How do you DJ?

[trickrick]

Hey all!

I recently took private Djing lessons from a professional who's been doing that for 20+ years. He's a master of tech and deep house so he mixes intro to outro and that's what he teaches.

I've been to many EDM concerts and festivals where most DJs switch tracks after every drop. Of course I've seen this mostly in Future/Bass/Electro/Progressive House, Dubstep & Trap.

I can understand DJs who do it this way since crowds usually don't want to hear 5 minute songs and the same drop twice. It feels like in this over-saturated music industry and consumer society that people get bored after 8 bars of one drop.

I don't have much experience in the concert/club/festival world and wanted to hear from some who can tell me what way of spinning works best with crowds nowadays.

Of course this will differ across different genres and locations but say I would go for that Bass House vibe, what are people expecting? I don't want to bore them with long 4-7 minute songs and long transitions.

I may be worrying too much but I want to give the crowd what they expect.


Thank you!

[wavespeech]

Hey all!

I've been to many EDM concerts and festivals where most DJs switch tracks after every drop. Of course I've seen this mostly in Future/Bass/Electro/Progressive House, Dubstep & Trap.

I can understand DJs who do it this way since crowds usually don't want to hear 5 minute songs and the same drop twice. It feels like in this over-saturated music industry and consumer society that people get bored after 8 bars of one drop.

This, is boring, but this, is an EDM 'concert', where the crowd stare at the 'DJ/Artist' like he or she is doing something amazing. They're not there for the long ride.
Most modern mainstream EDM tunes are just the same drop twice, they're just shit tunes. Unfortunately there's so much about now that finding and choosing good tunes is very hard and time consuming. And then if you have a mainstream crowd they wouldn't appreciate it anyway. For them just play the same tune for an hour and twiddle and twitch those knobs an each break or drop so it sounds different, they'll not know the difference.

And don't forget to make some spurious letters with your fingers in the air like you've gotten some kind of palsy from phaser and filter RSI. Proper love that shit they do.

I don't have much experience in the concert/club/festival world and wanted to hear from some who can tell me what way of spinning works best with crowds nowadays.

It's all about the crowd you want to play to, and what you like and educating them into what they should be liking. You're the DJ, control that crowd and teach them.

Of course this will differ across different genres and locations but say I would go for that Bass House vibe, what are people expecting? I don't want to bore them with long 4-7 minute songs and long transitions.

There's nothing wrong with that, especially in a club where you're in it for the night, to lose yourself in the music.
This doesn't go down too well on youtube or the 'net etc. Because folks want to dip in, have a quick look and listen, dip out to the next online vid or mix.

I may be worrying too much but I want to give the crowd what they expect.

You are. You find your style and the crowd that like your style and choice will follow you and you'll be playing to the right crowd.

Genre is a factor though, different genres favour different mixing and transition styles, but there's no reason you can't mix them up.

Eee when I were a lad, we didn't even know where the DJ was in a room, we shared the night with friends and strangers, one style would mix into another, we'd get lost in a hour of long transitions and teases of choice prog classics before the mixes got quicker, the tunes a little faster, the breaks more frequent and the DJ had taken us to techno heaven, then we'd be trance'd away to house heaven where we'd hear some joyous vocal house and we'd leave loving the new friends who were once strangers. Ahhh, I'm an old git.

You're driving, take them on a magical mystery tour.

[trickrick]

This, is boring, but this, is an EDM 'concert', where the crowd stare at the 'DJ/Artist' like he or she is doing something amazing. They're not there for the long ride.
Most modern mainstream EDM tunes are just the same drop twice, they're just shit tunes. Unfortunately there's so much about now that finding and choosing good tunes is very hard and time consuming. And then if you have a mainstream crowd they wouldn't appreciate it anyway. For them just play the same tune for an hour and twiddle and twitch those knobs an each break or drop so it sounds different, they'll not know the difference.

And don't forget to make some spurious letters with your fingers in the air like you've gotten some kind of palsy from phaser and filter RSI. Proper love that shit they do.



It's all about the crowd you want to play to, and what you like and educating them into what they should be liking. You're the DJ, control that crowd and teach them.



There's nothing wrong with that, especially in a club where you're in it for the night, to lose yourself in the music.
This doesn't go down too well on youtube or the 'net etc. Because folks want to dip in, have a quick look and listen, dip out to the next online vid or mix.


You are. You find your style and the crowd that like your style and choice will follow you and you'll be playing to the right crowd.

Genre is a factor though, different genres favour different mixing and transition styles, but there's no reason you can't mix them up.

