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is Chillout the hardest music to mix? (and easiest!)
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sundrop
IsraTrance Junior Member
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Posted : Sep 18, 2005 02:06
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i was thinking this after making my new mix.
ok not the hardest. but one of the hardest...
i say this because, unlike psytrance, where most tracks fall within 140-150 bpm range, it is not too hard to pick another track to mix with. similar with house, dnb, and trance... the majority of tracks are all the same tempo.
on the chillout side, it is hard to find 3 tracks in the same BPM! songs range from 60-170 BPM, its all over the map! so its hard to mix these chillout tunes (the ones with hihats and beats) with each other. even two songs that u think will sound great together, cant be mixed, because one is 95 and the other is 130... or is that possible and i cant figure it out... hehe
i also say chillout is the easiest, because the ambient sections of tunes are so fun and simple to mix. so being a chillout DJ is like a double-edge sword! both impossibly hard and super easy!  |
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blueOrb
IsraTrance Full Member
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Posted : Sep 18, 2005 07:30
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apart from beat matching .....i feel the tracks u put into ur set also need a lot of thinking and feelings ....
atleast i spend a lot of time listening to my music before i decide what to play and what not
yes i agreee its like a double edge sword .....
 New mixes on
http://soundcloud.com/blueorb
Older Mixes on
http://blueorb.podomatic.com/ |
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Goblim
IsraTrance Full Member
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Posted : Sep 18, 2005 11:52
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Also not all chillout tracks have a 4/4 beat, which makes mixing some tracks rather impossible 
Ut ameris, amabilis esto. |
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Chlamydia Jones
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Posted : Sep 18, 2005 20:29
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1. BPM range 1- true, chillout BPM range is much wider than dance music, although I wouldn't go all the way above 100 BPM, since then the BPM is divided by 2 (dub will be counted as 70 BPM and not 140, etc'...)
2. BPM range 2- the "7%=1bpm" rule in CDJs doesn't count in low BPMs, something that narrows the ability to match different BPMs. If in trance music you can (technically) match 145 and 135 BPMs, in low BPMs like 70-80 the difference would be much bigger, and the tempo range of the devices cannot reach it: if it takes +2.1% to change a 140bpm track to 143bpm (3bpm difference), it will many times take +30% to change an 80bpm track to 83. And the 7% is never accurate so far from 140bpm (the zero point for this rule).
3. non-4x4 tracks CAN be easily mixed, if you know how. as long as there is a fixed BPM to a track, it can be 'beat-mixed' (I'd rather call it Groovemixing, since you don't focus on any beat).
4. depending on what you define as chillout - if chill for you is psy-ambient, then slow intro->outro fading is enough. Once you start playing mainstream chill (like lounge grooves, songs, etc'...), it all goes out the window and you need to start working for your living.
5. The biggest problem in mixing chill (for moi) is the length of the tracks. I'm not talking about psy-ambient, I'm talking about the mainstream chillout where tracks can be sometimes shorter than 4 minutes. minus at least 1 minute for in-mix, and you have max 2 minutes to sync the track (since its at least 1 minute outmix...). Tough.
I find it much more satisfying to play chillout, both technically and professionally.
Love,
Chlamydia |
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blueOrb
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Posted : Sep 19, 2005 06:23
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patty on Hydro
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Posted : Sep 24, 2005 06:21
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Goblim
IsraTrance Full Member
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Posted : Oct 11, 2005 13:15
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Quote:
| non-4x4 tracks CAN be easily mixed, if you know how. as long as there is a fixed BPM to a track, it can be 'beat-mixed' (I'd rather call it Groovemixing, since you don't focus on any beat). |
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Then I wanna see you upload a successful mix of "Shpongle - ...and the Day Turned to Night" and a 4/4 track. Have fun  Ut ameris, amabilis esto. |
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Chlamydia Jones
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Posted : Oct 11, 2005 18:28
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well, technically it is possible (82-83 BPM), but it will sounds real bad, because any 4x4 track doesn't fit structure-wise and conceptualy to a track like this which is written as 3/4 track.
A track can have a fixed BPM yet be unmixable because it simply doesn't sound good with any other track (like OTT, for instance, which is extremely easy to mix technically, yet so hard to mix conceptualy because he has his own sound and approach).
playing chill out is about enhancing the existing atmosphere and not about 'who's the DJ with the biggest balls in the hall' (as opposite to main stage DJs...). Knowing what is right and fit is more important than showing off with your DJ skills.
C |
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(val)Liam
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Posted : Oct 14, 2005 21:50
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anyone try pitchmatching to beatless ambient? I was trying that while making one mix and it's probably the best mix I've done... only one was dead on but even trying made the tracks fit in very well... and the transistion from the one I got dead on was awesome |
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punkah
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Posted : Oct 14, 2005 22:15
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i agree with most things you`ve said chlamydia.
but non 4/4 bpm or even some 4/4 can`t be mixed, even with a fixed bpm. why?
hihats, cymbals, snares (wich sometimes can`t be "killed" in the 3way EQ of the mixer) are sometimes uncompatible. and I mean totally. even if tha Kick (BDrum) is beatsynced, you`ll have a total mess in the rest of the drumkit, since any song with a slightly more creative drum pattern (very common in chill) will probably be very unique and can be in a uncompatuble pattern to that song you wanna mix it wid. so you`ll consider cutting the high and mids to eliminate that annoying hihats & cymbals...forget. lounge/chill/dub/ambient Kicks use a lot of mids on it sometimes. depending on the situation you`ll ruin not only the kick with that attitude, but also the lead sounds.
