DJ – The Music Curator
Sarah Young explores the journey of the DJ and reports from the BBC Radio 1Xtra DJ Relay world record attempt.
DJ’S are much like art curators, in the sense that an art curators job is to select a collection of art and position it together in the most flattering way that makes visual sense, much the same as a DJ who’s job is to take a bunch of music artists work and position it together to make it sound different, interesting, and sometimes even better.
Back in the day it always used to be that geeky dude in the glasses who spent hours in his room fiddling around with dials and playing around with vinyls. Kinda nerdy, kinda uncool. But fast forward 20 years, now everyone and their Mum wants to be a DJ.
Cool, connected, skilled and friends with just about every ultra sick, ultra talented artist out there; we are seeing DJ’s such as Radio 1Xtra and Roll Deep’s DJ Target not only reach Number 1 in the national charts but also host very successful, critically acclaimed radio shows. DJ’s are also getting involved with other high profile projects within the music and media industries such as tours, t-shirt lines and book deals – we are seeing DJ’s transforming themselves into entrepreneurs and even forming their own successful business empires.
We are also seeing a whole new enthusiastic vibe spreading throughout the industry for us female DJ’s. So with all this buzz around the profession of selection, you can imagine how a new DJ like myself felt at the prospect of attending an event on the scale of the BBC Radio 1Xtra DJ Relay World Record attempt.
Arriving at the venue at around 4 pm and the event was in full swing. The concept of the day being to make an attempt at breaking the world record for the longest beat matching session.
More than 80 UK DJS mixing one track each into the next with a perfect beat match – no scratching, no cutting, just pure beat matching. Sounds pretty simple right? I mean it shouldn’t be so hard for the selected DJ’s, to put it in perspective, these are individuals who DJ every single day and have been doing so for years, most of them are what you would call music industry veterans. Talking about veterans, not long after I arrived I got chatting with Dancehall Reggae DJ Legend Robbo Ranx, who informed me about the level of pressure each DJ was under: “Its not the actual task of beat matching that is daunting to most of the DJs here, its the fact we are playing in front of all the DJs here! There are some serious legends in the crowd, you know, arms crossed analysing your technique, its hard not to be nervous to be honest, even for the ones who have been doing this for years!”
I also got chatting to Professor Greens’ DJ, IQ who agreed:”Its a lot of pressure, and yeah we do this everyday and we only have to mix in one track, but its hard because if your the one who messes up, well that’s it! I really hope I don’t f**k it up!”
He didn’t just for the record… get it , record, get it?
ANYWAY, DJ nerves aside, and talking about records, the world record attempt was successful and in the end broken, thats not to say there wasn’t any slip ups during the process. To give you an idea of the official set up, as well as the main stage, there was a practice area and back up mix inside the venue, and apparently one DJ whilst mixing on the backup mix made a big time mistake , as he was mixing the next track in his earphones he could hear the beats were matched and it all sounded pretty perfect, but alas, he forgot to put the fader up, so all that came out of the main speakers was silence and so it all had to start again! Doh! Epic epic fail! But Robbo was right, it just shows how nerves can even get the better of the best!
The event, however, was much more than just a record attempt, it was an opportunity for like minded creative people in the industry to come together to chat, network and generally compare and contrast music, mixes, and stories.
The most interesting aspect of the event was to witness the old skool DJ’s mixing with the new skool crew. I got chatting to one fellow new school DJ, DJ Motive, who as well as being ‘nervous as hell’ told me how the UK music scene was having its moment: “This sort of event just represents what musical talent the UK has, its great to see so much talent in one area, kinda scary too!!”
He was right, every which way you looked there were UK music heroes such as Terror Danjah, MJ Cole, Wookie and Donaeo who told me how much the music industry had changed:
“It’s interesting to see all these new DJ’s and artists here, the industry was dramatically different when I began producing and mc-ing. Music changes fast, but that growth is the best part of it, change is good.”
He was right change IS good, But when some of these well known names started out in the UK music industry it was a completely different place. Grime, Garage, and UK Hip-Hop were all genres of music relatively unknown to the wider, mainstream audience. These were ‘niche/specialist’ genres which never got mainstream radio air play. BBC Radio 1Xtra didn’t even exist, so hearing this type of music was only available to individuals who knew pirate radio station frequencies or who could stay awake for late night specialist music shows.
There were no other interactive mediums to listen to these genres either, no myspace, no facebook, no twitter, no itunes, no youtube, hell, no internet! From then to now it has been a true organic growth. Artists like Dizzee Rascal and Wiley and who were truly underground (sometimes literally e.g making music in Jammers basement back in the early 2000′s) are now in the the Top 10 UK Charts and with urban music saturating the market, internet and even fashion industry, these new skool DJs, artists and producers that I chatted to at the DJ relay have many more platforms to share new music , and as a result, the UK is finally receiving international recognition on a mainstream level.
But despite UK music going international, the one thing that was represented and reiterated at the BBC Radio 1Xtra DJ relay was that the UK music scene is a tight community of people who stick together, we have a strong sense of identity and ambition that never seems to falter, and we embrace new and fresh talent.
In the past few weeks we have seen Roll Deep, Tinnie Tempah and Dizzee Rascal at Number 1 in the Top 10, but it is important to remember without the new and old skool DJ’s plugging these tracks on the radio and playing them in the clubs, no one would even know about these artists and their work. DJ’s are in no doubt the unsung heros of the music industry but for any MCs, artists, Producers and anyone directly or indirectly involved in the scene, it is a very exciting time to be in the UK music business.
For the UK music industry now, the sky is pretty much the limit, and the world is definitely our oyster, and in 2010 I think DJ’s and artists alike are ready to crank up the volume in more ways than one! Question is, are you ready?
