About Nick Logan
Auckland DJ and MC. Over 30 years. Still here because I still love it.
I have been DJing since I was 12 years old, starting in rural Northland with tape decks and borrowed gear. At 15 I was on air at KCC-FM in Whangārei. By my early twenties I moved to Auckland where I was working nationwide radio — ZM, Classic Hits, Radio i.
I have worked in radio, I have worked in bars, nightclubs, I’ve done weddings all over New Zealand, I’ve gone as far as Las Vegas to learn how to be a better MC.
I love what I do!
This is the longer version.
From Radio to Weddings
At 15, while still in high school, I started on air at KCC-FM — an independent station in Whangārei. I had wanted to be an announcer since before I wanted to be a DJ. And right time, right place, and persistence, that turned into a career.
Following my years at KCC FM, I left the north and headed to Auckland where I had regular, long term regular nationwide shows on ZM (4+ years), Classic Hits (5+ years), filled in on Easy Listening Radio i (I was the last announcer on air before the brand closed permanently), EasyMix, Viva. More recently I did live all-request music shows and talkback producing at Today FM.
Radio taught me something most DJs never learn: how to perform to an audience you can’t see. How to hold attention, how to time a moment, and how to know when to get out of the way of the music.
The Years Nobody Sees
Radio was the day job… or the night job. Depending on stage of my career.
After finishing a 7pm-to-midnight shift on air at KCC-FM, I’d head straight to the nightclub. Whangārei’s biggest — up to 600 people on a weekend night, trading under various names over the years: Pips, Dolphin Bar, Powder Hound, Chelsea Club, and finally Heaven. I also worked Euro Bar, Oscars, Molly Blooms, Dickens Inn, and many others across town. This was in addition to “mobile” events – private parties, weddings, corporate events all over Northland, Rodney, Kaipara, Warkworth, and even in AUckland. None of that is on my wedding brochure, but all of it is in how I learnt to read a room.
For two years I was the resident DJ at the Lighthouse Tavern in Paihia — six nights a week, up to 300 people a night through the summer months, ninety percent of them international tourists. In a pre-internet era, when a Canadian guest asked for The Tragically Hip, you didn’t stream it. You found the CD, or you didn’t play it. I imported a CD single of Underworld’s Born Slippy because someone asked for it and I didn’t like saying no. That instinct hasn’t changed.
In my Classic Hits days in Auckland, I produced and recorded Jukebox Saturday Night — an eight-hour commercial free Saturday mix show, 7pm to 3am, built from manually recorded 20-minute mixes run through automation. The station manager had asked me to bottle the party atmosphere from his wedding in Dunedin and put it on air. So I did.
None of this is the wedding industry. But it’s why I understand music, rooms, and people in a way that can’t be learned from a wedding alone.
One of the highlights of that era: an interview I did for Classic Hits led to being asked to DJ the warm-up for Simply Red at their A Day on the Green concert at Villa Maria Estate, Auckland. Over the following years the same happened for The Proclaimers, Tom Jones, and The B-52s. Not a bad run for a kid from Whangārei.
I’d still be on air if the industry were what it was. It isn’t. But everything I learned there shows up at every event I do.
The Wedding Industry — From the Inside
I moved to Auckland in 1999 and shifted my focus to weddings and events.
I take on the right events — selective enough that every couple gets my full attention. Over a career that started at 15 — my first wedding client was one of my own high school teachers — I’ve worked well over 400 weddings, plus corporate functions, private parties, and events the length of the country.
For a number of years I also co-owned and co-produced one of New Zealand’s largest wedding expos: the Grand Wedding Show. It started at the Aotea Centre, grew to Sky City, and drew thousands of couples and vendors at its peak.
Richard Mills — on the right — was the fashion show MC at The Grand Wedding Show. More than that, he was my mentor, and one of the other New Zealanders to have completed the Marbecca Workshop. In 2019 he married my wife and I, as a legal celebrant, which turned out to be his last ever ceremony. He died in 2020. Some people leave a mark on everything you do. Richard is one of those people.
Inside the show I ran free seminars for couples — not sales pitches, but honest help rooms covering how to choose the right MC, what a wedding DJ should actually cost, and a session for grooms called Improve-a-Groom. I believed then, as I do now, that informed couples make better decisions — and know how to choose the right professionals.
Training
In an industry where most people are self-taught and stay that way, I’ve made a point of keeping learning.
I’ve attended DJ and event industry conferences in the United States multiple times — Mobile Beat, MEX (Mobile Entertainment Expo), and Wedding MBA at the Las Vegas Convention Centre, one of the largest cross-industry gatherings for DJs, MCs, celebrants, photographers, videographers, and venue professionals in the world.
In 2019 I was an invited guest at Think Tank in Chicago — a deliberately small, invite-only gathering of some of the best DJ business operators and performers working anywhere. You can’t just buy a ticket and turn up. That year I also spoke very briefly at ArmDJs (the Appalachian Regional Mobile Disc Jockey Symposium) in Gatlinburg, Tennessee — a tight-knit regional conference that punches well above its size for the quality of people in the room.
Most significantly, I’ve completed the Marbecca Workshop — a specialist performance training programme run by Mark Ferrell, a former Los Angeles performer who has spent decades helping DJs learn to present and communicate at a professional level. As far as I know, only three New Zealanders have ever participated in this training. Of those three, I’m the only one still actively working in the industry. It was so good the first time that I went back for more in 2024. Never stop learning. Never stop looking for ways to be better than I was.
What That Means in Practice
I’m not telling you any of this to impress you.
I’m telling you because when you hire a DJ or MC for your wedding, you’re making a decision based almost entirely on trust. You can’t audition the experience. You can’t test the instincts. You’re just hoping the person you book is the person who shows up.
So here’s what’s true: I started in a community hall outside Whangārei with borrowed gear and a lot of enthusiasm. I’ve worked live radio across the country. I’ve trained alongside some of the best event professionals in the world. I’ve stood inside the wedding industry — not just as a vendor, but as someone who helped build events, run seminars, and think hard about what makes a great wedding day.
Every event I take on, I take seriously. Not in a joyless way. In the way that only comes from genuinely loving what you do, and having enough experience to know the difference between what looks like a great wedding and what feels like one.