Productionwise, i can compose two straight 4/4-78bmp-dubsteppah who simply won`t get along, no matter the way I Eq both tracks, even if I throw them in a software with supanatural mixing capabilities like Abbleton Live with top notch parametric EQ. With a mixer, forget...
As far as psychedelia goes, some mixes are virtually impossible due to the complex rhythm productions and individuality of the songs.
more commercial, lounge tunes are usually way easyer to mix (beat matched or not) apart from the short duration time, since their "sections" are also shorter. And by being commercial, they usually use some very predictable structure, wich makes very easy to sync them and to control them.
Otts (not that) weird structure as well as many other psy focused artists (entheogenic, shpongle to satay with the most well known) feature longer, more orchestrical-like sections... longer breaks, longer endings. that can be a pain in the ass sometimes. saying that intro>outro fading mix is enough is totally equivocated. one can do that and it can sound sublime, but if one decides to beatmatch 4/4 fixed bpm psy-ambient-chill , weel, its way harder than what you could possibly imagine, simply because its way more elaborated and structurally complex than grooves or mainstream (bad word) chillout
but maybe is all a matter of style. 
blueOrb, keep da good work.
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Goblim
IsraTrance Full Member
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Posted : Oct 15, 2005 11:54
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Quote:
| On 2005-10-11 18:28, Chlamydia Jones wrote:
well, technically it is possible (82-83 BPM), but it will sounds real bad, because any 4x4 track doesn't fit structure-wise and conceptualy to a track like this which is written as 3/4 track. |
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That's exactly what I meant. If something can't be mixed and sound good, then it can't, and shouldn't be mixed at all. Isn't this quite obvious? That is the whole point of mixing! So unless you wanted to make a really bad mix, you were wrong. Next time be more humble. Ut ameris, amabilis esto. |
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Chlamydia Jones
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Posted : Oct 15, 2005 12:21
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Quote:
| So unless you wanted to make a really bad mix, you were wrong. Next time be more humble. |
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won't happen, since I will probably never going to use a Shpongle track in one of my sets...
Again, this is not a pissing contest (you boys...) - this track CAN be beat-mixed, yet it is pointless to do so. Many other tracks have the same approach - you can technically mix them but they simply do not fit melodically to the incomming track (as suggested by punkah). This by the way goes also for trance mixing - its not enough to know how to beatmatch, it is also about knowing which 2 tracks fit each other (like trying to mix a rolling bassline track <_ --_> with a bouncing bassline track <_ - _>). Technically you can mix a 135 deep danish minimal progressive track (like Cojurios One, Fabel etc') to a 144 full on track by (lets say) GMS or Silicon Sound - the question is how would it sound? probably sux, since the full melodies of the full on simply cannot be fitted to cross with the deep emptiness of the minimal danish progressive style...
love,
Chlamydia |
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Pax
IsraTrance Junior Member
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Posted : Oct 17, 2005 07:20
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What about a beatless set?
I've never heard a truly ambient, beatless chill out set. Someday I want to try playing one, just a really beautiful, lush, spacious
array of tunes..and stuff alot of people who
like the chill stuff might not have heard in
a chill space, if at all:
Steve Roach, CBL, a bit of Eno, Global Communications, Amorphous Androgynous, Thom Brennan, Vir Unis-that stuff. |
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sundrop
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
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Posted : Oct 18, 2005 03:14
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an ambient chillout set with no beats... quite tough! altho definitely possible.
the ambient music that is happy and uplifting is very rare. i find most ambient is either "epic" or "sad".
i would be interested to hear what you guys consider to be chill ambient tunes! |
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droozi
IsraTrance Junior Member
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Posted : Oct 18, 2005 17:55
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I have found that sometimes mixing a 4/4 with a 3/4 can be done esily with cut mixing - although Im sure a whole bunch of you dont like this form of mixing - but it seems to work for me most times - there can also be a mixing of a 4/4 to a 3/4 or vice versa during the outro stage of the out track with the staring beat of the in track (this seems to work from me - but i havent really got other peoples opinion about sets that i thinked i mixed well) But I do agree i have been spinnin full on for years and only recently got into chill out - to be honest i have to spend days/weeks and sometimes months thinking of which tracks and the sequence of these tracks for a set that i may be playing at a party. I also find using the jet function of a CDJ can help and give the sphongle effect of mixing tracks - when they are going from chillout to more of their south american style of music (i hope this makes sense).
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Close your eyes, take a deep breath and chill |
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