Dirk van den Heuvel (dirkv@groovedis.com)
Thu, 9 Sep 1999 19:27:32 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Turner [mailto:mturner@netcom.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 09, 1999 5:34 PM
To: acid-jazz@ucsd.edu
Subject: Re: 1.Topic to chat about
(much deleted..)
success of a set. Beat-matching of hip hop or house or techno can
definitely ENHANCE a DJ set, but I think anyone who feels they have
to beat-match their entire set should seriously think about expanding
their musical palette to include a broader range of music.
This reminds me of a little dispute I had with some deejays here in Chicago
years ago: Back in the early days of acid jazz in Chi-town (around 89 to 91)
I used to spin a very eclectic set which included jazzy house (ala Incognito
or BNH), rare groove and funk, hip-hop, acid jazz and early trip-hop tracks.
To me it was most important to pick songs I thought worked well together and
often that would prevent me from beatmixing big sections of my sets. I would
beatmix some tracks and some I would cut in or just fade them in and out
radio dj style. At the time I was co-hosting an acid jazz radio show in
addition to spinning out so radio dj fading in and out was second nature and
didn't bother me or (more importantly) my audience and crowds. They were
into the music and the transitions were smooth and appropriate and they
didn't care if many of the cuts weren't beatmixed.
Anyway the dispute came with a bunch of so-called acid jazz deejays (some
quite famous now) who would insist on beatmixing EVERYTHING. Because of this
they broke into two camps: 1) the house deejays who played mainly disco and
jazzy house cuts so they could beatmix everything around 120 (no RAD, LOVE
TKO, TERRY CALLIER, GALLIANO, etc would ever get played in these sets) and
2) the hip-hop deejays that would play mainly hip-hop and trip hop and some
jazz/funk cuts. And you'd NEVER hear an intro to a song if it didn't have a
beat 'cause they couldn't beatmatch it!
When beatmixing makes you second guess your song choices and programming
decisions I think we have the cart pulling the horse. If I want to play
MARLENA SHAW after BNH because they go together but the beats don't match
(do we really need MARLENA at +8 anyway??) I say fuck it, I'll play it
anyway and beatmixing be damned (for the moment). I think beatmixing has
resulted in a lot of (so-called) acid jazz club deejays playing less
adventurous (and less interesting) sets and the club going public often
getting a skewed and incomplete view of the diversity that makes up this
music.
And yes this is somewhat unique to acid jazz deejaying since it encompasses
such a wide variety of music (and therefore wide variety of tempos and
bpms).
Comments?
Dirk van den Heuvel (dirkv@groovedis.com)
Groove Distribution
www.groovedis.com
Your Guide To The
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