|
Yeah, I've seen people running Phase and thought how funny it is that even turntablists aren't really using their turntables anymore. It didn't occur to me that there's no ability to seek like with Absolute mode because I honestly haven't thought about DVS in years. I guess nobody really was using it at all, since cue points have been a thing for more than a decade. Still curious about how Absolute actually works though, wondering if I was right about it just being a simple drift in phase.
|
#
?
Jan 5, 2023 20:53
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 29, 2024 15:49 |
|
|
Mister Speaker posted:Still curious about how Absolute actually works though, wondering if I was right about it just being a simple drift in phase. There could be some kind of "tick" in the timecode as well but it seems pretty instantaneous which would point it towards phase [the audio concept]. I bet the gory details are somewhere on the Serato forums.
|
|
#
?
Jan 5, 2023 20:55
|
|
|
Mister Speaker posted:Yeah, I've seen people running Phase and thought how funny it is that even turntablists aren't really using their turntables anymore. It didn't occur to me that there's no ability to seek like with Absolute mode because I honestly haven't thought about DVS in years. I guess nobody really was using it at all, since cue points have been a thing for more than a decade. Virgil Vox posted:I even still use absolute mode. I even use cue points but only as a visual indicators. I think the serato control tone {NoiseMap TM} is a company secret. That doesn't stop us from analyzing it though, there's maybe some randomness or some code built in, let's look at the wave... I'm going to assume of the readers some slight math knowledge and familiarity with what DVS does. I dropped the needle for a few seconds at the beginning, middle and end of a control vinyl (v2.5, I couldn't find my OG discs) Every section looks extremely similar to this:  No matter where you go on the record the two channels are always 90 degrees apart [the bottom channel lags by 1/4 wave], what we're seeing is mainly the 1k hz control tone, the first function, and i'd guess directly related to the phase of the channels, is telling the DVS which direction the record is going, then based on the pitch change [or frequency change of that 1k hz tone] it can calculate the speed the track should be playing at. Now there must be something else inside this information to tell the DVS where on the record the needle is located. Within the three regions I mentioned earlier lets look at the spectrums... Near start of record:  Middle:  End:  Notice the increase in harmonics [the spike at 2k, then 3k and 4k], perhaps the DVS systems looks at these and depending on the strength and number of harmonics can tell where the needle is. Again: THIS IS PURE CONJECTURE!!! Serato claims the NoiseMap TM has random noise w/ the 1k tone so there may be other things at play too. At the end of the serato control record there are grooves with special purposes like scrubbing thru a library or something. The waves aren't as "pure" as the mostly sine above and the freq plot shows a lil more dirtyness   Again I'm not sure what function this section serves I've never used it. Did you know before Serato there was Final Scratch? Again I can't find my OG discs but I have the version 2: Final Scratch control disc sample:  Whoa that's messy, and you can hear it in the tone it's much more white noise like. The spectrums equally messy and just quickly eyeballing I couldn't see any obv differences like with the serato. It uses a main ~1200 hz tone likely for direction and speed but how it locates the needle would need more study.  I did find this on wikipedia but I have no knowledge of programing so this explanation is lost on me: wikipedia posted:The most complex piece of the Final Scratch setup is the code pressed onto the vinyl. A 1200 hertz amplitude modulated sine wave is pressed into the left and right channels with a phase difference of 90 degrees. Each channel holds one of the two bit streams required for the time code. In one cycle of either wave form, two bits are stored: one on the positive voltage peak and one on the negative voltage valley. The relative amplitudes of these peaks represent either a binary one or zero. A relatively high amplitude on either peak represents a one, a relatively low amplitude represents a zero. In each channel is a separate bitstream, the left channel is not identical to the right (disregarding the phase difference). Virgil Vox fucked around with this message at 23:00 on Jan 5, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 5, 2023 22:56
|
|
|
