Djs and how they mix...

[Paul Nisbet]

this gets too me a little....

i have heard so many people say this dj is shit, that dj is shit at mixing.... when they have only heard them a few times?!

Every dj has there off days....

also each club set up is different, and sometimes monitoring can be that bad that u cant help but mix shit!!!

There are a million and one factors to a good set, and a bad set.

Opinion
set up
decks!!!

whats everyone else think...

I used to do it myself, until i started playin in a few different clubs, then u realise how some clubs can have an especially shite set up!!!

[wenna]

i personally would only say a dj was shite if he played a set full of records that i couldn't stand.

or the set had no direction/structureto it whatsoever....

[Jay M]

I agree it can depends on circumstances .
Ive booked and heard many djs in my time and ive heard good and bad sets from most (inlcluding myself).

But the main thing is that the dancefloor is still jumping ;)

[WRAGG]

Must agree there. Unfortunatly the average clubber who doesn't mix doesn't know this and will be quick to critisise a dj.

[Paul Nisbet]

i think mostly it comes from djs who dont ave club experience yet... and thats not snooty or anything, cause i can mind doin that myself.

But until ur in the club and realise wat that situation can throw at u, u dont realise how tough a job a dj has!

[Voorheez]

I don't really agree - a good dj's bad set should still be worlds away from a bad dj's bad set.

I've played in a club before that had no monitor, and a massive main room, and although it was my worst set, i've heard worse by people who have had everything set up ok. The structure and placement of a mix and track selection is in my eyes what matters most, and a beat slipped out here and there because of bad equipment is excusable when you hear a good dj mix (and they should be able to rescue it pretty quick anyhow).

A badly placed mix or a poor track coming in is mainly what would make me think that someone is a bad dj, and that doesn't really have anything to do with the club's set up or decks, more the person's ability.

[MARKEG]

it's easy to know a good dj from a bad dj. a good dj understands everything about shit monitors, bad club promoters, loads of travelling etc etc and deals with it, has a positive attitude on life and gives it their all 100% every time. to me, it's not about the 'set'. that's why every dj in my top 5 i know really well and respect them. although that's just my opinion eh. when i used to just go out and party, it was all about the set. and that at the end of the day is what matters and it's so not right.

[Hakka.]

From my experience, a good DJ is someone who is fully comprehensible with beat matching and mixing technique suited to there chosen genre, and who has shown they can consistiently perform at this level. They are able to easily and confidentily, nearly always have the track you are about to mix in being properly beat matched and that your mixing style clearly shows that you have made use of the tracks inherent build ups and break downs to enable smooth and gel'd feeling to the mix. The esscence of mixing is to generate an acceptable and enjoyable bridge between two tracks, and of course we all know there's many ways to do this depending on what you like doing and what you find easier doing!

You can go so much deeper and claim that DJ's who can't adapt to using certain setups are bad/worse than others or perhaps that if your a DJ who decides to learn to do other things such as scratching, then this makes you a better dj. Fair shout, but if you only comparing overall DJ ablility then you really should break it down in to catorgries of:

Beat Matching Ability

(speed and accuracy)

Mixing Style

(to show thought has been put in to how you want the mix to be perceived through making use of each tracks individual layout. I would consider random cue`ing off to be poor mixing as I find it not nice to listen to a track drag out its build down and then a whopping bass line come in and overpowering the track your mixing out from which is nearing its end.)

Music Played

(Fundementally, for me and others who play hard trance / hard style, its ALL about being able to play the tunes that you like of this genre the way you'd want to hear it if you was that clubber. After being a clubber for so long I find it easy to spot a good record overall - regardless what I personally think of it. I dunno... perhaps cause I am a south west clubber come DJ that I sort of have a natural feeling that I know what "should" be received well by a crowd. I'm not saying I can tell what people want for fact, just that I think I can and when someone who likes hard trance / hard style gives me bad feedback about the tunes I pick, I'm sticking to what I think sounds best for me and clubber.)

For example, I shall use DJ THE CROW as my example for reviewing his dj abliity... this is purely my instinct and oberstation based on seeing him at Dance Academy, and that I know what there setup is and I'm direct contact with people who use the system regulary.

For Beat Matching, I would say that he fully understands the concept and can reproduce at request. When under pressure in clubs, he can regularly get the beats matched, with some mixes perhaps needing extra adjustments on the fly to keep them sounding smooth. In the club I find the large sound systems do conceal beats that are slightly out depending on what you've done with the gains/freq's when bringing your tracks in. If you hear a set in a club and hear the same set played back on a home steroe via CD, you will notice minor beat adjustments which I would deem to sloppy to be on a demo CD of mine perhaps. Overall its acceptable to hear in the club.


For Mixing Style, I'd say like most germans who dj that I've seen, they appear to not always get things cue'd properly (well, not to what I'd have them) and they make up for jumps in beats, sounds or breakdows in tracks by shifting large amounts of bass around on either one or both tracks. Its sounds like he may be bringing a fader down too as well to compensate for high freq's standing out over the tune your mixing in. In a club, it's acceptable to hear although on a CD it would to me sound like either not much thought has gone in to how they've styled the mix or perhaps they've not got the judgement/vision/judgement to spot a better cue'ing place to attempt a mix from. Overall, a basic level I think and when they make an error in timing its made up by exaggerated changes to the freq's of either track to compensate.

