Working DJ's - do you play 'on the fly' live, or do you have a set-list?

[dlove]

How do popular DJ's that work in two's or threes manage playing "on the fly". Wouldn't that be pretty confusing for them?

well, I'm not that popular either, but what ATX says; I used to have a partner and we played a tune each, or 3 tunes each off the bat - I've done that with other DJ's too - it's great fun!

[Jimanee]

Here's some food for thought for you "on the fly" DJs: how do you know that you are not repeating mixes or your sets over time sound samey?

[JackStalk]

I usually have 10-15 "core" tracks I want to play over a given set time. The rest is filled by reading the crowd, classic tracks, and/or throwing down EDM bangers.

[dlove]

Here's some food for thought for you "on the fly" DJs: how do you know that you are not repeating mixes or your sets over time sound samey?

because at the time, I move my records to the back as I play them, then when I get home, I look from the back to see what kinda order I played them in

one of the main criteria for DJ'ing is memory, I think.

[Ocie]

I pretty much play on the fly. I might make a set list of tracks I've recently added so I can try them out, but I never stick to said list. Just something to go back to.

Here's some food for thought for you "on the fly" DJs: how do you know that you are not repeating mixes or your sets over time sound samey?

Serato has the history tab which allows me to look at the tracks I played.

[login]

Here's some food for thought for you "on the fly" DJs: how do you know that you are not repeating mixes or your sets over time sound samey?

You keep diging for new music, you want to play it at gig's, you stop playing old songs or not enough good songs.

[DJ ATX]

Here's some food for thought for you "on the fly" DJs: how do you know that you are not repeating mixes or your sets over time sound samey?

It happens. There are just songs that I like to mix with each other. But since I play open format, I rarely will have the same songs in the same sequence. My last weekly residency, one weekend would primarily be hip-hop crowd the next maybe a mixture of house and top40. I would have night where people would respond to Top40 and we would get a different crowd in around midnight to where I would have to switch to electro and house. As I have said before, know your library. Even if you are spinning just one genre, you should have music from all its sub genre and various eras. I would always throw in 80's and 90's stuff into my mixes be it hiphop, house or pop just to spice things up. You can also play a different remix of the song.

[Sigma]

because at the time, I move my records to the back as I play them, then when I get home, I look from the back to see what kinda order I played them in

one of the main criteria for DJ'ing is memory, I think.

If you are going through your records at home and saying "OK, I played them in this order, so next time I will shuffle them around", you are doing some pre-planning.

[Lost Connection]

I play on the fly mostly, but I do have a Traktor playlist that I update/make before gigs that I do, where I put the "must play songs". For example, I did the wedding gig for my friend's cousin, and he and his fiance had a list of tracks they wanted to hear so I made the Traktor playlist to include those tracks, and then I made another one of songs that I expectd them to like and be like "wow I love this song".

But even with playlists like those, I only use them to remind me of what to play and to make it easier to keep control of what I have played and what I have not. They're not in the order that I play them, so even if there would be same tracks in the playlist on every gig, there would be changes to the order of tracks I play to create the sense of difference and something new every time.

And I use Traktor, so it has the nice feature of showing clearly which tracks I have played already

EDIT: And what Sigma says right up there, is exactly what I do, but only with Traktor

Which reminds me of my last school party I did, I had the playlist "ust play" and "What I want to play" Because my fellow highschool students tend to love the Top 40 stuff, so I have that stuff in the must list, and house and other tracks in the I want list Eases my work load a little.

[Archon]

usually if im playing a party or something, i have a few tracks in mind to start out with when things are just warming up, and when it gets going i put things in on the fly.