I thought about how to write a big summary of the year, but then realised I wouldn’t read someone else’s blog about “what a great year its been” and other such sentimental bullshit, so why should you.

Instead I will list ten or so tracks (in no particular order) that have really made a big difference this year, and my thanks go out to the people that made them.

Ben Sun / Salty Tears

Salty Tears – Ben Sun by Ben Sun

Quite simply the most beautiful, well produced track I heard all year. Its probably about as deep as I get…no idea if its disco or house or whatever it is, its just superb.

Andy Ash / Hip Joint

Andy Ash – Hip Joint by Andy Ash
I played (and still play) this out in every set. Its a party starter, and is unbelievably good. Its also coming out on the new Cosmic Boogie offshoot label in the next month. So there.

Toomy Disco / Age Of The Jaguar

Toomy Disco – Age Of The Jaguar (So Sound Recordings) (Free Download – click for link) by Kahua Music

Its an edit of sorts, but by eck its brilliant. Every time I played this out it makes people dance. Enough Said.

Eltron John / And Then We Realise

KINR001 Eltron John – … And Then We Realize by Koh-I-Noor Records

Sheer slowed down brilliance from super talent Eltron John,who also happens to be the words greatest racing car driver.

Trickski / Phil Collins

Pill Collins by trickski

Another slowed down brilliantly produced gem. Another deep one as well…this I think is in many peoples tracks of the year thingys and for good reason.

Heartbeat / LTJ Experience

heartbeat (ltj edit rework) sampler by ltj xperience

Maybe I need something to counteract the seriousness of a couple of the tracks so far. This fits perfectly – I played this virtually every gig this year and its cheesy but I love it.

Jacques Renault / In The Middle Of The Night

Jacques Renault - In The Middle of The Night by future classic

Loved many things that Jacques Renault has put out this year but this worked many many times because of a super vocal. Its an edit but its a very good one.

Leftside Wobble / Find A Way

Russ Brown – Find A Way (Leftside Wobble Dub) by Leftside Wobble

A great track from Leftside – Acid House vibe and one to lift up a crowd when there is too much namby pamby shit being played (by me usually).

Storm Queen / Look Right Through

Look Right Through (Vocal) by TimeOutNewYork

Another one that will probably be the top of peoples lists across the world. The best vocal and synth combo I heard all year (and I heard quite a few).

Franc Spengler / Open Eyes

Another one that was tried and tested (a great set starter), but I cant find a link for it on the cloud…will keep hunting.

Cosmic Boogie isn’t always about dubby percussion, having disco drinks in the park, or me spouting bollocks. No sir, one of the things that still brings many people to the site are the tutorials I wrote a while ago about how to use Serato and so on. I need to update these, as all my methods have changed now (I am 100% committed to my Macbook and iTunes these days), but that’s for another article. This one concentrates on something I found mixed information on everywhere I looked, but nothing that cohesive; ripping vinyl.

When I say ripping vinyl, I don’t mean ripping it down to 128 mp3′s for sharing on blogs, something that is personally not for me (only an opinion – each to their own). I mean ripping my collection so I can use it with Serato, or any other digital solution I choose to adopt in the future. Because, lets be honest, its kind of all going that way.

Background Research

When I started to look into this I didn’t realise how many options I would come across for ripping the correct way, or someone else’s correct way, or someone else’s correct way, or…well you get the idea. Everyone has a take on this, so I am going to lay down some caveats for my methods so you can understand what I am trying to achieve writing this and make sure it sounds useful before you have to dive in (it’s quite a lengthy article after all).

1. This article is written in such a manor that it is more about the reasoning why I chose to rip vinyl a certain way, with background info and alternatives suggested. Its not a step by step how to.
2. I am not an audiophile. I mean, I like my sound to be as good as I can with the budget I have, and try to make sure the basic things are right, but this article tries to look at things from the angle of someone who cannot spend £800 on a power supply.
3. To back that up, I am operating here on a strict budget, only buying things within budget that will really help the process. I cannot afford to spend £500 on new equipment, and I think that many other people would be in that position.
4. I struggle to fully explain technical terms. I am not a sound engineer. I know what compression means because I bought a book that explains it to me (written by a sound engineer), but that’s about it.
5. I took a lot of help from people on the wonderful DJ History Forum (in particular the ninja that is Darryl Funk and the super digital convert Captain Cookson), and other such places. You could do worse than look there to accompany this. I will add some “further reading” at the end.
6. This article is by no means the be all and end all – that is, even though I have learned a lot I don’t know everything. Anyone who disagrees or has something to add please do so in the comments at the bottom. I am  just as much a novice as some of you reading this might be, and nowhere near an expert as others will be.
7. Please don’t use this to have a debate about whether or not vinyl is better than digital. The answer is it probably is, but great music is great on all formats.

With all that in mind, and if your still with me, Ive split what I learned into three stages; preparing your vinyl, getting the right equipment and recording to digital.

Preparing Your Vinyl

Old records get dusty. In fact, new records get dusty too, but not like old records. Even if you have all your records stored immaculately in plastic sleeves in dry places, if they have been sat for years unused, they will be dusty. Old records also get scratched, worn, used, damaged and generally soiled more than new records simply because they have been around for longer. Dusty records sound terrible when recorded to digital, and although you can do your cleaning at the stage when its in the computer – do you really want to, when you could do it before hand and take away the need for often over zealous click / scratch removal software?

Before you rip your vinyl it needs cleaning. Maybe if its brand new from Juno / Piccadilly that morning you would be OK, but in general, it needs cleaning. There are of course many solutions to do this, ranging from soapy water in a kitchen bowl, to wonderfully expensive robotic cleaning systems. If you can afford it, for sure, buy one of the robots. If you cannot, there are a few things that I have purchased that made a real difference for me.

• Vinyl Cleaning Fluid – this one to be exact. Cheap, and good. Two little sprays and a good wipe is a good start.
• Ant Static cloths – for wiping the vinyl. Be careful which ones you buy because they sometimes leave fluff on the record, which I am sure defeats the object. Choose carefully, and they make a big difference.
• Static removing gun. I managed to get one of these quite cheap from eBay, and i was a little skeptical at first. However when I was cleaning my records it was really evident just how much static was on them, and static discharges through the needle – so it was really a no-brainer. Its made a big difference (just use it on the record before you are about to rip it).

That’s it. That’s how I clean my records, with a combination of the above. I guess, really, it doesn’t matter how you clean them as long as you follow one of the more tried and tested methods. Someone will undoubtedly tell me that using the vinyl cleaning fluid is bad for your records, and so on. I’m going off what I know, and all the above cost me about £40 altogether, which is palatable. I am thinking about getting one of these for some of my older records, they really clean into the groove well (read that review and you will see), but its an (admittedly small) expense (at around £30 on ebay) that I don’t need at the moment.

I’m not saying that all your records will come up scratch or crackle free if you give them a good clean, that’s really not going to happen. At least you have done your bit though to get rid of either years of neglect or overplay. Its probably an obvious step really, anyone who tries to rip dusty arse old records without even trying to do something about it probably deserves what they get. Once your records are nice and clean its probably a good idea to get some plastic sleeves over them, make sure they have an inner sleeve also – and generally try to keep them in as good a condition as possible. Sounds obvious doesn’t it, but I know loads of people who never follow any of these steps.

Getting The Right Equipment

I agonised over this for weeks. Months, if I am being honest. My poor girlfriend often had to be on the receiving end of what I had decided to buy and how I had decided to do things, just so I could hear my decisions out loud and make sure they made sense. Even then I wasn’t sure, and unlike many other facets of my life, she couldn’t help me. You see, I am a little bit obsessive compulsive (it runs in the family) and I start to freeze up a bit if I think I could be doing something better. (This, incidentally, is one of the reasons I am dreading comments from people who read this who know nu-fangled solutions I didn’t discover). In the end, I had to decide and get on with it, trying not to worry that if I spent another £1000 then I could get that little bit more from the rip – I wanted good solid quality with pretty much the equipment I already had, and a small budget for improving or upgrading.