Eee when I were a lad, we didn't even know where the DJ was in a room, we shared the night with friends and strangers, one style would mix into another, we'd get lost in a hour of long transitions and teases of choice prog classics before the mixes got quicker, the tunes a little faster, the breaks more frequent and the DJ had taken us to techno heaven, then we'd be trance'd away to house heaven where we'd hear some joyous vocal house and we'd leave loving the new friends who were once strangers. Ahhh, I'm an old git.

You're driving, take them on a magical mystery tour.

Wow thank you for this thorough answer! You've completely answered all of my questions. I agree with you when you say people stare at the DJ thinking he's a god. It's sad it has to be this way. Once at a festival, I decided to stop and analyze what was going on. We were basically robots, all moving in the same way, possessed by the music, staring at the stage. It must be a good feeling though, to be that DJ up there with thousands of people bouncing. But people are not having fun together like you said, they're just staring at the DJ the entire time. I myself often find myself facing away from the DJ to have a good time with my friends, but they keep staring and having fun in their own little heads.

I wish I had lived in those days you speak of.

I would much rather long mixes and transitions also. They just make more sense and take you on a longer and deeper trip.

[light-o-matic]

I wish I had lived in those days you speak of.

I would much rather long mixes and transitions also. They just make more sense and take you on a longer and deeper trip.

Go to better events.

[trickrick]

Go to better events.

Thanks for the tip, I'll look into it.

[andymunro]

...and that just about covers it all really.


I can't stand lots of quick cuts and short mixes blitzing through tracks every few minutes like one long bootleg mashup when I'm out, it bores the crap out of me. Some of my favourite tunes of all time are 8-10 minutes long and they are that good when I hear them out I want to hear 5 or 6 minutes of it with a long mix in and out.

[Rek_Aviles]

So much this!!!

Some of my favourite tunes of all time are 8-10 minutes long and they are that good when I hear them out I want to hear 5 or 6 minutes of it with a long mix in and out.

Also, "EDM" or Bigroom house tracks have short intros before the first drop so there isn't much time to do a long blended transition. You see more of that in, like you mentioned, Tech House or Deep House and other genres like Trance and Techno (depending on the DJ).

Eee when I were a lad, we didn't even know where the DJ was in a room, we shared the night with friends and strangers, one style would mix into another, we'd get lost in a hour of long transitions and teases of choice prog classics before the mixes got quicker, the tunes a little faster, the breaks more frequent and the DJ had taken us to techno heaven, then we'd be trance'd away to house heaven where we'd hear some joyous vocal house and we'd leave loving the new friends who were once strangers.

I enjoyed reading that bit

[ZSquared]

It all depends on the genre. For example, a trance dj isn't going to swap songs every drop since the ideology behind trance is the beauty of the long build ups. A trap musc/bass music dj is going to want to "wow" the crowd with unique drops, so they aren't going to let a song play out as long and will more than likely be cutting songs with other intros and drops.

[Not Applicable]

I play all kinds of genres - breaks, trance, dnb, house, downtempo

The way I mix depends on the genre.

My first love was breaks. I love to tease in a new track and pull back right before the drop. I also love to cut between tracks and even cutting the tracks volume altogether for a second of silence right at the end of a build. Then when the track(s) return, they have much more of an impact.

Dnb is mostly just blending with a few cuts here and there. The music is really to dense to do much in terms of teasing and such.

House is made for long transitions, so I usually just blend with that.

Trance is long transitions, but also enough energy to pull of some cuts and teasers.

Downtempo is just a free for all. Anything goes with this genre.

[RenDnB]

Personally, I mix drum and bass. I have since 1996. I remember the days that Wavespeech speaks of lol, man those were some great days when you had to wade through the crowd to find group of people huddled around the DJ at his booth. There are still some events where I'm at that go off like that, but I do know about the whole stage ordeal nowadays... UGH.. not my cup of tea.

The way I mix it, is outro's over intros then drop into the next song. Or, intro over a phrase, then the songs break together (for the most part lol), but then the double drop happens. I use both depending on the situation and what I'm trying to do. I do like a nice long 3-4 minute melodic mix. I'm working on an ambient/jazzy dnb mix right now which is 70% double drops. Sounds pretty awesome when I'm listening to it because everything is so layered.

Sometimes when the mix is going, I'll phase between the 2 songs mixing or swap the basslines or whatever I feel like doing at the time, and whatever sounds good. Really, I need a 3rd deck to add a bit more depth to everything. But thats how I do it... might be boring, I might be the DJ thats not really doing anything all that awesome, but hey it sounds good to me, and I have fun while doing it!