Disc Jockey

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During it is firstborn stages, a DJ’s occupation was a difficult and pricey career option. It required amateurs to buy costly instrumentation that necessitated to be carried along to each event. The development of computer software and hardware proved to be a boon for most businesses. Similarly, getting a DJ became much more elementary with the introduction of a virtual disc jockey.

Virtual disc jockey is a general MP3 mixing software available in the market. It is idealisti for all DJs, from beginners to masters and helps develop great mixes in a short span of time. This recent technical breakthrough is designed to aid mix beats and construct any new rhythm by mixing any queer song with a potpourri of beats. The beat lock feature makes it intellectual software. It may mechanically alter a pitch to match the BPM (beats per minute). The software may speed up or slow down the discs in order to match a rhythm and may proceed to do so with any type of music.

Virtual disc jockey software has a song-positioning feature that helps control a song. Users may click on any portion of a song and listen that portion before they are actually played. A pitch control feature helps modifying the speed of a song. Sample buttons permit users to listen to little tryouts and jingles. The software may be applied expeditiously to develop modern remixes.

The mere mixing of a song in a few minutes does not make a good DJ. It is primary that songs ought to be matched for tempo and beats before being played aloud. Virtual Disc Jockey has made the art of disc jockeying a less sophisticated task and has revolutionized the music scene.


Disc Jockey

From the introductory time a record was played over the airwaves in 1906, to a progressed club economy that totals $3 billion yearly in New York City alone, the DJ has been at the center of general music. Starting as little more than a talking jukebox, the DJ is now a premier entertainer, producer, businessman, and musician in his own right. Superstar DJs, from Junior Vasquez to Sasha and Digweed, command worship and adoration from millions, flying around the globe to earn tens of thousands of dollars for one night’s work. Increasingly, they are replacing live musicians as the central figures of the music industry. In Last Night a DJ Saved My Life, music journalists Bill Brewster and Frank Broughton have written the original comprehensive history of the mysterious and charismatic figure behind the turntables — share obsessive record collector, part crazy scientist, portion intuitive psychologist of the party groove. From England’s rabid Northern Soul scene to the birth of disco in New York, from the sound systems of Jamaica to the scratch wars of early hip-hop in the Bronx, from Chicago house to Detroit techno to London rave, DJs are responsible for most of the substantial changes in music over the past forty years. Drawing on in-depth consultations with DJs, critics, musicians, record executives, and the revelers at numerous of the century’s most legendary parties, Last Night a DJ Saved My Life is not one thing less than the life story of dance music.
  • Amazon Sales Rank: #86312 in Books
  • Published on: 2000-07-01
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Dimensions: 1.20″ h x 5.81″ w x 9.21″ l, 1.03 pounds
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 336 pages
From Publishers WeeklyBeginning with the contention that the disc jockey is “dance music’s most important figure,” Brewster and Broughton persuasively argue that the contemporary DJ is the epitome of the postmodern artisan and that disc jockeys have long influenced the evolution of American musical tastes. Brewster and Broughton’s passionate history is one of barriers and sonic booms, spanning closely 100 years, including nods to pioneers Christopher Stone, Martin Block, Douglas “Jocko” Henderson, Bob “Wolfman Jack” Smith and Alan “Moondog” Freed. Along the lines of Kurt B. Reighley’s recent Looking for the Perfect Beat: The Art and Culture of the DJ, this is an obsessively unabridged and ever-unraveling (the writers will offer updates at www.djhistory.com) chronology of DJs and the musicAnorthern soul, reggae, disco, hip-hop, garage, house and technoAthey have fostered, and, more accurately perhaps, the music that has fostered them. So as not to miss a note, the authors, both former editors at Mixmag USA and contributing writers to The Face, interviewed more than 100 DJs, dancers and scenesters and elicited numerous vibrant, pull-quote anecdotes, in particular in the hip-hop chapters. What comes to light makes sense: readers learn that the DJ is a without doubt or question American invention (Reginald A. Fessenden in 1906), but they came into their own, and into wealth and fame, in Britain (case in point: Paul Oakenfold). Brewster and Broughton’s subtext is refreshing: rather than draw curt lines amid American and British contributions, they show how intimate the countries were in forging a communications phenomenon. (Aug.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.From the Inside FlapThe DJ has been at the center of music history for the last forty years-from the initial time a record was played over the airwaves, through reggae and Northern Soul, the births of disco, hip hop, house, and techno, to the current global underground. The club economy now brings in billions and superstar DJs like Paul Oakenfold and Fatboy Slim are overtaking rock stars in popularity and earning power. Last Night a DJ Saved My Life is the firstborn comprehensive history of the disc jockey, a figure who has revolutionized the way music is conceived, created, and consumed. Drawing on in-depth consultations with the world’s most necessary DJs and the revelers at galore of the century’s most legendary parties, this book is not one thing less than the life story of dance music.