The key to getting the best quality recording is taking as many links out of the chain between your record decks and your PC as possible. Everything that you have between the vinyl and the final digital output can colour the sound in some way. Mixer, Amp, Cables, Digital Audio Interface – everything. You need to minimise the links, and if you do have to use equipment, use the best that you can. Same with cables, needles, and so on. Using the best that you can, however, does not mean that everything you have at the moment needs to be chucked out and new equipment purchased at huge expense, as you will see.

There are three different methods I looked at:

Ripping with a dedicated turntable that has digital out

For me, you can forget this method. I don’t really even want to waste that much space saying why – all you need to know is that they sell these record decks in the ever awesome electrical goods isle at Asda. That might sound snobbish – I don’t mean it to, what I am saying is that these are made for the mass market. If you just want to rip your old collection for your shitty pc speakers and play it through iTunes then these will do the job. They are not made for serious ripping (and subsequent playing), and should be avoided. Your DJ Turntable has a better needle, tonearm, everything. One of the decks I looked at only converted to MP3 onto a flash card with its own in built software. That’s some scary shit. If you want to see an entire list of what NOT to buy for ripping vinyl, why not browse the entire stock at Maplins.

As a side note, there are USB turntables that you can get from Numark and Stanton – although they are a good few hundred quid, maybe if anyone has used these and had any experience they could post up about it in comments…I am not even sure that these are something that you could successfully rip with (I assume they do analogue to digital conversion down the USB lead – but just don’t know).

Ripping with a Technics turntable through a dedicated phono stage

I learned a lot about sound quality and how mixers work with amps when I was reading up on this. It would shock most of the proper DJ’s to hear this, but I didn’t know what pre-amps or phono stages and such things were. Why should I? Its not something I ever really had to be concerned with. I don’t really use my turntables for listening – i use them as a technical tool. Somethings I do listen to on vinyl but always found the quality from the usual setup to be adequate.

It turns out it is something I really need to be concerned with when looking at ripping vinyl, and correct sound reproduction from vinyl…and everything else to do with vinyl. Its something that passed me by through ignorance rather than design. I am not going to go into the details of how these things work here, because Wikipedia is cleverer than me and can do a better job. However, I am sure if your serious about ripping vinyl then you have come across these terms and may be thinking about this route. There are three different ideas I toyed around with.

The Ripper

The first is this thing – The Ripper. Not only does it have a great name, but it also looks like it does nothing other than RIP YOUR VINYL. Which, of course, is a good thing. No gadgets, no fanciness, no over complifimication – just pure RIPPING ABILITY. It is basically a phono stage of seemingly very good quality that you plug your deck straight into, and it has a USB lead coming out of it that goes straight into the computer. So it does the analogue to digital conversion in the box, and then you use whatever software you want at your end on the computer. You don’t even need an external soundcard to go into – truly an awesome black box for RIPPING and RIPPING ONLY. There are, however, a few draw backs with it. Firstly its around $400 – which at current exchange rate equates to about £270. Not exactly fitting into my “small budget use the equipment you have” mindset is it. You can of course buy a kit version and make your own (for much less expense) but it requires you to have a masters in molecular nuclear physics no doubt, and I am stupid. So no.

The other problem is slightly more technical – as I will explain in the recording to digital section further down, when recording, you really need to to be able to capture at a high sample rate and bit resolution. You may be familiar with the standard resolution for CD’s – 16bit and 44.1khz – 16bit is the resolution depth and the 44.1khz is the sample rate. Just because CD music is at those rates doesn’t mean that’s all you can have with digital, you can record a far greater level. Ill explain more about this later, but The Ripper only rips at the aforementioned 16bit and 44.1khz – so straight away, even through it would sound good, you cannot record any better. That’s a limitation too far (and one I admit I didn’t spot at first). This coupled with the price led me to a sadly negative conclusion about this particular piece of hardware.

Alternatives? Yes, there are plenty. There is another USB cable straight to PC Phono Stage (of sorts) called the USB PhonoPLus V2. It looks a bit tacky compared to the machine that is THE RIPPER, however, I am told by a couple of people that it does a good job. Its about £80 (although hunting on eBay I found it for less) but sadly it has the same limitations musically as THE RIPPER – that is, your pretty much restrained to recording audio at CD quality. Its just not really good enough, so maybe a dedicated phono stage that’s not a digital converter would be better, and let my soundcard handle the analogue to digital conversion by itself?

I looked into this, and it would be great – but once again I found that it would cost me a good amount of money to get a really good pre-amp. The one I finally settled on, if I was going to go down this route, would be the Cambridge Audio 640p. This seemed a reasonable price and I also like Cambridge Audio gear. It might not be top audiophile standard, but its good value and good quality equipment and it has served me well over the years. Looking into what else I would need if I purchased one of these, in order to get the best recording I would need a moving magnetic cartridge (a needle for the deck) and also some really top notch audio leads from the pre amp to my computer. All this is starting to seriously mount up, and if you remember, there is a very limited budget I have on offer here so I am starting to wonder at this point is there any compromise between this method and the equipment I already have?

Ripping with a Technics deck through a mixer

This is almost identical to the method listed above, however, instead of a dedicated pre-amp, it uses the pre-amp that you already have in your DJ Mixer (assuming, of course, that you have a DJ mixer). In this instance, I am lucky that I own an Allen & Heath Xone 32. Some quick research on the web and I found out that the pre-amp installed into this mixer as standard is very good, and that I would be hard pressed to beat it even if I spent decent money…so, with my new found knowledge, I settled on using the pre-amps in the mixer.

The solution entails your Record deck going into your mixer via the phono leads, then some good quality phono cables coming from the “Record Out” of your mixer, and into your computers external (or not-come-as-standard internal) soundcard. Something that many people would already have setup these days because it is probably how many of us record mixes in the first place. The things I needed to do were upgrade the cables between the mixer and the PC – and, I settled on the best Cambridge Audio Azur cables I could get (around £40 each I paid for them), and I also needed to make sure my soundcard could handle the incoming signal and had decent analogue to digital conversion, at the correct 24bit / 192khz format that I wanted. Luckily, mine is ok. I have an Audiophile Firewire (picked up from ebay for about £100), and it can handle everything I need to throw at it.

Rme Fireface 400

Thats not to say if I had money to spend I couldn’t get better – there are a million soundcard’s out there that are better than the on I am using, but again, going back to the budget debate – I have to be practical. Realistically, to get the best possible sound conversion, you are looking at high end cards like the RME FireFace 400 – but this little beauty weighs in at about £650 brand new, or £550 second hand – so clearly, its aimed at a spectrum that is out of my range at the moment. Another good soundcard, and one that I will eventually upgrade to (in the next few months I hope) is the Edirol FA-66 (which I have seen going for around £200 on ebay). Both of these cards have better analogue to digital convertors, and so you will get a better, cleaner sound from your recorded vinyl. I am not exactly sure how much of a difference you would notice as an average user on standard equipment though, but maybe someone else could shed some light on that?

Hardware Setup

So you really dont need me to tell you how to plug a record deck into something with the minimum of fuss, and I am not about to do that. I am going to give you some basic bullet pointed tips for things to make sure you have your hardware setup correctly.

• Make sure whatever needles you have decided to use are tracked correctly and are in as good a condition as possible
• Make sure your Technics deck is grounded properly either with the ground lead attached to the ground on the mixer properly, or the technics ground lead modification fitted (i.e. – no need for a ground lead anymore).
• You want as few steps as possible ftom your deck to your computer – so really, one lead that comes out of the mixer straight into the soundcard. No shitty extension cables joined at the middle, no ground loop isolators getting in the way, nothing. Just one lead from the deck into the mixer, and one lead from the mixer to the soundcard.
• Make sure that any digital djing solution you might use is not connected – as in, dont use the pass through option. No point in “passing through” Serato for ripping, might as well just bypass it altogether.
• Make sure that you are not connected to an amp – you don’t need to be. As were taking the signal straight out of the mixer into the soundcard, we don’t need use the amp at all. If your connected to an amp and the sound is being ripped through that, the sound will be coloured by the amp.
• Make sure no noise enters the room during the recording process – there is no point you hearing what you are recording – all you are in effect doing if you have the sound turned up is increasing the chances of bass / noise feedback into the rip itself.
• Check your equipment for any digital hum – try to figure out if anything is laying any noise or interference down that could potentially upset the track that you are ripping. You can check for this quickly by listening through your speakers with nothing playing – if you hear something, there is a chance it could be recorded. (There is also a way to check for this in software I will mention later).

