There is one reason and one reason alone that we should love a DJ, and it’s because of the music he or she plays! Most electronic music has always been fairly exclusive and the era of Dubplate culture is still amongst us. The Dubplate culture refers to producers and record labels releasing an acetate record versus a full vinyl release. The acetate disk is almost a beta of the final version and is limited to certain amount of plays. These copies of the track are very limited and given to a select few. Although records are not commonly used today by DJs a dubplate also refers to a unreleased track that is held by only a select few DJs.
Ultimately what has happened is that big producers make a tune but don’t release it right away and give to a small group of DJs they chose to play the record. This builds hype for the track and good indicator of how much of the vinyl release should be pressed.
A lot of people have different views on this dubplate culture. On one side you have the people who love this because it makes the song more memorable when you hear a certain DJ drop one of your favorite track and then there’s the argument that music should be freely available. No matter what stance your take on this is it does give a certain aura about tracks and DJs. I can’t tell you countless nights where I’ll be out raving and an exclusive dubplate gets dropped and the place goes WILD because everyone knows it’s an unreleased tune.
This gives DJs power yet almost creates an elitism some say when it comes to music. At the same time some DJs make a living out of playing out and certain dubplates they have are the reason they get booked all over. This is predominate with DJs who play Drum & Bass and Dubstep today.
Now all the hype for this dubplate has gotten has faded once everyone gets their hands on it. This results in certain tracks being played out. It becomes a bit discouraging also as a follower of music and knowing you can’t purchase one of your favorite tunes at the moment especially when you know it won’t be out for months since you first heard it. The flipside is you will search and search for a specific song and have no luck but when you do get a hold of it; it’s this unexplainable feeling to finally have in your possession.
Today in a digital world you don’t see much of acetate records being made because of cost but you will see white label and promo copies floating around on very limited pressings before an official release. CDJs and Serato are so popular now that it has become about who you know and if you’re on that secret mailing list for certain producers.
All things considered now chose wisely on what parties and DJs you go check out this year at WMC. There are some tracks that I’ll never forget hearing last year at WMC events solely because it was something so rare to hear at the time on a big system. One that stands out to me right away was hearing Joker & Ginz’s Purple City dropped by Plastician at London Bass at Black Sheep months before that tune got an official release.
Hate it or love dubplates create a special moment for us all when we hear music played live. It’s what can make a lasting memory of the night hearing a certain song with hundreds of people around us loosing control to what is to be one of the hottest songs of the year.
I’ve only been doing this DJ thing since mid 2009. The first purchase I made was a Numark NS7. I believe it’s one of the best controllers out there. After the NS7 I finally made the plunge and picked up turntables. As of late November I’m a proud owner of the Akai APC40.
The APC stands for Abelton Performance Control. Ultimately what it means is that it’s mainly designed to be used with Ableton Live. It is layout so you can go out and use Albeton for live acts flawlessly.
I’m not going to lie; I’m no pro at DJing and mixing. Right now I’m pretty terrible at beat matching. Yet after really understanding what a standard DJ does I’m ok with not being the best at it or remotely good at it. The APC40 takes care of all that and yet introduces a new challenge, programming. Whereas a standard DJ with CDJs or Decks is limited in playing a track and slight control on a mixer the truth is all they are doing is popping in a CD or record and matching the beat and moving to the next track. Yes they do mess with the EQs but nothing too crazy. The APC gives you endless possibilities when using Ableton. The amount of things you can do is mind blowing.
I wanted to write an actual post. The past couple of months have been life changing. Mid 2009 I decided that I was going to follow one of my dreams of learning how to DJ. The past 2-3years of my life I spent too much time listening and finding music (dubstep) that it really took most of my energy. It even affected me at home because I was so obsessed. 2009 was a new beginning for me and things had to be rebuilt. I had so much emptiness that I needed to fill.
The thrill of finding new tracks and ordering the latest dub on record took on a whole new purpose. The music was all that could fill the void. All this energy transformed me into a whole new person. I would go out almost every night to catch every DJ set I could from locals and international DJs who spun dubstep.
It had been years since I had begun to party like this. Eventually I began to see familiar faces every night I went out. Facebook and MySpace are quite powerful tools and eventually started networking quite a bit. Kept my distance but would have a conversation here and there.
It really dawned upon me that all these years of following the music I was one of the few. It became apparent to me that the scene was now at its prime and getting ready to explode. The time was right and I had already invested so much time into the music that it only made sense to begin DJing.
We all know that Technic 1200s and Pioneer CDJ-1000s are the standard in most clubs today.
Pioneer announced today their new CDJ-2000 & CDJ-900! They’ve upped their ante and put some serious work into these new CDJs.
The first thing you’ll notice is on their new flagship CDJ-2000 is an enormous 6.1″ full color screen @ 480×234!
The main features that stand out to me about the screen are the addition of the showing of the wave data, needle dropping, and advanced info shown about track including album art.
One feature that is available on both now is Pro DJ Link. You now have the ability to connect up to four CDJ-2000/900s to each other and use one source of music. Another big addition to the new line is HID controls which allows the CDJs to connect naively to software like Scrach Live, Traktor and Cross2 without time-coded discs.
One of the last features I want to talk about is Beatgrid. This is ultimately Quantizing for DJs. It will now make sure your cue points are set exactly where you’d want them for you automatically and on beat.
There are many other features added to both of the new CDJs but these are the ones I find worth mentioning.
Now my only complaint I find about these beautiful additions… The price.
CDJ-2000: $2,150
CDJ-900: $1,600
Remember the CDJ-900 does not sport the new LCD screen.
Afro Monk
March 9th by Afro Monk 
Tags: CDJs, dubplate, Joker, Plastician, Purple City, Serato, Vinyl, what is a dubplate
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