Mix Club - The Remedial Class

deathbysmurf

Spent a good 20 minutes perusing this thread, and I’ve now got loads more to think about in terms of my own DJ stuff. I was recently in the market for a replacement for my aging DJM-600, but after looking at my 1200 & 1210 which I hadn’t even turned on for a good year or two, decided to splurge on an XDJ-700 (2nd one gets purchased when the Musician’s Friend reward points unlock in about a month…~$113 savings, woop-woop!).

Both will be used as standalone Traktor controllers, seeing as I’m sick of looking at my laptop so much while mixing, and I also wanted to get back that old feeling of “manual” control. About the only thing I’m unsure about right now is controlling loops within Traktor itself, seeing as I tend to loop the absolute fuck out of tracks that don’t really fit together until they finally do. I’ve been using an NI Kontrol S2 that has Move and Loop control knobs (handy little bastards), but I don’t see any capability like that with the 700.

/lifestory

Homegrove

deathbysmurf XDJ 700 has loops in the touchscreen, you can just push one, it’s got all different lengths in it, up to 32 beats.

deathbysmurf

Homegrove FFS…hadn’t tried it on perform mode until that. Cheers (again).

Homegrove

I’ve not put out any Livingroom-sets because they’ve sucked lately. Still play every Friday, but listening to the recording they’re dull as fuck, Hernan-level trouble getting to second gear. Yet it sounds great when I’m playing. Weird.

Some of it is probably beer, but maybe I also have too good a sound now, everything sounds intense when you play it loud.

deathbysmurf

Homegrove I think a big part of that has to do with their search functions going to shit over the last few weeks. I think I’ve purchased all of 2 tracks from them since late January just because it’s such a slog to find decent tunes at the mo, and Bandcamp/Soundcloud search functionality is limited at best.

303abuser

Homegrove everything sounds intense when you play it loud

that’s a definite possibility. i know when mixing during production, i try to mix as quietly as i can because everything sounds better loud.

Amps

Homegrove If you’re following the same labels and artists all the time… shirley what you are doing will stagnate a little? I genuinely suggest using different search methods, change it up a little.

Mad_Cyril

Maybe you just need a change ?

I thought your mixing shot up in quality when you started pacing them out over the last couple of years.

Maybe something different will stretch you again? Freahen it up a bit.Some different styles or a different approach ?

Not as if you’re a rubbish DJ like Hernan

Along_the_Wire

Luckily, I’m fucking dense and use Safari, so no problems at all.

Homegrove

Seems I needed to introduce a little change to the set up, and powered up Traktor again. I think I got a new mix done yesterday, will still need to listen to it through. Used my old set up, Xone P:X 5, Xone K2 and Traktor.

Matt

changing temp throughout a mix

Been messing about with more tempo variation in my mixes for the last couple of weeks. I’ve been trying to include tracks anywhere from 110 bpm to 130 in the same set. It’s not something I’ve ever really tried before and I’m finding it harder than I expected.

As a practice exercise, I’ve been aiming to increase the tempo by around 1 bpm on each track. By the time I’ve faded out the outgoing track and Tried to slowly increase the tempo of the playing track (without it being too noticeable), I’m finding the beatmatching and mixing in of the next track to be a bit of a panicked rush.

Wondering if anyone has any thoughts or advice on the matter.

Cheers

Homegrove

Matt I can’t do drastic changes, they always sound shit. The only way I can do it is with one track that has a beatless outro and mixing a faster track to that with a beatless intro.

I do however take the pitch up a few klicks (0.8 percent or something like that) after every transition. That way you can get from 118 bpm all the way to 122 in six hours!

Mad_Cyril

Matt Funny. Been researching this last couple of weeks.

Obviously can’t beat match owt so options seem to be get creative in breaks etc or, the only other option I saw was small increments.

Have seen a lot of references to 1bpm in no less than 30s. Cant see it not being obvious but going to play around with later today

Dan

Matt Try adding a strong fx and like Damo said you haven’t always gotta mix the bugger. Harvey has the knack of mixing like this.

Matt

Homegrove I’m just experimenting a bit at the minute and seeing how things sound. I’m getting a bit bored of hovering around the same bpm throughout the whole mix. I’ll give the outro/into thing a go though. Cheers

Unbroken1

…weirdly, I think I’m always bolder with tempo changes when mixing live, not keen on doing too much of it on a recorded mix (unless its deliberately chill/downtempo).

Like Hannu says, big changes are tough when mixing…. if you have an ‘end-goal’ tempo-wise, you need to bring it up very gradually over quite a few tracks. I’d also say, don’t be afraid to just do the odd crossfade, you don’t HAVE to beat-mix every track…. something with a nice whooshy intro/outro, preferably in-key, can make for a cool direction change.

Along_the_Wire

Unbroken1 Interesting…

SM001

Unbroken1 don’t be afraid to just do the odd crossfade, you don’t HAVE to beat-mix every track…. something with a nice whooshy intro/outro, preferably in-key, can make for a cool direction change.

Yup. Some tracks call for it. If done well can sound great. Especially when the listener is 2mins into the new track and can’t figure out where it came from.

Matt

Mad_Cyril Good stuff MC! Have your dancing shoes ready for my next mix. Its likely to start with you slow dancing round the kitchen with Mrs MC. Only few tracks later shell be looking on in disgust as you simulate some sort of seizure, bopping away to 170 bpm Drum and bass.

Mad_Cyril

🤣

Standing by brother!

Mad_Cyril

Dan Thats the other one that sounded plausible.

Memory like a sieve, thanks for the reminder !

Matt

Dan Cheers Dan. Bringing in a new track without beatmatching is something I’ve never even tried to be honest. I can imagine it’s a handy thing to be able to do though. I’ll check out some of Harveys stuff, see what I can learn.

« Previous Page Next Page »