Fascinating stuff, thanks for finding that post about Final Scratch, and taking those screencaps!Virgil Vox posted:No matter where you go on the record the two channels are always 90 degrees apart [the bottom channel lags by 1/4 wave], what we're seeing is mainly the 1k hz control tone, the first function, and i'd guess directly related to the phase of the channels, is telling the DVS which direction the record is going, then based on the pitch change [or frequency change of that 1k hz tone] it can calculate the speed the track should be playing at. Now there must be something else inside this information to tell the DVS where on the record the needle is located. Within the three regions I mentioned earlier lets look at the spectrums... Are those purple spectrum snapshots from the sum of both channels, or just from one of them? I guess what I'm asking is we know the fundamental of the control tone is 1kHz, but is each discrete channel a simple sinewave or are there harmonics in there that change over time? Or are we looking at a sum of the two channels, and the changing sidebands are created by fluctuating phase between the two channels? The sideband stuff is particularly interesting since I'm trying to take a crash course in Fast Fourier Transforms (and really not getting it as math is not my strength). Maybe I need to take a beginner calc course first. I'm a bit confused by the Wikipedia bit on Final Scratch too, which says "A 1200 hertz amplitude modulated sine wave is pressed into the left and right channels with a phase difference of 90 degrees," and the phrase 'amplitude modulated' to me seems to suggest there's something going on other than a sine on each discrete channel, and I'm trying to parse the binary information in the second paragraph but what it says to me is that yes every few cycles there's something encoded in the amplitude that acts as a sort of timestamp indicating position on the record. It's all very cool, I mean I was just high earlier thinking about ways we've figured out to 'encode' information before the advent of digital. Vinyl itself is (was) really an elegant solution to this end, especially when you consider how quickly they figured out stereophonic encoding that still works with mono records (I asked about this over in the Vinyl Thread, I think I've got it but just wanted to make sure). It makes sense how the medium has had such staying power despite much more practical innovations. Tape is kinda cool too, but encoding video on analog tape is really where things get loving bonkers. And I wish I could have been there in the room when some visionary at Serato came up with control vinyl. I guess the real visionary part of it was knowing back then that MP3s were the future. Once you can convince a room full of investors of that, the idea of giving DJs back their tactile 12" platters was obviously a moneymaker.
|
|
#
?
Jan 6, 2023 00:53
|
|
|
Mister Speaker posted:Are those purple spectrum snapshots from the sum of both channels, or just from one of them? I guess what I'm asking is we know the fundamental of the control tone is 1kHz, but is each discrete channel a simple sinewave or are there harmonics in there that change over time? Or are we looking at a sum of the two channels, and the changing sidebands are created by fluctuating phase between the two channels? The sum, but you will find the same results if you just looked at one individual channel or the other. The wave does seem to get more modulated or have added harmonics the deeper into the disc you get. Maybe this is all a side effect of the needle/tonearm setup: Even if it was a pure constant 1k Hz sine wave, analysis of that recording will still show a difference between the start and end of a record, the forces on the needle change because the radius changes. So I might just be chasing something completely unrelated. I've listened to the tone for a few min and this could be my mind trying to make patterns but there's something else there too I think in the white noise, like a rise and fall every few seconds. I also hear slight volume variation of the 1k tone esp between the left & right but again could be the mind desperately trying to find a pattern. Regardless Serato seems to have a very elegant and smooth solution to DVS, whereas the Stanton or Final Scratch approach looked rougher. I found some very good explainer articles on the free Mixx software page: https://mixxx.org/news/2021-11-21-dvs-internals-pt1/ https://mixxx.org/news/2021-12-22-dvs-internals-pt2/ Edit: yeah I think I'm way off but still worth diving into Also re: split cue; I forgot that was on the big djm used it for a bit wasn't as bad as I remember but that was long ago Virgil Vox fucked around with this message at 08:16 on Jan 6, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 6, 2023 03:04
|
|
|
Maybe there's a more appropriate audiophile thread for this but does anyone have a good recommendation for either a Mac app that will a) rip a CD to a 320 bitrate MP3 with any relevant metadata fetched or, b) assuming the answer is the most ubiquitous tool, ffmpeg; are there any optimal flags beyond "-ab 320k" I should be passing to get a good quality 320 bitrate mp3 conversion? I can extract raw audio from a CD just fine so I guess question A is just a tool that will do both the extract and conversion at once. Otherwise the only actual important question is B. Have a few Trance singles from back in the day that I could buy but .. hey, I already own them so.. Long story on B is that the laptop I want to dedicate to rekordbox is somewhat older and only has 128g with obviously far less actually available . I am only playing at home so 320kb is likely 100% acceptable for literally anything I will do before I die so I'm happy to sacrifice some theoretical quality for space right now. My first few beatport downloads were WAV (then AIFF once I quickly remembered WAV doesn't come with coverart and metadata, $0.70 I'll never get back wah wah) so I also want to run those through conversion but I guess I