The Best Podcasts and Livestreams For DJs

Written by Dan White on January 9th, 2013 105 Comments

In any artform, it’s critical to constantly be studying and observing the people at the top of their field, and DJing is no exception. Listening to well-assembled sets and watching DJs perform is one of the best practices that a DJ of any caliber can do to improve their craft. Today we’ve put together a list of the best podcasts and livestreams that every DJ should know about – read on to see our picks and suggest some of your own!

THE BEST DJ PODCASTS

Podcasts rock because they’re so easily integrated into everyday life – subscribe to one and have it automatically push itself to your music players on your computer and mobile devices. In the DJ world, they’re the guest columns, the editorials, the coming attractions and the closing arguments. Check out some of the best podcasts for DJs below:

XLR8R Audio Podcast

Recent DJ Hosts: Disclosure, Azari & III, Tom Demac
Updated: Weekly, with some exceptions.
Why It’s One Of The Best: XLR8R hosts one of the strongest electronic music podcasts online, with a wide array of DJs and producers holding down hosting duties each episode with exclusive mixes crafted for the show. The podcast is hailed for its variety of contributors and fresh tracks – all chapter-marked in iTunes, allowing you to skip over a track you’re not feeling or back for your own rewind.
Links: official site | iTunes

Annie Mac’s MiniMix

Recent DJ Hosts: Russ Chimes, AlunaGeorge
Updated: Weekly
Why It’s One Of The Best: There’s a reason that this podcast holds the number one slot at the top of the UK iTunes Music charts – it’s one of the more unique mix series on this list! Give a DJ five minutes of mix airtime – no more, no less – and it challenges them to create something unique with that format, much like DJ battleformats have done in the past.

Links: Official Site | iTunes

Resident Advisor Podcast

Recent DJ Hosts: Art Department, Danny Daze, Joy Orbison
Updated: Weekly
Why It’s One Of The Best: Resident Advisor is renowned for highlighting rising stars on their way up the charts – and while some criticize their tastes as airing towards eccentric or elitist, they’re regularly spot on with their podcasts.
Links: official site | iTunes
Also check out: RA Exchange: interviews with artists, labels, and promoters

BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix

Recent DJ Hosts: Eats Everything, Hardwell, Thomas Gold
Updated: Weekly
Why It’s One Of The Best: Do we even need to write anything here? Pete Tong’s legendary show on BBC Radio one hands over the reigns each week to a electronic dance music DJ. The mood of the mixes dramatically varies from week to week – with last year’s mix of the year going to the master of tempo changes inside of a mix, Nicholas Jaar. Artists put in the extra effort to really make their essential mix shine – often creating a smart theme or set of samples to tie together their mix.
Links: official site

A State Of Trance

Genre/Host: Trance / Armin Van Buuren
Updated: Weekly
Why It’s One Of The Best: Curated and mixed by one of the most popular DJs in the world, Armin Van Buuren, A State of Trance is tied only with Tiesto’s Clublife show for the repuatation that it carries. ASOT is just on the cusp of entering its 600th week in a row, making it 11 years old regularly plays live broadcast episodes live from a gig. Armin does a superb job of combining new tracks alongside classic tracks and tracks that are currently defining the genre.
Link to subscribe: official site | iTunes
See Also: Tiesto’s Clublife – is it any surprise that these “top two DJs” hold down weekly podcasts?

That’s whatpeopleplay

Recent DJ Hosts: Grizzy, Chymera, Tom Demac
Updated: Monthly
Why It’s One Of The Best: This one was suggested by a DJTT reader! It’s another rotating cast of electronic DJs and producers host the podcast for Whatpeopleplay, a Berlin-based digital distributor of dance music. The podcast tends towards being less high-profile DJs, which makes for a nice breakup in this list.
Link to subscribe: official site | iTunes

Other DJTT reader favorites:

Think you’re ready to start a podcast? Get started recording DJ mixes.

ESSENTIAL DJ LIVE STREAMS

Livestreaming is one of the best ways to watch a DJ perform in a club environment without being there – to see how they craft a mix, how they interact with the crowd, and yes, even how they screw up and recover. We’ve collected the best of the regular shows here, and even included an “in the booth” rating on just how good the stream is at showing you what the DJs are doing.