The result is that Dj The Crow on both occasions I've seen him he has pulled off great tune selection - a set of combining there best releases with other dark and hard trance tunes. As for ability, I can only say that it would seem that from what I have heard the ablility only was enough to get each mix through in a rough way. It wasn't obviously bad, but to anyone who knows how to mix could spot the pushing of beats on constantly (no adjuts to pitch to compensate) and the shifting of freq's to make up for the fact one record is about to build up or breakdown out of time with the other was apparent on nearly every mix.

Of course, two 2 hours sets isn't really a fair judgement of someone who has DJ'd the amount of times that Dj The Crow has. So although I've given detail, I've tried to justify any good or bad things I noticed from the set at the time. So from my experience Dj The Crow dj ability is low from a technical point of view (there's just so many excellent dj's these days on the up & comming list that would peform so much better the same tunes I would have to say that the standard of mixing was not club level) but his presence and of course typical dark natured tracks is warmley received.

Well I've rabbited on a lot there, again, it's just my thoughts on the matter... I agree it's difficult to say ultimately if someone is crap or not... people have different strenths and weaknesses. At the end of the day if a dj was crap in all areas I would find it hard to believe that a club promoter would not also notice this and not book him.

I dunno... interesting topic this though.

[Paul Nisbet]

See wat u guys are saying...


but my main point was on the fact on how easily djs can be critisied....

And then the opinions by those who have seen a poor set, spreading word etc....

[wenna]

a good dj should know how to hide slight 'out ' mixes due to poor monitors, using eq's and various tricks etc imo.


i also find goood djs tend to be sponsored by smirnoff ice. :dontevengothere:

[DJ Corbzy]

a good dj is one who reads the crowd properly, mixes to there best ability with the set up and dosent look down on others....

[Jay M]

a good dj is one who reads the crowd properly, mixes to there best ability with the set up and dosent look down on others....
i totaly agree ;)

[saki nzyme]

ive heard so many people slag dj's off sayin there shit etc u ask why and they say cause they play shite tunes.

everybody and every dj will have different opinions on tunes just cause a dj plays a few tunes your not really keen on that dosnt make them shit.

like people said before a dj is only as good as the club set up and lets face it in this scene there is a lot of crappy venus with terrible sound systems.

[Tim Hidgem]

IMO you gotta look at the whole package:

1. Technical Ability.
2. Tune selection.
3. Set building.
4. Attitude and how the DJ reacts with the crowd.

All the above will depend on:

1.Where the DJ is playing.
2. Wot time the DJ is playing.
3. Wot Dj has played the set before.
4. Wot DJ is playing the next set.

Unfortunatley you can pick faults with at least one of the above with DJ's in the world.

IMO the British are the best in the world so it is easy for us to rip other DJ's (espically Europeans) but I find the more I look on the positive on the DJ's sets and less on the negative them more I learn about the DJ and the scene in general.

[Hakka.]

yeah this is a very very deep subject. I just find it hard to believe that if a dj is crap, and I mean cannot mix very well and picks not so popular tunes, how is he or she going to get anywhere?

Surely there demo cd show how poor they play?

[saki nzyme]

yeah i see what your sayin hakka but its a lot easier to mix in your bedroom than it is in a club.......so the demo you might do in your bedroom could be tight as fuk but when u get to the club you play shite.

as for the tune selection it ul be crap in the club and tour bedroom haha

sayin all this lets say you hate this certain tune but the crows loves it would you play it?

my answer would have to be no!

[subsonic]

i played in a club in corfu and i couldnt hear shit i just knew my own records and got on with the job to best of my abilaty i didnt take the risks
what i mite have done if the system was right but the crowd enjoyed it
but i hated that night myself because i shit it but like i said thay enjoyed it and thats what matters ;)

[Hakka.]

Yeah I suppose... I do know what your saying... but I'm working on the assumption that the DJ's that would be highlighted as crap are ones that are regulary playing out if you catch my drift. So although they may make a good cd you'd expect that the promoter or something would think "hey this guy is really not doing a good job". I dunno... but it's in interesting topic this.

[Hakka.]

i played in a club in corfu and i couldnt hear shit i just knew my own records and got on with the job to best of my abilaty i didnt take the risks
what i mite have done if the system was right but the crowd enjoyed it
but i hated that night myself because i shit it but like i said thay enjoyed it and thats what matters ;)

Yeah I know what you mean... some setups do require for you to adapt to them. I've played before where I mixer has only one of two stereo outputs working on each of the chanels which led to the monitoring being very quiet of the track I wanted to mix in. It just ment that I had to be really careful and added a bit of panic at the time. I got on with it and I sort of didn't really have a problem anymore after the first few mixes... but there is nothing worse than not feeling comfortable because the setup has something wrong. But I see this as a challenge rather than a problem, I'd rather learn to be able to deal with these challenges and hopefully be able perform at a good level on them still by being adaptive.