“Brewster and Broughton…have written a lively and–to any individual with a more than casual interest in the history of usual music in the latter half of the 20th century–necessary volume.”–The New York Times Book Review

“A riveting look at record spinning from it is beginnings to the present day, the writers show that the history and art of deejaying makes for a grander and more arousing and attention holding story than one would think….. The book is intricately elaborated and informative, filled with grand themes and historical anecdotes, all leavened with a wiseass humor that keeps the whole thing from getting too pretentious.”–Time Out

“What makes [Last Night a DJ Saved My Life] so good, besides the crisp, lucid writing, is that it also gives a fascinating, episodic history of the jive-talking radio DJs and Parisian discos that traditionalisti the themes that would play out in hip-hop, disco and rave culture.”–Salon

“These British music-mag writers deliver the goods with humor and a basic sense of good storytelling.”–Vibe

“Brewster and Broughton exhibit substantial skill in rendering the meta-story seamless, subtly turning what is basically an oral history, culled from primary consultations and other published sources, into an orchestral piece.”–Hartford Courant

“Very informative…takes you way back into the ‘true roots’ of dance music and hip hop’s culture, then with no problems or difficulties brings you into the future.”–Danny Tenaglia

“This is for anybody who has ever found themselves lost on the dancefloor.”–The Face

“Exhaustive yet entertaining…a definitive history of the disc jockey…. The book lovingly captures a host of compelling stories from each seminal DJ all over the last century…. Energy jumps from the book’s pages.”–iD

“From counterculture to mainstream leisure, the DJ has always been at the heart of clubland…. An illuminating, thoughtful, and perceptive tome.”–Muzik

Excerpts Last Night a DJ Saved My Life:

“Today (no offense to priests and ministers, who try their best), it is the DJ who presides at our festivals of transcendence. Like this witchdoctor, we recognise he’s just a normal guy really–I mean, look at him–but when he wipes away our each and everyday lives with holy drums and sanctified basslines, we are rather prepared to think of him as a god, or at the very least a sacred intermediary, the man who may get the great one to return our calls.

“In a good club, and even in most bad ones, the dancers are celebrating their youth, their energy, their sexuality. They are worshipping life through dance and music. Some worship with the heightened levels of sensing that drugs bring; but most are carried away merely by the music and the humans around them. The DJ is the key to all this. By playing records in the right way the intermediate DJ has a tremendous power to affect people’s states of mind. A genuinely outstanding DJ, just for a moment, may make a whole room fall in love. Because, you see, DJing is not just regarding choosing a few tunes. It’s with regards to generating shared moods; it’s when it comes to understanding the sensations of a group of persons and directing them to a better place. In the hands of a master, records become the tools for rituals of spiritual communion that for a great deal of people are the most powerful events in their lives.”

Bill Brewster has been editor of Mixmag’s Update USA. His writing appears reg
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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful.
4Comprehensive–not techno obsessed
By P. Gunderson
Frankly, I bought this book because I was interested in learning more about techno/trance DJs, and was initially disappointed by the relative dearth of discussion of current trends (a discussion of these comes only in the last quarter of this book). However, my disappointment turned into appreciation as I realized this book truly is a history of the DJ, from way back in the early 1900s to today. This history offers a vast amount of information about who the first DJ pioneers were, and it is divided up into sections on the first radio DJs, northern soul DJs, reggae, disco, rap, and–finally–techno.

The authors point out that they’re not doing any academic, high-fallutin’ theoretical study of the DJ, but I think they took this anti-academicism too far. The DJ is a fascinating figure because s/he challenges so many of Western culture’s ideas about what constitutes “music” and what constitutes “artistry.” This book could have been much enriched by delving into the ways the DJ changes how we think about music.

As it is, the history in this study is admirably exhaustive; but because it doesn’t connect this history to a larger history of music and aesthetics, it sometimes becomes just exhausting.

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful.
5A Dj’s history book-house, hip hop, disco, northern soul
By A
Coming across this book has been one of the most enlightening finds of my music loving life. I picked it up and read it in it’s entirety in 2 days. It is a thorough history of the DJ and the music forms that DJ’s have spawned since the advent of vinyl as a medium of auditory stimulation and satisfaction. Just the discography alone, a listing of the top fifty or hundred songs and artist on the playlists of fundamental dance floors (like The Roxy, Paradise Garage, Warehouse, and The Loft to name a few) makes this book worth its weight in gold. The history that this book attempts to recount isn’t end all to be all, but it covers enough ground to satisfy even the most discriminating old club lover like myself. And even the most well versed club historian and afficionado will find something entertianing and educational within this books covers. I’ve bought three copies of this book, just to put some of my friends forever in my debt.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful.
4Excellent history, remarkable research
By Eric Antonow
I’ve only gone through the sections on Chicago house music and am astonished by the detail collected on this low-profile era of dj history. Though I was only a young bystander. the authors managed to unearth the mythical names, long desolate locations, and key events of the day. WBMX Jams on Saturday and Sunday mornings going down to Maxwell street, where last night’s pressings were available on too thin, recycled vinyl (sometimes with pieces of gym shoe in them). If they could discover this, I suspect the rest is as solid. Well written.

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