Well a while back i posted some impressions i had about using atomix on a laptop at a "real" gig, about 500-600 people. For those that dont remember ill just recap, atomix worked well, didnt crash at all. I however did feel a bit foolish standing there clicking the mouse and such though. I did have an external dj mixer even too. Even the soundguys said they were suprised that someone was paying me to dj when i just had a laptop. The soundguys also kept commenting on how bad the high and low end sounded from the MP3s i was using. I try to use at least 160kbs files but unless you rip them all yourself your still getting such variety in quality and soundlevels it kinda makes it hard to set levels. Now at home this really isnt a big deal but on the big PA system that few DB increase really messes things up. Lastly it was such a pain to carry my laptop, mixer, power supplies, cables, mouse etc and then home it all worked as well. So in summary its not that atomix didnt work, its just that it was alot more hassel than i thought taking it all to a gig and the worrying about the laptop crashing really did have me worried, not to mention alot of weird looks from people seeing me just using a laptop and basically letting the software do all the beatmatching.
OK so lets bring it up the the current time. Well after the gig i played i was able to get my stuff gathered up and get to a venue across town where DJ's Sasha and John Digweed were playing. I thought these guys were awesome, their mixing skill was just flawless, really made me feel like i wasnt a dj for just pressing a button more or less, know what i mean. So seeing them got me thinking. Being a dj that uses real decks has the advantages of being able to just show up at a gig with a case of records and perform, no need to worry about software crashes, the soundquality, be it cd or vinyl is going to be consistant and generally better than mp3 as well.
So all that being said i bought a pair of technics 1200's and the point of this post is just to share my impressions as im trying to learn to dj on them since i think alot of atomix users maybe are intrested in the same route. Atomix is a great into ro djing but really didnt prepare me for mixing for real i have to say. I feel like im totally starting over in alot of ways. Also alot of things i would try to do on atomix finally seem to make sense now that im using turntables.
Anyways, beatmatching is HARD !!! I think thats why i went for atomix in the first place, cuz i couldnt beatmatch and the software seemed like a good way to cover that skill. I was happy with it til i saw sasha and digweed though. Atomixs quick sync up and being able to hold it basically in sync for a few seconds is fine for most mixing, but its such another level when a dj can sync the tracks so perfectly on 3 turntables that they can overlay entire songs. Of course that takes much skill and practice but its something i now want to work towards. Its going to take me a pretty long time to figure out the beatmatching but i like knowing that it will be a skill i can take to any gig and pull it off. Not having to have a software that will beatmatch, or dual cd players that beatmatch etc is kinda nice. I have "kill" switches on my mixer as well and i was trying to do alot of mixes with just swapping the bass etc, just as alot of you do on atomix with the multi xfader skin, but i also realized that was sorta a crutch for me too. If i do all the mixing like that then i get to a gig with a different mixer and im screwed, know what im saying
Going to the record store is alot of fun. Every week on tuesday the local record store gets all the new releases for the week in, white lables, dj promo's stuff like that. Its fun to go down there, grab a stack of what looks cool and listen to all the records on the stores listening booths. When i find a record i like, its so cool to know that im probably the only dj in the city that has that track. SO much stuff by the time you can find it on MP3 off the net has been played for 6 months or something. Also is really cool having all the other kids that dj around checking out music and sharing in the experience. If they see i have a certain record they hand me another one that they say i will like if im into such and such style etc. Vinyl is kinda expensive though but not to bad, about $8 per record. Its nice to have usually about 4 mixes of a track too. Gives alot of variety for dj'ing i think if you have all those remixes to change it up with
Vinyl control is great. the hands on record stuff really is as good as people say. The technics turntables let you adjust the pitch so finely and smoothly. Being able to nudge and drag the record really is fun too, it gives me a sense of actually having the music be tangible and something im interacting with like an instrument almost. Also with the vinyl i can see when a breakdown or something is coming up as the grooves look a bit different. this makes dj'ing a bit easier since its just a more visual impression of whats coming up.
In conclusion, im finding it alot more fun, alot more expensive and way harder. Definatly glad i got into it though. Its night and day different than atomix. Not sure if ill ever get good but at least its fun working towards that goal.
