• Music
  • Mix Club - The Remedial Class

this thread though. It’s like a bunch of teenage girls discussing foreplay.

get a grip of yourselves boys. and post some mixes up.

    C_J double lolz! nothing wrong with a bit of knob twiddling - will get on with plotting the next sonic assault - slightly intimidated by Damo’s continuous extension of the boundaries!

    Oh and …has the thumbs up function disappeared?

    segwin

    I know nothing about audiences having never played to more than about 7 people at a time ! However - yes loop away both in and out.. when it helps - sometimes it is pretty unnecessary as you can see predictable blocks of sound on the waveform - but match the phrasing and know that in a 16 bar loop the producer might well add extra elements in the second 8. By all means align both tracks to the same number of bpm- but then its all about your ears knowing that you will have to make minor adjustments as you hear them going out in the mix when you are cueing number 2 in your headphones. small nudge up or down . you can mix them both in your headphones but its not always the same. breaks take practice as does D n B but in fact after a bit I find them easier for some reason. its all about putting the hours into your lugholes in terms of practice it seems to me . On the beat matching maybe the best way to learn to trust your ears is to go old skool and ignore the bpm numbers and do it all by ear until you get get pretty close or bang on with confidence.

      baggers44 Brilliant feedback regarding loops. Agree with your point about practice. Its almost instinctual as far as jog nudges go . . . more confidence as time goes on. Old Skool will be quite the leap as well as a significant confidence derail but a bridge that I would like to cross sooner than later. Appreciate your feedback. HA, I will have a mix up for @C_J sometime “soon” . . .

        Matt mixing out from a vocal with a bit of echo sometimes sounds ok - it is very hit and miss in my experience ……… reverb and filters are your friend although i have a weakness for the ridiculous helix effect in a breakdown which really needs to stop.

        segwin …I’ve heard folk say they hate hearing loops used in a mix, the trick is use them a seamless way so they don’t sound like loops, knowing when to trigger and exit is absolutely key.

        Tbh most wouldn’t notice in a club scenario, but if you scrutinise the some mixes on headphones, you can often hear artefacts in the loop, like the tail of some reverb or a crash or something… if you can trigger a clean loop at the right moment, switch the bass and know when to exit the incoming loop, you can extend a mix really cleanly. Diggers is a boss at this (helps that he was a quality mixer before looping was ever a thing!).

        I actually think having the ‘visual’ experience of using Traktor helps understand how best to use loops on a CDJ.

          Unbroken1 Agree with that. Oftentimes I toss in a loop before an impending drop or change in tone of track which is playing out on CH1. You’re right, sometimes 8 bars isn’t enough or you do tend to catch a tail. Plenty of examples on Bunker 46 as you had mentioned; loops leveraged as a tool to trigger a swift swap in bass and bring in next track. Looking forward to being schooled the next chance I can catch the guy playing solo in the states.

          2 months later

          I’ve been farting around a lot this evening mixing - who knew how much easier it is to beatmatch with headphones on cue rather than mixing / master and using one ear versus the other on the monitors?

          Fuck me.

            Used to practice late at night just through my headphones so I wouldn’t disturb anyone.
            It’s also good for getting the levels the same.

              Along_the_Wire
              I see. It’s good to get used to separating what you’re ears are listening to. Getting the volume just right is the key. To loud on the monitor and it will drown out the sound on the headphones.

                My first two mixers didn’t have an option to have two channels/ master in the headphones, so always played with just channel cued in the mixer, rest is the master. Imagine how fucked I was at my first gig without a monitor. They had a Pioneer DJM 600 and said “Just play on your headphones!”

                That was a fun skill to learn live in front of a full dancefloor.