Audible Therapy

Title: Audible Therapy #3 - February 2010

• Everybody Wants to Be a DJ
  DJ Hero, Vestax selling a DJ controller in the Apple Store, and the advent of celebrity DJs (let me barf for one second) are all examples of how the idea of DJ'ing has finally entered the mainstream. Why the sudden push into the mainstream? Its simple economics actually. In the days of vinyl, you need two turntables, a mixer, and a buttload of vinyls to get started. Then we evolved to CDJs. Same thing, you need two CDJs and a mixer. A typical setup can cost at the minimum $1000 (a CDJ-1000 will set you back about $1500), which is a pretty high barrier to entry for any amateur DJ. With the advent of digital dj'ing, you can pretty much use all your existing hardware (basically any laptop or desktop computer) and pair it up with a MIDI controller and software. My first MIDI controller came bundled with software and I paid about $250 for it. You can even use your existing MP3's with the software. With such a low barrier to entry, you're inevitably going to see a lot more bedroom DJs.

  So is this a good thing or bad thing for the art of DJ'ing? While purists tend to discount the advent of digital software and its inevitable consequence of bringing more amateurs to the market, I would have to say that this is a great thing for DJ'ing. Additional demand for these types of products means that leading companies like Pioneer, Numark, and Vestax are all going to bring their 'A' game when developing new products. More money in this market, means more innovative products. I will certainly be happy to see that.

  On the other hand having more amateur DJs and mainstream attention is going undoubtedly dilute the true underground feeling of genres like house (think David Guetta + Kid Cudi). Additionally, you're going to have more idiots jumping around behind their Macbook Pro and their MIDI controller pretending like they're the next Armin Van Buuren, when in fact, well, they're not. What also sucks is that there is going to be a bread of DJs who have never touched a pitch fader or jog wheel in their entire life. That is sad to me. My first piece of equipment was actually a pair of rack mounted Pioneer CMX-5000s (a SOLID setup which still works to this day) and going through the constant iterations of learning to beatmatch is what gives a DJ soul. Trainwrecking, beats flying all over the place, not being to monitor properly are all things that every DJ should experience. These experiences build the soul of a DJ and I have a feeling that OG heads are thinking "DJs these days lack SOUL."

  Is beatmatching a skill that is required to grab the attention of the crowd? Absolutely not. The crowd doesn't give two craps if you know how to line up two songs together. But in this sense its not really about the crowd, its about the soul of a DJ, are you a legit DJ or are you not? What happens if your laptop crashes? Can you spin on two CDJs with your backup CDs? I've always felt that I was missing a part of learning to DJ by not having picked up vinyl first (I started on CDJs) and ya know that is definitely something that I feel like I am missing from my quest to become a great DJ.

  So yea, everyone wants to be a DJ and that is certainly great for the innovation that is going to occur in this space, but an inevitable result of that is that there are going to be a rising class of wannabe DJs. So how do you separate the men from the boys?

• Its All About Live Production
  By far one of the coolest concepts that I saw at NAMM was the Ableton/Serato "Bridge." This is a fully integrated Ableton & Serato setup, where you can build your productions in Ableton and then play them through Serato. This is what will separate the men from the boys in the DJ world in the future. Think of it as the equivalent of someone like Carl Cox using three turntables to loop a track. Those who can really master the art of live music production and, more importantly, tightly integrate it into their sets are going to be the next superstar DJs. Using the basic functionality of Traktor or Serato is great to mix from track to track, but when you're doing remixes, edits, launching clips, and all the sort on the fly thats where the real pros come in.

  There is some debate out there about how much pre-production needs to be done in order to really pull of something like this off and it is true, you will need to develop all your samples, loops, etc. prior to your gig, but that pre-production is absolutely going to yield some very interesting performances. When you go see a big dj, you're going to hear a song that you'll never be able to Shazam, because well, they're just remixes being made on the fly.

  So if you really want to take DJ'ing to the next level, look into using software like Ableton and Native Instrument's Maschine.

