DJ Obi has certainly raised the bar real high for someone to get to this time. That’s a feat anyone DJ would lose their sleep over.
DJ Obi. Kudos! You’re awesome.