Dont know if that was helpful or intresting to anyone but i hope it was, if anyone has any questions feel free to ask. And i guess if you just want to say that i suck no matter what i use and that if i cant dj with atomix then ill never be able to on tables and things like that feel free to as well, but i would hope that you'd tried all the methods of dj'ing before you say things like that
OK so lets bring it up the the current time. Well after the gig i played i was able to get my stuff gathered up and get to a venue across town where DJ's Sasha and John Digweed were playing. I thought these guys were awesome, their mixing skill was just flawless, really made me feel like i wasnt a dj for just pressing a button more or less, know what i mean. So seeing them got me thinking. Being a dj that uses real decks has the advantages of being able to just show up at a gig with a case of records and perform, no need to worry about software crashes, the soundquality, be it cd or vinyl is going to be consistant and generally better than mp3 as well.
So all that being said i bought a pair of technics 1200's and the point of this post is just to share my impressions as im trying to learn to dj on them since i think alot of atomix users maybe are intrested in the same route. Atomix is a great into ro djing but really didnt prepare me for mixing for real i have to say. I feel like im totally starting over in alot of ways. Also alot of things i would try to do on atomix finally seem to make sense now that im using turntables.
Anyways, beatmatching is HARD !!! I think thats why i went for atomix in the first place, cuz i couldnt beatmatch and the software seemed like a good way to cover that skill. I was happy with it til i saw sasha and digweed though. Atomixs quick sync up and being able to hold it basically in sync for a few seconds is fine for most mixing, but its such another level when a dj can sync the tracks so perfectly on 3 turntables that they can overlay entire songs. Of course that takes much skill and practice but its something i now want to work towards. Its going to take me a pretty long time to figure out the beatmatching but i like knowing that it will be a skill i can take to any gig and pull it off. Not having to have a software that will beatmatch, or dual cd players that beatmatch etc is kinda nice. I have "kill" switches on my mixer as well and i was trying to do alot of mixes with just swapping the bass etc, just as alot of you do on atomix with the multi xfader skin, but i also realized that was sorta a crutch for me too. If i do all the mixing like that then i get to a gig with a different mixer and im screwed, know what im saying
Going to the record store is alot of fun. Every week on tuesday the local record store gets all the new releases for the week in, white lables, dj promo's stuff like that. Its fun to go down there, grab a stack of what looks cool and listen to all the records on the stores listening booths. When i find a record i like, its so cool to know that im probably the only dj in the city that has that track. SO much stuff by the time you can find it on MP3 off the net has been played for 6 months or something. Also is really cool having all the other kids that dj around checking out music and sharing in the experience. If they see i have a certain record they hand me another one that they say i will like if im into such and such style etc. Vinyl is kinda expensive though but not to bad, about $8 per record. Its nice to have usually about 4 mixes of a track too. Gives alot of variety for dj'ing i think if you have all those remixes to change it up with
Vinyl control is great. the hands on record stuff really is as good as people say. The technics turntables let you adjust the pitch so finely and smoothly. Being able to nudge and drag the record really is fun too, it gives me a sense of actually having the music be tangible and something im interacting with like an instrument almost. Also with the vinyl i can see when a breakdown or something is coming up as the grooves look a bit different. this makes dj'ing a bit easier since its just a more visual impression of whats coming up.
In conclusion, im finding it alot more fun, alot more expensive and way harder. Definatly glad i got into it though. Its night and day different than atomix. Not sure if ill ever get good but at least its fun working towards that goal.
Dont know if that was helpful or intresting to anyone but i hope it was, if anyone has any questions feel free to ask. And i guess if you just want to say that i suck no matter what i use and that if i cant dj with atomix then ill never be able to on tables and things like that feel free to as well, but i would hope that you'd tried all the methods of dj'ing before you say things like that
Inviato Wed 22 May 02 @ 7:40 pm
Dj T-Bone
The most important thing is having an ear for music i think ...
oh yeah, atomix makes you beatmatch in seconds ... but when you don't understand how most songs are built up you're still nowhere ... you can have 2 songs beatmixed perfectly but it still can sound like sh*t ...
harmonic mixing is just as important as the beatmixing itself ...
and that is something you can only learn buy listening to music and practicing ... knowing what will happen in a song ...
the thing I do is counting to 4 ...
like 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 on a beat ... and you'll see, this way you can discover how a song is built up and perfectione your mixin' ...
great post btw, cool to share ur experiences ...
