Random House DJ Mixing with the CDJ1000MK3

0:01 You know me, I like my house vibes

You know me, I like my house vibes. This one here, June 2021, disc 1, we have a track entitled Witness, Andy Reid. People sometimes ask me what is your favourite sort of style? Well it is house music but I like the uplifting sort of soul deep vibe which is a bit like this. I mean with loads of modern day technology as well now basically doing everything for you. It used to be a case of, you know, to learn how to DJ properly you've got to have vinyl and without Serato, Traktor or anything like that which is true but then as it's getting not so much more and more difficult to get vinyl but another way is like with the likes of the CJ1000s because even though you have a BPM readout, it's not, when I say it's not 100% accurate, you know, if you put like that side's 124, put that at 124, you're not getting the point. You know, for example, it could be 124.3 on that side, 124.7 on that side. So it's giving you an idea of the speed but it isn't 100% accurate. You've always got to use your ears.

1:42 Where I'm going to bring

So what I'm going to do here is mix a couple of nice kind of vibey tunes, but I need to go towards the end of this one here to get a good transition point. And I'm going to go to the beginning of the phrase. I've got that ready. So if we listen here track two, disc number two which is Show Me A Rhyme. Okay and all these can be found on the website. Just check out housejune2021cityful.com So go towards the end of this. Hold on. I'll show you where I'm going to bring it in. Keep that vibe, that sort of uplifting soulful feel. Okay, let's see if we've got something with a similar kind of vibe. Yeah, four would work. I'm going to try, no. Yeah, let's go back to four. Okay, go to, I'm going to go to the end of the break here. Slam the bass out on that side. A bit more careful there because the vocals started to sort of overlap each other a little bit too much.

5:55 It's not just, you know, oh, that sounds great with that

So again, a lot of it is about, you know, again, tracks working with each other, making sure that the same BPM. But also even if you've got two tracks that just sound as though they're made for each other, that's all well and good. But it's also finding the correct place inside both tracks. It's not just, you know, oh, that sounds great with that. Chuck them together. No, choose the position. Choose the transition point as well. Let's find something over here. See, if we listen to this track, right, that's how it starts. But I'm going to bring it in here. Hold on. That's where I'm going to bring it in. This one here is track four, which is some PPL full. I'm sure the PPL is short for people.

8:09 I didn't bring it at the beginning of the break

So I'm going to bring in, when the break starts on that side, track eight, which is I Pray. I didn't bring it at the beginning of the break. Again, slightly old school here. You can see where the bar is moving. It's just around about the break. But again, you know, if you have modern day technology, well, I'm saying modern day tech. Start again. If you've got Tractor, Serato or anything like that on your screen, you can see the beat grid and you can see, yeah, you're coming along. There it is. There's the beginning of the break. Bang, you snap it in. Whereas here, slightly old school style, it was sort of like not so much hit and miss. But this gave you a rough idea of where the break was starting. But really, if you'd have concentrated on the track and you're counting bars and phrases, then you should automatically think, yeah, it's coming. It's coming, you know, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49

9:55 Actual bars on the old 1000s

1, 2, 3, 4 in. So but when I did that transition, I wasn't really concentrating on the bars and phrases enough. You see here now I can see two minutes, 57, 56 seconds. So that's where I need to bring it in because if you look at the actual bars on the old 1000s, if I bring up, say for example, a track I've already played, then the bar will already be there. But if I bring up a track that I haven't played yet, you can see it's taking its time to read it, which means I haven't played it yet. So okay, I'm going to bring this one in anyway. I'm not going to mix these two because they won't work. But track six sounds very, very funky from disc number two, which is deeper and deeper like this. It's a funky house tune. Wow. Love it. This is so good. A transition track on here is 120 BPM over this side, 121. So what I'm going to do here is just filter this one out, bring this one in. Listen.

13:59 It's like fade one out and fade one in

I wanted to bring them in. I wasn't really bothered about beat matching and it's just like, you know, sometimes a transition isn't about one, two, three, four. It's like fade one out and fade one in. You see also as well, because you've got completely different energy and vibe and the whole feel of the two tracks, if I'd have maybe tried to mix them in, you'd have gone from an energy sort of scale of one to ten. Say an energy of like seven down to a two. And that might not have worked. There'd be too much of a step down. Whereas if you just, you're almost explaining to the audience, look, this isn't a smooth transition. I am intentionally taking you from one feel to the next. Then that works. Okay, track 12 here. By the way, that track number six, just to make sure I've said it already, is deeper and deeper.

This one here will finish off with Let the Sun Shine Through. Now don't forget, all of these can be found at June 2021, the house series. There is a link in the description. I've got the hard copies on CD, but you can download the MP3 or WAV as well. So keep in touch and don't forget, please like and share my videos, practice and enjoy. Muchas gracias.

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