The Songs Not the Speakers
Had a good DJ set on Saturday at a private resort outside of Austin, Horseshoe Bay, about an hour away. Super rainy in Austin, but it wasn’t raining there, which was great.
The mix was ’90s hip-hop, some reggae, deep house, ’80s—kind of more of my tailgate thing, feeling out the crowd.
I’m doing it again this weekend, and I’m definitely going to do a semi-modern deep house set, truly background music for this.
One thing I did realize is that my mixing was a little dodgy. I went back to Denon instead of Algoriddim djay, and I really do enjoy djay way more at this point.
I did a deep dive this morning on what it’s going to take to put backup music on the iPad, so I’m not streaming. Turns out I own a lot more deep house than I thought. We’ll probably sprinkle in some streaming, but mainly I’ll be playing downloaded tracks, so I don’t have to worry about anything pausing or not loading.
This will be the iPad mini with the MixTour Pro, which has proven to be really great. So hopefully, a lot of practice time on the decks this week for this set.
You’re just trying to elevate, give a feeling. I think at 3 o’clock, with everyone leaving the pool around 4:30, you’re just trying to create a vibe that holds people there for as long as you can.
But I’m really going to lean into the Algoriddim thing for the rest of the summer, because I think that’s the way forward. And obviously, my phone is in my pocket as a backup. So, no DOA.
At the end of the day, the lesson is that no one cares what you’re using. They just care what tracks you play.
And I would even say no one cares about the speakers you’re using, because they set up a little Alto mixer and Alto Busker speakers for me this weeken. They’re tiny. They’re a total copy of the Bose speaker, and they sounded great.
No subwoofer, no problem.
Cheap and cheerful speakers work.
It is all about the music and the tracks and the intent you’re putting behind them.
That’s it.
Don’t kid yourself.