Michael M. Hughes

Good points, Mr. John. My guess is that there will be the inevitable backlash to EDM’s success, but I’m not sure the trend has peaked yet. The big festivals are still raking in the cash and growing and spreading the popularity. The hardcore styles will always remain niches, and I agree that dubstep will peak and fade, but there’s always room for fresh sounds and new styles over a 4/4 beat, no matter what genre it falls under.

And good analogy to rock bands. I know guys in bands who are really having a difficult time—I’d hate to see that happen to DJs. But like any other art, Sturgeon’s law applies—90% is crap. So the 10% who really know how to DJ well should always be able to find paying gigs. At least I hope so. And overhead for DJs is nothing compared to a touring band, which is part of the reason the music labels are jumping on the DJ bandwagon.

Newportdj Drew, post: 7617 wrote: Just for fun start with this…… this is the main site but you can download rebirth and its many mods for free these days. Then get yaself a midi compatible synth hook it up to your PC and download the trial version of ‘reason’. http://www.rebirthmuseum.com/

It’s an iPad app now, too. I bought it back in the day and was overwhelmed by the complexity, but I have a lot of fun with the iPad app now, just playing around.

I would never exhort people to dance. Because for one thing, I can’t imagine doing it and have never had to. Secondly, if you do exhort people to dance, and they just sit and stare at you, you look like an utter dork. If the music isn’t doing the trick, either a) you picked the wrong music, or b) they just aren’t into dancing. Either way, just enjoy yourself and do your best to at least make them happy while they’re sitting. You can’t always get people to dance, for the reasons I pointed out above, and you shouldn’t make a fool of yourself trying to do it.

DJ Hessler, post: 7411 wrote: ?? When is it not optimal to beatmatch manually??:confused:

Answer: Whenever it’s easier to hit sync with properly gridded tunes that you know very well. I manually beatmatch when, like D-Jam indicated, there’s a bad blend or I screw something up. I do it when I need to.

Hessler, you’re right on when you point out that simply beatmatching all night can be boredom inducing—for the DJ and crowd. I like to throw in some dramatic shifts, with major changes in BPM, and you can’t beatmatch from 130 to 100, or at least you can’t do it without sounding like crap.

Which reminds me, I’ve been thinking about starting a thread on transitions, since beatmatching is something that can be somewhat automated (via sync) but you can’t go from psytrance to dubstep by pressing a button. I think a lot of peeps, including myself, would enjoy hearing tips and tricks.

Then I’m happy to be a buttonpusher who makes people dance and gets paid well to do it. If anyone laughs at me, I’ll laugh right back 🙂

Yep, sometimes you have a dud crowd. Do your best anyway and always look like you’re having fun, because crowds can pick up on your unease. Ultimately, you’re getting paid, you’re playing good music (I hope), and that’s really your part of the bargain—if no one dances, that’s *their* problem. And if MJ’s “Don’t Stop Til You Get Enough” doesn’t pull a few souls out of their chairs, just hunker down and view it as a learning experience.

I’ve been surprised on a few occasions when I’ve played for dud crowds and people came up to me afterwards to tell me how much they enjoyed the music. Just because the dance floor isn’t full doesn’t mean you’re not doing a good job. Some crowds, especially corporate groups, might be uptight people who don’t get along with each other and hate their jobs and view the event as forced socializing. Can’t blame them for not wanting to boogie.

Phil Morse, post: 7167 wrote: Have you tried editing the mapping?

I haven’t. Is that the kind of thing that can be tweaked? If so, I’ll have to look into it. I’m not much of a scratcher, but there are times I’d like to be able to throw a baby scratch or two in.