I was off today and spent the majority of the day at home. Since I'm flat broke, I decided to play around with some music mixing. Let me preface all of this by saying the majority of my spare time at the computer is spent downloading music, reorganizing and updating my iTunes, and making sure I have the appropriate cover art for most of the music tracks. Yes, my life is THAT exciting / sad -- take your pick. Needless to say, in recent months I've started channeling my so-called 'obsession' into something more meaningful. In my teen years when I actually did have the proverbial 2 turntables, a microphone, and a mixer I could never master the art of dj mixing with any decent results. I just kept buying the records and pretended that I did! It's 20+ years later and I've attempted to go 'back to my roots' so to speak. The whole idea of the digital dj is a lot more palpable for me now. MIXMEISTER has proven to be a great tool for me to achieve some of these long lost goals. Armed with a few great tips from fellow blogger Enda over at Daddy or Chips?, I've gone headstrong into trying to make the idea of me making my own mixsets for others to enjoy a reality.
Right before I moved to LA, I was all about going out and dancing and just carrying on with my friends. If ever there was a 'dj whore' or 'booth bitch' -- you could definitely count me in as one as well. Nowadays, I don't go out to the clubs that much anymore. It would only be during my visits back home to DC that I'd rekindle those all-nighters once again. My real heydays as a club kid were post-college in the early-mid 90's. House music was (and still is) king for me. Couple that with just being a dance music geek with my crates of 80's new wave records, I have an incredible wealth of pop music knowledge. Whenever I go out, I am constantly trainspotting obscure 80's and 90's music samples in today's club music. I can even go as far to tell you the original year of release, artist info, original record label, and sometimes video information on demand in some cases. It scares people sometimes so I have learned to tone it down a tad bit. LOL. In any case, the many genres of house music constantly fill my head so this whole progression of starting to dj mix again has become a lot easier for me these days. The mixing program has taken a lot of the technical parts out of the equation for me and it has allowed me to concentrate more on the end result ... the MIX! Mind you, there is definitely more to it than just piecing tracks together at the push of a button or two. Also, just after a couple of months at this, I'm far from being REALLY good at it let alone be able to play live by any means. I have definitely progressed from what I consider my 'first' mixes to what I have posted above though. I also think I've grown into a particular style as well. With the impending close of 2008, I'm definitely going to keep up with my newfound (old) hobby. I think 2009 will definitely see me back out and about again!
2 comments:
How cool. So glad I was of some assistance.
I'm glad that someone else sees the fun and value of making these mixes. It's great to actually learn how to do something new like this (and then have people all over the world dance to it!).
You certainly have developed your own style too, which is super. I've just done a new one (uploading later) which I'm pretty happy with now that I've stopped trying to please anyone other than myself! I try not to forget that making these things are mainly fun for me and a way to be in some way creative. If other people like them, it's really just a bonus.
Keep it up!
thanks enda! you really did give me a big kickstart in attempting this once again. so far, i haven't really gotten much feedback on my mixes. if i actually start 'advertising' them on my blog, the links and posts seem to get deleted. ugh. it's all good anyway. as you said, i'm doing this for me ... if people actually like it ... then BETTER!
hope your holidays are going well! :-)
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