The Lost Art of DJ RE-MIXING (Part 2)

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The Lost Art of DJ RE-MIXING (Part 2)

[Article Continued from Part 1]

Two months after that night out, I get a call from the deejay of that club. He apologizes for taking so long to get back to me. "I was busy touring, and couldn't get back to Miami until now." I didn't remember at first, then he told me,"I'm the over-paid, over-rated DJ you told off." Now I recall calling him that. It seems he is taking me up on my offer to show him how to deejay like me!! I'll show him the basics, only the basics, because I am an original, can't be duplicated. He won't understand that until I am through with him.

We agree to meet at the club he was to play at that night. It was called SPACE, so in the middle of a Friday afternoon I head to downtown Miami. This place is huge, an old warehouse, many different rooms. No-one there except me and him, and a guy cleaning up. It is here, that this guy is about to learn how to remix. First I needed some records. I went through them, picked up about twenty records, most of them over 130 BPM. Of all the records I chose, there was only one from 2005, most were oldies that I knew very well. I would do this as a way of passing the torch, I wasn't getting compensated, and that is usually against my religion. First rule of a real deejay, you only do it when you get paid for it. No freebies. This was my first CHARITY case since 1985!

When PAUL (that's a good name) came, I found out that he was prepared. He had a lap-top that he connected to the mixer. Then he connected a smaller device to the lap-top. And then an iPod to that device. He was seriously into this. I liked that, it shows interest. But in reality, he wants to do something that only the GREAT ones were capable of, and he really has to work at it, and meeting with me ONCE won't make him an EXPERT. I had told him that on the phone when he called. I advised him to record it, and listen to it constantly. He did me one better. He also brought a cam-camera to get what I was going to do on digital video! The guy was smarter then I thought.

I started by explaining that first, you have to be a good deejay, competent enough to mix records on beat. A MUST if you even attempt a re-mix. How can you get a record mixed on beat? You play one, cue up the headphones on the next record. You make sure they are the same BPM or at least close enough that your PITCH CONTROL on the turntable can compensate for different speeds. You find the beat, start counting them, come up with the measure. Now you can synchronize the two, and attempt the mix. Sounds easier then it is. The KEY is getting those beats to sound as one clear beat, no excess sounds. It has to sound as ONE record, no extra bass or echo. Precision is very important. That is why I always played with the digital Technic turntables, the one whose pitch control was a button that added or subtracted percentages of a beat.

Remixing can be done with almost any turntable that has pitch control, but I always found the Technics SL-1600 (I think that was the right number, it might be the 1500 or 1400 or maybe the 1100) to be the best, most accurate turntable for PERFECT re-mixes and mixes. The mixer really doesn't matter, as long as it is properly equalized.

I grab a record from the ones I choose earlier. It happens to be HEAVEN MUST HAVE SENT YOU by Bonnie Pointer. The one with the big church bells that chime through-out the song, but especially at the beginning and end. Time to SHOW OFF! The bells start ringing through the empty club, he turned on the light-show. It made me feel like it was 1980 all over again. I quickly cued up the intro again, when the measures lined up, I slid it in, then went to the other turntable and did it again. Then repeated that intro for a minute or two, That is when I played the middle of the song. Bonnie was singing, when I started the Bells all over again over the top of her vocals. It sounds great, like one record playing. Paul is busy with his camera taping my every move. Watching when and where in the record I use to remix. I explain that every one is different, and every re-mix can be different. There isn't a set standard of rules to LIVE remixing, it lets you be creative, do whatever you want to do with the song. Go wherever you want to take it.

As Bonnie Pointer sings away, I just grabbed ANY record. I happen to select SEARCHIN by Hazell Dean. I take one twelve inch record, and start in the middle of the song, a part where there is a good percussion break, that features a clapping sound. As Bonnie's song goes into its break, I had sped it up a little, and slowed down Hazell a little as well. The beats were in sync. The clapping came on over the bells perfectly, I slowly eased one song in, and the other out. Grabbing my second copy of Hazell, I returned to normal speed, and started from the beginning, right on beat, right on measure, SEARCHIN began anew. Then I followed it two beats apart, and played just the 2nd and 4th beat. It changed the complexion of the song totally. Paul's eyes opened as he saw and heard what sounded like a studio edit, LIVE and in person.

The show continued as I put breaks in over the top, then PHASED it. He had a hard time filming everything, it was happening too fast for him to understand what I was doing. I grabbed him, and made him put on the head phones. He listened to what I was listening to, he put that together with what I was doing. He could see and hear me now. He seemed to understand."You try it" I said. He refused at first, but I explained that he had to attempt it if he wanted to learn. With a second SEARCHIN on, he tried to duplicate what I did, but kept messing up the longer the record played. He could get it, but for less than eight beats. I showed him how to quickly mix out before he went off beat. Eight beats, then cut. He tried that easy remix, and pulled it off! He was ecstatic, screaming out loud in happiness that he actually performed a LIVE remix!!

I grabbed any record again, it was a VOYAGE record, the one that has the Arabian sounds in it, the chanting was where I was heading. After getting them lined up, On Hazell Dean's SEARCHIN, it has a great break, almost at the end, It has lots of clapping as well. Put those together, and mixed out to VOYAGE. Now lets remember that LP, it was full of remix opportunities, and I started going from one song to another, then back to the original again. I remixed and bounced all over the LP to the point, that he was losing track of what I was doing. I slowed down, showed him exactly where and when I was remixing the song. He tried it, he didn't mess it up, but was a long way from being any good at it.

Now this guy Paul has a lot of remixes to his credit, all done on a computer or in a studio. He loved what I was showing him, and now understood the REAL meaning of a LIVE remix! It took a lot of talent and practice to achieve what many from my generation did. He thought it was "cool". It is, it has always been. Back in the day, deejays would come see me, not for my mixing, but for my many remixes. They loved what I did. So did the dancers. The power I had over the floor was a rush, better then a hit of great cocaine. This was the feeling that PAUL was feeling, and he still sucked!!

Finally, I put on Musique's PUSH PUSH IN THE BUSH!! Here I showed off in spectacular fashion. Going back and forth, from break to break. Then putting one copy four beats behind, and playing solely the first and third beat. It was a different song now. Then I played it ONE BEAT apart in the middle of the break. I was like a painter with a paintbrush, going back and forth as fast as my fingers could move. The horns on PUSH PUSH IN THE BUSH, now sounded like keyboards playing something totally different instead of what they originally sounded like. It was enough, I explained that I just wanted to show him what a real DISCO DEEJAY sounded like. I told him that only lots of practice could help him do what I do, but that he has to know his music so well, he can change it, and still make it sound great. That is the ART of The REMIX. Taking a song, changing it to the point that it doesn't sound like the version that people always listen to. My versions were always a REMIX, performed LIVE. An ART that appears lost to today's deejays.

I think there is too much technology, it has made this generation of deejays lazy. Not in the class of an average deejay from my generation. There should be someone that can combine the past with today's advancements to give us the BEST DEE JAY ever. But like we all know, that guy doesn't exist. As for Paul, he asked me why I didn't do remixes like JELLYBEAN, or Jim Burgess and the like. "You have the knowledge and the talent to do that." I tried my best to explain, that the ART of a LIVE remix can't be reproduced, it is a happening that only happens that one time. Each version I played was always different. I explained that in studios they always did a re-mix with tape machines and the like. No record company would allow me to do a remix LIVE with three turntables, and after all, that was/is the way I remixed, with VINYL only. After all, I am The VYNIL JUNKIE. I am very sad to report to you, that live DJ remixing is a lost art.

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