Any DJs learned how to mix without hardware/controllers? -.-

[Genevieve]

I'm strapped for cash right now and still saving up for a VCI-100. So currently, I'm practicing with my mouse/keyboard and the free Mixxx software (and before anyone says, I've actually turned beat/bpm detection off).

It's a pain in the ass but I got kinda close beatmatching some dnb tunes. I find sparse drumfunk to be pretty easy to mix (without all the crazy jazz drumsolo'esque shenanigans). Trying to beatmatch gabber or harder edged dnb was an absolute chore, though.

I've gotten to beatmatch a number of tunes before, on CDJ1000s of the venue I 'work' at (hosting a breakcore party) and that seemed A LOT easier to work with than software. But has anyone had any success practicing beatmatching with software without controllers or hardware?

And what's the best music to start mixing? Fast four to the floors, or more 120 bpm type stuff?

I wanna know if I'm wasting my time or not.

And let's keep 'vinyl vs digital' out of this, please. It's not gonna help me.

[Sheff]

might not really help but...
as strange as this sounds, before i got my decks i used to open up fruity loops, make a 16 bar drum loop and keep your finger on the drag BPM counter thing and have a song playing in itunes in the background
then beatmatch from there. obviously wont help you get used to mixing with the EQ's or faders or anything but i think it really helped me to listen to when the beat was drifting out and really helped me get used to fine tuning with the pitch.

but yeah trying to mix is always 100 times hardware with software without a controller than it is on a set of decks or CDJs

[Genevieve]

Yeah, mixing with with EQs and faders is my last concern right now, I just wanna at least get into beatmatching right now. I don't really care for song structures either, I just wanna beatmatch those badboys. I'm slowly getting results mixing 160 bpm industrial hardcore. Correcting is a bitch, though!

How easy is dubstep for getting started with beatmatching?

[DJ Crackle]

How easy is dubstep for getting started with beatmatching?

I learned with electro and house. It's easy to hear a THUMP THUMP THUMP. lol. The drum patterns of dubstep made it hard for me to beatmatch. Now that I've been DJing for a couple of years, dubstep is my bread and butter, couldn't be easier to mix, and my house mixing never seems tight enough. So idk.

[Genevieve]

How easy is dubstep for getting started with beatmatching?

I learned with electro and house. It's easy to hear a THUMP THUMP THUMP. lol. The drum patterns of dubstep made it hard for me to beatmatch. Now that I've been DJing for a couple of years, dubstep is my bread and butter, couldn't be easier to mix, and my house mixing never seems tight enough. So idk.

Yeah, I imagined straight four-to-the-floors being the easiest to mix innitially. So far kinda 'minimal' industrial hardcore has been working for me.

So no consensus, just feel? I suppose I'll stick to 160 - 180 bpm four-to-the-floors unless someone has a better suggestion.

[DJ Crackle]

Suggestion is to take a genre you're comfortable with and plan to spend lots of time playing, and start with that. You'll feel a lot more comfortable if you start with a routine genre. Plus, every genre has its own structure, for the most part. As long as you pick what you think your primary genre is gonna be (at least for the first few months) and stick with it, you'll be straight.
But yes I agree, 4 to the floor will probably the easiest.

[Genevieve]

Cool thanks!

Beatmatching's slowly getting easier and easier. Can't wait to actually have gear.

[DJ Crackle]

Yeah, beatmatching is just gonna be practice practice practice, but it's really fun to consistently improve, and be able to tell you're consistently improving. And it's SOOO much fun with hardware in front of you

How you liking Mixxx btw? Just curious. I think when I finally hook up to a DVS it's gonna Traktor Scratch... but still. Infinitely interested in any DJ program, I think it's fun to touch on em all

[Genevieve]

In my non-expert opinion, it's reaally easy and intuitive. Even for non-hardware users.

Not many features, though. Not even filters. o.o

[honey-d]

I didn't learn to beat match till I got CDJs, BUT I can say that I started with dubstep and I didn't find it any harder than 4x4 house or anything. Obviously you don't want music that's ridiculously fast but other than that pretty much all 4/4 music is the same to mix. If you're relying on the thump thump of a house song to tell you where the beats are then you need to get better at rhythm, think of a metronome going off in your head counting the beats if it's not 4x4 cause a loooot of music isn't.

- On a side note I hope anyone who reads this knows the difference between 4/4 time signature and 4 to the floor (4x4) music... otherwise that could be a little confusing

[Genevieve]

I didn't learn to beat match till I got CDJs, BUT I can say that I started with dubstep and I didn't find it any harder than 4x4 house or anything. Obviously you don't want music that's ridiculously fast but other than that pretty much all 4/4 music is the same to mix. If you're relying on the thump thump of a house song to tell you where the beats are then you need to get better at rhythm, think of a metronome going off in your head counting the beats if it's not 4x4 cause a loooot of music isn't.

- On a side note I hope anyone who reads this knows the difference between 4/4 time signature and 4 to the floor (4x4) music... otherwise that could be a little confusing

Haha, the first tune I ever successfully beatmatched into another was the part that starts at 2:35 here into some jump-uppy dancefloor dnb tune. So I'm definitely not rhythmically challenged (though admittedly, it's easy to catch the snares on the 2 and 4 in this one).