Be-At.TV

Why It’s Essential: Be-At.TV takes their name very seriously – they partner with festivals and venues to livestream entire DJ sets, bringing online viewers into the audiences and DJ booths at events like the BPM Festival. Last year, we watched James Zabiela tear it up on the RMX-1000 at WMC before we’d seen it used expertly anywhere else. Additionally, Be-At.TV has probably one of the coolest archive systems – allowing users to rate the sessions, post comments, and provide track listings for mixes.
“In The Booth” Rating: 4/5 – They’re not afraid to put multiple cameras in the DJ booth and really show what’s going on. It’s counterbalanced with an appeal for non-DJs – showing the club, the crowd, and festival shots that appeal to punters in general.
Favorite Episode: James Zabiela and Sasha at WMC 2012

Beatport Live

How Regularly: Once a week (sometimes more!)
Why It’s Essential: Beatport has a DJ booth in their office, and being a major distributor, it’s no surprise that they have special guests eager to jump into the booth and put on an awesome live performance on their uStream channel.
“In The Booth” Rating: 5/5 - You’re right in the mix – sometimes camera tends to stay straight at the DJ’s face from an audience perspective, but there are plenty of overhead and side shoots of the booth to balance it out.
Favorite Episode: It’s an old one, but seeing Porter Robinson and Zedd play around in the booth together for a joint session was great fun.

Mixmag’s DJ Lab

How Regularly: Every Week
Why It’s Essential: Mixmag hosts a weekly show that’s comparable to Beatport’s – live from their office, with special guests who happen to be in town. They’re very much on a “kick off the weekend” focus, broadcasting Friday afternoons in their UK headquarters, so it’s more of a club atmosphere than Beatport’s stream.
“In The Booth” Rating: 4/5 – very similar to Beatport’s livestream in this respect – you’re right in the DJ’s face the whole time.
Favorite Episode: The recent Skream episode was top notch.

Boiler Room

How Regularly: Weekly, sometimes more often.
Why It’s Essential: Boiler Room books underground DJs in four cities around the world to livestream their performance: Berlin, London, New York, and LA. The show is very much a party atmosphere – and is a great way for DJs to see how crowds react and behave differently in other continents. You should see the faces some American viewers make the first time they see a promoter do a rewind on a DJ’s decks!
“In The Booth” Rating: 4/5 – in terms of angles, this show is absolutely more focused on the sounds and the overall performance than really giving DJs a technical view, especially when compared to Beatport and DJSounds. Still a front row seat, though!
Favorite Episode: Bonobo’s mix during the Ninjatune takeover last year.

DJsounds Show

How Regularly: Roughly every month
Why It’s Essential: Pioneer’s video mix show isn’t technically a livestream, more of a monthly video blog with sets from featured Pioneer-using DJs. If there’s one drawback to the show, it’s that you don’t see unique performance styles on alternative controllers – but in some respects, that makes it a more appropriate learning tool for an industry standard set of kit.
“In The Booth” Rating: 5/5 - there’s a camera that’s directly above the decks the entire show. Now that’s a DJ perspective!
Favorite Episode: The episodes with Laidback Luke are epic.

EAN’S FAVORITE PODCASTS

Ean lives by his culture-based podcasts – and wanted to throw in his own suggestions for two great non-DJing related podcasts that he thinks deserve a listen. Ean writes:

“Here are two great (non musical) podcasts you might enjoy that I personally love:

Planet Money (I am a secret economics geek and this is a great economics podcast for dummies)

This American Life (amazingly inspiring stories from the heart)”

YOUR FAVORITE LIVESTREAMS AND PODCASTS

It wouldn’t be DJTT if we didn’t open this list up to your own contributions – and while we’ve seen a number of responses already to the below tweet we sent out, we’re still want to hear more of your favorite podcasts and livestreams to watch online in the mix.

Obviously we don’t know about every awesome DJ podcast in the world – so tell us what’s at the top of your list! Let us know on Twitter or in the comments below and we’ll update this article with some of the best to build the ultimate list!

What do you think are the best podcasts and livestreams out there for DJs? Both for finding music + for observing/listening DJs in the mix

— DJ Techtools (@DJTechTools) January 9, 2013

Filed Under | Artist Features, Music, News + Culture
Tags | a state of trance, be-at.tv, beatport live, boiler room tv, boilerroom, dj livestreams, dj podcasts, djsounds, essential mix, mixmag dj lab, resident advisor podcast

atmoss

fabric live, and kmag guest mixes are more then worth a listen ;)
terri

frisky radio!!!
http://www.facebook.com/niels.neessen Niels Neessen

http://www.mixcloud.com/johndigweed/
Anonymous

I watch the Beatport, Boiler Room, and Pioneer DJ Sounds regularly…
On the Pioneer DJ Sounds, check out Kissy Sell Out’s 30 min set from 2011 (I think). First time he was on and he killed it!

Richie Hawtin in the Boiler Room was also a great set!

