great DJ documentary on youtube

[janzak]

"Dont Be Afraid To Bring The Funk." - Juan Atkins *sniff*

Word! Haha love that man

[3IJ]

glad you guys enjoyed! i was surprised how low the view count was on youtube, those are some of the best videos i've seen on there.

and yeah, seeing that absolutely makes me a little homesick for the good old days of vinyl.

...hearing what those guys (and girls) have to say kind of goes to show how pointless a lot of the controller/software/etc talk is. you don't need any of that stuff to rock a party. of course you can do it with the new tech too, its just that there is whole another level of complexity and $$$ without adding equivalent value over a traditional setup...especially for peeps who are just starting out.

[mostapha]

Keylock was a good invention.

It's nice to be able to do hot cues without doubles, though samplers existed for a while to do looping.

And it's really nice not to have to carry vinyl.

And here's the wird thing…I'm starting to think that vinyl might have kept out a lot of today's bad DJs not because it was harder or took more practice or was more expensive or anything like that…I think that some effect whores would have just gotten bored with tracks too quickly to put up with DJing when there was less you could do.

[synthet1c]

i think your wrong to an extent Mostapha, when I started djing early to mid 2000 the only way anyone would dj is with vinyl it too serious dedication to devote 6 months towards getting your mixing down, another 6 months to a year to be club ready, all the while spending $200 a week on tunes (which was everything I had), its far too easy to get a cracked copy of software, torrent some music and get a cheap mixtrack or something similar, then just hit sync and destroy good songs with effects, software djing opened the door for kids with adhd to start djing, before that they were probably wanking all day and listening to death metal because it was too hard to dj...
/rant

[scamo]

Hmm.. I think you are right, synthet1c. It is much easier to become a DJ these days than it was 10 to 15 years ago. (although I wouldn't consider someone with cracked copies of software and torrented music a professional).

I think though, to be a really good DJ is now even harder. The techniques in the past were relatively few in their numbers. The techniques themselves were hard to master. Now technology has overrun some of the old crafts and now there are new ones and getting to be a master of these, like using the multitude of effects wisely, mixing songs, sounds and samples even more smartly and even producing them to new songs, is just as hard if not harder than those in the past. I think, with today's technology, the ballgame has simply changed to new ways of doing "DJ" things. The definition of a DJ is changing. So, yeah. Many more people can call themselves DJs with today's technologies. Getting to be a great DJ today is still a very real challenge.

scamo

[*Otter*]

Thanks for the post. I play mostly breaks so most of the DJs interviewed I've not heard of but what they said about the craft was right on and it deffinately hit home. Long blends must be a house thing, I can't really say I blend more than 32-64bars before I slam the fader when the bass hits.

[U-31]

On every mix? hell no, variety is the spice of life, sometimes its a long blend, sometimes its a cut, sometimes its bring the bass in first, sometimes the synths or vocals, sometimes tunes are brought in on filters, sometimes took out on filters.. the tune will tell me the what and when
Bringing choons in repeatedly in the same fashion ad infinatum right thats 32 bars ...Bang! Thats about the single most tedious thing i could possibly imagine.
Oooh hang on, this is 64 bars.. Bang.

Newp, still shit

[mostapha]

@synthet1c & scamo:

I don't want to take away from the impact of those videos. While I respect your opinions and think I understand where they're coming from…I think you're both wrong. I have a lot more thoughts on the issue, but what I've typed out is huge and still needs to be edited.

I'll either start another thread or submit it as a blog post or something. I would like to thank you and the OP for clarifying my thinking on a lot of points of contention.

Long blends must be a house thing, I can't really say I blend more than 32-64bars before I slam the fader when the bass hits.

First, depending on what you mean by house…they don't do it either. Electro and Prog just don't work like that. At least, not the way Techno, Deep House, early Trance, and Acid do.

Also, what kind of breaks? If they're anything like the breaks I've spun, the difference between what they'd call a long blend and what you're doing is that they don't slam the fader when the drop hits. If the beat matching is perfect and the tracks are chosen well (so that the keys, melodies, samples, and rhythms don't clash) you don't need faders to spin breaks. Case in point: http://www.mixcloud.com/josephsimoneau/breaks-2007/. That's one of the best mixes I've done.

The one thing that several of them said is that you do what's right…for the track, for the night, and for the set…and usually that comes down to picking the right music, because the crowd and the music will tell you how to mix…you just have to know how to listen.

And there's no sync button for that.

[Alex Wild]

Awsome video, I'm probably going to sound like a numbnuts but what's the track playing at about 2:45?

[J5k]

Thanks for sharing! I got most of the way through it last night. I'm not too into the edm scene so most of the dj's are unfamiliar but one thing stands out that nearly every one of them mentioned and that's really knowing your tracks.