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digital djs.. a question about organization
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| DjJade |
cant really search for "cd" or "cdj" becuase its too short... i have been lurking in this forum for a while and i havent seen a topic like this so here it goes...
i am about to jump on the cdj bandwagon... i just cant afford vinyl anymore and i think i want to start getting more creative... i think cdjs would be a smart move for me.
i had a few questions about organization:
-do youguys generally buy cdr or download
-for downloading, how do the songs come? do they come in folders with multiple tracks? or just one single?
-how many downloaded tracks do you put in one cd?
if many, do you make two copies of the cd incase you wanted to mix two songs together that are in one cd?
-what do youguys keep cds in?
-how are they labeled? hand? printed sleeves? printed disc? etc
thanks |
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| ibiza_cat |
I buy music when i find it in a shop, but if im looking for a specific foot shuffler il hit up beatport.com for the latest tunes. I organize my cd with 8=10 tracks per CD and make a tracklist, print it out and slip it in the sleeve along with the key the tune is in.
I also make a habit of making two copies of each cd i make because:
1. incase one get lost
2. incase i want to do tricks
3. incase some prick takes one
out |
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| jpisani |
| I write down all the tracks I burned onto the CD (usually about 6 - 8) on an index card. I put a number on the corner of the index card, and the same number one the CD. When mixing I just go to the index cards to find which song I want to play next, instead of flipping through CDs. Just the way I started so its what I'm used to, seems to work good for me. |
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| beats and beeps |
| quote: | Originally posted by DjJade
cant really search for "cd" or "cdj" becuase its too short... i have been lurking in this forum for a while and i havent seen a topic like this so here it goes...
i am about to jump on the cdj bandwagon... i just cant afford vinyl anymore and i think i want to start getting more creative... i think cdjs would be a smart move for me.
i had a few questions about organization:
-do youguys generally buy cdr or download
-for downloading, how do the songs come? do they come in folders with multiple tracks? or just one single?
-how many downloaded tracks do you put in one cd?
if many, do you make two copies of the cd incase you wanted to mix two songs together that are in one cd?
-what do youguys keep cds in?
-how are they labeled? hand? printed sleeves? printed disc? etc
thanks |
I buy retail cds whenever its available, or if its one I'd like to own with album art or whatever. Otherwise download from whichever websites you can purchase it on. Surprisingly, I still end up buying a fair amount of vinyl and ripping it, simply because theres no other legal way to get what I want to play.
Whatever you do, pay for you downloads, no matter how tempting it is to play that promo/bootleg or whatever that you found elsewhere. Simply because you can get in trouble of course for legal issues, you can get mislables, or corrupt crap, but most important of all, most everything you download off of p2p will not be of fair enough sound quality to play out. Even if you do find alot of 320kb, or Wavs, sometimes the sound quality just still doesnt seem to be there. Another really odd thing is that alot of the rips you'll find by major "groups" have alot of wow/flutter in them, so they must use crappy tables to rip. Sometimes they will have they will have the eqs all wonky too. Obviously this is horrible for mixing.
Of course you should want to pay the artist as well. I mean you're getting a deal, cutting out the cost of material (vinyl) but the artist s are still usually get fair royalties from digital download site, from what I've heard.
As far as the rest of your questions go, its all personal opinion.
I just cram as much as I can onto a cd when it seems viable. Fill any excess space up with scratch samples, sound effects, little vocal quotes or whatever. Loads of fun. I try to actually keep the tracks organized on the cd by release, especially if its from records I own, so usually a cd might have like 4 records on it. Then I always make a second copy.
Then just type up a tracklist, print out 2 copies, cut them out and slip them into the pockets of a cd booklet, and slip the cds behind the papers.
There are all kinds of suitcases with this stand up little plastic cases made more for mobile djs if youre into that.