Also, love the Chris Liebing CLR podcast on iTunes
http://www.facebook.com/pista.zeleny Steven Greene

Love the datatransmission podcast myself. Not always my preferred genres, but alway worth a listen.
http://www.facebook.com/Andrewreinfeld Andrew Reinfeld

techno live sets is great
http://www.facebook.com/schwencke Vidar Schwencke Svendsen

Not exactly a podcast, but Deep Mix Moscow Radio has NEVER played a bad track! deepmix.eu It’s awesome music 24/7! Best radio on the net.
http://twitter.com/YuppieMike mike blakely

DJ Dan’s Stereo Damage is always solid https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/dj-dan-presents-stereo-damage/id386489114
wevchild

drumcode radio
misunderstood Destroyer

A STATE OF TRAP
Eoghain

“the faces some American viewers make the first time they see a promoter do a rewind on a DJ’s decks!” I laughed so much when I read that.
http://www.facebook.com/vanek.ryabin Vanek Ryabin

mishka keep watch mix
http://twitter.com/GuiltySounds Tung Luong

fabric
http://twitter.com/djing_com DJing.com

We try to build a quality EDM and DJing channel, so please don’t hesitate to submit your content. During the launch period, we are only broadcasting videoclips though. Sylvain, Djing.com
DJ_ForcedHand

I listen to:
* Digital Gunfire: http://www.digitalgunfire.com
* Real Industrial Radio http://www.realindustrialradio.com/
* Dark Asylum http://www.darkasylum.co.uk/
Most of these stations play grouped music but the quality of played artists varies so I mainly use Spotify and LastFM and plug in a couple of bands I know I like … like Mind.In.A.Box

On a personal note, I love the dark sound but I can’t stand this new (in the last 3 years or so) screaming-thing as a standard for vocals.

Any suggestions would be welcomed.
http://twitter.com/JMonly Jean-Marie

A STATE OF TRAP!
http://twitter.com/RobertWulfman Robert Wulfman

How could you guys make this article and not plug your ustream channel?
Reedo

I didn’t think BBC shows held that much favour outside the UK. I feel a little bit patriotic now
http://www.uniquesquared.com/blog/21341/news-2012/the-best-podcasts-and-livestreams-for-djs/ The Best Podcasts and Livestreams For DJsUniqueSquared Pro Audio Blog

[...] http://www.djtechtools.com/2013/01/09/the-best-podcasts-and-livestreams-for-djs/ var dd_offset_from_content = 70; var dd_top_offset_from_content = 265;Related posts: [...]
http://twitter.com/AStateOfTrap A State Of Trap

Hey thanks! Just released episode 12 last night, check it (and our complete archives) out on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/state-trap-state-trap-podcast/id560805503
Flashflooder

FACT Magazine podcast mixes!
conordontlook

Nerdist. It’s nerdy.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1617084193 Omar Caldwell

Cutz on Cuts! http://ustre.am/omXY
LoopCat

LWE Podcast (Little White Ear Buds) is my favourite for great underground House and Techno and Beats In Space with Tim Sweeney is another essential for me.
http://www.facebook.com/chad.inver Chad Inver

http://www.smarturl.it/VictorNiglioPodcast

The Victor Niglio Podcast
Spacecamp

God Save The BBC?
Spacecamp

Hah! Thanks for reppin’, JM.
Spacecamp

Links:
Kissy Sell Out DJ Sounds 2011: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EbzWalPLhDY
Richie Hawtin Boiler Room: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sui24hHDZDI
Spacecamp

Does Fabric live put all of their mixes up? Found a bunch of good ones on their Mixcloud: http://www.mixcloud.com/fabric_London/
Spacecamp

Link time ready go:
• Little White Earbuds: http://www.littlewhiteearbuds.com/podcast/
• Beats In Space: http://www.beatsinspace.net/
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1321250023 James Brian Thomaston

can not dl Annie Mac’s in US. :(
Snakebytes

Group Therapy (Used to be: Trance Around the World) with Above & Beyond
aboveandbeyond.nu/radio
Spacecamp

Was in the car on a roadtrip over New Years, friends put on the Bonobo mix from Boiler Room and when the rewind comes: “Why does he do that? Why wouldn’t they just let the track play?!”
misunderstood Destroyer

Already have it and downloaded all tracks that were in it :)
http://www.facebook.com/DJJayBishop Jay Bishop

shameless self promotion https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/original-pressing-jay-bishop/id375593519
Anonymous

Dude, the Essential Mix is a global phenomenon with tracks traded, torrented, and archived by trainspotters the world over. Choo choo!
Anonymous