Conclusion

Just to re-cap…I am going to use the equipment I already have to rip:

1 x Technics 1200 Turntable
1 x Ortofon Nightclub S cartridge (properly tracked and setup)
1 x Allen & Heath Xone32 mixer
1 x Audiophile Firewire soundcard
2 x Cambridge Audio Azur reference phono leads

Sure, with a better soundcard it might be better. Sure, with dedicated pre-amp and moving magnetic cartridge, it might be better – but ultimately, it would also be significantly more expensive, and I do not have that kind of money to invest at the moment. Its something I will upgrade over time. The only thing I really need to do now, is make sure I have everything I have decided on setup to the absolute optimum it can be. That doesn’t cost money, just the time and care to get it right.

Part 2 of this very wordy article will cover the software side of things – what to use, correct settings, cleaning up recordings, storage, tagging…the works. It might take me a few weeks to write it, but when its done, I will link back to it here…

Like most people I imagine, my understanding of disco went as far as Saturday Night Fever. In fact, even worse than that, somewhere in my mind I probably linked it with the film Grease just because that had John Travolta in it as well, and Grease was of course rock and roll (and crap rock and roll at that). Hey – what do I know. Disco was just an excuse for a shit party, or to stumble into one of the many ironed on night-club cum-disco-pub’s like Boogie Nights and such that fester out across the nation. Think Disco, think The Bee Gees, The Jacksons, Chic, I Believe in Miracles, I Will Survive, D.I.S.C.O, YMCA (surely the ultimate disco record *cough*), Stayin Alive, The Hustle and millions of other tracks, artists and groups that appear on every “Best Disco Album Ever”, ever. Its safe to say that disco couldn’t have been further from what I considered dance music, even though it more often than not made people dance. These people were the enemy of music, as far as I was concerned.

In around about the year 2003, as my days of djing were drawing to a close (through a combination of the impending arrival of my first little girl and what I thought was a simmering down of the passion I once held for the music), I started to look at other tracks and genres that had always interested me but id never really found the time to explore, and undertook a 4 year journey that completely rewrote everything I knew and understood about dance music, and specifically my cheesy friend Disco. For the 7 or 8 years previous, I had done nothing but buy one kind of music really in order to better understand and appreciate, and for that reason listening to music had started to become a chore rather than the pleasurable experience it should have been. It was time to find the passion again.

I had already read a couple of books that had been of some interest on the broader spectrum of dance music. The first was Last Night a DJ Saved My Life, by Frank and Bill. This armed me with a knowledge of the progression of the sound, but not necessarily the commitment to research further into it. Whilst it was a great book (and one I have since re-read), I was just happy with the fact that I had a more rounded understanding. I also read at the time books about the spectrum of dance music I already knew about having lived through it – Simon Reynolds Energy Flash and Altered State by Matthew Colin which were both pretty formulaic and forgettable (in my opinion, of course). People from Blackburn took ecstasy? Really? Astonishing.

What happened to me musically as I started to dig deep, is probably no different to anyone who is aware that disco is not all for four year olds. Its amazing though, how many people say things like “do you wear platforms when you DJ” or other such bollocks…so with this in mind I wanted to write down, as best as I could, the things that helped me to discover that Disco far from sucks. Call it a starting place to discover more about dance music if you will, something to help a newcomer (not an experienced old cynic) what direction they might have to take. The directions are numerous, and I probably cant remember them all (Cd’s, documentaries, books, films, people, places – some that aren’t directly about disco), but this should be a good start, if nothing else.

Love Saves The Day

Nothing could prepare me for the change in my life when it was suggested to me by THP from Cosmic Disco that I read and understand a masterpiece. Love Saves the Day is a book by Tim Lawrence that defines the rise of dance music in America during the seventies and describes how foundations were laid. The idea of how a party should take place evolved over the course of the decade until it reached a climax with The Paradise Garage and Larry Levan. This book introduced me to so many names that I remembered from Last Night a DJ Saved My Life, but as it concentrated on a much shorter period it allowed a far greater depth to each. Francis Grasso, David Mancuso, Nicky Siano, Arthur Russel, Mel Cheren, Larry Levan, Francois Kevorkian, Frankie Knuckles, Bobby Guttaro, Danny Krivit, The Gallery, The Saint, The Loft, The Garage. If you don’t know much about how these are connected to disco, read this book. See how the complex relationships between all intertwined to create one of the most vibrant, creative and hedonistic times of modern day. This is still the best factual book have ever read, and I have read numerous. I am just about to give it a third read in 2 years.

Mel Cheren – My Life and the Paradise Garage

Mel Cheren is considered by many as the godfather of disco. I’m not sure I agree with that moniker but he was certainly a hugely important figure in the development of the sound. As the head of West End Records, Mel presided over the release of many tracks that are timeless classics, and still move dance-floors today. Indeed, one of my favourite tracks of all time comes from the West End label of this era – Brenda Taylor, You Can’t Have Your Cake and Eat it Too. The book itself chronicles Mel’s life up to the late nineties, and shows the creation of West End records, the development of the super-elite gay community on Fire Island, the birth of the Paradise Garage and The Saint (two seminal New York gay disco’s), drug dependency, and the tragic hangover from years of guilt free partying. This book isn’t just about disco, but it puts disco into perspective from the person (and people) who helped to put it on the map. Understanding the time itself helps to understand the music. A warning though – if you are sensitive about reading about issues and descriptions that are not necessarily about your particular sexual persuasion, then read at your own risk.

Maestro

Maestro by Josell Ramos chronicles the rise of clubs like The Loft, The Paradise Garage and The Gallery by people who either witnessed or helped to shape the disco, and ultimately, the house scene. Focusing heavily on New York and Chicago, interviews with Mancuso, Tee Scott, Grasso, Siano and many of the dancers and party goers of the time give a brilliant insight that really compliments the vibe created by a book like Love Saves the Day. Some people would say that its hurriedly put together, and maybe lacking in chronological flow but I like that about it – and its only hurriedly put together if you are already an expert on the subject. Its the interviews with Grasso that I found most interesting, as he really was the DJ that laid the foundations in New York. Sadly, he passed away in 2001, but watching the footage of him in this film there is no doubt of his impact on later generations, including the likes of Ron Hardy (a hero of mine), Knuckles, et al. The documentary goes on to cover the emergence of House and Garage music from the disco scene, and puts things into context perfectly. Find out more from an interview with the director, or one of the many clips on youtube.

DJ History Forum

Even though its populated with far too many southern Manchester United fans for my liking, the DJ History forum is an invaluable resource. Everyone (almost everyone) who lives on it knows loads, about everything. Any track you don’t know, someone will. And not only that, they will know the year it came out, the label it came out on, what other mixes were with it, where you can buy it, and what your grandads dog was called. Couple this with posts from scene leaders such as Francios K, Greg Wilson, Todd Terje, Bill Brewster (who owns and runs the site) and so on, and also mixes from almost every disco DJ in the country (with track listings) – you are talking serious musical knowledge. Even if you don’t post much, you can browse, read, learn, buy and conquer.

Salsoul Compilations

Salsoul, oh Salsoul. A label that most people know of, even those not riding the disco merry-go-round. I wont lavish you with the details of why Salsoul were so instrumental (along with other labels such as Prelude and West End Records), but I would suggest that you take a listen to the compilations that came out on Suss’d around 2003/2004 and onwards. Disco Divas and Soulful Sista Flavas, Walter Gibbons Anthology, Essential Boogie Flavas, Latin Funk Flavas, DIsco Trance and Cosmic Flavas…the list goes on and on for great compilations of timeless disco from this label. A real insight to music being created around the end of the seventies / beginning of the eighties. Greg Wilson was asked to put together a compilation of disco electronica for the Suss’d Salsoul compilations – it was to be entitled Electrophonic Beats, Dubby Mixes & Black Underground Flavas. Sadly, It never came out, but we decided to document the story about it regardless.

