dj's: do you "program" your sets?

[J Who]

there hasn't been a whole lot of topics flying around in here lately, so i remembered one i saw on another message board about a month ago that was a really good one.

do you plan out (program) your sets track for track, just get up there and do whatever comes to mind, or a little of both?

please read everyones comments in here. this ended up being a really good post where ALOT of good points/ideas were made before and i think it will do the same, if not better in here.

J-ME

[J Who]

well, i think i do a little of both. i have alot of tracks that i buddy up together cause they mix very well, or i have tricks that i use with them. i know what tracks i want to use and use them. i might drop one or two of them if i am not feeling them for instance, and then again, i might add one or two of them if i do happen to be feeling it at the time. and all of this goes hand in hand with the crowd too. watching their responses and knowing where you want to take them with your set, and knowing how to get them there.

J-ME

[TAMARA]

nope...... I bring my records.... and play what fits the energy. I'm a firm believer that 90 % of being a dj is feeling the energy of the music and the energy of the crowd (wether the "crowd" is 2 or 75897185797176) and making them work together and follow eachother. I couldnt tell ya which records I played last night, or at the last party, or in what order.... I kinda more feel em than hear em if that makes any sense to anyone......

I have an "ideal" 3 hour set.... but its more of genre flows and what I think I can do with the people's energy, not specific records. Even if I DID have it all planned out, record by record, I'd change it in a heartbeat if it didnt feel right.

Do I make any sense?

......... do I ever???.........

hee hee

much luv

[phoenix]

it makes sense when you hear her play...

[SirMarkis]

I take two record bags when I play. I never plan out a set unless its for a cd etc etc but when you play out, I feel "programming" your set live by what the crowd is telling you is a must. I usually think about 3 or 4 records a head of myself by what the crowd is telling me and how I feel. Sometimes I start hard, drop the energy in the middle and let them have it at the end. sometimes I stay hard the entire set and sometimes I just play the groovy shit. It all depends on what time, the venue, the crowd, and ofcourse how i'm feeling at the particular time.

If you ever hear me play a full set of banging techno, it's because someone or something has pissed me off that day and im taking my agression out on the crowd. When that has happened inj the past, it's never been a disaapointment so I carry about 20 techno records just incase.

usually, i will bring several different styles of music, usually a couple of hours of each. Since the average set is about an hour, this gives me plenty of playroom. I usually try to bring a set of house, trance, breaks or 2-step, D&B, and usually about 30 - 45 minutes worth of hip-hop, that can be mixed with the D&B if needed. I usually try to feel out the crowd, i may know every record in my bag, but they are in no particular order, actually they are usually out of order For me programming seems to take more away from a mix than help it. After listening to it 8 times or whatever, i am bored with it, and it know longer holds it's flavor. I guess i think that it is better to just know the sound of your records so that you can adjust to different situations.

Well, as a downtempo DJ, I usually play last at parties in the chill rooms, so I almost always know what the crowd "wants to hear VS needs to hear" based on what the main room is spinning. I bring two bags with me, with an ecclectic mix of downtempo/ambient genre's.
I NEVER program a live mix. By 4 AM the kidz can tell if you're spinning from your soul or not. BUT I DO program my mix Cd's. There's a big difference betwen the two though.
BUT....
Each DJ is different and unique in how HE/SHE plays their set. MY advice is to approach spinning out however it makes you comfortable. But never forget to put your heart and soul into the mix......

-Me

[Logic Theorist]

I play around at home a lot and usually have a large number of 3 record mini sets in my head, then put those together depending on what's going on with the crowd. Garage is pretty hard to play completely off the cuff, you end up overlapping vocals and whatnot, and in knowing the records really well I usually end up with some idea of what's gonna go together, hence have some sort of plan. But I don't plan out a whole hour or anything and have a dozen or so sets I -could- play. I personally prefer to play more than an hour, because typically it takes me 30 min just to get into a groove. Hour and a half or 2 is perfect for a 2step set, and I like playing atmospheric dnb and downtempo for about 3-4 hours.

Besides, try planning your hour when you're playing twice a week. That's a full time job.

[nastinator]

i dont exactly spin regularly at clubs or parties but any sets i have spun i usually step into them knowing the first 5-6 records i'm going to spin. I want to try to set the mood not feel the croud out. If i can get the mood set and everybody hype in the first 5 records i feel the groove and just take it from there, but likewise after the 4-5 records is played and people aint feeling me i will change it up and go another route to try to get the people invovled in the music. Even any mixed cd's i've tried to make that is usually how it turns out, i plan out the beginning of the set and take it from there. Like some one said it just takes way to damn long to try to plan out an enire set. Since i'm just making promo cd's i want it to be pretty much how it would be live. however if i were trying to sell a cd i would most definately plan it all out. I would sure be sick of it when i'm done but i know others hearing for the first time would dig it

[wes lee]

Oops, posting under wrong profile. See following post.

