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Song selection comes from hours of listening to music in the style you will be playing. Eventually, you will hear a riff from one song and it will make you thin

Song selection comes from hours of listening to music in the style you will be playing. Eventually, you will hear a riff from one song and it will make you think of another song. Those will be interesting to mix together. You might hear one song with a bass line that you really like with a melody line that is on the lighter side. You might then come across a song with a strong melody, but a bass line that could be punched up. Combine the two with some appropriate EQing, and make your own mix. After mixing for awhile, you will learn to listen in a different way than just someone listening to music. Using a tool to beat match has always been considered "cheating", but it is obvious why it is a tool. Beat matching is probably the most technically challenging aspect. Eventually, you'll even get a feel for songs that are close in tempo--most music in a genre will be pretty close by default. Learning to ride this bike with training wheels is just an option I did not have. Being able to manually adjust the pitch/tempo (depending on equipment) without the auto tools becomes quite satisfying. Some DJs talk about knowing what key a song is in, and if it will mix into another song. If you then have to adjust the pitch for beat matching, how does that affect the key of the song and how it now mixes? I've never claimed to do this, but after playing in school band I can at least hear the wahwahwah from something being out of tune (or was that the nitrous??). Maybe if you're mixing some prog-trance with sustained chords you might hear that, but I'd suggest finding a different place in the track to be mixing. The physical controller is precisely why I love vinyl.

jrowen 2y ago
Using a tool to beat match has always been considered "cheating", but it is obvious why it is a tool. I guess in the same way that using a higher-level language than Assembly is "cheating." I'm not sure if you're referring specifically to the Sync feature (which is still largely frowned upon) or more generally analyzed beatgrids, BPM readouts and Master Tempo (which keeps the pitch in tune when you change the tempo), but the vast majority of practicing DJs today are not needing/using the old school vinyl beatmatching techniques. Call it whatever you want but you're going to be incredibly hard-pressed to find anyone that can mix as smoothly on vinyl as someone decent with CDJs. Sure it's a cool dying art and analog and all that but at this point virtually anyone trying to play vinyl out is sacrificing the listener's experience for cool points (including the physical issues with reproducing sound from delicate machinery in a chaotic environment).
- dylan604 2y ago
  > Call it whatever you want but you're going to be incredibly hard-pressed to find anyone that can mix as smoothly on vinyl as someone decent with CDJs. Sure it's a cool dying art and analog and all that but at this point virtually anyone trying to play vinyl out is sacrificing the listening experience for cool points That's a sad commentary on today's DJs then. Yes, there were some very bad vinyl DJs that loved the shoes in the dryer mixes and could not advance past that. They love the "beatmatch" magic. Doesn't mean that those that could are less of a DJ which is what you're trying to say? My perfect setup would be vinyl controllers of a digital player which is very much a thing. Of course, hearing a DJ mix vinyl that is older with all of the snap crackle pops of a burning log is not pleasant, but that does not diminish the vinyl as a controller being superior to a tiny plastic spin wheel on a digital controller.
  - jonwinstanley 2y ago
    I agree that the beat sync tools feel like cheating for the old school DJs, but the newer generation are using it to get more creative. Without spending half the time beat matching, they now have time to interact with the tracks more - play with stems, loops, filters, fx, scratching etc. It’s becoming more of a live performance
    - dylan604 2y ago
      Becoming? May I introduce you to the DMC World Championships https://www.dmcdjchamps.com/ https://www.dmcdjchamps.com/ edit: Also, I take offense to the insinuation that "old skool" DJs are not using new things to be more "creative". Old skool DJs are not old dawgs that can't learn new tricks.
    - w_TF 2y ago
      >but the newer generation are using it to get more creative. Without spending half the time beat matching, they now have time to interact with the tracks more - play with stems, loops, filters, fx, scratching etc. >It’s becoming more of a live performance while this is true in theory, i find that sometimes the new tools end up becoming a crutch making djs extremely boring the extra time freed up from not having to concentrate on beatmatching etc. is replaced with nothing a lot of the time i have no idea what people are even doing they may as well just be playing a playlist from spotify whereas i can generally discern what a vinyl dj is doing, and watching someone like jeff mills dig through piles of records & spinning 3 decks while being on the edge of trainwrecking has a kind of energy and tension that gets lost and is not replicable with newer technology it's sorta like someone being able to sing really well naturally vs someone with autotune that being said i've still seen amazing sets from digital djs or people with interesting live setups
munificent 2y ago
> After mixing for awhile, you will learn to listen in a different way than just someone listening to music. There is a whole other side to song selection which is reading the room and figuring out what the audience needs next. That side isn't visible until you happen to start actually playing for an audience but it's ultimately the most important one, I think. > If you then have to adjust the pitch for beat matching, how does that affect the key of the song and how it now mixes? Music hardware/software can now do a pretty good job of changing speed and pitch independently. "Time-stretching" is the older term for how those algorithms work and they've gotten pretty good over the years. I don't know how newer DJ software behaves by default you when change tempo. It's been a long time since I DJed. But, also, producers making music for dancefloors know what they are doing and anticipate this. Most tracks made for DJs will have a long intro and outro that is mostly drums and other atonal instruments. That way DJs can mix without having to worry about keys clashing as much. It always feels really good when you find two tracks that harmonize well with each other and you can mix their tonal parts together in the transition. > The physical controller is precisely why I love vinyl. 100%. Beatmatching vinyl is one of those lovely zen activities, like driving a manual transmission, catching the wind in a sailboat, or hitting balls at a driving range. You're always chasing the perfectly smooth execution and never quite getting there.
shit_game 2y ago
> The physical controller is precisely why I love vinyl. It's interesting how djings origins in vinyl led to the controler interfaces we have today. I don't have any aptitude for djing myself, but also having played with mixxx before also, it makes so much intuitive sense why the controller format of turntables and sliders works so well.