May I add the best from the world of Mashups
Radio SoulWax: http://www.2manydjs.com/
Bootie!: http://bootiemashup.com/webcast/
LoopCat

haha there’s been some discussion about that in the forums http://forum.djtechtools.com/showthread.php?t=58814
DDaniels3000

Soulection Radio
antifmradio

And here i thought they were trying to do BOTH shows. Guess not
https://plus.google.com/112767041460502214504 Greg Miernicki

Stress Factor podcast
Expansion Broadcast
DeepFoc.us
Dubplate Digest
Phuture Frequency
http://twitter.com/RobertWulfman Robert Wulfman

also, Above & Beyond’s new Group Therapy radio show http://www.aboveandbeyond.nu/radio/episodes
lauti

I miss the 00s when the internet had so fucking many great and diverse podcasts/mixtapes coming every week from everybody
http://www.facebook.com/ricoot Rico Netten

CLR
Drumcode
Ibiza voice
Moon Harbour
Minus

My all time top 5 podcasts.
It’s all i listen to on my Ipod really; CLR and Drumcode and Brtv on youtube for the videos :).
http://www.facebook.com/piopro James ‘Pioneer’ Burkill

Defected records podcast 1of the UK’s best huse lables
Anonymous

there many amazing Vodcasts as well… Recently have been listening to Solarstones Podcast on Mixcloud, as well as working on my own
Manolo008

Carl Cox ‘Global’ radio show (mixcloud)
Manolo008

Dancetrippin.tv
smuve415

^this!!! how the hell was Dancetrippin’ left off the list?!?!?!? I’ve been watching they’re videos for years! good stuff
Rutger Willems

can’t watch the mini mix cause i’m outside of the UK :(
http://www.facebook.com/matt.kraemer2 Matt Kraemer

The new Markus Schulz DJ Sounds is amazing. Just from him talking. Dubfire boiler room is epic. Best Podcast is Group Therapy Radio.
DJ BloodHound

i was reading this, and thought to my self, “there better damn well be a mention of ” A State of Trap!”… none in the list… but glad its made the top of the comment list.
Harry Butt

every fridaynight starting 8pm european time: protechnive radio and jacques chips movement on http://www.deep.fm ! great shows with good house and techno.. no edm fluffy sh*t !!
Guest

Guys,
ApeShape

man u forgot jugglerz.de radioshow, most important radioshow for reggae music in europe u electro nerds
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=889370654 David De Garie-Lamanque

definitely have to agree with Kmag mixes….awesome stuff for DnB heads
cris

i Know all these are great for finding new tunes and listening to cool sets but wouldnt it be awesome if there was like a Joe Rogan-esque music podcast where djs just talked about their sets stories from gigs the tech they use and how they use it. would be awesome. Djtechtools should get on it!
cris

this might exisit but if it doesnt i dont know about it l
aL2

24/7 video stream on http://www.rts.fm, since 2007!
Anonymous

If your down for some serious Drum & Bass bizness >> “The Thirty Hertz Sessions” Live every Sat Live on http://drumandbass.filth.fm/ & http://www.Stickam.com/TheThirtyHertzSessions from 2-4pm PST & 22-00 GMT…
http://www.facebook.com/weehollywood Heather Sawick Kennedy

It’s not a true “best-of” list unless you’ve included iax.podomatic.com! :)
Mac

Yes! They’re all so good.
Kaïou

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/true-lyon-radio

True Lyon Crew radio
Ginkgo

Don’t forget Little White Earbuds!

Other great non-music podcasts: Radiolab (Like This American Life for science), Best of the Left (I assume there aren’t too many conservative DJs on this thread), 99% Invisible (all manner of design geekery),

and one you almost certainly haven’t heard of- Atoms, Motion, and the Void: Think magical realism buddhist noir detective fantasy voiced by a reclusive gentleman with a captivating Tom Waits rasp. Give it time to work it’s magic on you, and I promise you won’t be disappointed.
Ginkgo

Oh, also:
The Adventures of Soul Clap podcast
Freakonomics – another fun one for lay-econ geeks like Ean.
Ginkgo

Oooh, also Music for Programming: all ambient/droney stuff. Mostly artists I’ve never heard of, though Com Truise did one of the earlier episodes. Great for folks like me who sometimes need a different type of music in order to focus. (As a DJ, my attention is always drawn to new sounds – not necessarily the best state of mind to be in when studying.)
http://twitter.com/awesomerdotcom Awesomer

Admins : link to http://www.be-at.tv currently points to 404 url http://www.djtechtools.com/2013/01/09/the-best-podcasts-and-livestreams-for-djs/www.be-at.tv
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=42810688 Greg Lane