want to min/max my quality setting before I do. I also plan to store my media on my Synology NAS with significantly more space but I don't relish the idea of streaming my data to rekordbox over wifi and having to deal with "oh cool the network share didn't mount for myserious reasons" when I might need the tracks to be there, so my plan is just to stage and analyze any purchases to my NAS, then drag them into rekordbox on the laptop. Or maybe there's a better way to backup my rekordbox library with media to a network share, I haven't really looked into it. But the gist is -- small laptop drive, don't seriously think I'll be filling it to the brim but it'll last longer with MP3s than WAVs. Not sure if progress blogposting is getting tedious, hope not, but I had a lot of fun trying to impromptu mix without cues on the fly picking multiple different tracks. This is easier as my collection grows because now I can start to at least default to dummy mode "play something in a complementary key" and it doesn't sound like trash when I mix. The beats may still sound different and there are probably lots of tricks I'll need to learn to make the transitions sound less jarring or noticeable, but it's not for lack of a beatmatch or becuse I mixed in in the middle of a phrase or something. Slow progress but I'm glad it's coming back to me. e: I think I'm going to take the DJM-2000nxs to long & mcquade and see how much they'll give me for it, then go pick up one of the djm-900nxs off kijiji locally. I am REALLY hurting for space and as dumb as it sounds I really think the 12" vs 17" form factor will help. some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 02:24 on Jan 7, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 6, 2023 12:45
|
|
|
is anybody here familiar with traxsource.com? just ran into this place by accident and it looks similar enough to beatport that i'm wondering if it's actually a legit site or not
|
|
#
?
Jan 14, 2023 18:33
|
|
|
Seems legit to me. Apparently it's "like Beatport but with more underground stuff," if some guy on Reddit is to be believed. Is my Traktor Audio10 interface worth anything? This thing was ridiculously OP when it came out; if you can convince a synth head to get some TS-RCA converters it's an incredibly useful little line interface. I kept it around for a while for unrealized dreams of synth jams but if it's still holding some value I could stand to make a few hundred bucks. Just have to get it back from my friend first (I really need to stop lending gear and labour to friends  )
|
|
#
?
Jan 14, 2023 22:42
|
|
|
some kinda jackal posted:Maybe there's a more appropriate audiophile thread for this but does anyone have a good recommendation for either a Mac app that will XLD is my go-to CD audio ripping / audio conversion software on Mac. I'm not sure if it fetches metadata, but you could use MusicBrainz Picard or Yate for that after ripping / converting the files if it doesn't. e: just checked and XLD does support CDDB for fetching metadata susan b buffering fucked around with this message at 23:17 on Jan 14, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 14, 2023 23:15
|
|
|
Thanks friend! Also signed up to zipdj for a month or two to start filling out my library and I’ve gonw down a nice rabbit hole of things I like, but most of my “keepers” have been me listening to sets and just really gelling with a track. I don’t always remember them by name after the fact so I think I might start adding a quick comment to my rekordbox library, most of my tracks are “filler” that sounds good, but then maybe highlighting the ones that were just love at first sound with a quick comment. Also picked up a DJM-900nxs (1) locally. I lknow if I’m just using both as an eq mixer with basic effects there’s nothing on the 900 that I couldn’t get from just ignoring the middle third of the 2000, but the fact that it’s visually less complicated, combined with the fact that it’s narrower and just those few inches keep my decks from precariously pushing my lamp off the edge off the table just makes this feel like a winner to me. I think I’m much happier for all the weird reasons. Still have the 2000, haven’t gotten around to listing it or taking it in for a trade in. I imagine it might be worth enough in trade in value to get nice set of monitors at the very least so I’ll have to get my rear end out to the car at some point. On the actual learning front, I’ve been busy with work but tried to do a little every day. At the very least just juggling the same song between both decks for a few minutes. I managed a few longer mixes but I’m still really rough on picking the right phrase to mix in/out of, and my actual song selection leaves something to be desired. So in the end the mix may sound seamless in that it doesn’t sound like shoes in a clothes dryer, but it doesn’t sound like a natural progression just yet. some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 00:49 on Jan 15, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 15, 2023 00:41
|
|
|
Learning to pick the right phrase of a song to mix in and out of is IMO first something you gain from knowing your songs really really well(eg “ok, the high hats come in here” or whatever) and then with practice you can guess with like 90% accuracy based on subtle cues in the song and DJ Superpowers
|
|
#
?