[romelpotter]

i think a good dj will adjust to his/her situation and try to give the best performance possible, a bad dj just won't give a funk !!

[subsonic]

ok i do get what your saying top jocks on top doller should be able to perform week in week out not just live off there big fat reps,
not meaning to sound perdantic but i wouldnt like to higher a top joke
to just put record after record not putting a vibe to it not enjoying what they do not givin you what you paid for :cry:

[Voorheez]

I think that you can break it down to two different kinds of bad dj:

1) A Technically poor dj

2) A dj who doesn't put full effort into it

[DJCraig Ryan]

Obviously Beat-matching and Fading has a lot to do with it but personally the main factots of a good DJ to me depends on 'Tune selection and Structuring the set'

Take M-Zone for example, we all know he isnt the best at beatmatching or keeping the mixes tight but this doesnt really matter. His tune selection and structuring is so good it compensates the beatmaching a hell of a lot!
Take his tunes, we all know he has a very good collection of all styles of Underground Hard Trance. He has all the classics and all the tunes we sometimes cant get our hands on. Basically he knows when and what to drop. Most importantly, his structuring is probably his strongest strength.
We all know M Zone likes to mix early into his tracks, this for me, does all the damage. This is what keeps dancefloor full. His High-energy mixing keeps the dancefloor full. Hes mixing so quick the crowd cant pause for breath. 1 Bassline has broke, and before you know it the next Bassline is in and the crowd are Jumping again. When the break comes in before you know it the next tune is fading in. Always keeping the floor full because they simply cant come off.

As for most of the German DJ's, we all know to, these for technical ability are not the best. As Hakka said, EQing not the best. Heavy-Shifting on the Bass etc but still it doesnt really go against them because there tune-selection is so spot on, they simply know what to drop and this is irreplicable.

[Carl]

a good dj should be able to play in a dark forest on a set of belt drives in the freezing cold :lol:

[Carl]

should be able to play well even :doh:

[Tiddlypeep]

should be able to play well even :doh:

even when naked?

[Carl]

yep! wearing nothing but a scarf :lol:

[lukekendall]

Obviously Beat-matching and Fading has a lot to do with it but personally the main factots of a good DJ to me depends on 'Tune selection and Structuring the set'

Take M-Zone for example, we all know he isnt the best at beatmatching or keeping the mixes tight but this doesnt really matter. His tune selection and structuring is so good it compensates the beatmaching a hell of a lot!
Take his tunes, we all know he has a very good collection of all styles of Underground Hard Trance. He has all the classics and all the tunes we sometimes cant get our hands on. Basically he knows when and what to drop. Most importantly, his structuring is probably his strongest strength.
We all know M Zone likes to mix early into his tracks, this for me, does all the damage. This is what keeps dancefloor full. His High-energy mixing keeps the dancefloor full. Hes mixing so quick the crowd cant pause for breath. 1 Bassline has broke, and before you know it the next Bassline is in and the crowd are Jumping again. When the break comes in before you know it the next tune is fading in. Always keeping the floor full because they simply cant come off.

As for most of the German DJ's, we all know to, these for technical ability are not the best. As Hakka said, EQing not the best. Heavy-Shifting on the Bass etc but still it doesnt really go against them because there tune-selection is so spot on, they simply know what to drop and this is irreplicable.

i dont like the way M-zone mixes!! :neutral: for me the way he mixes is too quick :eh:
i think it spoils some of the tracks he plays! when i reconise a tune hes playing and its about to build up to the best bit of the track and im really ready to let lose on the dancefloor!!! .....he mixes it out!! :rambo:

dont get me wrong M-zone is a wicked dj and some of his tunes he gets hold of are wicked!!! i just hate they way he mixes like this :rambo:

[karl54]

hay this is a good topic...

before i got my decks and started mixing, i would only think a set was crap if i didnt like the tunes.....

but once i got my decks and started mixing, id be in a club and listening to a set and if mix went worng id think "god that was crap". and this was only because i knew how it was supposed to sound.

If i didnt no anything about mixing, i wouldnt have gve a fuk.

i found that when i went out i was listening to the music & the mix and started to scrutinise the mixes, but if i didnt have a clue about mixing i would never have done this...

Basicaly what im saying is,

Your average NON Dj'ing cluber wouldnt know about dodgy mixing, all they care about are the tunes.

A Cluber who HAS got decks and mixes themselfs, would know when the mix is fuking up and would judge a "good set" or a "bad set" on the mixing.

I think this is wrong, which is why i try and just concentrate on the tunes when i go out to a club & not the mixing.....

do u know what i meen?

[Voorheez]

I think that it depends on how wrong we're talking that a mix goes - if it goes grand national style then the crowd will notice. If it's a complete train wreck the crowd usually cheer, so they deifinitely notice. If it just goes out a little or the mix is badly placed, then a layman crowd won't notice, but I think it still sort of affects the energy of a set.