Add a Little Extra to a DJ Track to Give It a New Sound and Feel

0:00 I've got the CDJ-1000 Mark III here

Right, sometimes you can find a couple of tracks that just seem to work sort of well together but tiny parts of one into the other. So I've got the CDJ-1000 Mark III here. So I haven't really got the latest tech. The mixer is the Formula Sound FF 2.2L. Now this really is probably too high end for these decks to be quite honest. This should really be sat in between the two. A set of daddies. What am I on about? Technics SL-1200 Mark II. Then you've got a nice setup. But don't get me wrong, this mixer can still be used with CD players by all means. But these players, they're a little bit, when I say clunky, if I was to make a loop on these then I'd have to be very clever to get it precisely in time or I'd have to spend a great deal of time getting it in time.

So what I'm about to show you will give you an idea of what you can do if you've got, let's say, something that's a little bit more technically minded. In other words, something that's more digital instead of analog. So two tunes I've got here. Hold on. This is the underground releases and this was disc two, which is that one and this is disc one. So disc one on this side here on the left side, track two, which is tracking type The Lights. By the way, all these tracks if you click the link in the description to CDPool and go to April 2021 underground series, you'll be able to hear these cuts and the others. And this is track ten on disc two, which is Futurama print by Luke Chin. Okay, let's have a listen to this. Let's just go to the beginning. Nice sort of feel to this very, very sort of uplifting techie kind of sound.

Just turn up a bit.

2:08 There you get that nice, airy, sort of feel

There you get that nice, airy, sort of feel. Just going to pause that. So what I've got there is I formed a loop. I put that in hot cue number A or number A letter one. Come on. I used to have that in school many years ago, the teachers used to go, come on now get out your books and start at letter A no letter one. So I did it the wrong way. That's dyslexia for you when I want to do it the right way. I do it the wrong way. I want to do it the wrong way. Do the right way. Or was it the wrong way? Right? Right? Wrong. Anyway, that's left and that's right. Is that right? No, that's what you know what I mean? Okay, so I've done one loop there. Let's have a look.

See what it sounds like from the beginning.

4:29 I mean, I've got I've got low pass, high pass and low pass

Can you hear that chunk? That's where it's slightly off slightly better still probably not perfect, but it'll do okay, let's come out of that. Let's maybe do another. One somewhere. All right, so I've got three loops now again, this is going to be very clunky, but if you can imagine, I suppose I really what I should have done is put these through record box and use the XZ, but why not do it the hard way so you can do it the easy way? Why didn't I do it the easy way so you could do the easy way as well? Ah, what the hell? Never mind. Okay, so there's my loop. Okay, so this is really a kind of a rough demonstration, but if you imagine you've got two tracks, you have the one track as the base. In other words, you just let it play all the way through, but the other one, you take parts of that track and form loops, maybe some hot cues and just add it over it as well.

Now again, I've got very few effects here. I mean, I've got I've got low pass, high pass and low pass. Felt doing loads of mistakes today, today always do mistakes. Yeah, okay, but you see if I had, for example, the capability of doing a better loop or maybe echo reverb, then in essence what you're doing is you're doing a remix of a track, but what you don't want to do now, this is the key here. This is where it gets very important. What I could have done is just gone really over the top with that track and just like mashed it up over this one. But what I don't want, that's what I don't want to do. I don't want to make it too big, make this overpower that what I want to do is just add little bits. So if we were in the kitchen making a shepherd's pie, of course, the main ingredients is the meat and the potato on the top.

7:45 Let's have a listen to track two, which was again the lights by itself

Mm hmm. Or the veggie mints, of course, if you veggie, but that sounds great or it tastes great and well, it won't taste great if you don't add the salt and pepper. So what this is, is the seasoning. It just enhances the flavour of what you're eating. And remember, the salt and the pepper, they are the basis of getting the flavours out. So what you're doing is you're like adding a little bit of flavour and you're making the original sound. The original meal just tastes so much better instead of like something bland and horrible. Okay, so let's have a listen to track two, which was again the lights by itself. Just go forward a bit kind of almost fall to the floor. But Chicago style filter liking it, liking it a lot actually.

