I’m progressing towards setting up my sets with more “creation” instead of just putting my tracks one after the others, with some overlaps, loops, etc. I am using the remix decks from Traktor with some sets I bought on Beatport, with a combination of S4 and F1.
I wanted to know generally if you were using as an “almost” continuous background a “supporting” beat or beat part (like one or several precise drum parts of a remix set), in order to keep an homogeneous background, or if you were relying most of the time on the beats and drums of the songs you are playing. How do you deal with the changes in bass levels (let’s say when a kick that comes in your song seems louder than the background beat you were using) in the first case. I am trying to play with the low button to harmonize it but still it is clearly audible whereas I am always under the impression that it is not the case when listening to people mixing.
Are pro DJ using only separated tracks from remix sets, allowing them to reconstruct all the music without this problem or do they also play complete tracks without the possibility to dissociate layers, only playing with loops, etc.
i am using a hybrid setup .. 4 decks in traktor and a Roland TR8 … since you can change the parameters on teh fly on the TR8 this is most ideal for me.
What cables do you use to connect the TR8 to your mixer/controller? Just line to RCA from each of the left/right outs of the TR8 to the ins on your mixer/controller?
Getting all the sound sources to the same level is one of the very basics of DJing. Youve missed some steps if you are doing live remixing without knowing how to EQ and set gain strucutre.
You should read up on gain structure, how a mixer works, and how to use EQ to take some energy out of a prominent bassline for example.
Ive been experimenting with this recently using my Twister. I generally have a constant recognisable background ‘noise’ and alter the beat pattern so that it doesn’t get monotonous.
And I kind of get what you mean about the volume. Its a fine line when using the remix decks because if you are pulling samples from everywhere the volumes will need to be adjusted individually per sample rather than the overall deck volume. That just takes some getting used to. However, I would imagine that this isn’t the issue you are having. I would guess that your issue is that you are using a sample that is competing with, rather than supporting the music. I’ve found that it works better if you use either an 808 tom or a clav or something on the high end as the low/mids of tracks can be overloaded if you start to add kicks etc. A lot of the harmonic content of house music can be found in the low/mid frequencies so you also have to think about the harmonic affect that your supporting beat is going to have.
Long story short, try to use samples that are harmonically neutral (if there is such a thing) and you will find that it becomes more supportive to your foreground tracks.