10:30
Phrase mixing well enough to impress a club
On YouTube this video is called Phrase Mixing DJ Lesson to Impress the Manager of a Club
What this lesson teaches
He uses sync here on purpose, and says so - the lesson is about structure, not beatmatching, and he does not want to spend it on headphones.
Setting up the entry points
He counts the incoming track: an eight-bar intro, then the beat. Hot cue there.
Forward to the first break. Another point. Then into the bassline - another.
So the record now has several places he can start it from, each one a structural event rather than an arbitrary position.
That is what hot cues are for in this context. Not tricks - entry points. A track with four cues set at its four meaningful moments is a track you can drop in four different ways depending on what the other record needs.
The argument
His main point, stated plainly: try not to be a beginning and end mixing DJ.
And then the honest version of why. A two-hour set of smooth transitions where every track plays from start to finish has good points - you hear each record whole - and one fatal one: you lose interest. The listener can predict the entire evening after fifteen minutes. Every record will arrive the same way, run its length, and leave the same way.
Mixing in halfway, at the break, over the top - what he calls mashing it up - makes the set something that could not have been produced by a playlist.
Why a manager notices
The title promises this and the logic holds up.
Anybody can queue records. A venue that wants recorded music played in order does not need to pay anyone. What they are buying when they book a DJ is judgement about what to play, when, and in what form - and re-cutting the material in real time is the most visible evidence that judgement is happening.
It is also the thing that cannot be faked, because it requires knowing both records well enough to know where the joins are.
Where to start
Take three records you know extremely well. Count each one and set a hot cue at every structural change - end of intro, start of bassline, the break, the drop after it.
Then practise entering each of them from each cue. You will find that some entries work against some other records and some do not, and that discovery is the whole skill.
Contents of the video
0:00 Phrase mixing
Right guys, it's Jonathan here, DJ Tutor, and in this video we're going to look at phrase mixing. Two tracks I'm using, A Night Out, the original mix on the left. On the right hand side, track entitled Breathe, the Francesco Gormez remix. I will put the full names of the tracks in the description. OK, so, I'm using the XDJ-RX. I've put the files through the program known as Rekordbox, which is a free downloadable file program from Pioneer. And they're both in the same key. I'm also, for this demonstration, using Sync, because I don't really want to have to mess around with trying to get them in beat, make sure they're in beats and headphones and whatnot. This is more a demonstration. Right, let's have a listen to the two tracks first.
This one here is A Night Out. This is the original mix. So, we just go a little bit forward.
Nice, good, solid, chugging bass line. I'm moving the camera.
Coffee on the go.
OK, so, bit of phrase mixing. So, I'm going to press play again. Now, we've got an intro of, I think it's eight bars. Two, three, four, yeah, eight bars. And then, beat comes in. Set a hot cue there. I'm going to go forward a little bit. Another break. After the second, or after the first break, sorry, we get into the bass line.
2:16 I've already set the cue point, the beginning of the track on the brea
Sorry, messing around. Do beg your pardon. I've already set the cue point, the beginning of the track on the breathe. Oh, sorry, I'll start again. I've set the cue point on breathe here.
There, at the beginning of the bass line. So, if we go back to the beginning of the track, let's have a listen to the track. From the beginning, three, four, two, two, three, four, three, two, three, four, four, two, three, four, five, two, three, four, six, two, three, four, seven, two, three, four, eight, two, three, four.
All right, so we've got eight bars and we've got the bass line. Now, as I've said in numerous videos, try not to be a beginning and end mixing DJ. Try and mash it up. The more you can sort of mix in halfway through, maybe a little bit at the beginning, maybe at the break, the better your mix will sound. Trust me on that. There's nothing worse than having these smooth transitions of a two hour mix. But you're listening to the entire track from beginning to end. OK, it has its good points and bad points. You get to listen to the entire track. But then. You're you will lose interest, especially if you're trying to, let's say, inspire. And you're trying to get the ear from a manager. You know, you want them to make notice, to take notice of your mix.
The last thing you want to do is have your mix for two hours long and you're playing maybe 15 tracks. That's it. You want to play 15 tracks in ten minutes. Now, that is going to get their attention big time. So what we could do here if we have a listen again from the beginning of track one.
No, I'm just thinking off the top of my head now. So we have eight bars and then the beat comes in. But on the other side, on the brief track, we have eight bars. Then the bass line comes in. But on the left hand side. And night out.
We just have to kick with no beat. So let's start them both together and let's have a listen, see what it sounds like.
5:12 Listen to both of them to a night out
Seven eight using the crossway going from one side to the other, not from one to the I'm going from the middle. Listen to both of them to a night out.
Check this out.
Bang. There we go. We go straight into a night out with the bass line now back to me. All right. If I was going to do. This kind of mix at the beginning of my set to impress a manager, then I would be very happy and the manager would think you know what this DJ is trying their very best, not just playing one track and hoping for the best, but just having a complete mashup. All right. So I'm going to pause that one now. Let's have right.
I'm going to set hot cue here. Now, this is very random what I'm about to do now. In fact, this entire video is very random. I've had me cup of coffee. I'm a little bit sort of like. Awake now, and I thought, let's do a good tutorial on phrase mixing. So now what I've done is I've set a hot cue in breathe so slightly off right. I'm going to press shift, press that hot cue when you do press shift with the RX. It's pretty much very similar with practically every single controller now shift and you can delete the hot cues that you've already recorded and then you can overwrite. Them you can't overwrite them if you don't press shift. So so I was slightly out there, so let's have a listen.
That's much better. All right. So I've got a hot cue there set up at the beginning of a new phrase. Let's go back to a night out.
7:42 Swang it forward a bit, right?
Swang it forward a bit, right? What I'm thinking here, it might be a nice idea to have this, but in the background of the night out track. So if I want it in the background, I could lower the volume. I could maybe add an effect, but I'm going to reduce the base. So now that's better. I'm gonna reduce even more there. Okay, right? I've reduced the base even more. No need for any effects. Excuse me a second. Hold on. Hello, someone at the door. All right. Okay, it's all right. It's all go here. Okay, so let's carry on playing very. Mind. As well, I haven't got any headphones, so if it does go off, it's because this is a demonstration and hopefully you'll do better than me. Here we go. Basing on right hand side, base out on the left hand side.
Bring the volume down on the left hand side. Crossface still in the middle. Spin back and we're straight into the right hand side. All right. I hope you've got a few tips from this. But I think the main reason for this video is make sure when you do a mix for someone, you want to promote yourself. Just try and be a little bit more inspiring in your mix. Don't do beginning and end. And whatever you do, make sure that the beginning of your set catches people's attention. So important analogy I've said before when you watch a James Bond movie, a James Bond movie never starts the first ten minutes where it's slow. James Bond Mission Impossible things like that start off boom bang. Get your attention first. You're into the film and away you go.
Exactly the same with your set. Practice and enjoy. Thank you.
This transcript was produced automatically from the audio of the video and may contain mistakes.
