Originally posted by Domesticated
What makes you an authority? SYSTEM-J's original post only mentioned that Parrish couldn't beatmatch, which triggered a number of posts from you saying how boring super-smooth transitions are. No one suggested that Parrish should be doing the safe, predictable transitions that many DJs do - only that he should not be a complete hack at it; i.e. shoes in a tumblerdryer, as Jay so aptly put it.
He's not a complete hack at it that's the point. He's damn good at what he does.
Super smooth transitions ARE boring when its the only kind of mixing in the whole set, and the music itself is very repetitive or samey, mostly because it's predictable. As I said to someone else in this thread, it's not that smooth mixing itself is inherently bad, there are times where it works well, but it's not the only way to mix, and i think the cult of beatmixing takes it so seriously that they ultimately do a disservice to themselves to the point that they only listen for it and can't just enjoy good music played at the right moment. I know people who will literally stand and bob by the DJ booth and just listen to the transitions and then comment on them and say nothing about the tracks. (mostly because there is nothing youd want to say about them lol)
I like the smooth mixing sometimes, when performed by older DJ detroit techno guys like Rob Hood, where the music is absolutely thrilling and visceral. But they still do a ton of cutting too.
In any case it definitely doesn't work with the variety and and freeformness of what they plays. Theo's approach is more like free jazz. He's like the ornette coleman of deejaying.
quote:
Originally posted by Domesticated
Besides, your assertion that mixing that way indicates a lack of love or passion for the music is ridiculous, and clearly a lame excuse to let you continue with being the guy who gets what's 'authentic'. Don't think anyone has forgotten that, like the rest of us, you too were a trancecracker not so many years ago.
I didn't assert that, and this isn't about trance or what music I like versus what music they like - plenty of dub techno and modern deep house djs also do the super smooth mixing.
quote:
Originally posted by Domesticated
Also, on this comment: "to me he's like a ron hardy, mixing with attitude versus aptitude." What delusion makes you believe people can't possess both?
They can.
But actually that was a stupid comment because I think Theo has aptitude of a different sort. And he certainly also can beatmix long and smooth as anyone, and there are plenty of recordings of that out there. I guess I liked the stupid wordplay too much..
nefardec
quote:
Originally posted by EddieZilker
I'm not entering the debate here, apart to pick the bones of a few facts/opinions, but this isn't a valid argument. If I were going to be trolling, defending the work of ********, DJRYANtm, Vincent, Wesley Oakes, or any other lack-lustre goomba to populate the overall thread count with unending noise pollution, this is something I would use to start.
You may not be wrong and maybe Parrish is an acquired taste (From what I've heard, I like him, but I haven't heard a lot) but I think you're going to have to dive in a little farther to demonstrate the method to his madness. I don't think blaming someone, who can't relate to Parrish's performance eccentricities, for being ignorant negates the validity of their claim. If you truly feel that way, the burden is on you to enlighten that person rather than casting out a conditional ad hominem which places your comprehension above theirs.
Not clueless about Theo, which comes down to taste ultimately, but clueless about the different ways to mix which are all equally valid and useful, doing different things for the music and audience. (sometimes lulling them to sleep :p)
quote:
Originally posted by srussell0018
You're right. He can mix. He just doesn't do it well.
Not he just doesn't always mix smoothly. It's quite like when a painter lets the brush strokes show, or spills paint on the canvas or leaves the canvas rough or naked. Or if a bronze sculptor doesnt buff out the artifacts of the casting process.
srussell0018
Back to the OP, the worst DJ I saw this year was Robbie Rivera by far. Trainwrecked to the point where the music actually stopped for a brief moment after his very first song he played, and then the next one just started from the beginning.
Maybe I just didn't get it though :toothless
EddieZilker
quote:
Originally posted by nefardec
Not clueless about Theo, which comes down to taste ultimately, but clueless about the different ways to mix which are all equally valid and useful, doing different things for the music and audience. (sometimes lulling them to sleep :p)
I understand what you're getting at - as far as techniques go - it's just that there's some things I don't think are going to be reconciled. Unless you were in the same room as SYSTEM-J, it's impossible to establish that what he heard was some form of esoteric blending from a 7/8 jazz meter into a 4/4 house that defied his tastes. From what I've been able to gather about him, he seems to want to defy the sorts of rules that dictate one shouldn't do that. EDIT: But he doesn't want to do it in an obtrusive way.
quote:
Originally posted by srussell0018
Back to the OP, the worst DJ I saw this year was Robbie Rivera by far. Trainwrecked to the point where the music actually stopped for a brief moment after his very first song he played, and then the next one just started from the beginning.
