Pioneer rekordbox DJ Quantize Feature with the Hot Cue Demonstration

0:00 First of all the track we're using is from Karmic Power Records, Mr

Alright guys, first of all the track we're using is from Karmic Power Records, Mr. Lenny Fontana, Love Is Real, it's the deep mix and if you are into your deep soulful house music then this is a monster cut. In this video we're using the rekordbox DJ software from Pioneer, we're also using the DDJ-RX and Mr. Lenny Fontana Karmic Power Records himself. In this video what we're going to do is look at something called the quantize feature and how it is a great feature to use but not all the time. I will show you how the quantize works, what you can do with it when you use the hot cues. Right, what I'm going to do is on the RX we have 8 pads and I can set 8 hot cues during the course of the track. Now first of all as well.

What is a hot cue, what does it do? So this really, this part of the video is for the complete and utter beginner. So let's imagine you're playing a track and there's a part in that track that you really like and you feel as though towards the end of the track you just want to go back to that point and start it all over again. Well, you can do that by using the hot cues because as soon as you've engaged one of the hot cues and you press that again for the second time. You will go back to the point. Where you press the hot cue the first time, the only way of getting rid of that hot cue is by pressing shift while your finger is on shift, pressing that pad again and you will disengage that hot cue. I'll give you a demonstration there.

Right, I pressed the hot cue. I'm going to explain as precisely and concisely as I can for also people who may be partially sighted. Now what's happened now is that pad is now highlighted in red. In green. So when I press that again, if we have a listen, we can hear that hot cue.

Now then how do I get rid of it? I've now got my finger on shift while my finger is on shift. I'm pressing that same pad and now it is no longer highlighted in green. That means I have now overwritten that hot cue and now it's good to go to form another hot cue. Right. So in this video what I'm going to do is the top. Four pads. I am going to set hot cues manually by myself without the use of quantize, then the bottom four. I'm going to engage quantize after that. I'll show you a little bit about what's good and bad about using quantize. There's nothing really bad, but you'll see what I mean. Also, I'll show you the rekordbox DJ software on how we can see the hot cues on the software in relation to the hardware.

So we'll start off all I'm gonna do. Is just the basic kick a, b, c and d will be my hot cues that I would have recorded by myself without the use of quantize abc indeed. And then E F G and H I will use the quantize feature. So off we go now. I'm going to engage quantize do the same thing there. Okay, so let's disengage quantize. Let's have a listen to my hot cues.

3:40 Wave format of the track

Now. All right. There's not. Not much of a difference, but there is definitely a difference in the sound of those hot cues now. Why is there a difference? What's going on? Well, if we have a look at the wave format of the track, the way format seems to start quite abruptly and then slowly vanish. That's because the starting point is where the kick hits hard and then it fades away. So what's happening with the first? Four that I recorded by myself without the use of quantize, I'm not a machine. So I might have let's say pressed one of the pads a fraction of a second before the kick started or for that matter, I may have been slightly too late and pressed it a fraction of a second after the kick started. So I haven't the term used snapped it in time.

5:28 Again, there's not much of a difference, but there definitely is a dif

I'm now going to try the four at the bottom where we had quantized engaged. But I've now. Now disengage the quantize feature. So let's have a listen to those four. They sound exactly the same. There is no difference. I'm going to press them one at a time and then bring the volume down so you can hear exactly. You can hear each one by itself with no interference from the other pad. So there's one pause it number two, pause it number three, pause it. Number four. Four there. Let's do the same now with my four at the top. Pause it, pause it, pause it there. All right, again, there's not much of a difference, but there definitely is a difference. So let's have quantize engaged now. And now what I'm going to do is I'm going to press the bottom four pads slowly.

But then what? What I'm going to do, I'm going to use them like a bit of a drum machine and press them a little bit faster. Now this is where quantize may not be a good idea to use if you want to do, let's say some juggling around with the hot cues and have a really bit of a mash and a mess up. So quantize engaged. That's fine. But now listen, I'm now going to press one pad quite quickly so you can hear me tapping. I'm going like done, done, done, done, done. And all I'm hearing is snap, snap, snap. Snap. That's what I'm doing. And all we're hearing is one, two, three, four. I'm now going to disengage quantize and do exactly the same. So that's quite important. You mustn't forget about that because a lot of DJs are thinking, hold on a minute.

I'm pressing that pad more times than it's actually playing. It's because you have quantized engaged. Disengage it and you're back to doing whatever you want to do. All right, let's have a look at the program. This is Rekordbox. DJ program, by the way. Or Rekordbox DJ, should I say? All right. So what we have here very simply is we have hot cue pad effects. We have slicer and beat jump, which is pretty much exactly the same as the controller. And you'll notice that all of these pads here, these areas highlighted. Not only are they highlighted, we can see the time that the hot cue was set. So what I'm going to do is I'm now going to press shift and watch them all disappear. There's A, B, C, D, E, F, G and H.

That's it. And I'm good to go to record more hot cues if I want to. All right. I hope that's been a help. Very simple explanation. And I'll finish off with practice and enjoy. Check out Karmic Power Records. Thank you very much. Cheers.

This transcript was produced automatically from the audio of the video and may contain mistakes.