-Matt

[High Maintenance (4peace)]

I never have a freakin clue what I'm going to play. There are several reasons for this, one of has been mentioned in this thread already, and that is I think it is very important to "read" your crowd and be able to adapt on the fly. If your set is completely programmed out and the crowd is not digging you 3 mixes into your set, what are you going to do? If you stick to your plan, you may end up with a dancefloor of crickets.

Secondly, I think it's more enjoyable and thrilling to fly by the seat of your pants. When you have been spinning records as long as I have, you get bored early on with just playing the same thing every time in the same order, so you begin "testing" yourself. Pushing yourself to the limit. It's exciting to walk that fine line of not knowing what's next. It's not challenging or fun to me to know what I am going to play before I play it as it limits my performance. I love not knowing when the break is coming or when the vocal is going to drop. I enjoy making my own break. Tamara said something in her post I can relate to and that is that I usually don't remember half of what I played after I'm done with my set. I mix at about a 2 1/2 minute clip so I don't have a lot of time to think about what I am going to play next so I just let my gut instinct and the crowd's reactions determine what road I follow. I dig through my bag so fast, it's like a thief going through a jewelry drawer until I find that one gem I just know will mix in perfectly and add to the vibe. After one of my sets, you'll see white dust covers all over the place because I didn't have time to put them back in the sleeve and it usually takes me half an hour to go back through my bag and put the records back in their correct sleeve. The life expectancy of a 4-Peace record is about a month and it usually ends up so scratched up that it becomes unplayable.

The other reason I don't program my sets is because I don't usually have time to listen to the records ahead of time. I stay pretty busy and I do have a pretty involved social life outside of DJ'ing which includes family time and lots of video gaming. Owning my own record store allows me the priviledge of being able to play lots of new records everytime out. However, I usually am only able to listen to most of them briefly in the store before they end up in my bag and often times I'll just grab stuff off the shelves as I'm heading out the door. I tend to learn the tracks by playing them live, not the other way around. I take a pretty big bag of records when I play cause I like to have options. Sometimes before a gig, if I have time, I'll dig through my crate to see what's in there and many times I'll find something that's been in their 2 months that I have never played.

Now don't get me wrong. I don't think a pre-programmed set is a bad thing. I did it way back in the day before I had the confidence to just go with the flow. When you are just starting out, you are usually full of nervouseness and/or anxiety and having a programmed set gives you a peace of mind as your number one concern is not screwing up. Once again as with most things, it's just a personal choice that makes you the most comfortable and gives you the most pleasure. There is really no wrong or right way.

[Funatik]

Whenever I play I never program a set, and like 4Peace says, after I'm done I dont really know what I just played. I know one of the things thats helps me ALOT when I play is the fact that I know every single record I play, I know all the breaks, change-ups, intros, outros, everything-backwards and forwards.

Whenever I first get a new vinyl I'll listen thru the whole track I like the most and basically memorize it, luckily this comes easy for me. So whenever I play it I know exactly where its gonna break and change, that really helps when I'm playing.

And I'm usually thinking at least 1 track ahead of the one I'm about to cue up. I'm pretty good at matching beats quick and that just gives me more time to pick out a record, so that I can mix on the fly. And I still practice alot, not as much as I did when I first started but enough to feel very comfortable on the tables at a party. The more you practice the easier playing on the fly will be.

But remember that programming/not-programming IS a personal preference and in DJing THERE ARE NO RULES!!!!!!!!!

I tape my sets, later replay them at the party, and "lipsynch"

[Alienswede]

Much like most others have said on this thread I don't plan my sets out unless it's for a CD. I'll have a general idea of what I want to play but that can change depending on how the crowd reacts. Much like The Logic Theorist I have a bunch of "mini-sets" of 2-3 records in my head that I know go really well together but I wouldn't consider that planning at all.

I also like to push my limits in mixing but not having played out much yet I tend to leave most of the experimentation at home I like to try and mix really weird combinations of tracks to see if it can be done well. One such example is here. The interesting part starts at around 3:00

[Jobe]

I let the records come to me. It makes it more interesting and it keeps you on your toes. If I planned a set, I'd clear my floor.

Don't fake tha funk!