I kind of see what you mean, nobody wants to start at the beginning of a record and turbo fast forward (while carefully counting bars) to get to a cue point.

If you look closely at the records you can often see where they make a transitions from one section to another just by looking at the grooves. Usually you can get away with starting so far in or so far out from one of these visible transitions to land the needle at about where you want to be. At least doing so always gets me close enough such that I can find the right place after spinning/backspinning the record just a little bit.

I have heard of people putting stickers on their records. You could put it just before the groove you want to start at. I've never done this myself, but I imagine the sticky goo from it has at least some chance of messing up your vinyl/needles if it doesn't come off completely.

Yea thats what i've been doing so far, looking at the record and finding my cue. Although some records are a pain and hard to see.

GREAT THREAD

lets get johnny in here to tell us whats up!!!!

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what trainspotters are.

Yeah you can look on the record for changes in the grooves, but really the only way to do it is to learn your choons (yes even your new ones) inside out, so you know when to mix it in. This way you will also have a much better sense of the music and you sound as if you're doing "set" mixes. It will allow you to mix far more different choons into each other because you will know what will go with what.

Yea thats true... The tunes that I am really familiar with I always mix perfectly.

i feel ur pain. i cue up vislually as well,
but sometimes i come across one of those records that have spirals in the vinyll (in the backroung) and i cant see anything.

my solution. when u have some time. take your records, and just mix them one by one. feel free to stop the mix to figure out better ways to mix and cue up. very time consuming but it'll get you good at it.

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"to be intoxicated is to feel sophisticated but not be able to say it"

I dont use it but ive seen this done. Get one of those wax pencils...not sure if youve ever seen them. If you have had braces the orthodontis used it to mark the wires before they put them in. Dont affect the vinyl put donesnt come off easily. Just maark where you want it.

Meta

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If the music moves you thats all that matters

Looking for vinyls of:
Brainchild - Symmetry C
Kamaya Painters - Endless Wave
Heaven Beats - Free Time

About my above post, you do not want to mark the drop in point...you want to mark a few grooves up even with the point you want to drop in at. The way I saw it was with a line perpendicular to the grooves.
Also make sure you have a flat soft point or else you may damage the vinyl.

Meta

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If the music moves you thats all that matters

Looking for vinyls of:
Brainchild - Symmetry C
Kamaya Painters - Endless Wave
Heaven Beats - Free Time

thats a very interesting tip, thanks'

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what trainspotters are.

That idea is pretty good but when mixing other songs you might want a different cue point. What I mean is if 2 records mix good at say 14 bars but if cue the same record into a different one, you might want a shorter into at say 16 bars or a longer one at 12.

Did that make any sense? oh well