DJ mixtape cue burn
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The imperfection of perfection and why I miss cue burn

DJ mixtape cue burn

Technology — it’s empowering and forgiving all at the same time. It allows us to do the most amazing things, to create the previously uncreatable, and to do it without eating significantly into our lives or bank balances. Our creations never looked and sounded so good thanks to the arsenal of hardware and software tools at our disposal.

While we used to hope for excellence, perfection is now more or less a given. We have little excuse for not dotting the Is and crossing the Ts in everything we do. We no longer have to worry about nailing 30-45 minutes of exquisite blends with velvety EQs and just the right amount of filter in one complete take — now we can just bung it all into Live, Logic, or Protools and fix the formerly unfixable. We can layer a mix over a period of months and years if we choose, rather than fill the side of a cassette in one go. We effectively apply the turd polisher VST, and out the other end comes yet another slice of aural awesomeness, free from double beats, key clashes, and cue burn. There are no takes, just assembly.

But here’s the thing — I’m beginning to miss the rawness and the sound of a path well-trodden many times over to deliver that amazing one shot mix. I miss the sneaky correction of slightly off beats, and a hastily thrown in spin back to mask that vocal that arrived a few bars too soon. Damn it — I miss cue burn. It’s the sound of dedication.

It may seem odd to say this, but as a listener I want to hear the flaws, the little mistakes, and frankly some of the outright screwups that used to be reasonably commonplace in a live DJ performance. Where is the sound of a perfectionist practicing a set many times over and burning that cue? What has happened to the human element that clearly showed that a mix was performed warts and all?

DJing is about performing live to a crowd, and it used to be that I’d listen to a mix and hear the live DJ. Instead, I imagine a DJ sitting in front of a DAW rather than stood in front of decks. Everything is there — the brilliant music selection with spot-on blends with just the right amount of effects, but for a lot of mixes it feels like the actual DJ is missing. The quest for perfection has left an imperfect DJ shaped hole.

As an example of what I’m talking about — I love Jeff Mills’ Liquid Rooms live sets. They’re raw and flawed, but incredibly powerful because I can hear Jeff’s human touch in the mix. But I wonder if I would like it so much if I knew it had been carefully composed sans screw-ups in Logic?

THE BIGGER PICTURE

No matter how much old or new tech is in front of us, the human element is essential. Not just for the obvious selection and technical skills, but also to humanise a performance. So the next time you’re tempted to put out that polished-to-perfection mix that took months to create, try and do exactly the same thing in one take in front of a camera, i.e. perform and not produce. I promise that we’ll be considerably more impressed, and you’ll feel a rush of accomplishment too. Why do you think the Boiler Room is so successful?

A PARTING THOUGHT

I write this from the perspective of a DJ who made and sold one-take mixtapes back in the day. But at the end of all this, I have to wonder if the non-DJ listeners i.e. the target audience for these mixes really cares as much for the craft as we do. Don’t they just want a perfect mixtape for their trip to the office or treadmill session at the gym?

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Mark Settle
The Old Owner
I was the editor around these parts for the first two decades of the DJWORX journey. I’m on a creative journey at The Worxlab, and drop in occasionally here. Expect the odd article from me every now and again.
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40 Comments

  1. A mixtape is like building a house out of a deck of cards. Its difficult and involves risk.
    Using mixtape tools is more like Lego’s. Easy and safe. But everybody can build the same set with the same pieces. It’s different with a house of cards. A good mixtape deserves respect and the Lego set is cheating, if you call it a mixtape that is.

  5. Do people really make their mixes in a DAW that often? I played around with doing so once or twice, but the mistakes and in-the-moment inspirations of recording a mix in DJing software is just so much more rewarding to me, and lacks that weird feeling of dishonesty that comes over me when I consider putting up a “mix” I might make in Ableton.

    1. I think more people (DJs) would if it was easier to do. Ableton/Serato were going in the right direction with The Bridge. If you had the right hardware, the software (Live) recorded not only the audio but every movement of EQ, faders etc. which could all be tweaked later.

      It was all too restricted though, in terms of needing the full versions of both Live and Scratch Live, Rane audio and a tiny choice of controllers.

      Doing it all manually in Live is very time consuming and alien to the “DJ way” of working. It’s production rather than DJing.