Greetz
oh yeah, atomix makes you beatmatch in seconds ... but when you don't understand how most songs are built up you're still nowhere ... you can have 2 songs beatmixed perfectly but it still can sound like sh*t ...
harmonic mixing is just as important as the beatmixing itself ...
and that is something you can only learn buy listening to music and practicing ... knowing what will happen in a song ...
the thing I do is counting to 4 ...
like 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 on a beat ... and you'll see, this way you can discover how a song is built up and perfectione your mixin' ...
great post btw, cool to share ur experiences ...
Greetz
Inviato Wed 22 May 02 @ 8:09 pm
NaDeR
to mix on real dex:
it doesnt even need counting it all depends on your ears and the co-ordination of your hand,if you train your ear is easier than beat counting cause there always some screw with that besides trying to count beats and it ends up 137.5 try matching the .5 on the other deck is hard so just train your ear and ur hand to move fast and ull get it in no time,moving the tempo up or down after matching the tempo gets the beat on the other try that,when your on a mixer youll know which beats comes first the one on the headphones or the normal ones and you can slow them as you see which is faster or slower,mix outro over intro to start thats the easiest to practice(32 beats in 32 beats out),then go up to mixing vocals with intro,or fast mixing beat of one song to the other, then you'll find your own style,just practice cause you wont get it perfect from the first million times,itll take a while like a couple of months or even more to prefect it!
Keep on mixin dem records
NaDeR
it doesnt even need counting it all depends on your ears and the co-ordination of your hand,if you train your ear is easier than beat counting cause there always some screw with that besides trying to count beats and it ends up 137.5 try matching the .5 on the other deck is hard so just train your ear and ur hand to move fast and ull get it in no time,moving the tempo up or down after matching the tempo gets the beat on the other try that,when your on a mixer youll know which beats comes first the one on the headphones or the normal ones and you can slow them as you see which is faster or slower,mix outro over intro to start thats the easiest to practice(32 beats in 32 beats out),then go up to mixing vocals with intro,or fast mixing beat of one song to the other, then you'll find your own style,just practice cause you wont get it perfect from the first million times,itll take a while like a couple of months or even more to prefect it!
Keep on mixin dem records
NaDeR
Inviato Wed 22 May 02 @ 8:30 pm
DJ Rick
It's really hard for me to believe your "long post" or at least as much as I read of it. I DJ 4 nights a week with Atomix. I used to use "real decks" weather you see a real deck as a pair of turntables, or a dual CD player, I used them both for many years. The responce to me from the sound people, the club owners, club managers, and general public is that they are simply amazed!! They can't believe how many songs I have, and they can believe how good it sounds coming out of a laptop. I'd say your sound guy was a closed minded individual who was simply pre-disposed to not like how it sounded before you even started. I've played outdoor events with stacks of speakers, and racks of amps. It has sounded just fine every single time. Perhaps you yourself are a bit close minded as well. I'd like to encourage you to re-evaluate it... try mixing directly from your real deck to an mp3... see what the difference really sounds like.
Inviato Wed 22 May 02 @ 10:59 pm
trip_likeido
Interesting Post ! Alot of interesting opinions, except for the fact that we have had this discussion only 17,546 times before =)
1) Blame the sound quality on the poorly-encoded MP3's. Don't trust the ones you download over the net. Start to compare the sound qualities of both formats when you encode them yourself @ 192 kbps with a good encoder, like EAC (exact audio copy).
2) I don't think beatmatching is THAT hard. It's just a matter of practice, practice and practice. Beatmatching on tables is 10 times easier than on CD players.
3) It seems like a social thing going to the record store !! Its LOTS of fun !!!!
happy mixin.
1) Blame the sound quality on the poorly-encoded MP3's. Don't trust the ones you download over the net. Start to compare the sound qualities of both formats when you encode them yourself @ 192 kbps with a good encoder, like EAC (exact audio copy).