Maybe I just didn't get it though :toothless
I saw Ritchie Hawtin, one night, who's very first record was a massive train-wreck. KA-boom, KA-Boom, BoomKA, BOOOM KA, BOOOM KA! He would slam the fader down, make adjustments on the tables, and then bring it back in the PA mix to monitor. It took about three reveals before he felt the pocket, but it was an awesome affect. Great show, as well with no more wrecks.
nefardec
quote:
Originally posted by EddieZilker
I understand what you're getting at - as far as techniques go - it's just that there's some things I don't think are going to be reconciled. Unless you were in the same room as SYSTEM-J, it's impossible to establish that what he heard was some form of esoteric blending from a 7/8 jazz meter into a 4/4 house that defied his tastes. From what I've been able to gather about him, he seems to want to defy the sorts of rules that dictate one shouldn't do that. EDIT: But he doesn't want to do it in an obtrusive way.
Well the reviews seemed pretty typical responses to a Theo night to me. There are always the people who are like 'how DARE he defy our god and protector the Beatmix!'
And then there are people who are like 'oh this is awesome, let's get down'.
Here's some video of the set:
looks pretty ing awesome to me. Lots of people screaming and partying with his 'bad mixing'.
I would have enjoyed it but I do get the sense from the video that he's treading water and having difficulty playing what he wants to play for that crowd. It looks like people are a little uptight and packed like sardines and the slow funky stuff isn't clicking with them, so he tries to bring it up with one of his big room techno tracks. (which works)
Now if he were the worst DJ he would have just kept playing similar stuff.
Silly venue for the guy though - he's not suited to playing on stages away from a shoulder to shoulder concert crowd, but more the small rooms and open spaces for people to get down and dirty. I personally can't stand shows like that.
sg_57
I am trying to remember some really, really bad sets I saw. Problem is that in most cases, even if they were boring and trite, I always manage to find a redeeming quality somewhere.
One that sort of stands out as especially irritating was Audio Bullys a few years back.
There was just something that felt really wrong playing breakbeat mashups with Frank Sinatra and U2 on top and that sort of stuff. Just pandering for cheap thrills and it left me completely disgusted....especially because the crowd went for it. Vulgar?
But even that wasn't so terrible. Just not my cup of tea.
These days it's really hard for someone to be that abysmally bad, unless they are totally off their heads, or experience multiple technical malfunctions or all at the same time.
Zyklon_Jay
this thread is now about Ricardo Villalobos eating a burrito he stole from Zip.
EddieZilker
quote:
Originally posted by nefardec
Well the reviews seemed pretty typical responses to a Theo night to me. There are always the people who are like 'how DARE he defy our god and protector the Beatmix!'
And then there are people who are like 'oh this is awesome, let's get down'.
Here's some video of the set:
looks pretty ing awesome to me. Lots of people screaming and partying with his 'bad mixing'.
Silly venue for the guy though - he's not suited to playing on stages away from a shoulder to shoulder concert crowd, but more the small rooms and open spaces for people to get down and dirty. I personally can't stand shows like that.
The bass was double rolled-off in that video and the quality was bad, but I could at least hear it as decent - possibly being there, opposing the other YouTubes, which seemed to argue more against his mixing than for it. It sounds like he rushed out of the intro, a little, but, because of the sound-quality, that's a little difficult to discern.
nefardec
quote:
Originally posted by EddieZilker
The bass was double rolled-off in that video and the quality was bad, but I could at least hear it as decent - possibly being there, opposing the other YouTubes, which seemed to argue more against his mixing than for it. It sounds like he rushed out of the intro, a little, but, because of the sound-quality, that's a little difficult to discern.
Well he definitely rushed it, but you can tell he did it purposefully to energize the crowd, and you can tell that it worked pretty well. Those aren't two tracks that you'd want to layer in any fashion really. and it was beatmatched fine enough.
EddieZilker
quote:
Originally posted by nefardec
Well he definitely rushed it, but you can tell he did it purposefully to energize the crowd, and you can tell that it worked pretty well. Those aren't two tracks that you'd want to layer in any fashion really. and it was beatmatched fine enough.
Yeah. He did get a little pop and he could have been leaving the James Brown loop in the mix to build up tension. That's the reason I would have left it in there, anyway. Again, not being there, I can't make any kind of sober judgement, but he kind of worked himself into a corner that could have been interesting given a different incoming track choice.
nefardec
Speaking of 'bad mixing' - another technique that only people like Theo and Francois K do these days that I love is when they build up and build up the set and whip the crowd into a crazy frenzy, and just when the music can't get any more intense, they will drop a slow jam to bring it all down to the bottom.
In my experience everyone then just sways in the afterglow and cheers, maybe buys another drink and talks to the people around that they just met dancing, and then the DJ will bring it up all over again, over and over all night long. And no one gets tired, it's always exciting, the dancers get a break and so does the DJ. This is the way DJs like Larry Levan and Walter Gibbons would do it, Nicky Siano, David Mancuso, all of the originals. They had the crowd at their fingertips.