      It’s a shame that Atomix decided to kill off their Time Line feature in VDJ 8 as that looked like a good option for this type of thing.

  6. One take…. lol…. I can’t count the amount of times I’ve messed up mid mix, like 30 mins in on a hour long mix and had to start all over. When I first started DJing it would take me a whole day to finally finish a mix as perfect as possible.

  7. most mixtapes don’t include much mixing skills, just some tracks that are supposedly “blazin” hot” at the moment with some DJ screaming in the intro and outro.

    Now Spinbad and some others of course actually put mixing and cutting work into it like a DJ supposed to but your average mixtape is just a promotional collection of new rap tunes (puke puke) put on a CDR.

    A lot of DJs have been complaining about why it’s even called a mixtape.

    1. Why’s it called a mixtape? Because back in the day (before CDRs, before rap tunes) DJs used to record mixes onto cassette tapes. Maybe you’re not old enough to remember, but I certainly do – and I definitely did mix.

  8. When I used to record mixes to (cassette) tape, if you needed to redo a part of it, then you’d do a “pause button edit” and try to get a join that wasn’t too obvious.

    Once I started to hear the sort of stuff Alan Coulthard / DMC were doing, I got myself a 1/4″ tape machine and edited with a razor blade. :-)

    1. i done a lot of mixes for national radio shows also on casette, actually overdubbing 2 cassette players, later i used DAT but the imperfection of cassette had its charm, metal tapes sounded pretty good

    2. I remember using the “record pause”. It allowed you to punch in without hearing any pop or click. That’s how I made my first mixes, before I got turntables. I would listen to the radio on Sundays (old school Sundays on Q106FM San Diego)
      And hold record pause until the next song’s verse came in.

  9. One thing I like about the technology today is, you can just hit record when you’re spinning a party or set. I use the kontrol z2 and I usually hit record. Mainly to review my work and to release some of the mixes. I remember back when I used to record to cassette, then to minidisc. For some reason, when we had the capability to make CD’s, I didn’t record too much of my mixes. That’s when I got into producing and making albums. #memories

  10. I think a lot of my perspective comes from the world I run in, which I’ll own, but I’ve listened to TONS of mixes that have errors. I’ve listened to DJs that have mistakes. I think that most DJs use fewer tools than we give them credit for, but the bare minimum is just easier to reach. We don’t deal with physical media breaking or wearing down anymore.

    And a lot of mixes are, let’s be honest, boring. They don’t get less boring with mistakes, they get less boring when better DJs make them. I don’t think that adding a “human” element of mistakes will make them better. I think adding a “human” element of understanding how music makes people feel will. A good mix is a good mix, whether it’s made in Ableton or Traktor or with two tape decks. I think the polish has a lot more to do with the music that gets used and the way it is mixed (technique wise, not tools wise) than anything else.

    I also don’t think the target audience for mixes are non-DJs. I think mixes are primarily used as a promotional tool to get gigs, and hence there’s a perception they need to be near perfect. At least, that’s how I’ve seen them used. That brings up a whole other can of worms, though, regarding what the purpose of the DJ is.

    1. Your last paragraph really nailed it. Mixes have been the way DJ’s get gigs. Most (non DJ) people that I know enjoy a mix once and a while but listen to singles most the time. A 60 minute mix is daunting to listen to as a casual listener/club goer; a commitment unless you are specifically enjoying that mixing DJ’s sound.
      Regardless, I personally love making one shot mixes still. I rarely make post fixes and leave all the human in. I don’t care if I am judged on that human element when it comes down to a gig. It really declares that “I am a human doing a mix” not so much a mindless drone on a Sync binge, and if the promoter recognizes that, YAY!
      Also yes, a good mix is a good mix regardless of where/what gear made it.

      1. I generally do “human” mixes, but if it’s something REALLY stupid I’ll fix it in post. Like hitting pause on the wrong deck or something, which still happens once in a blue moon. Beyond that, outside of some normalization and MAYBE mix-wide EQ I do the same thing.

  11. I would say that most decent DJ turntablist mixtapes on the likes of Mixcloud and Mixcrate that I listen to are recorded live. It’s pretty easy of pick up on mixes that are put together on a computer, they are flawless, as well as soulless. I can understand your standard, generic, dancemix CD’s being produced in a DAW as they are about maximum profit for minimum effort but personally speaking, mixtapes are about time, creative effort and the satisfaction of having expended many an hour planning and recording your latest work. Listening back to my mixes from 5 years ago I can still remember the mistakes made before they play out of the speakers!

