Noobish Question about Beatmatching

DJ Life & Community General Discussion
1

Noobish Question about Beatmatching

Hey guys, really quick question. I searched the forums but I couldn’t find an answer.

When I started learning to Beatmatch, I used VDJ and I had 4 bars at the top so when I matched, I matched the first beat to the first of the second track and so on.

I’ve recently switched to Traktor and I’m wonder how to do it by ear since in doesn’t seperate the beats like VDJ does.

Any tips? Maybe there’s a way to get that display up?

Thanks so much,
Lilac

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just figure it out with your ears. Stop relying on silly tools that aren’t ever perfect. You’ll hear it when your songs are “off a beat” and are not phrased properly, even when they are perfectly beatmatched. How do you always know you are on the first downbeat of a bar? Traktor sometimes grids tracks screwy as shit, I don’t even pay attention to the bar/measure counter in it. It’s pretty much useless and the only time I use it is as a visual memory cue to know where I should be cuing the song up - even if it says I’m on the 4th beat of a measure, I know I’m on the first, etc…

Also - if you want a visual aid for actually beatmatching and phase matching use the phase meter in traktor. If you have at least somewhat properly gridded your tracks it will give you a ballpark idea of how out of phase your tracks are. You still need to use your ears though. There really is no substitute in DJing.

And - as a last resort -

Get Serato if you want to line up beats visually.

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I want to be able to do it by ear, but I need somewhere to start. If I want to turn on Phase Meter, how would I do that?

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usually it’s already turned on. Go into traktor’s settings —> decks —> check show phase meter

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I know VDJ puts a slightly larger beat marker for the first beat of the bar, but you shouldn’t rely on this, even in VDJ.

It’s often wrong, and besides that point, you should be considering song phrases when mixing, not just bars, try to match the phrases of the songs as well (usually every 8 bars) it will make your mixes sound better.

Even VDJ won’t show you this visually. Serato tries a bit by lighting up the bar marker, but it’s frequently wrong, especially if the song has a bar lead in, or some silence in the middle, etc. the best thing is to know what you’re listening for, and stop relying on beatgrids, It’s something worth practicing on.