DJing with controllers, Sync and expectations.....

[Deejaesnafu]

i was a strictly vinyl dj for over a decade as well, for me the digital age is everything ive always wanted, access to tons of music, a rig so light you can carry in all you need for the whole night in a bag or 2, all the toys ie looping , beat jumps, effects etc all under one roof and mappable to one device... the list just goes on forever. cdjs and technics were the shit for a long time but people need to wake up and smell the coffee. as far as the sync debate, a wise man said that the audience neither notices or benefits in any way from whichever way you decide to beatmatch. essentially if you have other things you want to be doing rather than re-qing a song 5 times to match it up, then listening to it for 20 seconds to see if its gonna work, then sync is for you. if you do get something out of doing it by ear then do that, but the crowd dont know so who cares in the end, its all up to the ego or conscience of the individual. in the end if you can keep people fired up for your entire set, your doing everything right.

[calgarc]

i am the exact same way i never wanted a controller i loved my vinyl setup but lugging gear around was a problem, so i used a novation SL until i got my self my xponent. it keeps things simple, it save energy and how i love bieng able to carry days worth of music in my pocket

now the sync button is cool if you are doing all sorts of routines and live performance, but i also do love beatmatching

[Tommi Bass]

Take it from me......

THE CROWD ARE THE ONLY IMPORTANT ONES!

IT IS ONLY OTHER DJS THAT ARE SNOBS........... learn to use this equipment blindfolded and be creative...... and get some other friends.

I have been a professional dj snce 1988.......... I never hang around with other djs cus they are mostly boring wankers just into the latest equipment... and talk about equipment.

A real dj uses whatever they can to create a party, a fucking good time........

The equipment is just a vehicle to play the media........

In the past I've seen amazing djing using belt drive turntables and a real shitty mixer........ this was in the u.k in the 90's at illegal raves.. we used a generator to power the rave and had thousands of people turning up to erm party.

Try this ......... get them to have a go..... I bet they have a good time and can focus more on being creative rather than trying to control wandering pitch.

[backtothefront]

Take it from me......

THE CROWD ARE THE ONLY IMPORTANT ONES!

IT IS ONLY OTHER DJS THAT ARE SNOBS........... learn to use this equipment blindfolded and be creative...... and get some other friends.

I have been a professional dj snce 1988.......... I never hang around with other djs cus they are mostly boring wankers just into the latest equipment... and talk about equipment.

A real dj uses whatever they can to create a party, a fucking good time........

The equipment is just a vehicle to play the media........

In the past I've seen amazing djing using belt drive turntables and a real shitty mixer........ this was in the u.k in the 90's at illegal raves.. we used a generator to power the rave and had thousands of people turning up to erm party.

Try this ......... get them to have a go..... I bet they have a good time and can focus more on being creative rather than trying to control wandering pitch.

I like this.

[Eliot Han]

take it from me......

The crowd are the only important ones!

It is only other djs that are snobs........... Learn to use this equipment blindfolded and be creative...... And get some other friends.

I have been a professional dj snce 1988.......... I never hang around with other djs cus they are mostly boring wankers just into the latest equipment... And talk about equipment.

A real dj uses whatever they can to create a party, a fucking good time........

The equipment is just a vehicle to play the media........

In the past i've seen amazing djing using belt drive turntables and a real shitty mixer........ This was in the u.k in the 90's at illegal raves.. We used a generator to power the rave and had thousands of people turning up to erm party.

Try this ......... Get them to have a go..... I bet they have a good time and can focus more on being creative rather than trying to control wandering pitch.

- amen!

[synthet1c]

I use sync, it enables me to focus on the combination of the flanger, beatmasher and delay... I like music, but I really try to be like my hero's aphex twin and squarepusher. The crowd doesn't like it that much but one day they will know me as the musical prodigy that I am prophecised to become. Without sync this would not be possible and I would still be mashing away on super street fighter being an arcade shark but thanks to sync I can finally impress girls with my musical ability.

[deevey]

Last few gigs I played I started with Ableton and after a while moved to CDJ's for the heck of it.

I had more fun beatmatching manually, screwing around with live looping and proper honest to god, old school live mixing.

The energy picked up and people had more fun because I wasn't so focused on pressing the wrong button and more focused on the music selection, the crowd that was there, and able to have a conversation that was more than 2 words - oh and and my beer**

The Computer and Software tends to make you feel like you should be doing more - and as a result you try too hard.

**not necessarily in that order.

[BradCee]

Take any sync comments calmly on the chin, and drop a technically amazing set.

[ksandvik]

I think we have reached a point -- such as Chris Liebing's DJ setup or Richie Hawkin's -- where if there was no sync, they could not pull off the complex interactions betweeen Traktor, Ableton Live, Maschine et rest et rest. Do they cheat? Well, how DJs moaned the transition from vinyl to CDJs with its cheating BPM meters...

[dj matt blaze]

Being a 20+ years DJ veteran myself, the technology has finally caught up to me and what I wanted 20 years ago. I used to time out the bpm of every record and put it on a sticker on the record sleeve. I would pitch the record down 1 bpm so the 121 bpm I was getting ready to mix in will match the 120bpm beingh played, recued 5 times to make sure it was on before I started the mix. Now I hit sync and the bpm matches automatically and its set and ready to go in 5 sec, bring the beat in on a loop ever so slowly, release the loop and let it play while using eq, effects, loops for the transition for the outgoing track. I have said this a million times, if the technology was there 20 years ago we would have used it. Its not bout the tools, its about how it sounds coming out of the speakers.
The haterz and the vinyl "purists" snobs who think that controllers and dvs systems are ruining the "art" of DJing need to stop driving cars and get horses, stop using electricity, and use candles. Life moves on, technology advances, get with it or get left behind.