Jan 15, 2023 03:10
|
|
|
Does beatport now let you preview an entire song? I could have sworn it would just pick like a 1 or 2 minute section in the middle when I first started using it not too long ago.. Or are they on some system where I've already given them probably a hundred bucks or more so they figure I'm actually paying for the content? I've been doing a lot of shamefully blatant poaching of tracks from 1001tracklists lately. ZipDJ and beatport have been GREAT for random searching, but I find that my tastes vary a lot when I'm just randomly finding things I like, and I'm not really trying to piece things together into a coherent .. I don't know how to describe it, I keep saying vibe, but that may not be the right term. That is to say, I feel like I pick out one or two tracks that sound good together, then another sound catches my ear and I go down the rabbit hole of trying to match that, rinse and repeat. At the end of the night I have 1/10th of ten different sets in my basket. That's not a complaint or gripe tough. I'm really enjoying finding things I like -- playing with the CDJs is great fun, but I'm getting almost as much enjoyment from expanding my horizons in artists, labels, etc. But I have been leaning on 1001 to just get sets of songs that sound good together when I'm not blindly clicking through the pool or beatport. What a great resource 
some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 01:45 on Jan 27, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2023 01:38
|
|
|
Whatup y’all, just wanted to say that I’m glad this TWELVE year old thread is still going. I’m a working DJ in NYC using Serato DJ pro almost exclusively. The addition of stems has really re-invigorated my love of djing because it lets me play so much more differently now.
|
|
#
?
Jan 27, 2023 19:51
|
|
|
some kinda jackal posted:Does beatport now let you preview an entire song? I could have sworn it would just pick like a 1 or 2 minute section in the middle when I first started using it not too long ago.. You have to pay them a subscription for LINK to get the full track preview. I’ve spent over $10k on Beatport over the last decade+, I use YouTube if I feel I need to check out the rest of the track. They definitely have never upgraded me for spending money, haha. A bit of a tangent, but I have no interest in LINK anyways. I can’t imagine not owning my music and it being owned by some cloud company that may not exist in another decade.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2023 00:53
|
|
|
mitztronic posted:A bit of a tangent, but I have no interest in LINK anyways. I can’t imagine not owning my music and it being owned by some cloud company that may not exist in another decade. Yeah I agree, streaming services for DJs (or at least, relying on them entirely) seem absolutely ludicrous to me. I forget to make a payment and they hold my entire library hostage? What if the venue's wifi goes down, or you're playing an outdoor festival without wifi? What if the website gets DDOS'd by hundreds of thousands of DJs trying to access it on New Year's Eve? Extremely not worth it for the small benefit of 'being able to call up the obscure song that cute girl requested.'
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2023 01:09
|
|
|
Ohhh I forgot I subscribed to that thing for a month just to try the rekordbox integration but immediately cancelled it when I realized you could only use it in perform mode. Well that explains that, should have known it was too good to be true. But it is nice to get the full preview Guess I should see what perks I can enjoy before Feb 7 when it disables. E: For someone who’s just starting out with absolutely zero prospect of playing to an audience in the next while, streaming really appeals to me for bedroom DJ’ing. But since I have a pretty awesome CDJ setup I have absolutely zero interest in hooking up to my Mac :/ If I think about a professional losing WiFi in the middle of a set, or tethering off a phone in a super crowded nightclub or something, that gives me hives. If you could integrate streaming into export mode so you could call tracks up over Pro DJ Link then that would absolutely change it up. I already do most of my music streaming from rekordbox, just not in perform. some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 01:31 on Jan 28, 2023 |
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2023 01:27
|
|
|
mitztronic posted:You have to pay them a subscription for LINK to get the full track preview. you can pay 10 instead of 15 to stream full tracks and treat it as a regular streaming service, but in my experience the android app at least is total dogshit and logged me out 5 times a day and would constantly have trouble actually playing anything when it bothered to stay logged in (this was just a few months ago mind)
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2023 01:30
|
|
|
I mean I wish another major streaming service other than Tidal would do DJ software integration. I played around with it on a trial and it was cool being able to mess around with genres of music that I don't typically keep in my downloaded DJ library very easily on a whim. Tidal is just frustrating because its catalog, even for non-dance music, just isn't on par with services like Spotify, YTM, etc. I wish it were because it would be amazing to have access to all my streaming music/library/playlists as essentially a free bonus to my main music streaming app subscription. Still would use actual purchased/downloaded files for my real DJ sets rather than rely on streaming.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2023 01:32
|
|
|
I like LINK but I don't use it to play real live gigs, just a way to keep costs low as I practice/stream. DJing is a very expensive hobby and being able to play multiple different sets/genres in one month for less than buying one set of music is a good value proposition to me at this time in my "career". I'm finally back into the workforce at least, so I hope to be buying ala carte again soon. Maybe my situation is unique, but I think dismissing streaming services out of hand is kind of gatekeeping the hobby because you can afford to do it "the right way". Not to simp for a music distribution company but several complaints in this thread are "solved" by subtler points of how LINK works. If you pay 35 bucks for their super premium you get an offline library, which while still not allowed in Export mode, I believe only needs to phone home once every 30 days. Probably still not useful to some kinda jackals as I don't think it shoots to a stick for CDJ's, but it's not like an always online video game as seems to be the prevailing notion ITT. It's not all roses though, I do have a couple complaints. Mostly that rekordbox at least doesn't link the track from the service to the purchased track on your hard drive even if you buy the exact same release. It'd be nice if cues and plays were merged or something.