Music Blogs

There are absolutely millions of music blogs. Some give away free tracks for you to download, which is mildly naughty. Some inform you of edits that are coming available, some review older tracks, some have interviews with cool people. Some, like this one, just post up mixes and talk shit. Never underestimate the power and the knowledge of the people in the musical blogging world. Some of these people bleed cowbell if you cut them, and they should be feared, revered and respected for the knowledge and wisdom they possess. Or something like that. I am not going to list every blog I visit here, I don’t see the point when DJ History has pretty much the most difinitive list of music blogs I have ever seen (and the largest sidebar to boot). Just look under the Blogs We Like section on the right. A special mention must go here to Cosmic Disco as well, as I have said in the past, without that site this one would not exist.

Discogs

I think some of the people on the aforementioned DJ History forum are actually hard wired into the database of this website. I, however, knew next to nothing when I started to use it for finding out about labels, tracks, producers, compilations – everything. Its a database so vast and precise that I bet even the people who made the tracks themselves didn’t know half the stuff about their own music. If you want to see what the engineer for a track has worked on, no problem – click his name and off you go. There is also the added bonus of the discogs marketplace, where you can buy the track you have searched for as long as someone has it for sale (or even sell it, if you have it). Better than buying off eBay were you invariably get completely ripped off, as I found to my detriment.

Disco Tracks

You might notice that until now, I really haven’t actually mentioned any individual tracks or labels (apart from the Salsoul Compilations). Bit stupid that, you are probably thinking – as disco isn’t theory – its music. The reason is that its not really up to me to dictate what you should listen to when you delve into the world of disco. I can, however, list some tracks that I like (love, in fact) and some that show that disco isn’t all high pitched Mancunian’s and Italian Americans. Here are some great tracks, with relevant information bits. You don’t have to like them all but I think its a reasonable spread, and although many of them fit into other sub-genres, they are all disco to me. Note – these might not be obscure oddities or treats, but then that would kind of defeat the idea of writing an article about “Discovering Disco”. Walking before running, I think the expression is. Note 2 – It took me hours to think about what to include or not include, so I know I have missed out a million things, and yes, it hurts. Note 3 – I toyed around with adding soundclips with each track, but you know – as this article is all about discovering it for yourself – maybe it would mean more if you tracked them down yourself.

Aquarian Dream / Phoenix
http://www.discogs.com/release/1064027

This crossed over into Northern Soul clubs (especially The Mecca in Blackpool – it was a Levine favourite). Great up tempo early disco track, easy to find on loads of disco / northern soul compilations.

Al Hudson / Spread Love
http://www.discogs.com/release/579578

A track I know as it was re-made as a drum and bass track by nu:tone (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPCcnlEaRxc). Another uplifting slice of early disco funk.

Eumir Deodato / Space Dust – Sherlock
http://www.discogs.com/release/502967

Straight dance-floor stuff from Eumir Deodato – a superb musician who has released many great tracks over the years (and still does).

Disco Drum – The Cats ‘N’ Jammer Kids
http://www.discogs.com/release/312985

The only more obscure one here – even a search of GOD doesn’t show me much about who Cats N Jammer Kids are. Great slower percussion heavy disco track.

Five Letters / Tha Kee Tha Tha
http://www.discogs.com/release/1221494

Italo Disco – recently released on the Italo Disco compilation. I wont go into the whole sub genre of italo disco here, but this track could be a good starter for you.

Jean Carn / Was That All It Was
http://www.discogs.com/release/790602

Paradise Garage classic – very camp (IMO), brilliant – great structure. Really good disco and relatively easy to find on compilations (CD or vinyl).

Love Unlimited Orchestra / Strange Games & Things
http://www.discogs.com/release/472823

Barry whites backing orchestra (40 piece orchestra according to discog’s) go solo on quite a few albums and this one is a real good bubbling disco, very laid back, showing another string.

Liquid Liquid / Optimo
http://www.discogs.com/release/95988

Disco not Disco – sub genre alert – this doesn’t probably sound like disco per say, and that’s because it isn’t. But it was played in the disco clubs of the time, and still is today – disco influenced, if nothing else.

Montana Sextet / Heavy Vibes
http://www.discogs.com/release/196601

A masterpiece. Vince Montana had his hand in everything. No words I could put here could sum it up, so just have a listen yourself.

Tata Vega / Get It Up for Love
http://www.discogs.com/release/361477

Great up tempo disco track released on Motown records. Dancefloor stuff again, great lyrics.

The Salsoul Orchestra / Magic Bird of Fire
http://www.discogs.com/release/7329

Salsoul – inspirational. This might not be the best of the Salsoul, or Salsoul Orchetra tracks, but its certainly individual and shows disco’s live roots in a great light.

Womack & Womack / Baby I’m Scared of You
http://www.discogs.com/release/865095

Another Paradise Garage classic. Another hands in the air, camp anthem.

And…

Well – I am still learning at a reasonable pace. I have just finished a book by Peter Shapiro called “Turn the Beat Around” which I didn’t enjoy one bit sadly, and would struggle to recommend. I also recently finished a few other books about hip hop which has really interesting links to disco culture as one helped to progress the other (and vice-versa). Really though, the only way to learn more about the music is to keep searching, and keep listening. And I intend to do that until I shuffle from this coil. At the risk of sounding cliche’d, I am still discovering what disco is every time I read something new about it, or hear a new track.

Actually that sounded really, really cliche’d. Great ending.

This is the second part to an article I started last week on tracks that changed my life. I wrote a load of blurb at the start of that one so I wont bang on here, ill just dive right in. Remember, these tracks are in no particular order (least of all chronological).

Black Water (Octave One)

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Back in 2001 I was going to Bugged Out! in Liverpool from time to time. I had always known that Justin Robertson was a good DJ from his sheer variety (northern soul, house, techno and whatever the fuck lionrock was). He was resident at Bugged Out, and the first time I heard Blackwater played it was by him. I wouldn’t say I was a techno connoisseur, but this track led me onto many things I would have missed otherwise. Funk D Void, Phil Kieran, etc. are maybe not a similar style to the somewhat percussive detroit sound of Blackwater, but it was a pass way to them none the less. This track is fantastic, could fit into a set of any genre (and was played by all and sundry, not just techno DJ’s) and is widely revered as a classic. The mix I love has the Ann Saunderson vocal. A really great piece of music with one of the finest basslines I have ever heard.

Share The Fall (Grooveriders Jeep Style Remix) (Roni Size)

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A great track on its own, Share the Fall really benefited from the Grooverider jeep style remix when it came to working for a dancefloor. Why the original album version crossed the border between trip-hop and drum and bass, Riders version is a workout for any club. The beats are toughened up, the vocal used to build energy, searing tech synth stabs roll throughout, and the overall hypnotic feel makes it one of the standout tracks of all time for me. Another track I played out many times, that worked even though it might have been slower than many of the darker pieces around it. Optical was the studio engineer for Grooverider, I am led to believe, so there is every chance that he could have been the man behind this. I wouldn’t be surprised.

Better Days (Jimi Polo)

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This was the first track I heard when entering my first proper dance night at the ripe old age of 14, and for that reason it gets included. Its a big room piano cheese monster, not something I really love now but at the time I had never heard anything as euphoric or uplifting in my life. I think the version I would have heard must be the Sasha remix (and I think that is the one in the video also). Its still a great track if you like that kind of thing, and I am sure still gets played to death all over everywhere. Strangely I never bought this on vinyl, I only have it on a retro compilation. Maybe I will hunt it down if only for nostalgic reasons.

Breakdance (electric boogie) (West Street Mob)

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I suppose really I should reference back to Apache by Incredible Bongo Band – as that’s all this track is, its just a cut up with added electronic voice samples (Breakdaaaance!) – but I heard this first so there is no point trying to look all authentic and original. I still play this, in fact, I played it a few weeks ago when DJing out and people never get tired of it. I started to play it when me and my friend Roscoe did a little upstairs party at the Zanzibar in Liverpool in about 2002, and I think I will always take it out with me (even if it is a really obvious track). I don’t really need say anymore, I could pretty much guarantee that anyone reading this will have heard it. May have been responsible for my start it looking back at the history of dance music.

