How to get familiar with all your tracks?

[Stazbumpa]

i wing it 100% of the time

i dont suggest that though

This actually. I also agree with the comments about vinyl and artwork. I knew my tunes backwards when I DJ'd with vinyl despite only really playing them in the club rather than at home. Also, I knew which record, or remix, was which because of the artwork which made flicking through my record box much quicker.

[ImNotDedYet]

I used to always listen to my digital files at work, but I found it really didn't help much as I wasn't really concentrating on the music, but it was more of a background thing.

Now that I use primarily records, I can't do that as well.

Your best bet IMO is to just practice mixes with your songs. As you add new songs, add them into your practice routine with a lot of the older stuff.

Some of these more experienced cats can wing it and still pull it off, but I think it's harder for newer cats to do that and still sound as good. I know I wing it and I get caught on a number of occasions, not knowing the song well enough. But, I have a lot of musical interests and only so much time throughout the day.

[Shakxxx]

I just create folders and label them by month of purchase. Then whatever music I get or buy in that month I place in that folder. Then I also totally Wing what in playing, I never create a play list, I just go with the flow.

[Daniboy]

Using markers in a logical way is good.

I don't listen to all my tracks many times, but I know that if they are in the folders they are good, and the markers show me how they are, if there is a vocal in the beginning, where are the breaks and drops. The different folders tell me their style and energy.

And like this guy up here ^ I also never make playlists, I go with the flow, it's much more fun!

Markers and folders will tell you everything you need to know.

[Nicky H]

Just wing it - it's not precision science

[spinthe1sand2s]

I used to be able to wing it every night. The tracks that I played more, I knew better, obviously. Each track had a "learning curve"

Now that I'm not DJing out as much, I'm finding that I need to spend more time learning my tracks.

Practice time, recording my sessions, and listening to my recordings are how I learn my tracks and figure out what I'm doing right (and wrong).

[deathy]

Well, I technically have playlists, but not like what you are meaning when you say you don't use them - I have them as essentially crates of related tracks so I can get to them easily, but when I play, I pick the tracks at playtime... can't react to the crowd otherwise. (Excepting one festival I played in Berlin where their agent was told by the GEMA that their DJs had to supply their playlist ahead of time to be cleared.)

[JamesGodfrey92]

I always listen to the tracks before hand but when it comes to playing i usually end up just winging it. Seems to work most of the time lol

[BoomDraw]

I custom-tune my "Recently Added" smart playlist on my iTunes to include new songs added for a longer period of time, then i just pick 15-20 tracks at random, load them onto a flash drive, plug it into my car radio (it has a usb port) and just put it on shuffle. I rotate the songs on the flash drive every 2-3 days.