does it start working if you apply presure on the first pixel which doesn’t work? so in your case if i understand it correctly it would be the first of the 150 led stripe… https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipMvTAgJlaqeF7XYl3mosnXZonhmzf_1-79CCdUtdFqfnjTjhe5ApHE9oEhDsW9ySw?key=MnY1NlhVQTR0ckIyOGFDV1FYck1WUDFVd2wtZ2xR
+1 for @Severin_N . I had to stop my exterior Christmas light installation this winter because of faulty LEDs doing just that. But every time I replaced one, another further down the line gave me issues, or the next drastic drop in temperature would mess one up. Currently, I’m messing around with building 10-LED sections I can easily replace and repair (indoors!) if needed.
@Post-Master_Sodium I appreciate you for really expanding on what may be the issue. I might just end up leaving the 150 out since it may pose to much of a challenge for me to hook them all up in time for the event I want to use this at which is in 10 days. (but i’d like to get this going for another future event for more leds)
I did some research on regulation and I tried to draw a wiring diagram using an LM7805 but as I’m aware it looks like they are made for use on a breadboard which I am not currently using so I am not sure if wires wrapped around / soldered will work the same. It seems they need minimum 7v input and I have 2 4xAA battery holders i’d like to wire in series (if possible to save on costs since I have spare ones) and I could just use 6 batteries instead of 8 so there isn’t a lot wasted energy or more heat being dissipated.
I will be resoldering the connections later today to rule out a cold solder or bad connection. Please correct me if i’m wrong on anything, thanks again!
that one is the reason why i ask you the thing with presure: "When I jank the wires around it starts to work correctly but the first led is spazzing out with random colors and the leds start to flicker as well. " because my leds where spazzing also the whole strip from the broken one until it stopped working completly without adding presure. And moving them around was a temporary fix aswell 
Yeah, soldering them to wires works fine. Just need to make that connection, and cover the exposed leads, of course.
Not sure your battery holders, all I’ve ever used need to be filled all the way to make a circuit. But no harm trying it out and seeing what the multimeter says.
Just connect the gnd going from the battery pack to the lm7805 to the 150 strip. You can even just make a loop: battery>lm7805>strip gnd>arduino gnd (or even the gnd pad at the end of your 300 strip)
If it were me, I’d run a strandtest on just the 150 strip, just double check to see if any got fried. Hopefully not, and if so, hopefully just the first one.
I know there’s tons of events for memorial weekend, but out of curiosity, would your event happen to be lightning in a bottle? Just wondering cause it’s a good, led friendly event, lol.
@Post-Master_Sodium cool sounds good i think we can say this post is now resolved. Never heard of that event but im gonna check it out online. Im going to a music festival called summer camp in illinois. I have a matrix (10x30, i wanted to add the 150 leds going spiral down the staff im holding for the display) and people have totems in the crowd so i’ll be displaying very dim 8 bit animations i made and scrolling text.
@Ricardo_Gamboa , I know of summer camp. Jealous you have the opportunity to see Claypool-Lennon Delirium! Lightning in a Bottle is a different music fest in California. More electronic stuff. I’m not going (had to choose the oregon eclipse music festival this year), but the dates lined up.
Sounds like a cool project. I’m sure people there will love it! I hope it all goes good and you have a blast at Summer Camp!
@Post-Master_Sodium Yeah it’ll be a good time! Thanks buddy!!