Love has Come Around (Donald Byrd)

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I must admit, when I heard this track again in context over the last few years, I had no idea it was a Jazz Funk classic from the early 80′s. In fact, I had heard this many times going out, or maybe it had been sampled so much I just thought I had. Its a great track that I have played out in all the places I have played, and have included it on one of my Cosmic Boogie mixes. You could easily start or end a night with a track of this magnitude. I don’t know anything else by Donald Byrd, which I guess is just lazy really considering how highly I rate this. I should make the time to find out.

Teardrop (Massive Attack)

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Teardrop reminds me of a low point in my early life – a time when for one reason or another, not many things were going right. Early relationship trouble, not knowing what to do with myself (I was about 18 at the time), and generally, not enjoying life. I bought the Mezzanine album the day it came out, having been a big fan of earlier Massive Attack stuff. I played teardrop all the time, some might say its a depressing tune, but I think that all depends on the context. The overriding feeling it always gave me was “everything is going to be ok”. No matter what had gone wrong I could put this track on and things could brighten up – if not literally, at least in the way I looked at them. It also had characteristics of the sound i was into at the time (dark drum and bass), with haunting beats and hypnotising vocals from Elizabeth Fraser (of the Cocteau Twins). I don’t play this now as much as I probably should, but it had a huge effect at that particular point in my life.

Alien Girl (Ed Rush & Optical)

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Boom. Dark, nasty, rave drum and bass. Perfect for the big room, a masterful tech stepper that owes more to heavy metal than it does funk or soul. Darker music at the time was far more uplifting to me than any of the funkier shades of Marcus Intalex et al, and this is just about the epitome of it. I still love hearing this track, it killed every dancefloor around, still does (played in the right context of course) and I am very happy that I was there to witness this and many other tracks of its ilk as they happened. After this period, drum and bass started to reinvent itself because it had lost all the feeling, but still now, I reckon there is more feeling in this than many tracks that came out later. An anthem for the cause, and only one of a number of brilliant tracks produced by these two.

Electric Relaxation (A Tribe Called Quest)

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In younger years, I always thought that I didn’t have much time for hip-hop or rap, I thought Public Enemy were OK, and NWA, but probably more because my mates did rather than ever actually really connecting in any way. One friend though who was really into both started to pass me more things he thought I would “get”, and that was pretty much solely A Tribe Called Quest. I could have picked any number of tracks, but Electric Relaxation is the best (for me at least), with a fantastic groove, production, and lyrics. Not too “different” like Outkast or (sometimes) De La Soul, Tribe Called Quest are still the best hip hop act of recent times for me (with my limited knowledge, of course).

Daughter of Darkness (Tom Jones)

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Another track that fuelled my early vinyl fetish. Everyone who collects vinyl must of at some point gone through the grandparents vinyl and tried to find things that they liked. At the same time i was listening to early Elvis stuff, I was also finding out that I liked Tom Jones – or at least one track. I don’t know why I picked this out of the pile of records, I would have been no older than 10 or 11, and for some reason I played this over and over again, until I eventually bought the album second hand from a charity shop (or was bought it – I cant remember). I don’t really know if I can articulate what it is I like about it – its nothing special I don’t suppose, not a “stand out” piece of music, or anything ground breaking…I just like it. I always have and I always will. Please note that why I don’t really give a shit about American Politics (as the youtube video shows), I do think that at certain points Hilary Clinton looks like the spawn of beelzebub himself. So I thought id leave this video up rather than a picture of a record spinning.

Nightmare (Kid Unknown)

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If “Better Days” was the first hugely uplifting tune that I experienced in a club, this was probably the most satisfying. Uplifting because of its raw energy, rather than its hands in the air euphoria, this breakbeat house monster was a favourite of a few of us clubbing at the time. Dark, driving and very northern old-skool, produced by Nipper (although discogs disuptes that fact), this track was clearly a precursor to the darker breakbeat drum and bass I would get into many years later (for example – Alien Girl mentioned above). I like a lot of Warp stuff and although this may not be the most ground breaking by any stretch, it would always be my selection from the label.

Thanks for reading through. What I would really like to do is make this the start of a series of 10 or 20 tracks that changed other DJ’s lives. It would be really interesting to see what people come up with. Ill fire some requests out to people I know, and if successful I will turn this into a series of articles.

Its really difficult to write a list of favourites. What is your favourite house track? What is your favourite film? They change all the time for me. Some days I might say Donnie Brasco is my favourite film, other days it might be The Panic in Needle Park. Some days it could be Voodoo Ray, another day it might be Strings of Life. I guess it depends what kind of mood I am in. Today, for example, its The Panic in Needle Park. Until I get home, then its more than likely Blazing Saddles. You see my point.

One thing I can list though are tracks that have changed my life, for better or worse. That wont ever change unless I happen to bump into the Doc and borrow his time machine. This list (in no particular order) is not exactly representative of the style of music I like now, or the style(s) of music I always liked in the past…but it does have 20 tracks that left a lasting impression. It’s not the most original maybe, but I can’t go throwing obscure cosmic classics in just to make myself look cool.

Here are the first ten, the second part will be posted next week…

And She Was (Talking Heads)

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Talking Heads were a big part of what I listened to growing up. My father is a great lover of this band, and although I could have named any Talking Heads track here I guess, I am going for And She Was. I remember I used to sit next to the hi-fi at home and write the words down, wondering what it actually meant. I was only eight or nine, so I didn’t understand it was about taking drugs. It’s a fantastic story – musical poetry, with a kind of folk/pop backing that only Talking Heads could successfully pull off. This will always be one of my favourite songs because of the profound effect it had on me as a kid – maybe that’s because its written like a children’s story, or maybe its just because it was a brilliant song no matter how old you are. The fact that I picked it up on vinyl for £1 in a second hand shop is the icing on the cake.

In The Ghetto (Elvis Presley)

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I always liked Elvis when I was younger thanks to a friends influence, it was probably the start of my passion for record collecting. The later stuff he did rather than the earlier rock and roll – after the 68 Comeback Special – appealed to me most. In The Ghetto is a brilliant song about a boy growing up in poor surroundings, unable to break free he turns to crime which leads to an early death, and the circle continues. Indeed, the song was originally called “In The Ghetto (The Vicious Circle)”, but it was shortened before it was taken to Elvis. Its my favorite Elvis song, and one of my all time favourites because of the wonderful (yet very sad) story it tells.

Papa Was a Rolling Stone (The Temptations)

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Another great song in a lyrical sense, as well as a musical sense. This builds up and up and up and…with so many layers intertwining to make a track that can work almost anywhere, in any context. It was played a lot around my childhood as The Temptations were prevalent in our house, and it surely must have had influence on my taste in predominantly black music. A mixture of soul, funk, with maybe even a small amount of disco, and a searing vocal that has been sampled to death. Genius.

Brown Paper Bag (Roni Size)

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Roni Size had been producing drum and bass before the Reprazent album dropped onto the world in 1997 and won the Mercury music prize, but this for me has to be his outstanding track probably of all time. Brown Paper Bag was not only a great track on the album (an album which I still adore), dropping it on the dance floor also caused maximum damage (and still does today). A long, jazzy intro was synonymous with Roni at the time, but the live instruments used to full effect mean the energy was infectious, and this appealed to both hardcore and non drum and bass audiences. It helped me to fall in love with drum and bass for the next 10 years.

I Know You Got Soul (Erik B & Rakim)

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As a young raver, I frequented a club called Maximes that played “old skool” house music, usually stuff from about 1988 – 1992. I started going around 1994, and as I was usually one of the first people on the dance floor I was always dancing to the earlier, slower stuff (before all the obvious cheese got banged out). One track I always loved, but didn’t know the name of till much later, was “the ABC track”. This is all we knew it as for years as it sampled The Jackson’s ABC (Motown having again been played a lot through my growing years), added a fatter break and hip hop attittude. Finding the name of the track out, I should really have just paid more attention to the lyrics in the chorus. The start of my love of hip-house, and later a fascination with certain aspects of hip hop, this track lead me onto paid in full, The Jungle Brothers, and A Tribe Called Quest.

