Something I've been noticing

Norwax

Norwax

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I've got alot of friends who dj, most of them are dnb dj's but there are alot of techno/trance/house/electro/even edm dj's too and I decided to try out something... Everytime I went to their place here's what I did: Asked the dnb dj's to mix some trance/techno/dubstep, and the result was fine, they mixed it with no problem. Of course they didn't do it like techno dj's do it, full of loops and effects and stuff, but the basic mixing was done, 2 tunes playing, perfectly beatmatched.

But when I asked the other genre dj's to mix 2 simple drum and bass tunes, it was impossible. Almost 1 hour trying, and they can't. They just can't beatmatch. Gave them 2 tunes with the beat from the beggining (Alix Perez - Underprint and The Tube VIP from Spectrasoul) to make it even easier and they couldn't mix them.

Decided to do this because when I'm at home I try to mix alot of different genres (not edm tho), just some techno, trance, dubstep, even hard techno some times, for fun, and I noticed that it always goes great, as I said before, no effects and loops, just the basic stuff on mixing.

What are your thoughts on this?
 
174 BPM is just to fast for them I guess. The beat is also maybe a bit tricky for those who aren't used to it.
Trance, techno, dubstep (more or less), electro, house,... All have a steady 4/4 beat, with the kick on each count. I guess on dnb the kick may trow them off or something...

I notice it myself, I started with mixing dubstep, made the switch to dnb and not long ago I tried my go again with dubstep, almost flawless mix. It's just so much easier to mix... Not worry about double drops, easier drum pattern, slower tempo...


I've actually heard someone (some house dj) say to me (after mentioning I mix dnb): well, that can't be to hard right? since it's at 87 bpm?
Wait, what?
 
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Yeah that's what I thought, everything they mix is the basic 4x4 beat and they barely need to touch the pitch, pretty much play/pause with loops and effects to make it sound perfect, that's why I like to mix drum&bass more than any other genre. It actually makes you pay alot of attention to what you're doing, it's like a challenge. Not something that you know is going to go fine before you start to do it

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Keep in mind that I'm refering to 2 decks mixing (cdj's or vinyl), not stuff like this (wich is awesome)


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DjTiesticles said:
Can't believe that I used to listen to trance when I was about 15/16

Such awful music
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For me it depends. There's trance I like and there's trance I just can't stand. there0s a huge variation of sound inside all the trance scene, only appreciate like 2 of them tho
 
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I reckon its simply because its faster. Theres less time for you to correct the beat before the kicks and snares start overlapping and it becomes more confusing as to if you need to speed it up or slow it down.
 
Crizis said:
174 BPM is just to fast for them I guess. The beat is also maybe a bit tricky for those who aren't used to it.
Trance, techno, dubstep (more or less), electro, house,... All have a steady 4/4 beat, with the kick on each count. I guess on dnb the kick may trow them off or something...

I notice it myself, I started with mixing dubstep, made the switch to dnb and not long ago I tried my go again with dubstep, almost flawless mix. It's just so much easier to mix... Not worry about double drops, easier drum pattern, slower tempo...


I've actually heard someone (some house dj) say to me (after mentioning I mix dnb): well, that can't be to hard right? since it's at 87 bpm?
Wait, what?
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I swear every cunt and their mother learns bpm off beatport. people all over the internet spew the most random numbers
 
DjTiesticles said:
Can't believe that I used to listen to trance when I was about 15/16

Such awful music
Click to expand...

Trance at the turn of the Millenium was quality. I loved going to Cream @ Nation in Liverpool around then because Trance was epic.

I think this has to do with understanding the bar structure of a syncopated drum pattern vs mixing a 4/4 drum pattern.

Its easy to mix a 4/4. If you don't understand a syncopated bat structure then you're never going to keep it in time.
 
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its just a different skillset, a house/techno dj isn't gonna need to be good at beatmatching, he has to be good at using effects or whatever though (which are basically never seen in dnb)
 
Sounds fishy to me tbh, in my experience while Techno is harder to mix than DnB is the actual performance standards in Techno - even on an amateur, getting-the-odd-warmup-slot-two-or-three-tunes-on-a-bogey-netlabel buzz are miles higher than DnB.

Proper house is way harder to mix properly than DnB is too, although less stressful.

Also, if you're using a shit ton of FX on a house or techno set you're doing it very wrong IMO.

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Agreed for a reasonably decent DnB DJ to start mixing techno intuitively it's pretty easy to get your head around and it's much less stressful than DnB is though.
 
MARKLAR said:
when there are sticks on the beat you might think its faster than it actually is
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I have played both Trance and D&B for around 10 years now (not so much trance these days as there is just no scene for it where I live and I found it tough to keep up-to-date with both genre's), and I found this funny with opposing DJ's trying to mix them too.

I think the difference is that you basically match the bassline 4/4 with trance/techno/house, and with D&B you mix on the snares (well I do anyway). That's quite a big difference, then when you add the broken-beat style of drums with D&B into it it could be quite confusing when you are not used to it I imagine...

Also, some trance in freaking fantastic...and of course some is god-awful. But hey, you can say that about D&B too...
 
My mate put me to the test the other day, destroyed him with some Detroit house & techno when he was certain I could only spin dnb.

Just depends on how well you know the records but never let anyone know how much you really know.
 
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I actually really like mixing techno whilst drunk. It's easy to mix and there isn't as much pressure compared to dnb. I find when I mix dnb I'm overly critical and I overthink. I find myself touching the pitch when I don't have to and stuff like that.
 
I think mixing house and techno is much harder. I also think the level of djing is better. I know I've said this in a few threads lately, but I've been on a techno kick.

When I try to teach people to mix, I always tell them to match on the downbeat and ignore the snares. Percussion varies, the down beat never changes.
 
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