• Like It Or Not, Digital DJ'ing is Here to Stay
  Software like Traktor, Virtual DJ, etc. has been around for almost a decade now. Look at how much the digital DJ industry has grown over the past decade. I think its safe to say that companies like Native Instruments and Serato have got the software market locked down. The interesting part of all this is not the software piece of the equation, but the hardware piece. There are some great start-up type companies that are out there right now who are making some leaps and bounds in the development of MIDI controllers and sound interfaces. EKS brought the Otus controller, which is a fantastic looking MIDI controller. Rane brought out the 68, which is an absolutely beast piece of hardware and will most likely rival long standing companies like Allen & Heath and Pioneer in their similar product offerings (Xone 92 and DJM-800 respectively). So the real interesting thing over the next few years will be the hardware that is going to be released on the market. We all know there are some die hard gear heads out there, so the next few years should be a very interesting and exciting time for DJ product innovation. 

• Comfort - When I first got these headphones I plugged them straight into my mixer and didn't take them off for the next 3.5 hours. They're that comfortable. I have a pretty small head and these wrapped around my ears quite nicely. There is also a padded area in the middle of the 'U' shaped area of the headphones for those who like the rest their cans near their forehead while monitoring a mix. The protein leather that Pioneer developed for these headphones is absolutely amazing. You can leave these cans on for hours and you don't get that itchy and sweaty feeling you get from normal headphones. Another great thing about these cans is that the arms which hold the actual earpieces are made entirely of metal. I was a little worried about their ability to flex and meet my ear when I had them wrapped around my neck, but the hinges bend, fold, and twist to whatever angle is best for you. By far the most comfortable headphones I've ever used.

• Sound Quality - For headphones in this price range, you'd expect a unit to have stunning sound quality. These headphones are no exception. The 2" driver allows mids and highs to come in nice, crisp, and clear. I do feel like these headphones lack some range on the low-end, but not to the extent where I feel like I'm missing everything. Isolation is great as well. I had to play a gig in a pretty nasty environment for monitoring, so I had to mix entirely through my headphones. These headphones provide just enough isolation from the environment around you to keep you from having to crank up the headphone volume (result: a happy set of ears at the end of the night).

• Durability - We will have to see on this one. Headphone breakage tends to occur with DJs who have big heads (no pun intended) and while I don't have a big head, many DJs have been lazy and just thrown their cans in their gig bag only to find their headphones 3 different pieces after getting home. Time will tell with these bad boys, but with the all metal hinges and the simple, yet utilitarian build quality, I have a good feeling that these will last a while (and yes I understand that I relative to all DJs out there). One major concern that I have is the detachable cable for the headphones. They look kind of like a mini XLR connection with three pins inside. I'm mainly afraid of these pins getting bent or damaged over time. Hopefully Pioneer will make replacement parts readily available at a decent price (we'll see).

• Pioneer CDJ-2000 - Nice update to the renown standard CDJ-1000, but nothing really revolutionary. The screen is nice, but just a cool looking interface that allows you to search through different tracks. Faders, jog wheel, play and cue buttons all feel just as nice as they did on the 1000's. Worth the $2500 each? meh I dunno, but apparently word on the street is that retail stores can't keep these bad boys in stock. Ahh Pioneer, you smart, I'm pretty sure you're purposely limiting the number of 2000's that are out there.

• Pioneer SVM-1000 - Not new, but a beast piece of machinery. Full mixing and DVDJ capabilities. Touch sensitive screen. Cool stuff. I was enamored by the entire Pioneer booth (or should I say room). Behind the main DJ booth, they had about 8 flat screen TVs (Pioneer of course) hooked up to the SVM-1000 and about 4 CDJ-2000s. Quite a sight to see when you have a DJ who really knows what he/she is doing.

• American Audio - American Audio came out with a pretty beast looking controller for NAMM 2010. 4 separate eqs, built in sound card, and direct drive jog wheels make this a pretty solid unit. Buttons have a nice rubbery feel to them and there are more than enough buttons, knobs, and faders than you can imagine on this. I had a chance to use it for about 10 minutes and initial impressions indicate that this is a solid product. Not sure about pricing, but It'd have to be below the $700 price point for it to be competitive.

• Numark NS7 - One of my favorite products from NAMM. Its an integrated MIDI controller that contains two direct drive turntables and a mixer interface to control Serato Itch. Very solid build quality on the turntables and mixer, although I have to ask the question: If you're going to have such a large controller surface (this thing is the size of two CDJ-1000's and a DJM-800), how on earth are you going to cram this thing into a tiny DJ booth?