|
|
#
?
Jan 28, 2023 02:08
|
|
|
So I grabbed Mixed In Key 10 and I've gotta be honest -- it's auto cuepoint algo seems to be doing a really good job. Every track it's analyzed, I've gone back in to look at what it recommended and it's either really close to what I already had, or it felt really right to the point where I almost just want to let it take a first crack at it. I don't really expect it to do the job for me for for every track, but as I start to build out my library I find I'm grabbing a lot of filler material that .. eh, I may never play again because I listen to it and I'm like "why did I download this again?", but I'm ok letting it live in the library until I decide to prune. That's the kind of track where I'm probably happy just letting an algo go to town. Mildly curious to see if ZipDJ has a practical limit to how many songs "unlimited" actually means. I'm usually grabbing 10-15 tracks a day just playing connect-the-dots on tracks I like to artists I like to labels I like. some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 03:04 on Feb 1, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2023 02:14
|
|
|
some kinda jackal posted:So I grabbed Mixed In Key 10 and I've gotta be honest -- it's auto cuepoint algo seems to be doing a really good job. Every track it's analyzed, I've gone back in to look at what it recommended and it's either really close to what I already had, or it felt really right to the point where I almost just want to let it take a first crack at it. drat, I had no idea this was a thing, maybe I should give it a try. I assume it's placing them on downbeats based on things like the intro or drop? On the other hand, if you set up some keystrokes for insert cue point and beatjump fwd/back you can get really fast at it, like how some recording engineers can slice and correct a drum take in the time it takes the drummer to come back into the room. I use the lower keys on the numpad and in most cases can drop all the needed cue points in a track in under three seconds. I say "in most cases" because the hidden benefit of using this technique is that you can very quickly identify songs that don't follow the same formula for musical phrasing - something that can really gently caress you up if you're playing live and forget that a song has an extra bar before the drop or something.
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2023 02:22
|
|
|
Yeah, I have no idea what the logic is but it seems to be doing as good a job as I was, so I’ll go with the more generous “it’s good” and not “I’m robotic” interpretation  Right now I’m just using it as a reference for doing the cues manually on the less interesting tracks. There’s a whole workflow to get them from MIK into rekordbox but that involves exporting your library as xml and then running it through MIK and honestly I’m just too lazy to figure it out right now. It has a “don’t overwrite existing cue points” setting but I’m paranoid that it’ll reset on some app update or something and I’ll accidentally blow all my hard work away  e: Ok I figured out the workflow. Mildly annoyed that it automatically inserts both hotcues and memcues for the same. I think I'm just going to use the MIK window as a reference to set them by hand if I'm feeling lazy rather than have it do the auto-cuepoint rekordbox import. e2: Ok I just made a holding queue/basket in both beatport and ZipDJ that is essentially "do I actually like this or am I just downloading noise?" for things that I have suspicions about. Throw it in there, let it steep and come back to it later to see if it's actually interesting or just a habitual download/buy some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 02:10 on Feb 2, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2023 03:03
|
|
|
I am having a nightmare of a time trying to mix this into anything else gracefully: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77mYUgek3_c I'm starting to think it's a song I just need to smash cut to.. But also maybe I need to start thinking about expanding learning how to mix things that aren't just simple 4/4 house and more breaks-y. e: I magically turned my DJM-2000nxs into a nice pair of KRK monitors for my setup and it's heckin nice to ear things outside the cans on my head. But speaking of DJMs, now have a 900nxs question (gen1). Is the x-pad supposed to effect the select channel even if the ON/OFF button is lit (not flashing)? If I drag the x-pad around it absolutely affects the selected channel (main, in my experiment) if the level depth knob isn't at Min. I would have thought that would only be the case if the ON/OFF button was flashing but I guess not? If that's the case I presume that there's no way to cue preview the effect before you start effecting with the x-pad which kind of sucks. some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 01:12 on Feb 5, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2023 01:02
|
|
|
That's one of my favourite breakbeat tunes. Used in The Bourne Identity Mini Cooper chase scene, and also in the nightclub shootout in Collateral - curiously, the vocal sample in this version is changed to (I think) Korean. Not sure if this is simply a different version of the song or if it was done that way at the music director's request, to 'better fit' the apparently Asian-owned nightclub. Yeah, the X-pad has that redundancy where it automatically engages the effect just by touching it. It's one of the things I literally never use, used to use it a lot for flanger buildups but not so much anymore.