Deephouse Cat
http://www.facebook.com/DJBlofeld Ond?ej ‘Blofeld’ Posolda

Big Ups, nick!
http://www.facebook.com/DJBlofeld Ond?ej ‘Blofeld’ Posolda

there is this guy on Bassdrive radio. The Komatic Show. I listen to every damn show for years… i even had to start my own thing, just out of admiration > The Liquid DnB Crew show aired on drumandbass.filth.fm and with cam on 175bpm.cz
sign up
http://www.facebook.com/groups/352707708150632/
http://twitter.com/KasataSound Kasata Sound

ELECTRONIC EXPLORATIONS!!!!!!!! http://electronicexplorations.org/
Thanks for this list DJTech Tools and DJTT Community
http://www.facebook.com/MWagner77 Michael Wagner

Filth FM for dubstep and drum & bass
podcasts: http://filthfm.podomatic.com/
live feeds:
dubstep: http://www.filth.fm
dnb: http://drumandbass.filth.fm
http://twitter.com/strangelo_e Dr. Strangelove

FACT are great thumbs down though for them not having a standard RSS feed. Cant listen in my regular Podcast app.
DJ SOUZA

No love for Remix Report? http://remixreport.com/
devils advocato

TEA & CAKE WITH JESSE ROSE & CLAUDE VONSTROKE Jesse rose actually posted him talking to claude von stroke i was literally just listening to this
Anonymous

Came in here to post that… Also Percussionlab
http://www.facebook.com/mikecharles.net Mike Charles

The Electronic DanceCast. We’ve got 6 years worth of work in all genres just waiting to be discovered. I also have guest DJs mixes frequently if anyone is interested in submitting their mix.
https://itunes.apple.com/podcast/the-electronic-dancecast/id207034818?mt=2

The full backed catalog can be downloaded here:
http://www.mikecharles.net/blog/about/the-dancecast/
Anonymous

Whaddup :D
Alkemyst

The Going Quantum Podcast.
http://djtechtools.com Michael Mitchell

Hospital Records!
http://twitter.com/Kelsey1B Kelsey B

You forgot one of my favourite streaming sites…
http://www.be-at.tv – I’d strongly recommend it.
Travis Trax

Check out my weekly podcast of my favorite new Electro tracks with a dash of Trance and Dubstep!!

http://traxcertified.podomatic.com/
Lente175

Fuck that, CLR Podcast, Hospital Records Podcast, Deep House Cat is where it’s at, Techno Live Sets is superb too
Lente175

yea boooyyee!!!!
Lente175

Nah… Drum & Bass Arena and Hospital Records!!!
Lente175

Super!!
http://www.facebook.com/jesse.andersen Jesse Andersen

John ’00 Fleming’s Global Trance Grooves
http://www.facebook.com/jesse.andersen Jesse Andersen

Temple Of Boom Podcast *wink*
Ephortless

Djtechtools needs a weekly mix show!!!!
Anonymous

Podcast reviews say Annie Mac minimix can only be accessed in UK… Might want to update post
cwcushman

I love that site. Much better than be@tv which always has glitches in its stream.
Robert

Check out my Tech House Podcast from Germany!
http://robert-ham.com
iTunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/podcast/robert-ham-podcast/id591905877
http://diskotech.tumblr.com/ Mohamed Kamal

For all things house you should know these:

Defected – https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/defected-in-the-house/id120107389?mt=2

Grant Nelson’s House Call – https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/grant-nelsons-housecall/id335387058?mt=2

Noir – https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/noir-music-deep-house-tech/id391519614?mt=2
http://twitter.com/DJHYPHYZ DJ HYPHYZ

Diplo and Friends on BBC Radio1Xtra
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01dmw90
Evan

Definately, EARSLAP is one of the best podcast in the world!
somethingsomething

Little White Earbuds for podcasts, and StudioR for livestreams + video recordings definitely deserve honorable mentions here too, they’re excellent
elvis

how do you not post Pete Tong
http://twitter.com/djtarek08 Dj Tarek

You missed http://www.radio4by4.com
Galvanized

I find a lot of the TENMINMIX contest videos on youtube to be pretty useful. Almost always the entrants have a top-down view of their booth so you can see what they do.
flo

nice yummy 25 min mixtapes at http://www.micromix.fr :)
Viandoks

You guys should check Rough Tempo. It’s 7/7 various DJs a day!
Orionbreaks

Orionbreaks.com – shameless self promotion
simon sayz

blindspot !!!!
http://podcast.blindspotshow.co.uk/
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