There has been a
long standing battle in the hip hop dj world between what’s been considered
“real djing” versus “digital djing”, and there are djs who stand on both sides
of the fence on this decade long issue.
Vinyl records have been equally as important as the turntable itself in
the hip-hop world. Ever since the
inception of the Technic 1200 turntable in the late 1970s, hip-hop djs have
used only vinyl for their amazing party rocking events for years.
That all changed
around 2004, when a New Zealand company called Rane introduced a digital dj
software program called Serato Scratch Live Serato Scratch Live.
Serato had already been around since the late 1990s, but the Scratch
Live element brought a completely new twist on how djs manipulated sound with
vinyl records. I remember first hearing
about this program around 2006 when I was an undergrad at the University of
Colorado-Denver.
A fellow dj
classmate of mine told me about a program that uses mp3 files in the same way
vinyl has been used. I came from the
vinyl area and this sounded too good to be true, because of how new and
innovative that this idea was at that time.
I remember my friend taking me to his house so I could see this “Serato”
for myself, because I was just too skeptical about djing with mp3s on
turntables. In a dj’s mind, playing with
anything besides vinyl was absolute blasphemy in the highest form, and I was
determined to never let digital take over my dj talents.
Once I had overcome
my prejudice about this program, I eventually bought my own and began
experimenting with it at home. This was
a phenomenal experience for me, because I had been used to vinyl records all of
my life. I had only dealt with mp3s for
a few years before this on my home computer.
I also had been used to carrying 6-8 milk crates full of records up and
down stairs, hallways etc. for 10-15 years anyway.
To make a long
story short, this program actually made djing fun again for many people, and it
made travelling with your equipment much easier to haul around. Now all you need in order to dj a gig is to
have your turntables, mixer, laptop, and Serato itself.
There are still
some djs who refuse to use it, and even some that feel you have to earn it
through using vinyl records first. I
have included a video by a famed hip hop producer named DJ Premier who started
off with vinyl, but has since began using Serato Scratch Live as well. I agree 100% with the comments that he had
made in the video and I hope that others will understand vinyl’s importance in hip-hop.
At some point,
audio and digital would have had to meet in the music world, but I think
overall that this program was a blessing to djs worldwide. At the same time, there has been some
backlash from purists (myself included), who felt that “new school djs” needed
to know the history of djing before using Serato. There is unfortunately a misconception about
djs now, and that all you need to dj is a laptop and headphones.
Serato has been
both a blessing and a curse at the same time, but regardless of others views on
its worth, I am happy to now be a digital dj more than ever.
Sources: http://serato.com/about
http://hiphopwired.com/2011/10/20/dj-premier-breaks-down-vinyl-vs-serato-video/
0 comments:
Post a Comment