CTRL Room offers beginners ‘the feel of being a DJ’

Just like the way karaoke won’t set you up for a residency on the Strip, The CTRL Room won’t land you a gig at a nightclub. At least not a reputable one.

“We are not a DJ academy, first and foremost,” says Chris Clark, owner of the DJ experience at 3345 E. Patrick Lane.

“We’re just teaching the basics,” he continues. “There’s a lot you can learn from us, but there’s still a lot to learn. We’re not going to tell you that you are a DJ right now, but we are going to say this is the feel of being a DJ.”

The first step: Attendees choose their DJ names.

The CTRL Room, which opened April 25, offers seven identical booths, each with its own Pioneer XDJ-RX3 controller and a 16-inch MacBook Pro running Serato DJ and Rekordbox.

“This is top-of-the-line DJ equipment that they use in the clubs right now,” Clark explains.

Each booth also comes with an iRig to connect your phone to record audio and/or video or to livestream, headphones and a ring light to make everyone look their best.

Those booths are laid out in a semicircle facing the instructor, who’ll walk participants through the fundamentals — how to mix properly, crossfaders, hot cues, etc. — for roughly half of the 90-minute experience.

“Obviously, in the beginning, we teach the BPM,” Clark says. “You have to match the beats per minute in order for your songs to actually come out right.”

There’s an accent wall in the lobby covered with colored vinyl albums ranging from the Beach Boys to 2 Chainz. A collage-style mural near the DJ booths features the likes of Tupac Shakur, Freddie Mercury, Prince, George Michael, Jimi Hendrix and John Lennon.

Both illustrate the range of music that’s waiting to be mixed. Clark says The CTRL Room has around 15,000 songs, from country to dubstep, on hand. If you’re looking for a song they don’t have, you can pull it from Apple Music.

Despite stressing that it isn’t a DJ academy more than once during a tour of the space, Clark says there is a route for people interested in learning beyond the basics. DJ Blitz courses offer two-hour sessions on three consecutive Wednesdays, with a goal of having participants leave with a 10-minute set.

The DJ Blitz series costs $249 for six hours, compared with the regular 90-minute sessions that cost $60 before 6 p.m. on weekdays and $70 after 6 p.m. and on weekends. All sessions must be booked in advance.

“You have a lot of people that may wanna have a house party or something, and they wanna DJ it for themselves. Well, now you have the confidence, and then you have the actual ideas for DJing your house party for yourself,” Clark says of the experience. “It’s not to say you’re going to go DJ at Club Whatever here in Vegas.”

Contact Christopher Lawrence at clawrence@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-4567.