Do I Love You (Indeed I Do) (Frank Wilson)

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The most popular Northern Soul track of all time? It is said so. Not for me, I doubt, but still a track that has left a huge mark on my life. Its not for what it does for me, but who it reminds me of. My girlfriend, soon to be wife, played this a lot when we met as she loves Northern Soul and it always reminds me of her. With the arrival of our little girl she has had more of an impact than all of these tunes put together, and if that’s not enough, then as an introduction to Northern Soul its not a bad one…

You Dropped a Bomb On Me (The Gap Band)

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A good friend gave me a copy of this as an MP3 when I was at the height of my Drum and Bass collecting. I loved it. It was definitely one of the tracks that started me collecting boogie/disco music, and one of the first 7″ tracks I bought by accident from ebay mistakenly thinking it was the 12″ (which has now happened at least 10 times). A fantastic track with an absolute killer bassline, great vocals, and a wonderful hook in the chorus. I’m not so sure about the dancing in the video though…

Al Naayfish (The Soul) (Hashim)

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Another track that I didn’t know the name of for many years even though I loved it from the moment I heard it. Mixed in with all the old house sounds I used to listen to, this stood out because it simply wasn’t like anything else. I didn’t realise that was because it was made in 1983, and had preceded so many things that didn’t sound as good by 10 years. Incredible really. Id argue that this was, maybe is, my favourite dance track of all time. Although as I said before, that changes with the days. It certainly helped craft a love of break-beat that still burns strongly – even though the track is pure 80′s electro. A genre defining moment. Id have said this must be the only piece of early electro that had Egyptian influences, but I have since learned otherwise.

Is It All Over My Face (Loose Joints)

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A great moment, when I found this track shortly after reading Love Saves the Day, I realised that disco was so much more than “Chic – Good Times” (an admittedly great record), and it could be driving, minimal, raw yet still really funky, without the need to have a thousand violins going off, and no John Travolta in sight. Whilst this isn’t by any means my favourite disco track, its certainly the track that made me understand the most about disco. I don’t know as much as I would like to know about Arthur Russel, but masterpieces like this drive my need to find out more about music and the people who made it.

Miles From Home (Peshay)

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Another great drum and bass track, brilliant for the fact that it was played to death by many of the DJ’s who only played the darker, techier styles of drum and bass at the time. Peshay was, and is, an innovator – with countless brilliant pieces of music to his name (with another one I really should include with the next part of this article). Not quite as soft and dreamy as Bukem, but certainly as jazzy as anything produced by the Reprezent crew, miles from home has a step beat, jazzy piano, strings and bass, and a brilliant build up to the break release. I played this tune almost every time I played out (the original not the later equally as good remix), and always got a fantastic reaction. I don’t think it ever got the recognition it deserved, but maybe it did and I just didn’t ask the right people.

Update: 20 Tracks that changed my life (Part 2), is now online.

That is one hell of a statement in that title, and its not entirely truthful. I guess the real title would be “How I started to understand how to mix disco and other earlier genres of dance music and what advice I can give.” That’s a little self indulgent (and long), plus, I’m going to put the thoughts of others down here as well, so its not just about “me” per say.

Its impossible to explain how to mix a genre of music really. I mean, its all in the ear of the beholder isn’t it? And does music need mixing together? David Mancuso doesn’t think so, neither do I when I listen to an album. I’m writing this because I want to share my experience of waking up on the record decks, learning how to mix in different ways, and how you can crossover genres and BPM’s without it sounding awful. I’m no master at this craft yet, I’m still a novice really…but that doesn’t really matter. I learned a lot over the last few years, some the hard way naturally, but some by listening to other people (how they mix (and what they say). So if you have just woken up to the fact that you want to mix up a bit of everything together, and not just be 130bpm hard house all the way, then keep reading.

nb: there will be people out there that will scoff at everything written here. If you scoff, its because you worked out your own way of doing things that’s immeasurably better, and you don’t really even need to read this in the first place…this is just how I did things and it might help others who are still at the start. Also, im not knocking any other styles of music, I like everything (apart from Trance). Whatever flicks your switch.

My Background

OK – there is a self indulgent part here. My background is, basically, a drum and bass DJ. I was never really a very good one – I was pretty good at tune selection (I was told) and at finding music that others might not play…but I was pretty rotten when it came to technical ability. The whole “leaving a tune mixing for 3 minutes” thing never really worked for me – not only could I not do it very well, I didn’t really like it. I liked the tunes how they were, not really crossing over basslines for that killer mix – I just wanted to play the tunes one after the other blending them in, and I did that, but it was considered (understandably) by some to be boring. Without character I suppose. Not stamping my own style, and so on.

As my tastes in music changed over time, I found that I wanted to play all different genres together, different speeds, different rhythm’s…but yet still keeping it as a mix rather than a compilation. This was the most important thing; it still had to have flow, meaning, form…but not with the same rigidity and uniformity that I had always mixed drum n bass.

Mindset

The first thing I had to do was change my mindset completely on how records should be put together. It turns out this was the most important part of learning to DJ different genres in new and exciting ways. If you can imagine that when mixing drum and bass, or even early house music before it, I had always just beat matched two records and let them crossover, then brought the other one in. Sure, I had a few tricks like places to drop certain tunes, but that was pretty much it. Blending two tunes together, take one out as the other one kicks in – and away you go. Also, as I mentioned earlier, the longer the mix, the more technically proficient I was – and therefore the better DJ I was. Correct? Sadly not.

It turns out that the more I thought about it, and listened to mixes from other DJ’s (god bless you Deep House Page), I realised that the only thing that mattered really was the next tune you put on – did it keep the energy going, did it flow right, did it sound right…did it feel right? Once I understood this, I stopped thinking that I needed to beat match and 30 second blend every single mix together. Tracks that I loved had been consigned to the “can’t play that because I can’t beat match it in” bin. Anything that didn’t start with some form of predominant (and easy to mix) percussion had been demoted, even if the track that burst in from it was amazing. But not any more.

Its like un-learning everything that you have learned over the last however many years you have been mixing. Its taking that robotic way of doing things and giving it back a human touch. Drum and Bass, although I will always love it, can be very synthetic. I think the same can be said about house music (certainly genres like hard house). Blending together Disco, funk, Boogie, Soul, Electrofunk, Pop, Hip Hop and so on, is anything but…so you need to remove that synthetic way of doing things.

At last I understood that the correct mindset was “play anything as long as it fits”. Fits with the mix you are making, fits with the vibe you want to create, or fits with the crowd that you are playing to. And although this might sound really obvious, it was the biggest change I had to make.

Technique

Mindset may have been the most important change (for me) – but technique certainly has its place. There are many, many different ways to mix, and I would be stupid to suggest that I know all of them, or can explain even the majority of them here. I did, however, pick out three new(ish) ways of mixing that have become key for me.

Chop Mixing

Chop mixing is great. I would never have chop mixed a few years ago – its cheating. Slamming in one record without even mixing it? Pah. I can blend my two records together for 17 minutes, I’m that good, so why the fuck should I chop mix? Simple really – chop mixing can sound both astonishingly good, and can blend two tunes of complete different BPM or Genre together extremely well. Chop mixing is your friend. Take two disco tracks that have so much going on in them that they would be hard to segue together, chop from one to the other and hey presto – your into a new track, taking the mix (or dance floor) off in a new direction. Nobody has noticed until its too late to care (or in truth, nobody has noticed because they didn’t care as it sounded so good).

There are some things I try to do when chop mixing – that’s find compliments between the two tracks. For example, a track has a bongo roll in it, so I might find another that starts with a bongo roll and chop over at that point. People were either listening to the bongos at the time, or expecting them to come in – so no one notices. The other thing would be to find a contrast – so say the music is building up to a crescendo, just as it reaches its peak, chop it over to something that drops everything down again…as that’s what the tune you just mixed out of was probably about to do anyway, so you are keeping the structure and flow correct. With chop mixing you can throw funk into disco into hip hop into house into boogie into northern soul into…whatever you want really. I don’t know many people who can do that by beat mixing, apart from maybe the worlds most skilled turntablist’s, of which I am not.