    1. So if you execute your practiced mix perfectly, it’s soulless. Got it. Are you sure you really want to go with the difference between a soulless mix being wether you “did it live” or “put it together on a computer”?

      Most people making mixtapes are using music that was sequenced. Why? Music that was played live would be better, with regards to your opinion. Imagine if ALL of the music you wanted to play/mix had beats that slightly changed over time so you had to constantly correct for slight changes in the music? That happens occasionally when trying to mix old music and people complain about it nearly every time or pat themselves on the back for being able to mix tracks that are notoriously hard to mix.

      People don’t complain when they can just match up the beats and let them go and assume the beat is going to stay steady. They don’t complain that it’s soulless.

      This really sounds more like an argument for liking “how it used to be”, like people that don’t like “sync”. Can’t count the number of times I’ve seen people say that “sync” takes the soul out of DJing.

  12. Great article!!! I have been DJing professionally since 1998 and I embraced the laptop & Traktor in 2011. I can honestly say that I make more mistakes today than I ever did on 1200s or CDJs and that’s because the only real fear I had back in the day was a trainwrecked mix and even then a quick swipe in the opposite direction and we were back on track. These days I have to worry about Cue point juggling, complicated FX chains and key adjustments to name just a few… For all the Traktor users out there, if you want to get that human feel back into your sets try replacing the beatsync function with temposync, this will automatically match the tracks tempo but you will still need to bend the track into place also allows you to adjust where your track sits in the mix so it doesn’t all sound overly quantized.

  17. I whole heartedly agree with this. I’ve gone from using 1210’s to Tracktor and a controller for a few years, now I’m using CDJ’s as its a perfect marriage of technology and raw mixing technique, they are my happy place.

    The joy of doing one-shot mixes, thinking there are sections that weren’t up to scratch but sound great on the first listen back. Can’t beat that.

    1. I use a ns7 3 for the same reason. I went from vinyl to controller but I missed manipulating vinyl the jogs felt a bit alien to me having never used cdj’s. I’m not a scratch DJ I play house and techno so some might argue I’ve wasted my money but to me it was well spent. I just get more pleasure from touch the platters

  18. I like live, one-take mixes because that’s how I learned but don’t sleep on produced mixes. Some of the best stuff was multi-tracked. DJ Signify, 1200 Hobos (Mr. Dibbs, AM, etc.) Marcus B, DJ Q-Bert’s Demolition Pumpkin Squeeze, Babu Comprehension, etc. They have live elements but were most definitely only doable by multi-tracking. If you’re going to multi-track though, I think you have to step up your game. The product should not be possible to do live.

    2. Right on, “impossible” mixes are one thing, creativity and originality make a huge diff in the final product. I listen and listen to 2ManyDJs series and always get amazed at the result. Those guys rule!

    3. Right on, “impossible” mixes are one thing, creativity and originality make a huge diff in the final product. I listen and listen to 2ManyDJs series and always get amazed at the result. Those guys rule!

    4. Right on, “impossible” mixes are one thing, creativity and originality make a huge diff in the final product. I listen and listen to 2ManyDJs series and always get amazed at the result. Those guys rule!

  19. Gen-pop are usually ignorant, and would rather hear sterile perfection than organic imperfection. That said, this very idea is what drove us to nail every mix with both technical and musical perfection, either live or recording. Every mistake was like nails on a chalkboard for us, and was the source of somewhat good-natured ridicule among crew mates. If you bomb a mix, you will hear about it ad nauseum for the rest of the week until the next guy screws up. But this is what kept us hot. Iron sharpens iron. I’m not seeing as much of that today, probably because of the tools you mentioned. Too many exits, not enough trial by fire.

  22. The produced mixes actually leads to confusion if you want to use it as a DJ demo. I have a classic hip hop and R&B mix I did from 2002 that I’ve given to promoters and they don’t believe it was me and don’t think I can do that live. Quick mix I did – like 25 minutes but with something like 18 records used. I think It took me 2 takes because my levels were off the first time, but it was all live.