DJ lesson 4: Before you even try to mix... do this
I know you’re itching to start messing with your new DJ kit and learning all the technical skills to be a DJ. But hold up. Learn how to listen to your tunes first.
When I started DJing – before you could download tunes digitally – it was essential to ‘know your records’ and was central to any great set. You knew how many bars (more on this later) were in the intro, when different elements came in and out, and when the bassline dropped. This knowledge made it simpler to place a mix in the right place, and create the right energy for the right moment in your sets.
It’s so easy to build a library of thousands of tunes now, people forget to ‘know their tunes’. Beat grids on your decks or controller may show you when the action happens, but if you rely too heavily on your eyes, not your ears, you’ll never really understand music and dancefloors, and create those magic, emotional moments that people remember.
So here’s an exercise. Before you tinker with the technical elements of DJing:
LISTEN AND LEARN
1. Grab one of your favourite tunes and listen to it through headphones
2. Pick out one element of the song – a drum, bassline, or melody. Concentrate on where those sounds come in and where they drop out again. When you’re familiar with the pattern of one, move on to another element. Repeat until you’re fully acquainted with how the song is structured.
3. Choose another record and do the same again. You’ll start noticing common patterns and ideas shared between your favourite songs.
At first, keep it simple with the songs you choose. You’re looking for something quite commercial, where a simple drum starts the song, and elements drop in and out without any weird rhythms and patterns to distract you.
Try doing it with:
Endor – Pump it up
Fisher – Losing it
Stardust – Music sounds better with you
CJ Bolland – The prophet
What to look out for: the key elements of your tunes
A lot of dance music features the same common ingredients. So listen out for:
Drums
Usually, these can be broken down into the kick drum, snare and hi-hats. Together, they form the beat patterns we’re all familiar with.
You’ll hear the kick drum (the one that goes BOOM) on every beat in a lot of house records, but it might come on the first beat of each bar of four, or the one and three. Listen closely and see where it drops in the tunes you’re listening to. Percussion - snares and cymbals - usually form the off beat.
There’s lots of other percussion to be found, too. Cow bells are popular (Wild Cherry, Play that Funky Music) and still sound great today. Listen out for anything from bongos, to human claps, and church bells. They’re all there to create rhythm and atmosphere.
When you get to know where drums start and stop, you’ll create natural and uplifting mixes, and avoid train-wrecks.
Bassline
The other element that gives a tune its groove is the bassline. You won’t need me to tell you that this is the part of the song that you feel coursing through your body in a nightclub – or which rattles your windows and annoys your neighbours when you’re playing at home.
A lot of songs build up anticipation before the bass drops, so listen out for flags that the bassline is coming in with your tunes. It might be a really obvious snare roll full of reverb (a cool audio effect), or more subtle.
Melody
You know the part of a song you whistle in the shower? That’s the melody and it’s created by any instrument that produces different pitches, like pianos, synthesisers and guitars. Melody done right adds familiarity to your sets and gets more people on the dancefloor.
Vocals
Vocals fall into the melody category, but deserve a special mention because they can add so much extra emotion to your sets. While there are plenty of DJs who play dark, underground, largely lyric-free music, there’s power in playing that perfect vocal, or spoken word, at a particular moment in time. Like when the sun’s coming up!
So now you know your tunes, let’s get mixing.