jrowen 2y ago

Using a tool to beat match has always been considered "cheating", but it is obvious why it is a tool. I guess in the same way that using a higher-level language than Assembly is "cheating." I'm not sure if you're referring specifically to the Sync feature (which is still largely frowned upon) or more generally analyzed beatgrids, BPM readouts and Master Tempo (which keeps the pitch in tune when you change the tempo), but the vast majority of practicing DJs today are not needing/using the old school vinyl beatmatching techniques. Call it whatever you want but you're going to be incredibly hard-pressed to find anyone that can mix as smoothly on vinyl as someone decent with CDJs. Sure it's a cool dying art and analog and all that but at this point virtually anyone trying to play vinyl out is sacrificing the listener's experience for cool points (including the physical issues with reproducing sound from delicate machinery in a chaotic environment).

dylan604 2y ago
> Call it whatever you want but you're going to be incredibly hard-pressed to find anyone that can mix as smoothly on vinyl as someone decent with CDJs. Sure it's a cool dying art and analog and all that but at this point virtually anyone trying to play vinyl out is sacrificing the listening experience for cool points That's a sad commentary on today's DJs then. Yes, there were some very bad vinyl DJs that loved the shoes in the dryer mixes and could not advance past that. They love the "beatmatch" magic. Doesn't mean that those that could are less of a DJ which is what you're trying to say? My perfect setup would be vinyl controllers of a digital player which is very much a thing. Of course, hearing a DJ mix vinyl that is older with all of the snap crackle pops of a burning log is not pleasant, but that does not diminish the vinyl as a controller being superior to a tiny plastic spin wheel on a digital controller.
- jonwinstanley 2y ago
  I agree that the beat sync tools feel like cheating for the old school DJs, but the newer generation are using it to get more creative. Without spending half the time beat matching, they now have time to interact with the tracks more - play with stems, loops, filters, fx, scratching etc. It’s becoming more of a live performance
  - dylan604 2y ago
    Becoming? May I introduce you to the DMC World Championships https://www.dmcdjchamps.com/ https://www.dmcdjchamps.com/ edit: Also, I take offense to the insinuation that "old skool" DJs are not using new things to be more "creative". Old skool DJs are not old dawgs that can't learn new tricks.
  - w_TF 2y ago
    >but the newer generation are using it to get more creative. Without spending half the time beat matching, they now have time to interact with the tracks more - play with stems, loops, filters, fx, scratching etc. >It’s becoming more of a live performance while this is true in theory, i find that sometimes the new tools end up becoming a crutch making djs extremely boring the extra time freed up from not having to concentrate on beatmatching etc. is replaced with nothing a lot of the time i have no idea what people are even doing they may as well just be playing a playlist from spotify whereas i can generally discern what a vinyl dj is doing, and watching someone like jeff mills dig through piles of records & spinning 3 decks while being on the edge of trainwrecking has a kind of energy and tension that gets lost and is not replicable with newer technology it's sorta like someone being able to sing really well naturally vs someone with autotune that being said i've still seen amazing sets from digital djs or people with interesting live setups

munificent 2y ago

> After mixing for awhile, you will learn to listen in a different way than just someone listening to music. There is a whole other side to song selection which is reading the room and figuring out what the audience needs next. That side isn't visible until you happen to start actually playing for an audience but it's ultimately the most important one, I think. > If you then have to adjust the pitch for beat matching, how does that affect the key of the song and how it now mixes? Music hardware/software can now do a pretty good job of changing speed and pitch independently. "Time-stretching" is the older term for how those algorithms work and they've gotten pretty good over the years. I don't know how newer DJ software behaves by default you when change tempo. It's been a long time since I DJed. But, also, producers making music for dancefloors know what they are doing and anticipate this. Most tracks made for DJs will have a long intro and outro that is mostly drums and other atonal instruments. That way DJs can mix without having to worry about keys clashing as much. It always feels really good when you find two tracks that harmonize well with each other and you can mix their tonal parts together in the transition. > The physical controller is precisely why I love vinyl. 100%. Beatmatching vinyl is one of those lovely zen activities, like driving a manual transmission, catching the wind in a sailboat, or hitting balls at a driving range. You're always chasing the perfectly smooth execution and never quite getting there.

shit_game 2y ago

> The physical controller is precisely why I love vinyl. It's interesting how djings origins in vinyl led to the controler interfaces we have today. I don't have any aptitude for djing myself, but also having played with mixxx before also, it makes so much intuitive sense why the controller format of turntables and sliders works so well.