2) I don't think beatmatching is THAT hard. It's just a matter of practice, practice and practice. Beatmatching on tables is 10 times easier than on CD players.
3) It seems like a social thing going to the record store !! Its LOTS of fun !!!!
happy mixin.
Inviato Thu 23 May 02 @ 3:15 am
Thanks for everyones feedback. If it seemed like i was trying to make a point of atomix being inferior to turntables that was in no means what i was aiming for. Also i dont belive MP3s sound worse or better than vinyl/cd. Its simply a matter of them being of various quality, even when ripped at high bitrates they still can sound poor or have varying levels. I listen to music at home and in the car off MP3 all the time so i certainly am not biased against it. Its simply that over a large sound system these factors are greatly magnified. A big system running at the edge of clipping goes from great to horrible sounding as soon as a mp3 is played that maybe had its bass up a bit to high when someone encoded it, particuallry those mp3's that are ripped straight from vinyl since it has to be run through the users preamps while the record it. Now of course the option of ripping your own mp3's solves all of that, but since i buy most all of my material on vinyl since thats the only format its availible in, it simply made sense to me to just spin the vinyl in the first place.
Peoples closemindedness does affect my decision however based upon some promoters will not book dj's using laptops or sometimes even Cd's. They feel their crowd wants to see a dj spinning vinyl. Now we all know that a dj can be just as good on atomix, but i think we are in the minority. I feel it just depends on what style of dj you are, be it a club dj, a "rave" dj, a mobile dj etc. Certainly at a dance club playing top 40 hits and dance remixes, no one is going to care how the music is played. Often they just use basic cd decks in such places. The only time people come up to the dj is to ask if he/she can play a certain song. In this manner it would certainly make the promoter or club owner happy to have a dj with tons of tracks. Now if it was in the "rave" or techno sense of dj'ing, people gather around and watch the dj, not to ask him/her to play a certain song but to what the technique mixing and such. I doubt anyone has gone upto a dj of the likes of Paul Van Dyk, Carl Cox, etc, and asked if he could play a certain song, so basically i think that when we each talk about what method works best for us, we need to remember that were doing different styles.
Lastly i forgot to mention in the first post that im working on doing a bit of scratching into my sets. It really adds something special for the crowd doing that plus gives some new ways to mix tracks if you do alot of cutting from one track to the next, and at this point turntables really are the only way to scratch still. Yeah the pioneer cdj decks are nice but $1200 each and still not quite as good as vinyl for scratching i didnt feel.
SO theres a little bit more reason for my decesion to switch over to turntables from atomix for you all
Peoples closemindedness does affect my decision however based upon some promoters will not book dj's using laptops or sometimes even Cd's. They feel their crowd wants to see a dj spinning vinyl. Now we all know that a dj can be just as good on atomix, but i think we are in the minority. I feel it just depends on what style of dj you are, be it a club dj, a "rave" dj, a mobile dj etc. Certainly at a dance club playing top 40 hits and dance remixes, no one is going to care how the music is played. Often they just use basic cd decks in such places. The only time people come up to the dj is to ask if he/she can play a certain song. In this manner it would certainly make the promoter or club owner happy to have a dj with tons of tracks. Now if it was in the "rave" or techno sense of dj'ing, people gather around and watch the dj, not to ask him/her to play a certain song but to what the technique mixing and such. I doubt anyone has gone upto a dj of the likes of Paul Van Dyk, Carl Cox, etc, and asked if he could play a certain song, so basically i think that when we each talk about what method works best for us, we need to remember that were doing different styles.
Lastly i forgot to mention in the first post that im working on doing a bit of scratching into my sets. It really adds something special for the crowd doing that plus gives some new ways to mix tracks if you do alot of cutting from one track to the next, and at this point turntables really are the only way to scratch still. Yeah the pioneer cdj decks are nice but $1200 each and still not quite as good as vinyl for scratching i didnt feel.
SO theres a little bit more reason for my decesion to switch over to turntables from atomix for you all
Inviato Thu 23 May 02 @ 8:19 pm
www.finalscratch.com
YDC
YDC
Inviato Sat 25 May 02 @ 8:10 pm