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2023 03:09
|
|
|
i have no idea if this is the right thread, but i'm a complete novice - never mixed or produced anything that wasn't harsh noise, and that requires no skill at all. i really, really want to get a mixing deck so i can play around with techno, but i want some recommendations from actual real people and not sponsored top ten lists on google. what would be a good, reasonably priced mixing deck for a TOTAL beginner?
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2023 22:48
|
|
|
I'm sure 1000 people here better suited to this than me but I guess I'll take a crack with the obvious: I think the Pioneer DDJ-400 is kind of the "standard" for someone who is starting from zero. Or maybe I'm confusing it with the DDJ-200. I think Pioneer is in flux with the DDJ models right now. I /think/ the DDJ-FLX4 is the new equivalent? Pioneer is also super weird on stock right now so there are definitely alternatives. I've since discovered I'm friends with some folks that play gatherings and they do just fine with a Hercules 500 each, they're way better on those than I will be for years while I learn my CDJs. You'll probably see talk about making choices about software before too long if you pick one or the other, but if you're just starting out then I think the DDJ will let you choose Rekordbox or Serato (lite?) which is enough to get started, I'm sure. I only say this because at some point you'll either care about choosing software or like me you'll just get comfortable with the first thing you tried (hello my good friend rekordbox  ) and not worry about how the other half lives. I think you can go cheaper but from everything I handled at the music shops in the last few months the lower you go the more like a toy it feels. They'll probably do the job just fine, but since you're manipulating these with your hands I think a nice solid feel is a bonus. I think a bunch of the top ten youtubes aren't unreasonably outlandish to be honest. I think the guys from crossfader did a pretty good round-up of controllers for each price tier. some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 23:09 on Feb 9, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2023 23:05
|
|
|
w4ddl3d33 posted:i have no idea if this is the right thread, but i'm a complete novice - never mixed or produced anything that wasn't harsh noise, and that requires no skill at all. i really, really want to get a mixing deck so i can play around with techno, but i want some recommendations from actual real people and not sponsored top ten lists on google. what would be a good, reasonably priced mixing deck for a TOTAL beginner? What's reasonably priced mean to you? I'd start here if buying new: Pioneer DDJ-FLX4 or DDJ-FLX6-GT https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KjF0Iw-jQmI Most Techno DJs will be in the Rekordbox ecosystem if that matters
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2023 23:10
|
|
|
w4ddl3d33 posted:i have no idea if this is the right thread, but i'm a complete novice - never mixed or produced anything that wasn't harsh noise, and that requires no skill at all. i really, really want to get a mixing deck so i can play around with techno, but i want some recommendations from actual real people and not sponsored top ten lists on google. what would be a good, reasonably priced mixing deck for a TOTAL beginner? Do you have a budget in mind? The person above mis correct that most techno djs work in the Rekordbox system, and honestly you should too, but I will add that while rekordbox laptop djing is one thing, throwing it on a thumb drive and playing on CDJs is another. If you have the budget look for used XDJ standalone. This will let you practice on something that more closely resembles a CDJ kit, which is what you’re like to end up playing on
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2023 23:22
|
|
|
w4ddl3d33 posted:i have no idea if this is the right thread, but i'm a complete novice - never mixed or produced anything that wasn't harsh noise, and that requires no skill at all. i really, really want to get a mixing deck so i can play around with techno, but i want some recommendations from actual real people and not sponsored top ten lists on google. what would be a good, reasonably priced mixing deck for a TOTAL beginner? it basically hinges on whether you want to just dick around in your bedroom or want to play for other people eventually. if the former, the three major ecosystems are rekordbox, serato, and traktor. iirc all are available for free trials, so your best bet is to try them all (just using a mouse and keyboard) and find out which has the most comfortable ui, then buy an entry level controller for that program. if you want to play out at any level above event small enough that you can bring a controller, youre stuck using rekordbox for better or for worse. it's probably prudent to learn it and become a slave to the pioneer ecosystem so you don't have to learn cdjs in a rushed two hour session before your first gig(s), trust me from experience. in that case you're stuck with a pioneer controller