But seeing as I host a breakcore party, it's probably wisest for me to stick to hardcore four-to-the-floors for the time being, anyway.

I'm wondering if I'll ever get to the point where I can beatmatch jungle without a snare on the 2 and 4, though.

[DJ Crackle]

I didn't learn to beat match till I got CDJs, BUT I can say that I started with dubstep and I didn't find it any harder than 4x4 house or anything. Obviously you don't want music that's ridiculously fast but other than that pretty much all 4/4 music is the same to mix. If you're relying on the thump thump of a house song to tell you where the beats are then you need to get better at rhythm, think of a metronome going off in your head counting the beats if it's not 4x4 cause a loooot of music isn't.

- On a side note I hope anyone who reads this knows the difference between 4/4 time signature and 4 to the floor (4x4) music... otherwise that could be a little confusing

Haha, the first tune I ever successfully beatmatched into another was the part that starts at 2:35 here into some jump-uppy dancefloor dnb tune. So I'm definitely not rhythmically challenged (though admittedly, it's easy to catch the snares on the 2 and 4 in this one).

But seeing as I host a breakcore party, it's probably wisest for me to stick to hardcore four-to-the-floors for the time being, anyway.

I'm wondering if I'll ever get to the point where I can beatmatch jungle without a snare on the 2 and 4, though.

Yes. It's not like you're ever gonna be HURRDURRICAN'THEARTHEBEAT, the issue at the beginning for me was just that it's hard to pinpoint which track needs to do what when you've both got 'em going in your ear. but once you're comfortable with hearing two things at once and matching them, it really doesn't matter what you're matching.

[_boring]

i learned to mix on my laptop with traktor 3.4 and also just by playin out on cdjs. just av at it!

[Sheff]

just a heads up though mate, when you get your first set of decks expect it to be extremely frustrating at first.
but after a while, took me about 9 months(maybe longer) to get fully comfortable with mixing any 2 tunes.
after that point you'll look bad and laugh and wonder how the fuck you couldnt do it before, it will really come like second nature.

not saying i dont drop a few clangers sometimes but it only takes like half a second to get it back

[Basic A]

I learned to DJ first by opening two instances of windows media player and fiddling with the plays/volumes/speeds, then upgraded to Mixx, then on up to 2 walkman cd players and some dimmer switches, then on up to a numark cdmix2, and now Im quite comfy with my denon's, this gem mixer has to go though.

Anyone that says you need gear to learn the theory is fuckin thick to be blunt, the concept of djing is universal, two play buttons and some volume controls is all it is at the heart, from there its luxuries and brand loyalties.

Learn the philosophy on anything you have access too, then worry about the kit.

Also, the best music to start mixing on is whatever you enjoy playing. The only advice I can offer here is that slower tunes like house/downtempo are going to be more noticeably off when they are, and that breakbeat/2step descendant genres are going to present the challenge of conflicting shuffles, ect, which comes down to earing them out for what will work, riding eqs, or just keepin your gameface on.

[Genevieve]

I seem to be having more problems with 120 bpm house than 170 bpm hardcore! So that's what I'm sticking to for now. I think I'll get more into 2-step rhythms once I'm comfortable enough with four to the floors. But that's way ahead in the future.

Yes. It's not like you're ever gonna be HURRDURRICAN'THEARTHEBEAT

Haha, you have no idea how much this alone has motivated me to keep it at.

[Lethal_Dose]

WTF do you think we did before all this bullshit was out

BUY some nice direct drive decks preferably tech12s and a nice fucking mixer and a dozen or so crazy ass vinyl and go to town. Learn to mix tight as a virgin on prom night then start getting gigs. Don't make some huge deal out of it.

[Genevieve]

WTF do you think we did before all this bullshit was out

I don't care what you did before all that 'bullshit was out'. I care about what I do while 'this bullshit is out'.

BUY some nice direct drive decks preferably tech12s and a nice fucking mixer and a dozen or so crazy ass vinyl and go to town. Learn to mix tight as a virgin on prom night then start getting gigs. Don't make some huge deal out of it.

Let's remember:

And let's keep 'vinyl vs digital' out of this, please. It's not gonna help me.

This thread isn't about your agenda. If you want to talk about how much I suck for wanting to start with digital with no to minimal funds, go ahead. By all means, start a thread. I don't care. Just keep it out of this one.

[Electric_Head]

I learnt to mix with 2 side by side tape decks.
Now that`s an effing chore.
You need to know your tunes and keep the tempos similar.
Know the breaks

Why Start at 160?

Try 145 to 150, it`s far easier.

[Genevieve]

I learnt to mix with 2 side by side tape decks.
Now that`s an effing chore.
You need to know your tunes and keep the tempos similar.
Know the breaks

Why Start at 160?

Try 145 to 150, it`s far easier.

I found 160 - 170 easiest, but I'm starting to think it's because I don't hear them go out of time as easily. So now I've just started practicing around 120. Lotsa Moodymann and Theo Parrish. I find it much harder and I'm not making any improvements, hah.

I'm not really practicing song structure now as much as just getting the beats lined-up, though.

I was tryna go by this tutorial, beat matching without "touching the platter". Just oscillating with the pitch, but I don't see how I can correct that way..., it goes more out of time when I do it that way. But he seems to get it to work, heh.