DJs Spinning Those Hard Drives

Mipmap writes "Ben Kirkendoll leaves the records at home in favor of his iPods, Apple Computer's disk-based music player, which he simply plugs into an audio system's mixer. He's part of a small but growing number of DJs who have turned to MP3 music files for their accessibility and convenience..."

Comments

Access time and capacity

[yerricde]

Is a hard drive really that much smarter than a cd-r?

It's easier to access multiple portions of a HD at the same time because seeking on HD is much faster than seeking on CD. This is important unless your device has a very large RAM cache to load the next song you're trying to beatmatch to.

A single CD stores 8 hours of 192 kbps Ogg audio. If your set is larger than that (one copy for each Ogg CD player), you have to carry multiple CDs and possibly swap after every song, which brings me to the next part:

Unlike a CD-R, a HD has an airtight seal between scratches and your data.

I could be talking out my

Not important.

[Krapangor]

At the very high sound levels in clubs a human ear cannot distinguish any longer between the high frequency pitchs which would be affected be low quality encoding.
Additionally the standard audience of a club is usually exposed to high sound levels over longer periods therefore having a reduced ability of hearing these high frequencies.
BTW: This also affects the DJs, you can check this by making a spectrum analysis of the standard techno/club stuff on MTV. You'll notice extremely repetitive/monotone patterns in the high frequency bands. This is were the club saying: "I'm addicted to bass" comes from.

Re:I hope they use some high-quality encoding

[Lord Apathy]

We got one radio station here in Birmingham that is already using MP3. Nothing like driving down the road and hearing a MP3 artifact.

Re:You don't need DJ's is you go to crap clubs....

[damien_kane]

Let me know when you can beatmix with iPods. :D Oh wait, you can't!

You're right, you can't beatmix with an iPod.
with a laptop, and two usb soundcards like this offering from CreativeLabs you can do beatmixing, and quite well I might add.
There are plugins available for winamp for pitch/temp control (run multisession, each out to a different soundcard) or even better use professional mixing software, i.e. something from SonicFoundry (like Acid, or Vegas)
You setup the two extigys as separate buses and you can do mixes straight to your board (at which point you add your analogue filters and panning). You use the internal built-in soundcard on the laptop for your monitor. You can do some really amazing stuff.
Don't knock it till u've tried it... although I'm assuming since you're completely clueless on the available digital alternatives, you haven't even tried oldskool vinyl.


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Video games don't affect childrens' minds... If Pac-Man had affected us, we would all be running around in darkened rooms and hallways, eating magic pills, and listening to repetetive electronic music now, wouldn't we?

This article was not interesting at all...

[steppin_razor_LA]

I hate to be a troll, but I'm a little bummed this article made it to slashdot. I read it last night on Yahoo and was only impressed with it's lack of newsworthyness.

The recent Slashdot article on Digital DJ Turntable was far more interesting.

Lets recap this article. Some people have figured out that you can put a bunch of music on a computer or ipod and play that at events. Wow! You say this technology allows you to put together a list of songs and then play then in a row one after another???

Look at who they interviewed:

But Kirkendoll, who calls himself "The Podiatrist," was hired for his collection of music and penchant for feeling the vibe of a crowd, not his ability to mix or scratch.

In other words, this is the guy who plays music at your wedding.

What the story should be about is about some of the developments in technology that allow *real DJs* to perform instead of vinyl. When I say *real DJs", I mean those that perform at clubs that use beatchmatching, effects, and other techniques to create a fluid music listening experience.

AtomixMP3 has been making some good progress at allowing people to use MP3s like turntables. Unfortunately, it still doesn't have anything that allows DJs to be able to "see" the CD the same way real DJs can apparently visually check out the grooves on the record.

Re:Not important: Not always

[Simonetta]

Perhaps soon the legal issues will weigh over the artistic issues. The RIAA is working to make every public performance illegal and then decide whether to prosecute according to how much money you feed back to them after the commission of your 'crime'.
In these situations, it's a lot easier to run away from the police with 4000 songs in storage medium the size of a video cassette than to try and make a quick exit carrying two turntables and 4000 albums.

gdam (open source mp3 dj software)

[pmineiro]

that article mentioned some commercial software due out by the end of the year to make dj-ing with mp3s easy.

time to shamelessly plug gdam an open source mp3 dj-ing app some friends of mine have been hacking for over three years now, which imho is totally awesome. using gtk and runs under linux, os/x, and maybe even windows (don't know about that last one for sure).

one of the main developers is a dj in the burgeoning new york electronic dj scene.

check it out.

Re:Who doesn't have talent?

[bad-badtz-maru]

"Commercial-grade" sound systems, such as those typically found in dance clubs, generally reproduce the music so poorly that not only can you not hear the difference between vinyl, CD, or MP3 you can barely recognize any track as being anything other than "something with screaming highs and bone-shaking bottom". A club isn't exactly an environment for critical listening and I seriously doubt that anyone at an average club could hear the difference between a CD and a 128 bit MP3.

maru

Don't tell the RIAA

[eldub1999]

Since the music is being used in a public performace, I'm sure he pays the appropriate ASCAP and BMC licensing fees...