• Rane Sixty Eight - Rane brought out the big guns with this mixer. Fully compatible with Serato Live, this 4 channel mixer looks pretty solid. 2 banks of cue points, filters, FX control, and a whole bunch of goodies show that Rane wanted to include all the bells and whistles on this mixer. Even better, Rane designed this mixer to allow two DJs to work together. Sorry, wasn't able to get pics of this today, but I'll try to snap some before the show is over.
  
• Vestax FX-1 - I'm going to admit, I'm a little disappointed that they didn't make a Traktor ready version of this. Its currently configured to work with Serato Itch. The FX-1 is designed to be added on to something like a VCI-300 to allow full control over all of the software's FX capabilities. It has a really nice, large, and smooth knob to control the depth of the selected effect. The buttons are nice, not too firm and are raised just high enough.
  
• Vestax TR-1 - Ok, one more admission. I saw this and wanted it right away. This looks like an evolution of the VCI-100 sans jog wheels (WTF!) and crossfader (sorry scratch DJs). If I move over to this controller, I'll have to get used to spinning without jog wheels and using the beat jump function to move through my tracks. This controller is fully optimized for Traktor Pro. I really like how all the major Traktor functions (transport, loop, effects), its not overly crammed, and the buttons/knobs are rubber where they need to be (hate plastic). Best part? All the controls on this unit basically mimic what you see on-screen for Traktor. $$$$. I'm still torn on the next controller. Ahh choices choices.
  
• Xone DX - This was another highly anticipated mixer from Allen & Heath. Its designed to work four decks on Serato Itch. I had a chance to play with it for a little while and it is a very well built controller. Nothing feels plasticky or cheap (I was a little worried about that when I saw initial pics). It has two jog wheels which can also control the four decks (you have to use a modifier to switch A/B or C/D).

• EKS OTUS - This is a baller MIDI controller. I love it and will most likely pick this one up when it gets distributed to the states (I had my heart set on a VCI-100 before). Its responsive, has a touch sensitive pitch fader (that actually works), a small trackpad built in for control of the mouse, a GIANT touch-sensitive jog wheel, and lots and lots of programmable MIDI buttons and knobs. My favorite part? The platter for the jog wheel is lifted off the ground by four "feet." At the base of each of these feet is a large rotary knob and with a button at the center. Its a great tool for scrolling through playlists. Definitely a cool controller.

• Numark V7 & X7 - Numark's V7 is their new controller designed to work with Serato Itch. Its basically a CDJ style MIDI controller. Its designed to work with Numark's X7, which is a four channel digital mixer. Bringing all of this hardware together is Serato Itch, which is basically Serato's answer to Traktor Pro. Using the V7 & X7 with Itch gives the user the ability to use four decks and FX units. 

• Akai MPD 26 - Akai's "lite" version of the popular APC 40 Ableton controller. This unit has a 4x4 pad to trigger effects, samples, loops, etc. Akai has a number of lite flavor products at their booth this year. Only goes to show that more and more people are getting into using Ableton to perform live DJ sets.

1) Spencer Parker - The Beginning (Michel Cleis Remix)
2) Dennis Ferrer - Sinfonia Della Notte (Gel Abril Remix)
3) Audiowhores & Haze - Stay (Shik Stylko Remix)
4) Tom de Neef, Baggi Begovic - Fake (Dave Mayer Remix)
5) Oxia - Whole Life (Original Mix)
6) Joey Negro - Sax My Bitch Up (Audiojack Remix)
7) Mint Royale - Blue Song (ATFC Main Vocal Mix)
8) Olav Basoski - I Feel So (Original Mix)
9) Sandy Rivera - Dirty Sax (Original Mix)
10) Cicada - One Beat Away (Arno Cost Remix)
11) Syke 'N' Sugarstarr, DBN Ft. Cosmo Klein - My Belief (Syke 'N' Sugarstarr Mix)
12) Filthy Rich, Romain Curtis - Javalaan (Filthy Rich  Mix)
13) Paul Gardner, Hugh Grant feat Marcella Woods - Come Get My Lovin (Plastik Funk Remix)
14) Laidback Luke, Gregor Salto feat. Mavis Acquah - Step by Step (Big Room Mix)
15) Medina - You & I (Deadmau5 Remix)