10:18 I like a bit of the old spin back towards the end

Okay, track ten. Okay, put this forward a bit. I'm going to go to track number four from December one, which is track it up together. Now again, all of these releases you can get them on the hard copies CDs or you can download them as well. And if you feel like dipping your big toe into CD pool, then go and check out the link in the description. And if you are a first time user, I still believe you get 50% off your first two months of downloading. Not bad. And that's not everything terms and conditions apply. You can always ask him what you can get together. I like a bit of the old spin back towards the end. Okay, we do something else condition number two. Track 11 is good to do here. I'm just going to bring this one in, but I'm going to use my filter to the high pass actually.

Okay, I'll put forward a bit so you get an idea what it's like. No, actually no low pass. This is where an echo would fit quite nicely because I just want to like bring this with me. I'm not going to beat magic. It was offbeat, but if I'd have had an echo on that track leaving the mix, it would have almost it would have been what I'm picturing here. It's almost like rain because this is like listen, it's like rain and the echo out on that. This comes in you see not all the time, but just on the odd occasion. You don't have to think it's got to be in beats. Sometimes a natural kind of blend, an organic blend of the two tracks instead of that. Don't. Don't make work. Okay, track number twelve from this number two, which is dream state.

12:45 Something else from disc number one

Now again with the Underground series, twisty bendy sounds a bit of DMV there as well. It's very experimental, not experimental, as in some DJs decided to just put a track together and see what it's like. No, there's a lot of time being taken into these tracks. But if you do want to maybe take your mix to that another level where you're playing general tunes and all of a sudden you want to play something that's slightly left field, it's different. Then you can't go wrong. Okay, so something else from disc number one. Okay, what I'm going to do here is I'm going to bring this one in. It's a similar kind of feel to these two tracks somehow. Okay, go towards the end of this one. Okay, what I'm going to do here is just spin back because I don't have many effects.

In fact, I'm going to try something here where I'm going to just start off with my low and high pass filter and then no, that didn't work. Actually, that didn't work at all. It was worth a try. It was worth a try. Now some people would go, I'm going to edit that out. Luckily, I edited that part out so you didn't hear that. Don't care. All right. Very industrial sort of sound here. This is track number nine, which is PDA, a track entitled Talks. We're going to do one more from disc number two. Stop trying to play this game. And I rolled the dice just to see you again. Even in the furthest reaches, I've searched for forgiveness. Bound to the heart that you gave me. Confess about what I thought.

I'm going to say it straight out. If you knew right now your inner being and what your inner being thinks about most things, try number one, physical human being reaching your inner being. Sophia Essel once again, very expensive, experimental, very twisty venue subscience. April 2021, the Underground series. Check out the link in the description. This is wacky. I like it, though.

16:26 Not a good tune to start mix off, though

It's almost got that old school kind of break beat to it in the background. Not a good tune to start mix off, though. Something like this. I like it. Yeah. Or the end of a set. This is the sort of tune you could play right at the beginning or the end. So if you think about it. All right, I didn't think I was going to do this because I thought that's it. Finish. Good night. Practicing. Enjoy. Bugger off. No, listen. We want you to know something. We're just going to say it straight out. It's like the tune for the end of a mix. You've just stopped the mix. You finished it and then you go, thank you ladies and gentlemen. Good night. Played this right at the end. And people are like, whoa, chilled out, laid back. It grows.

It grows. It grows. A bit of breakbeat in the background. And then it gets a little bit harder and then it gets into a nice house beat. Loving it. Amazing. Or the beginning of a set. What a good tune. Amazing. Oh, very good. Yeah. Almost like 80s electronics in there as well. A synth kind of tune back into breakbeat. Immense. You see, there has been a lot of time taken to put that track together. Respect, practice and enjoy. Thank you.

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