Time to Lay off the Laptop DJ and Work the Hard Way It Will Pay off in the End

0:00 Are you a keep fit fanatic?

Are you a keep fit fanatic? Do you like to stay healthy? Maybe you do some kind of exercise, like at the bar when you're pulling your pint up to your mouth and it's exercising that arm. Or maybe you like taking the dog for a walk and you just happen to go past the bar where you do lift your arm. So, good on you because you're not only giving the dog exercise, you're also exercising yourself and it just so happens that when you go home, my dear, that was a long walk. Look at the dog, it's knackered. Because you let it run outside in the beer garden while you're sipping. Anyway, on the other hand, maybe you like to cycle, maybe you like to swim, maybe you like to run, maybe you like to do yoga or something.

But what you're doing is you're exercising your body. Now I'm going to show you a way how you can exercise your mind, but in a very sort of weird way. Yes. Now, I'm going to make two loops. Now, because I have relatively old school technology here, the Pioneer CDJ-1000 Mark No. 3, 1, 2, 3, 3, 3, 3, 1, 2, 3. Anyway, because I've got the Mark 3, making a loop isn't as easy. As the normal up-to-date kit where it's all quantized and there's little men and women and stuff inside there. Just slap your wrist and say, you've done it wrong. We'll do it right for you. In other words, computer wizards and silicon chippy bits just do it for you. Whereas with these, you've got to sort of do it yourself. But what I want to do here is I want to form two loops that aren't proper loops.

Now you may think, so you want to form two loops that aren't proper loops. Why on earth do you want to do that? That's a good question. I'm very glad you asked me that. The reason being, you see, you must think I'm stupid, but I know exactly what you're saying. I know to a T. Why do they say to a T? Why don't they say to a coffee? To a coffee. I know what you're saying because you're asking me why on earth would I do that when the loops are going to be off? Ah, because they're going to be off. Now, earlier on in the video, in fact, at the beginning of the video, I talked about keeping fit. Now, I want you to be able to keep your mind fit. So in a way, doing something like this is just packing up the mind.

It's just keeping it fit. It's just keeping it active and making it work that little bit harder. So when you do find something that's easy to do, it's not only easy, it's like simple. You get it? It's a little bit like... Going for a run tomorrow and doing a mile, the day after another mile and another mile and so on until eventually you're like, oh, flipping heck. You're only just about warmed up at the end of the mile and then you could probably do 10. And then after two months of doing 10, you're like, oh my God. And then you're doing 15, you see? So this is what I'm going to try and do here. So first of all, I'm going to do a loop on this side, but not a loop.

Now can you hear? It's off.

I want that to be off. I'm going to leave that play. Let's do the loop on this side.

3:39 Going to be a half

That's not bad.

5:09 Let's say it's a fifth for argument's sake on the first loop

All right, that's very good. It's half what I wanted to do, but I'm going to do the half what I wanted to do first and then I'm going to do the whole. So a half and a half is a whole. So this is half and the next bit is going to be a half and a half, which is a whole. Hmm. Right. So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to play. This loop over that one, and it should actually not match because that loop isn't a proper loop. So let's try it. Listen going off. Yeah, it is going off, but only very slightly, very slightly and very slowly going off. We can definitely hear it's going off now. Okay. So what was happening there now? Because which is. Definite that loop over there is not a perfect loop every time it does its rotation, it's going to be out by, let's say, a quarter of a beat, an eighth of a beat, a 16th, a third of a beat, a fifth of a beat.

So let's say it's a fifth for argument's sake on the first loop. The second time it's going to be two fifths, then three, then four, then five. It's going to be off one in time. So that's going to be the whole beat. So that in itself will be difficult to mix to, which means you have to concentrate on what you're doing. And it's not a question of just putting it there and that's it. It'll keep it in time. No, you have to keep it in time. Now, if you add to that two loops that are off, then wow, that's difficult. So by the time you've got it in beat, it's out of beat. And then you've got to try and get it back in beat for it to be in beat. But then, of course, it's going to go out of beat again. So I'm going to go out of that loop.

I'm going to go out of that loop. I think what I did there was a one bar loop, and I think it was a two bar over here. I can't remember now. So let me do maybe a four bar loop on both of them. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four, one. No, I'm just going to do two bar. Otherwise we'll be here all bloody day. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. Out. Let's have a listen. Yeah, it is definitely out. I'm going to make it out a little bit more. So I'm going to press the act. Let's have a listen. That's definitely out. Right, let's do the same over here. Definitely out. Let's play them together. Now we can hear they're off. Okay, so this is where riding the pitch using the jog wheel just kicks in.

8:06 See, I've already sussed it

Now, this is where the eighth, ninth, six, 30 seconds. The 45th sense have to just creep into your body and your soul and take over. Right, okay, so I'm going to put my headphones on and I'm going to do a little something like this right here we go. Do this all day now. See, I've already sussed it. Slow down. Bring it back up. Watch what happens. Listen, if I don't do this one more time, leave it back in there every time we have that rotation, the gap that isn't connected properly in the loop will just increase again and again and again. Hold on a minute. Yeah, it is going on or is it? Actually, it's not too bad. Do you know somehow what I did there is I made, I believe, a loop and a loop. I made the loops out of time and I made

Them out of time the same amount of time. So I think what I was doing there when I was moving the pitch is I was adjusting it. Maybe I didn't have to, but then bringing it back anyway. Let me try something different here. What I'm going to do now is I'm going to go out there. I'm going to make it even worse. This has definitely got to be off there. I mean, that is like really off. Here we go. Let's try this.

10:28 Oh God, I think this should prove a point

Oh God, I think this should prove a point. Now, let's do this sucker. This mother sucker is all the mother sucker. Get the mother sucker in on the mother sucker. Get the mother sucker. Okay, now I got it. Okay, so this is working your brain and this video definitely was working my brain, but it's about testing yourself. It's just pushing push, push, push. Why on earth would you want to do this with today's technology? I mean, what's the point in doing this when you've got a laptop and you just go click and it does it for you? Genius. Well, do you really want to be in the position where you wake up in the morning and someone gently slips lightly buttered pieces of toast into your mouth, gives you a bucket that you can piss

In, opens the bottom of your bed so you can have a poo, closes the bottom of your bed, takes the bucket away, and you can just lie there and watch Netflix or actually, that sounds like a dumb guy. Mind you, that would get very boring, wouldn't it? And that's a little bit what laptops are doing for you now is they seem to be doing everything for you. So why don't you maybe stop letting the laptop do everything for you and maybe you should start doing things because really what is DJing now with a laptop? You have your controller. You have your deck. If it's plugged into a laptop, what should that laptop be doing for you? It should be having the tracks, cataloging them, having them there. You drag a track in and then you start to DJ.

There is no need to look at a way format. There is no need to concentrate on those lines because you should know what you're doing anyway, and that's what I'm about teaching you the hard way. So the laptop. You look at it and go, don't need that ninja style. Use your Chi practice and enjoy. Thank you. Good stop.

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