The other thing to take note of is that “chop” is quite an amusing word.

Fading

I don’t know if “fading” is the correct term, or “fade mixing”, but I am sure you understand what I mean. Fading is pretty simple – fade one track out, fade another one in. There are subtleties around this; you can fade a track out when its near the end, bring the upfader (the volume fader) down, and taking the other upfader up to bring the new track in. Alternatively, you can find two instrumental parts of the track and fade those across each other, so nothing clashes (beat wise). Clearly, you have to make sure that the fade will work – don’t, for example, try to fade one horn section into another horn section unless you are certain it will work. Fading strings can work but its tricky (in my experience), and fading across pads is usually OK.

You can also use the crossfader to fade (no shit) – just find a part of the tracks that sounds similar and slowly slide the fader across. Same as the volume up/down really, only slightly easier to perform. Take note of when the beat might drop. If you are fading at the very end of one track into a new one, make sure the beats don’t together hit on the fade – that is unless you have successfully managed to beat match the two tracks together (in which case that would probably sound great).

Fading is simple – its the best way to get two tracks that are in no way similar together. You don’t necessarily need to find sections that compliment each other, you just need to make sure they don’t crash bang wallop over each other. I think fading is the most common kind of mixing with different genres that i have heard because its arguably the easiest and doesn’t detract away from the tune itself. It leaves the music unspoiled, and that’s pretty much always a good thing.

Beat Matching

Warning. Disco, Funk, Boogie and most other forms of dance music pre-1980 are not programmed by a drum machine. Well – they are, but that “machine” is fed on burger and chips rather than the mains supply. Human drummers are not as precise as a drum machine. I prefer that – I love live drums – I only wish I could successfully play the drums – but it can be a real problem when you are mixing. With house, drum and bass, techno, trance, hardcore and all of our other recent forms of dance music, the beat is invariably laid down perfectly. With many of the earlier styles of dance music, it is not. This means that just when you think you have something beat matched perfectly, the drummer goes off by a couple of BPM’s for 20 seconds or so, and it sounds like you have mixed the records together with a brick.

There are a few things to take note with beat matching, if you want to do it. I still do it, but I always make sure that the mix is fairly short (more a quick blend than a 20 minute wankfest), that I know the records that i am trying to beat match (therefore maybe knowing about any BPM pitfalls). I also bear in mind that if I do attempt it, and it doesn’t quite work (especially when I am playing out), to just fade it over quickly because most of the time no one really cares about beat matching anyway.

The only time you really have to worry about beat matching is if you are in a room full of DJ’s who are all sat with a crate of rotten vegetables. I think some people are of the mindset that if you beat match correctly, you are a good DJ. Maybe a long time ago, I thought that too.

Let one record stop, then start another one

Not for me this one, although the great David Mancuso would always champion it and there is no reason it shouldn’t be a valid way of playing records, because that’s exactly what it is – playing records. I don’t really think it needs any explanation; let one record stop, take it off, play another one. I’d be careful doing this if you are playing out, unless the crowd know what the score is, any stop in the music usually means you have fucked up as far as they are concerned.

Other things to consider

Knowledge is key.

Knowing your records, studying them, studying were the breaks are, finding records that work together, all that usual stuff – its still just as an important aspect as ever. In fact, its very important; you can’t rely on records mixing together just because they are both house records (as some people may have done), you need to find ones that work. Its not too difficult, its just spending time with the music you love.

Reading was also key for me – reading and listening to mixes, meeting Djs, getting advice from people (and listening to it and taking it on board). Ive done all those things, and I am still a complete novice really, and still struggle to get certain records together even though I know Djs who can pretty much mix anything with everything. So never ever stop listening and learning.

In the space of a few years I read maybe 10 or 15 books on music, DJ’ing, and so on – things I didn’t know, like the vibe at the time disco was around that Love Saves the Day captures, or some of the more interesting technical hints and tips in How to DJ Properly. There are sites better than mine that have a good book listing so I wont put one here (I’ll just post a link to the one on DJ History).

What others say

This article was written because I read a page in a now sadly departed dance music magazine (Keep On Magazine) entitled “the art of mixing disco” (volume 1, issue #4, page 72). Its a great little article, here are some excerpts of some of the thoughts of the DJ’s in that article, and also from friends of Cosmic Boogie:

Al Kent (Million Dollar Disco)
The most important thing, and probably the most obvious, is to be prepared. No matter how tight the records sound, they’re always going to drift; especially around a fill. If you can learn the fine details of your records, then all the better. But realistically, unless you are going to play the same half a dozen records for the rest of your life, you will have to play it by ear.

Matthew Burgess (Lowlife)
Unlike their house counterparts, most disco records don’t tend to begin with 16 bars of drums. However, they sometimes have cut friendly horn stabs (like Kasso by Kasso) or drum fills (like Wings of Fire by Dennis Coffey), which can be combined with a break in the previous record to create a seamless mix; even though the records have only been playing together for a small amount of time.

Nicky Siano (The Gallery)
Mixing records can go beyond beat matching, and I’ve always believed the selection was much more important than the mix. But that is my personal opinion. When mixing, I hear a horn that matches a horn in another section, or a bass line that is similar, and those two sections would BLEND together, without necessarily beat matching. Words which answer messages in the last song also create a fantastic blend and atmosphere.

Baggy (Cosmic Disco)
Other than learning the basics of beat matching, counting bars, song structure, not clashing the vocals (Almost as bad as when the Ghostbusters cross the streams) etc. the main words of wisdom I can give when mixing styles would be just keep an open mind with your programming, do your research and go out into dusty records shops and dig out and listen to as many different styles of music as possible, get on the blogs and forums and take recommendations from trusted friends and acquaintances and play what instinctively feels good to you. Finally don’t be afraid of making mistakes.

Simon Busby (Short Circuit)
Cough loudly and flick the crossfader across.

Niles (Cosmic Disco)
You just need to feel the tracks and play it by ear.

Summary

You really will make your own mind up. You really will find a way that suits you best, that might not take on board any of what is written here, as it might be too restrictive. Mixing comes from the heart, not the head – or it should – and this advice is purely mechanical and functional. As with everything written on blogs everywhere, its personal to me (the author) so don’t shoot me down for it, just take from it what you will. Or nothing, if you wont. If anyone wants to add to the page, I am always happy to update so feel free to throw any comments in below.

Happy mixing.

Note: as a follow up to this article, I created one thats less technical and more about how I discovered Disco is not shit. You can find it here: Discovering Disco.

About a month ago, I wrote an article on how to organise your MP3s for DJing. It would seem from the amount that have read it, it was found to be pretty useful. I thought that maybe following it up with a number of other Serato tutorials would be a good idea… so here is the second; Setting up your (PC) laptop for use with Serato. Before I start this article, I want to make it clear that many of these ideas have been taking from existing forum posts, the SSL wiki, and other tips from people on the web. I am just trying to put everything together in one easy to read chunk to save you all the hassle I had finding out this information. With that in mind, I’d like to thank jaybird, and the many other people from whom I recycled and reorganised many of these tips.

This is written with my circumstances in mind, therefore it is a PC only guide (I don’t have a Mac), and specifically for Windows XP. I may transfer over to Vista at some point, and if I do, I will write a new piece about that. Also, while I try to explain everything as best I can – it also assumes you have some level of technical knowledge as far as computers are concerned. The more technical, the better, in fact.

Background

When I bought my Serato, I didn’t have the money to buy a brand new laptop as well. I assume that I am not the only person who found themselves in this position. Even though you could get a new laptop with good enough specs for about £400, it’s just money I didn’t have. So, I had to use an older laptop, and figure out a way to get the absolute best performance out of it so Serato would run without issue. This turned out to be pretty difficult as at first I had USB dropouts, poor performance, tunes stuttering and stammering as the CPU load went to 100% all the time… almost everything that could go wrong went wrong. If any of these things are happening to you when you are tying to use Serato – then this article could help.

