Imo this is a subject that many people find hard to agree on 
personally i don’t think it really matters which platform you wish to use as long as the end result is a packed dance floor.
for me the plus side of vinyl is that not only does it feel more natural but its better imo to have an actual collection of tunes to flick through, i think i’m more in love with my record sleeves than the actual records. mixing on turntables still makes me feel really cool and i do feel that in my mind nothing will ever replace the turntable. I am now 100% Mac + Midi and can see the full potential of this set-up but still i don’t feel cool using it, no matter how good the set is to me there is always something missing maybe because i feel like i am only using a substitute for my addiction.
I don’t want to start a thread slating anything, imo the advances in software will only make good dj’s better and those ones pretending to be dj’s will soon show their faults.
It’s what comes out the speakers that counts.
i was kinda hoping for people to say what makes them feel better when they are using it and why. but yes you are right roben.
after thinking about it i can say that the only real difference for me is the adrenaline buzz from mixing on vinyl, i don’t get this when using midi as i can be 99% sure i’m not gonna miss a beat.
I totally agree jon, I also like the feel of vinyl and mixing with turntables. For the longest time i was against using anything else. A couple of years ago i shared a residency with a guy who had Serato and after a lot of thought I made the switch. I got tired of carrying 2 heavy record bags or more to long dj sets. Its as close to actually mixing with vinyl (when you use it with turntables) as i’ve seen. Also I was spending 200 dollars a week getting records sent from the uk to Sandiego every week as my local record shop could’t get a lot of the stuff Juno or global groove had. As far as using ableton or traktor to mix I don’t have as much respect as the dj who learns how to mix be it tuntables or cdj’s himself and not let the computer do it. I’ve been djing for 9 years and still struggle to get all my mixes as tight as I want them. Anyone can go onto to stage like deadmau5 create a playlist for the night and press a button and mix two tracks. i respect deadmau5 as a producer not a dj. But roben is right in the end its what comes out of the speakers that matter. Even if you play crap tunes but ableton isw mixing them perfect for you your not gonna make the people on the floor happy.
It is a strange one and often has me thinking. i mean i now use traktor and a vci-100 but i started mixing on turntables 17 years ago so most people that have known me as a dj don’t say anything to me. i hear my same friends saying that the “new” dj’s have no skills and you’re not a “real” dj unless you use vinyl. i really think this is unfair to a good percentage of these kids now starting out. some of these kids our gonna take this software and run with it, maybe take it to levels we never even thought of lets give in 5 years before we judge them.
i remember when i first started playing, people would slate me (including my music teacher) telling me that unless i knew how to play the piano or guitar i didn’t have any skills, all i was doing is playing someone Else’s music (anyone with two ears could do that). so to me anyone saying that these guys are skill less cheats is no different than my teachers or the other people that didn’t understand back then.
i can remember when the first ever mixer came out with a phase effect built in and thinking that was cheating because i had spent weeks learning how to do it with two copies of the same track but i soon jumped onto it .
i know we are still gonna get the guys that wanna be “super star dj’s” but their lack of real passion will soon show them off to be frauds when the guys with a real passion start pushing boundaries with the new technology. so to me i’m happy to hear a good dj play no matter what he’s using, no matter if he knows how to mix on vinyl or if he only leaned the skills on his iphone, time will soon have the technology separating the men from the boys.
true dat
you have a point but what if i could find a computer program that makes me a perfect turntablist should i have the same respect as dj qbert or the like who have spent years practicing their craft. I could sit in front of a crowd ,battle qbert do beat jungling, scratching with my laptop. I think their definetly is a difference. I have a midi contoller but cant play or read notes on the piano. I know im not a piano player. If I could get on stage and press a button and mozart played I would be fraud because I never spent the time actually learning how to play. Thats why I feel biased about some dj’s . To me it’s not the same.
[quote]jon_fisher (11/28/2009)[hr] as i can be 99% sure i’m not gonna miss a beat.[/quote]
To be honest i’m like this on CD and Vinyls anyways.
The reason why and how you can tell a ‘blagger’ aka someone who isn’t in it for the love and has real skills is because being a real dj is more than just mixing two tunes together.
It’s the creative flare that goes behind it, the understanding of how to move a crowd, keeping your tracks in key, progressivly moving your tracks that sound phonetically good together. It’s also the little edits here and there, the stage presence, the crowd interaction. Knowing how to entertain is vital.
Blaggers just stand there playing everything they love with no real order of things and stand there going ‘look at me’. It quickly gets boring and it’s easily spotted. Plus they dont stick in it for the long haul, to get anywhere with DJing you have to put your life and soul into it.
Any tom d**k or harry can get gigs, not many can still be saying the same thing 5 / 10 / 15 years down the line…
Anyways I blame the promo companies for my move to CD, i kept getting sent CDs and MP3 / Wav promo emails and had no way of playing/supporting any of the tracks. So i had to end up getting a CDJ… the rest is history basically.
roben watch your language , Im a tom
[quote]tommyt (11/28/2009)[hr]you have a point but what if i could find a computer program that makes me a perfect turntablist should i have the same respect as dj qbert or the like who have spent years practicing their craft. I could sit in front of a crowd ,battle qbert do beat jungling, scratching with my laptop. I think their definetly is a difference. I have a midi contoller but cant play or read notes on the piano. I know im not a piano player. If I could get on stage and press a button and mozart played I would be fraud because I never spent the time actually learning how to play. Thats why I feel biased about some dj’s . To me it’s not the same.[/quote]
i used to feel the same but it has taken me 4 years so far to learn to use the software i have to even this low level and if im honest im not ready to start releasing stuff on a regular basis. were as with djing i was earning money from it after only 7 months.
i learned to beat match on vinyl well in about a week and it’s take me almost a month to sort out all my grids in traktor
so to me there is time effort practice and learning that has to go into any aspect of djing be it virtual or real
your definetely right jon, good points, i dont think im gonna argue my point on this issue again
i don’t think i’ve heard anyone on a laptop match or even get close to what dj q-bert can do on vinyl. but with someone like q-bert i think if he was to go on a laptop and ableton he would still take that to levels that even most good couldn’t ever dream of