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2023 23:27
|
|
|
I wouldn't discount Virtual DJ these days, and there are mappings for a lot of the entry level controllers. Probably at least as relevant as Traktor now (lol). e: I'd also not really worry about RB being industry standard as a complete beginner. Go with what feels best to you initially. 99% of what you learn is transferrable to any other DJ program / gear, and there is software that can make migrating collections to other software a breeze. Splinter fucked around with this message at 23:55 on Feb 9, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2023 23:51
|
|
|
reasonably priced for me is no more than £200. i've had the pioneer dj-flx4 recommended to me before, so that's very high up on my list. rekordbox is a little bit terrifying to me - so many buttons! - but one of my close friends is a dj who hasn't been able to get any gigs because he refuses to use it, so if you can't beat em join em etc etc etc. thank you all for the advice! another thing - other than a mixing board and software that won't alienate me from my local scene, is there anything else you'd consider absolutely essential for a home setup? any specific headphones? should i just cave in and buy a maschine plus so i can pretend to be fred again? i have a yamaha shs-10 so should i ever need a sampling keyboard i think i'm good, but if anybody wants to disagree with me they can go right ahead. please read that as a brag about my vintage instruments
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2023 23:53
|
|
|
w4ddl3d33 posted:reasonably priced for me is no more than £200. i've had the pioneer dj-flx4 recommended to me before, so that's very high up on my list. rekordbox is a little bit terrifying to me - so many buttons! - but one of my close friends is a dj who hasn't been able to get any gigs because he refuses to use it, so if you can't beat em join em etc etc etc. thank you all for the advice! if you are on a budget do not buy a maschine plus lol. if you already produce music at a level where you would feel comfortable playing it live then mayyyybbeee think of incorporating live poo poo to your djing. for now your best bet is to focus on getting familiar just djing. you can do it with just your computer and literally any headphones or speakers at all, add a controller to that and you're good for a while until you get used to djing. you will probably make rapid progress at the start but it takes a long time to get live-ready (depending on the quality of your local scene). youre mostly concerned with song structure and phrasing at the beginning so it doesnt matter how good it sounds(audio fidelty wise. it is very important to have decent sounding music as a dj). if you decide you like djing and want to do more, then you can impulse buy some headphones in the 150-200 dollar range. buy the sennheiser hd 25 or similar popular dj headphones.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2023 00:04
|
|
|
Don't worry about rekordbox. There's a lot of things to push but you don't need to know most of them to just start mixing two songs together. Go find a rekordbox cue point tutorial and you've got pretty much what you'll need for the next little bit. I have a pair of MDR-7506 Sony cans that I have no reason to replace.. Seem good enough. While you're practicing I don't even think you need to play audio out loud. I've been learning 100% in-ear for the past month and change, I only picked up a pair of studio monitors last week because I traded in some gear I had lying around taking up space. Honestly I'd start with nothing else but the controller and rekordbox for a while. Spend your money on a DJ pool or beatport tracks if you are building up your library like me. Everything else will probably be a distraction from practicing mixing (in my experience). e: Oh and watch your levels. Tinnitus and hearing loss is a bitch e2: I don't know if this course is any good, but I grabbed his other main paid course when it was on holiday sale because YOLO and I have nothing but good things to say about it. I think collectively you can find all this info for free on youtube but he seems to present it well: https://www.clubreadydjschool.com/free-videos/ It's listed free and has a bunch of stuff I'd want to know if I was learning so hopefully it's not full of weird shady upsells or anything, sorry if it is. some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 00:10 on Feb 10, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2023 00:05
|
|
|
I mean, you don't need to use Rekordbox to play mp3s on a set of CDJs. You can literally drop a bunch of files on a USB stick and plug them into it and they'll read fine but you give up the perks of the software, namely the instant tempo analysis and grid placement. Oops accidentally hit Post before I was done. All the other advice ITT is sound, especially some kinda jackal's last point that you should just get the controller and software and spend the rest on music that you like.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2023 00:17
|
|
|