First Steps

First thing is to make sure your laptop is as close to (if not better than) the minimum system requirements. These recommend that you have at least 1GB of memory, and a 1.5GHz processor, but I have managed to get Serato to run without a problem on 512MB of ram – albeit having to disable pretty much everything on the laptop and using it solely for Serato and nothing else. If you can get 1GB of memory though, I recommend it as an upgrade for a 512MB machine usually costs very little (£20 – £30).

The next thing I would do is make sue that the laptop is running Windows XP – it’s better than Vista performance wise at the moment for Serato. For a clean copy of Windows XP, follow these steps:

1. Format the Laptop, making sure you have all the latest drivers for the components in the laptop at the ready. Rather than use a driver CD that came with the laptop, if you are technical (and comfortable) enough, I would get all the latest drivers for each component from the relevant site. For example, I had to get motherboard (chip-set) drivers, sound drivers, graphics card drivers, and so on.
2. When the laptop is formatted, you should partition the drive, leaving 10GB for your operating system on the C drive, and setting up whatever you have left as a library backup / mix recording drive. On an 80GB drive this would mean 10GB for OS and the small packages that you would eventually install, and 70GB for your tracks.
3. Install a fresh copy of Windows XP on the C drive.
4. Install all the drivers, putting the chip-set drivers on first, then graphics, then sound, then… (delete as applicable).

Do not, under any circumstances, download any software at this point to put on the laptop, or install any other packages that came with the laptop on CD. We simply don’t need them. The only thing that should be on the PC at this stage is our nice fresh copy of Windows XP… at this point we do not need any virus packages, or broadband helpers, or printer software – leave the fresh install as is.

Optimising Windows

Now we have this install of XP – it’s time to optimise it. There are many ways to do this, and many things you may or may not need to take out/clean/optimise. Basically rather than split it up here into what is absolutely necessary and what isn’t, I am going to give you a whole list of tips to follow. You can run through these in half an hour and have that clean copy of windows running even faster. In most instances, you don’t need to do a lot to Windows XP to get Serato running at its most efficient.

1. Visual Performance – right click computer (on the desktop), select properties. Select the “Advanced” tab. Click the “settings” button (under performance). Select the radio button that says “Adjust for best performance”. Click “Apply”.
2. Background Services – right click computer (on the desktop), select properties. Select the “Advanced tab”. Click the “settings” button (under performance). Select the Advanced tab. Select the radio button that says “Background Services”. Click “Apply”.
3. Disable error reporting – right click computer (on the desktop), select properties. Select the “Advanced” tab. Click the “Error Reporting” button at the bottom of the screen. Click the “disable error reporting” radio button. Click “OK”.
4. Disable Remote Desktop – right click computer (on the desktop), select properties. Select the “Remote” tab. Make sure both the boxes on this page are unchecked.
5. Disable Automatic Updates – right click computer (on the desktop), select properties. Select the “Remote” tab. Click “Turn off Automatic updates”. Click “Apply”.
6. Turn off system restore – right click computer (on the desktop), select properties. Select the “System Restore” tab. Make sure the “Turn off system restore” box is checked. Click “Apply”.
7. Remove unneeded components – Open up the “add/Remove Programs” box from the control panel. Click “Add/Remove Windows Components” in the left hand gutter. Many of the items that pop up, you will not need. Look through them and uncheck any you do not want installed, then click OK. A tip here is I don’t have any of them installed and it doesn’t effect what I can or cannot do.
8. Turn off system sounds – Open up the “Sounds and Audio Devices” box from the control panel, and click on “Sounds”. From the drop down list, click “No Sounds”, then click “No” then click “Apply”.
9. Turn off screensaver – Right click the mouse on the desktop, select “properties”. Click “Screensaver”. In the drop down list choose “none”. Click “Apply”.
10. Remove desktop image – Right click the mouse on the desktop, select “properties”. Click “Desktop”. In the “Background” box, click “NONE”. Click “Apply”.
11. Remove Drive Indexing – Open up windows explorer, and right click on your C drive and go down to properties. Uncheck the box that says “Allow Indexing Service to index this disk for fast file searching”. Click “Apply”. repeat this for all the drives on your PC.
12. Disable Fast User Switching – Open up the “User Accounts” from the control panel. Click “Change the way users log on or off”. Untick Use Fast User Switching. Click “Apply”.
13. Switch Off Power Schemes – Start > Settings > Control Panel > Power Options > Always On > Turn off monitor and turn off hard discs to Never
14. Switch Off Hibernation – Start > Settings > Control Panel > Power Options > Hibernate > Untick Hibernation
15. Startup and Recovery Options – Right click My Computer and click on Properties > Advanced > Start Up & Recovery Settings and uncheck “Automatically Restart”. Fixed Swap File (Virtual Memory) – Select the Advanced tab of the Systems applet and then select the Performance settings button. Then select the Advanced page. In here it is possible to customise the Virtual Memory. For custom size, this is often recommended to be 1.5 to 2 times the amount of your total RAM for both initial and maximum size. Set this to a fixed minimum and maximum value according to your existing RAM.
16. Disable Offline Files – Start > Settings > Control Panel > Folder Options > Offline Files > Untick “Enable Offline Files”
17. Disable Automatic Desktop Cleanup Wizard – Start > Settings > Control Panel > Display > Desktop > Customise Desktop > Untick “Run Desktop Cleanup Wizard every 60 days”

Some of these tips I already knew – some I found on this excellent article that has 25 tips on how to optimise your PC for sound, and other general stuff I picked up in this very good Windows XP Optimization Guide. This is now about the best system we can get, so let’s continue.

Installing Serato

The driver CD that came with your Serato box will more than likely be out of date. The current version of software that is available at the time of writing this article is Scratch LIVE 1.8.0 which you can download here. You can also download the latest update of the manual from this page. This version has the most features of any Serato release so far, and I have been using it without a single problem now for a number of months, so this is the version I am going to recommend that you install.

1. Connect your laptop to the Serato box via the included USB cable.
2. The laptop will now ask you for drivers for the Serato system. You can find these drivers in latest version of Serato that you just downloaded, inside the Drivers > XP > SL1 directory (they are called SeratoUsb.sys and SeratoUsb.inf). Select this directory and continue through until the drivers have been fully installed.
3. The Serato will now be installed for use on your system, however, due to some weird technical issue that is way beyond me, it will only install the Serato drivers for the USB port you had it attached in at that moment. In order for Serato to work on any USB port on your laptop, I suggest that you follow steps 1 and 2 for each port, and then check that it does indeed work as it should no matter where you have plugged it in.
4. You must now install the Scratch Live software. Simply double click the setup.exe that came in the 1.8.0 download, and this will install the software to a location of your choosing. I recommend that this be the C drive, the same as the operating system.
5. When installed, click the Scratch Live icon on the desktop, and the software should load without problem. As long as you have your Serato box still plugged in via USB, you should be able to see the standard Scratch Live view displaying the visual representation of two turntables.

And that’s it. A nice fresh install of optimised Windows XP, with the latest version of Scratch Tools and the drivers installed on all ports. You should really be ready to take on the world.

Serato Configuration

I’m not going to talk too much about Serato configuration, the Serato manual does a good job of that. There are, however, two really important options that you can enable/disable depending on the resources on your machine. If you setup everything as the above article suggests, and you are still experiencing USB dropouts – you need to go into your settings and make sure that the “Auto Build Overviews” and also the “Hi-Fi Sampler” settings are both unchecked. They really can make a big difference to the performance of the laptop. You should also read the aforementioned Serato manual from cover to cover, at least 10 times, because I find something new every time I do.

Disclaimer

I’ve never had to add anything like this to an article I have crafted – but as I stated at the very beginning, I am assuming you have some technical knowledge before you dive in and do any of this. You can post me your laptop to fix if you break it, with a letter complaining that it was all my fault – but expect to see both items for sale on ebay within a few days. In other words – if you are unsure, don’t do it, because it’s just too difficult to troubleshoot.