I’ve been DJing since 2005, back when you still had to haul crates of actual CDs and pray the disc didn’t skip during the first dance.
I started with a small wedding company out of Lexington, and around the same time I was apprenticing under a DJ at a Louisville nightclub, learning the craft the old way: watching, listening, and getting thrown into the fire. From there I bounced between wedding companies, tried running my own wedding gigs, and worked the clubs around town. Petrus, back when it was still standing. Then a residency on the deck at Phoenix Hill Tavern.
Phoenix Hill billed me as “DJ Sam The Tiki Man.” I hated that name. My mentor had already given me a name I thought was genuinely clever, DJ Sam I Am, and I wanted the world to know me by it. The tiki bar had other plans.
Twenty-plus years in, I joined Complete Weddings + Events in 2022. Not just for the gigs. Somewhere along the way I figured out I’m not really in the music business. I’m in the unforgettable-moments business. And that’s what Complete specializes in: the whole experience, done right, not just some guy pressing play.
My philosophy is simple: your dance floor is my dance floor. I don’t just press play. I watch the room, feel the energy, and mix the night around your people. A playlist can’t do that. I can.
When you book through Complete and ask for DJ Sam I Am, you get me. The guy who’s spent two decades learning exactly when to drop the song that blows the roof off.