They also introduce pauses into the sets- this is from Larry Levan
quote:
When I first heard you play, I noticed you would sometimes leave spaces in between songs or create introductions for them
"That's from Nicky Siano. He believed in sets. Out of all the records you have, maybe five or six of them make sense together. There is actually a message in the dance. the way you feel, the muscles you use, but only certain records have that. Say I was playing songs about music - 'I Love Music' by The O'Jays, 'Music' by Al Hudson and the next record is 'Weekend'. That's about getting laid, a whole other thing. if I was dancing and truly into the words and the feeling and it came on it might be a good record but it makes no sense because it doesn't have anything to do with others. So, a slight pause, a sound effect, something else to let you know it's a new paragraph rather than one continuous sentence.
quote:
"When I listen to DJs today they don't mean anything to me. Technically some of them are excellent - emotionally they can't do anything for me. I used to watch people cry in The Loft for a slow song because it was so pretty." - Larry Levan
Putting a roomful of people in the moment. Amazing them, surprising them, challenging, even confusing them; pushing, electrifying, loving them; carrying them with you towards a better place. Shaking the dull daylight out of their bones, waking them into their other life. Few people know what great DJing is really about. Those who don’t dance think of wacky radio presenters and gabby wedding spinners; they have a real problem seeing how playing records could be a performance.
But, ironically, most of today’s young clubbers can be just as clueless when it comes to separating a good DJ from a bad one. UK club culture, with its rootless brand-name jocks and their two-hour guest sets, has bred dancers with a painfully short attention span. Our dancefloors might throw their hands in the air for a clever technical mix, a swift key change or a bombastic snare roll, but they’re largely immune to anything that takes a bit longer to achieve – like pacing, building, teasing, exploring. Sadly, these days most of us just want to pay our money and get an immediate dance fix. We’re happy to be switched on by manipulative drug-pop and thrashed around at fever pitch all night. It’s rare today to find a DJ brave enough to take a crowd down as well as up. Or to reflect emotions more complex than mad-for-it ecstasy, or to play music outside the narrow focus of their niche. Or to throw a risky curveball or two and ‘cleanse’ the dancefloor for a fresh start. When you find a DJ willing to do more than stitch together a bunch of surefire floorfillers, shake his hand.
quote:
You may well be surprised to hear a few sketchy mixes, but surprise turns to excitement when you see the bigger picture –the connections he makes with the meanings and feelings of songs, the way he teases just the right moments from each record. The variety of styles and tempos. Levan’s greatness is proof that technical prowess is but a tiny part of DJing. Technically speaking, he was no match for the likes of Walter Gibbons or Nicky Siano or, indeed, most of the early disco-mixers. His mixing was slapdash, and he’d often prefer to slam something in awkwardly rather than seamlessly blend. What made him great was his sense of drama, his obsessive control of all aspects of his clubbers’ experience, and his heightened ability to transmit his personality through the very grooves of his records.
‘He yearned for more than technical perfection,’ writes Cheren. ‘ He wanted inspiration. Ecstasy. He wanted to spin the way he lived – in inspired anarchy.’
‘Larry himself was a wizard when it came to DJing,’ says Joe Claussell. ‘But I don’t think many DJs today understand his philosophy. Everyone is still with the pretty mixes, making sure that it’s all on-beat but they don’t have a clue what it takes to present their music to a crowd.’
quote:
On occasion, Levan’s attention to detail would even mean a pause in the music. ‘I’ve seen nights where everyone was rushing around to get things open and they’d forget something like cleaning the mirror-balls,’ recalls DePino. ‘It’d be 1am and Larry would run onto the dancefloor with a ladder to clean all six mirror-balls. The record would run out and everyone would be standing there waiting. Not booing, nothing mad… just waiting. And when he finished, he’d go up and put the next record on and people would go mad again. They loved that. The fact that even though he was the DJ, he’d spend half an hour cleaning all the mirror-balls. That would never happen today, DJs are such divas!’
quote:
Each week was a lesson in improvisation, an unscripted performance on the emotional level of high opera. What would be served up on a particular night depended on any number of variants, with only one thing certain: Levan gave good show. He could shock you. He could thrill you. He could amaze you. He could even appall you. The only certainty was that he would surprise you. He was an audacious programmer. His high-octane, seat-of-the-pants DJ style was the aural equivalent of a highwire walk across Niagara Falls.
Rarely has a DJ’s mood been broadcast quite so powerfully to a dancefloor. By the records he played and the order he played them in, you could tell whether he was feeling good or bad, whether he’d just had an argument, whether he was tired or whether he was ready to party.
Theo Parrish is one of the last in this line of practitioners of this art form. It's quite sad what DJing has turned into for so many people.
EddieZilker
Oh, the writing on music, you cited, brings me back to the first time the whole "rave" thing clicked with me. I was stone sober but just kept hearing these amazing transitions where the DJ would have one record playing and then bring in another record on a four+ speaker system surrounding the floor that would be just a synth arpeggio. He had some device to control panning on all of the speakers, so the synth line would swirl all around until more elements started coming in, and then the second record signal would come in and center to take over.
It's stuff like that, the stuff no one is thinking to do, that should be done, but it's ultra risky and one of the reasons formula is more likely to prevail. It seems like the music has returned to its 1992 state of decay, if merely judging by the Black-Eyed Peas appearance at the Super-Bowl, and now, as Parrish would put it, comodified.
