Originally Posted by
mostapha
Umm…don't.
Everything other than beat-matching (whether manual or with grid/sync) and pressing play is icing on the cake. Assuming you already know track selection and how to structure a set (not a safe assumption in this day and age), don't do anything else until you actually have a reason to do it.
There are a lot of things you can do that sound great…layering loops, creative use of effects, samples…even scratching…the sky's the limit. But, if you're just doing it because you feel like you're not doing anything, then IMO DJing is not for you. This world is drowning in DJs who do stuff just because they're not capable of letting tracks speak for themselves. They add too much garbage, they jump around, they destroy the music they're working with, and they do it without any real intentions besides "i can do tricks, and i'm saving time by using sync…so I should always be hitting buttons and turning knobs so people get to see me doing things." Goodbye groove. Hello wanking.
If you want to goof off on your own time and maybe figure out how to start adding a few things that actually enhance the music for other people, cool. In my experience, though, people who ask "what else can I do?" aren't doing it for those reasons…they're doing it because they're bored with their own music. Either they're not meant to be DJs or they're playing the wrong type of music.
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