Cdjs certainly let you be creative (especially of you have dn-s5000s) and of course the cdj1000s are still fairly creative, hell even my cdj800s are offer a bit more than turntables, but I hope you arent planning on selling your turntables...depending on what you play, it might now be so viable to download the tracks you want to play. Its best to keep at least one if you really need the money. |
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| DjJade |
naa by downloading i meant buying the download...
i would never play out something that i dont own. i was just wondering how downloads are "packaged" when you get them from a store.
definitly will not sell turntables. i am only gonna buy the records that i really want and like to listen to, download the rest that would just be good for a set or whatver...crap that "normal" people would like : )
yea another issue is playing for people... i have started playing out alittle and to make a crowd happy, you have to play what they want to hear and its not necessarily soemthing that i would want to have or especially use the bit of money that i have to pay for it |
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| Dirk W. |
i have pretty much completely transferred over to CDs now. My method is pretty simple and it works for me just fine:
1. Buy tracks from Beatport/Label sites/etc
2. Convert to wav and cram as many as I can onto a CD
3. Burn 2 copies of that CD
4. Label them with the same number
5. Create a spreadsheet with the CD numbers and track numbers
6. Print it out and take it with me
I thought it was going to be a problem playing in the club with the poor lighting and flipping through quite a few pages to find tracks, but it turned out to be not an issue at all. |
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| Axolotyl |
Welcome to the bandwagon. Digital is fun and creative regardless of what djpolitics.com.org tells you.
I usually download 320kbs MP3s. I hardly ever leech them off the net as I want the artists to get payments for their efforts if at all possible. If digital is ever going to have the selection of tunes that vinyl sees, then labels have to see it as a legitimate way to make a profit and that means paying for them. Just consider that when you make your purchases.
When you download, your downloading single tracks, or "releases" which are replicas of the vinyl counterparts. You can choose either, and they cost the same. I usually get atleast 1 other remix of a track, sometimes more if I really like it.
I group most of my tracks together.. like I'll have 2 or 3 releases on one CDR, or if I download a couple of tracks by the same artist, then I'll put them on the same CDR too. I usually try and fill up a CD with as many track as possible. I dont buy into this whole treating a CDR like a piece of Vinyl, ie: 2 tracks per CD. Its not a record, its a 99c disc that you can burn again and again if you feel like, so treat it as such.
I just keep them in a cd wallet that holds like 200 CDs and print out sleeves with artist, remixer, track name and label on it. Seems to work fine for me =) |
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| DJSTER |
The first thing i do when i receive my cdr's from beatport is that, i put it right in the cdrw and transfer all the files to computer. Next i pack the original cdr's and store them in a safe place and use them only in a emergency (which is basically never but good to have back ups back ups). I figure out the key of the song and BPM (yes BPM) and then i just make a spreadsheet, keywise. So Am on top to G#M at the very last.
finally:
1. Burn 5 tracks on each cdr
2. Make another copy of the same cdr
3. Slap on a tracklist on the cdr.
4. Print spreadsheet
5. Get all that and go to a club.
The end. |
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| Omega_Blue |
| i was thinking.. if you had cdjs that had mp3 playback.. you could just throw a load of mp3's on a couple cd's. i figure if i ever pick up some decks like this, i'd have a ton of mp3 on a CD, then make an exact copy of the same cd.. so you wouldn't have to around with shuffling through a bunch of 'em in your cd case. |
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| dinoXpress |
| its ok i guess, but memorizing what track # of all those tunes is near impossible. if you named a song of mine i could tell you what cd# and track# very very easily. |
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| CosmoKid |
| quote: | Originally posted by Omega_Blue
i was thinking.. if you had cdjs that had mp3 playback.. you could just throw a load of mp3's on a couple cd's. i figure if i ever pick up some decks like this, i'd have a ton of mp3 on a CD, then make an exact copy of the same cd.. so you wouldn't have to around with shuffling through a bunch of 'em in your cd case. |
mp3s will sound terrible on a club system. you need to be playing .wav files or something similar.
even though van dyk uses FS, he still doesnt use mp3s. all of his songs are converted to some other less compressed format.
if you are playing in your basement, go for it. |
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| DjJade |
if mp3s sound terrible in a club..that means most people buy the cdr? mail order?
i see lots of formats..
192
320
wma
flac
i like flac files... how are wma compared to mp3? also... would 320 also sound bad in a big system?
thanks for all the help |
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