What do EDM DJ's actually do during their live set.

The job of a DJ is to play music that they think the crowd will like. While doing this, they aim to make a continuous mix by matching the beats per minute of two tracks or other "tricks" to make one track flow into the other. That's the basics. If you can entertain a crowd without having to make hard switches from track to track, you're a good DJ.

All that other stuff that people expect a DJ to do these days isn't really part of the traditional DJ's job. Playing with effects, juggling beats, making live mashups... that's all stuff that can be really nice, but it's never been a part of DJ'ing traditionally.

If you do the first, you're a DJ. If you do the second, you're also a DJ. People think it's easy to just put on records and it's like "pressing play." It's not. You have to both know your BPM's, beatmatch live and improvise a lot all the while reading your crowd and playing the kind of music they respond to.

Edit: forgot to mention there are DJ's who actually just press play. Mostly guys with complicated, timed visual effects. They can't afford to be one bar late because it messes up their show. It's debatable whether this is a good thing or not. Depends what you come for, the show or the live music.

#deejay #dj #DJplay #DJdayoff