ZipDJ has a valentine’s day sale, 40% off a 3-mo subscription. I’m on a $50/mo plan while I fill my library so it was a no-brainer to update my sub. Figured I’d post here in case anyone else on the platform wants to save a few bucks. There’s nothing more romantic than unlimited downloads. I would presume.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2023 12:38
|
|
|
whats a good value / $ direct drive turn table? I've used the LP 120's in some form or another for about 15 years because I"m a cheap bastard. I have sold or had them all stop working and moved and now I want another turntable or two for a battle coffin setupLISTEN TO ME posted:Whatup y’all, just wanted to say that I’m glad this TWELVE year old thread is still going. I’m a working DJ in NYC using Serato DJ pro almost exclusively. The addition of stems has really re-invigorated my love of djing because it lets me play so much more differently now. ahaha I can see some of my old posts in here. guess Its been about 10 years not 15 that I've been doing vinyl DJ stuff. the internet is getting weird A MIRACLE fucked around with this message at 02:37 on Feb 17, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2023 02:30
|
|
|
Anyone ever had to tune up the jogwheel on a CDJ? I'm not sure if this was from lending it to a friend (rrgh) or after I got it back, but one of my jogwheels feels tighter than the others - I mean it is; the 'transmission' inside it still works but it's two steps heavier than normal - I can spin it back but it doesn't spin as freely as the others and stops sooner. It's probably just some of the dirt in there from years of use but I want to know what I'm getting into if I decide to open it up.
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2023 03:40
|
|
|
Mister Speaker posted:Anyone ever had to tune up the jogwheel on a CDJ? I've taken apart my old 2Ks before and there's a friction adjust you can turn to adjust tension for sure, but if it's suddenly different then I'd suspect the dirt thing you mentioned. Have I ever done the clutch adjust? No. Is it seemingly easy? Ridiculously, as long as you're comfortable with disconnecting the ribbon cables and maneuvering the jog wheel PCB out of the claustrophobic nightmare that is where Pioneer decided to jam it. It could also be the plastic roller wheels are dirty and just need lubing too. Mine were pretty easy to deep clean and lube up, but also two of them were just snapped off on the axles since they're plastic. I have some spares if you ever need since I ordered like ten just in case. If you're in there, it's a good opportunity to also make sure your vinyl-mode springs aren't compressed. Again, super ez. There's a pretty good video about the tension adjust somewhere. I'll see if I can find it. I also say this with scant 2 months CDJ experience under my belt, so I might be talking nonsense. e: Oh wait, I guess you don't even need to move the PCB out of the way, it's just there, accessible once you pop the rear: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm1Soxf59PM Apropos of nothing -- I didn't know Afro House was a genre, and all of a sudden it's where a non insignificant amount of my ZipDJ favourites are. The heck is going on that I didn't even know this existed? There's some consistently fun stuff in there and it mixes with prog house really easily (IMO). some kinda jackal fucked around with this message at 18:25 on Feb 17, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2023 18:18
|
|
|
some kinda jackal posted:CDJ repair stuff Thanks for this, really helps a lot. I suppose I'm just miffed because they've been fine for years but right after I lent them to a buddy this happens. And I didn't notice it immediately either; I got them back from him and set them up and it was only a few days later that I went to pull a spinback on them and immediately noticed something was different. So what I'm wondering is if this is something I should confront him about or simply stew on it because it's probably just some dirt that maybe got shaken into the
|
|
#
?
Feb 18, 2023 12:55
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 29, 2024 15:49 |
|
|
... And the same guy just asked to borrow the CDJs again. So now I basically have to bring it up with him, and I don't really know how to broach the topic without accusing him of damaging them (and potentially ruining my chances at gigs or even hanging out with folks at events because buddy has some clout). On top of this, I'm tired of being seen as a free rental company by people I've asked to toss me a bone here and there, gig-wise. This is hard to express without worrying that I'm alienating someone who could actually help in the future, but I don't want to be strung along like this. Sorry for basically xposting from the E/N Chat Thread, but I was pretty miffed to get that text asking to borrow my poo poo again. Edit: I talked it out with him and he understands my reticence to continue lending gear out. Sounds like we're good, I'm just always overthinking these things and stressing over it. Mister Speaker fucked around with this message at 06:02 on Feb 19, 2023 |
|
#
?
Feb 19, 2023 03:44
|
|