I learned to mix just by listening to my mixes compared to professionals and going out watching the DJ's hands.

As long as your're spinning for yourself and for practising you really have no need to keep up with all the new stuff popping up everywhere. Just go out and buy some vinyls you like (preferably some that are easy to mix ).

After you feel confident in mixing go out to the clubs and find your sound, ask the DJ's if you don't know a track. Ask your vinyl dealer. Look at the charts(that's what they're made for )

At least that's the way I did it, xept for the easy-to-mix stuff

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well.. as far as keeping up with music..

most online recordshops highlight the new releases.. so it's always easy to find out what's out.

you can also start to identify record labels that you like.. and start following thier websites - alot of labels will tell you what is up and coming, what has been released, and even sometimes a complete list of all the releases.

I'm still learning... getting better slowly...
i started out on the PC.. atomixmp3, VTT, and PCDJ.. did this for over a year before finally getting my decks.

I taught myself how to beatmatch.. it's pretty straight forward once you start to understand what is going on.. but alot of little tricks I picked up from watching other pro DJ's spin, like hand control tricks and other things of the like. watching an experienced DJ in the best way to start picking up tricks.

of course, you have to develop your own style and find out what works for YOU the best, so give yourself plenty of time to practice and mess around!

Listening to DJ Mix sets is important too - it'll give you ideas for new tricks to try - and sometimes its better to only hear the end effect and figure out for yourself how to achieve it rather than watching firsthand.

all in all, learn anyway you can and incorporate each little trick in your activities... and see what works best for ya!

and the most important part.. spinning records is supposed to be fun, dont get frustrated and fed up... so just go at it with the attitude of getting your groove on and do it whichever way makes you feel good! if your doing it right, you should be entertaining yourself as much as the listeners are being entertained

-mer



-mer

u could check out some websites with trance tunes reviews.

that's always a good thing... you can learn alot of music just by reading some of the boards here... and looking at people sig's where they list thier fav tunes

another nice thing is the record sites with audio samples of tracks.. or winmx.. (id say or audiogalaxy, but they are bye bye)

one thing you should look for is some very minimal records to start with - clean beats, not too much "noise" (synths, etc) - just a few tracks with clear, well defined basslines for you to start practicing with.

I honestly found trance was a hard genre to start with - I've been spinning almost 3 months now, and I just got my first quantity of trance records - I started out with hardhouse because it has very defined beats, and also has alot of highhats that match up well too. now that my ears are trained, trance has become easier to spin... working with hardhouse to start with definitly was a good move, atleast for me...

-mer


-mer

have a question for you guys that might help out Fanyen too,

what tunes, genre or dj style would you call "easy+clear" to start learning beatmatching with ???

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quote:

what tunes, genre or dj style would you call "easy+clear" to start learning beatmatching with ???

I remember starting out with a lot of PvD tracks/remixes. He tends to make/remix songs with decently sized intros amd outros and very prominent bass beats, not to mention treble (the infamous PvD hi-hats). It's really easy to hear when those huge PvD bass thumps are drifting...

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mmmm.. delicious...

Join a record pool.....they keep up w/ most new stuff.....

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WTB--Favorite/WTB Vinyl:

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Please PM me if you have these.

wohooo... I don't know about USA, but here in Germany it's really hard to get into a record pool.

Normally you 'll have to be a resident somewhere. But noone want's to employ you if you own about 30 Vinyls... Then you'll have to vote for at least one chat-system. Which are even more complicated to get into... So first of all you'll have to invest a lot into actual vinyl to become a resident DJ, then apply for chart voting, then for a record pool and chances are, you wont get in. Then you'll have to keep spending more money for records.

Btw. because of this stupid charting system most of the record pools will provide only cheesy stuff, that has some appeal to the bying audience. So don't expect to get real good stuff from record pools.

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There is some excellent advice provided in other threads in this section which can help you learn the basics.

Everyone knows that you must learn beatmatching, but with that you need phrase matching & eq'ing to perform good basic straight mixes. Don't try anything fancy until you can rely on your straight mixing at any time.

You should have a few favourite artitst/tunes at the moment. Find out what record label this has been released under and check other releases from that label as they will almost always be of a similar genre. As has been mentioned, you will eventually have certain labels that you know will release good tunes. For me I can always rely on Vandit, ID&T, Bonzai, Planet Traxx, Pulse and Overdose. I play a lot of styles of trance but I would recommend learningon the PVD style tunes as was also previously mentioned.

As for record pools, there are different types. There are some that you pay to be on and some that will only let you on if you will promote that labels tunes. This means you will need a residency and probably a radio show that will go out to a large audience.

http://www.dj.deft.ukgateway.net/menu.htm

check out that page, befor ei got my tables i read through pages similar to that to basically get the idea of what your doing,

get your setup, and practise practise practise, then wen u r totally confident u can beatmatch try mixin in different styles, and mess about with the EQs on ya mixer to find out what sounds gud and what doesnt, its all about trial and error,

try and get a relationship with ya local record dealer, and he will soon find out what style u r into, tell him what djs u like the sound of, and soon enough if u buy regular u wil walk in the shop and he will have a pile of records which he will know is your style andd u will like,

well , thats all i can think of for now,
mick

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my advice would be what someone else said in here, start off with some easier music then trance (although i started with trance)... id recommend some deep progressive, satoshi tomiie style dark, deep beats with looooong intros and outros, or if that isnt your thing, hardhouse is good also

if your really keen on mixing trance, PvD's tracks *do* go together well.

as far as 'learning' to dj goes, practice, practice and when uve done practicing, more practice if you get stuck someone here should be able to help you out.

good luck with it.