2SHAE!

Let me rephrase. For a 32 bar (128 beat) transition, on the incoming track, I start with the volume fader all the way down, cross fader in the middle, track PAUSED (I forgot to mention this before), and EQs as follows- Bass: all the way down. Mid: 10 oclock. Highs: 10 oclock. To start the transition, press play, and for 8 bars nothing will change. (since the volume fader is still off at this point). The reason for leaving the volume off at this point, is so you can cue the mix in your headphones before it comes out of the speakers live (Youll have 8 bars to cue). While cueing, you can align the beats, and tweak your EQs/gain if necessary, to make sure its gonna sound good for when it comes out of the live speakers. Once everything is intact, on the 9th bar of the transition, quickly turn the volume fader up to about 7/8ths. This will give you a sharp, clean starting point of the transition that your crowd will notice (and love), while keeping the main volume at pretty much the same level. If it sounds fine, leave it for 8 bars. After these 8 bars, youll be on the 17th bar of the mix. (your crowd has only heard 8). So…on exactly the 17th bar, your gonna wanna swap your mid and high EQs on both tracks. That means… Quickly turn your mids and highs up to 12oclock on the incoming track, while turning them down to 10oclock on your outgoing track. if done correctly, your mix will still remain at the same volume, and your incoming track will be more noticeable. If this sounds good leave it for 8 bars. Then on the 25th bar of the transition (your crowd has only heard 16), swap your volumes on both tracks. So now your incoming track should be increased to full, and your outgoing track should be decreased to 7/8ths, and leave this for 4 bars. Then, on the 29th bar, very slowly start turning the bass up to 12 oclock on the incoming track, while at the same time, slowly sliding the crossfader in the direction of your incoming track. Youll have 4 bars left to complete this motion, so make sure you properly time the bass and crossfader to finish right when you hit the 33rd bar. This is the beatmatch transition ill typically make with house music. Itll give you a smooth mix every time if done correctly, and keep your dancefloor energy high. I know this is long, so let me know if you understand it lol

Even with hip hop, I typically beatmatch about 90% of my set. Obvsiously when you have a drastic temp change you need to find another way, but for songs with a similar tempo

1. Know your music inside and out. Know what works good with what, and what doesn’t.

2. Know your EQs and filters. Know exactly what frequency each EQ or filter can take out of the specific track your playing. This is much more important in hip hop since you have more irregular beat patterns

3. Pre-cue your music once youre familiar with the tracks. Place hot cues at your ideal intros, and before you move on, be sure to practice it, to make sure its ideal. Once you have it at the spot you prefer, leave a note in the comment section on what that cue means. For example: 8 bar intro, 4 bar intro, slam intro, loop intro, etc. Chances are, after mixing the track a few times, youll remember exactly what your cue is, and how your gonna transition in, without referring to the comment.

4. Loop Outro/Cue jump intro beatmatch: This is an advanced technique that combines the first 3 methods I explained above. I tend to use it alot in hip hop, and DnB. If your hip hop track doesn’t have an instrumental intro that you can beatmatch, go to the end of the song and see if you can find a workable instrumental there. You will be surprised with how many hip hop tracks have instrumental outros, so its good to take advantage of them. If there is an instrumental, place a cue point on the 1-beat of it, as well as a cue at the start of the track, on the 1-beat of where you want the track to come in. To beatmatch, you can loop the outro for as long as you need to, and slowly EQ it in to the out-going track. When making the transition, you will use the second cue (the cue on the 1-beat at the beginning of the track) and jump to it, from the end, while at the same time cutting the volume out of the outgoing track. This is a technique I taught myself, and Im not really sure if any other DJs do this for transitioning purposes, but with a few hours of practice, precise pre-cueing, proper EQing, and knowing your tracks inside out, it’ll come naturally, and impress any screen watchers 😀

Stick with photoshop, as its a good tool to be knowledgeable in even outside just making flyers. I was in the same situation as you about a year ago. The club wouldnt provide a flyer so i took it into my own hands, and now I insist on making all of them myself and get paid even more on top of the DJing. Other DJs have also offered me gigs in exchange for flyers as well. Tip: While in the process of learning photoshop, its a great time to listen to your recently added music to learn it before the gig your making the flyer for. ++ If you ever need flyer background/layouts .psd’s let me know, ive made quite a few. heres one of mine after just a few months. Nothing fancy but gets the job done 😀

Anything Koyu has been working for me lately, whether its a house, electro, progressive, or top 40 set for that matter

[media=youtube]XK9iIuZ_CBc[/media]

surprisingly, ive done all my mashups the “old school” way, by making a one-shot recording on serato, and later master sound quality on audacity. feel free to check this one I made. If you like, i can give you more advice on making them this way [media=youtube]4qv5_Jch0dY[/media]

ive been messing around with some filter-flanger-basskill combos…used sparingly its alright, but in all honesty its unnecessary

Afrojack had more people at his set in EDC Vegas then Armin. I was quite shocked, but he played a great set.