Personal Opinions on Sync Button

All of it are tools. Either you can create magic through your passion and love for music or not.
When I transitioned from vinyl to CDJs and later to controllers, my workflow actually stayed the same. Yes I expanded, first through new effects, CDJ had loops (uh yeah), better mixers and now everything you can do with controllers.
I played with the sync button a bit, but honestly, I cannot remember when I last used it. Take a look at my TM4 and you can prolly see by the rubber on the transport buttons that this is the only button looking brand new.

But this is my workflow. If you press the sync button every 2 seconds and your set will make me dance, then you have a winner. I do not care and never will care about the tools you use to make me dance and enjoy the night. What I do care about however is those elitist DJs who think they are better because of their skills, that then present a mix which makes me want to listen to my iTunes Genius DJ, because the damn machine has better music selection….

Good points all around. For me, I try to look at it from the club-goers point of view. 99.9% of the audience usually isn’t a DJ, even with the “everyone is a DJ” trend going on nowadays. Will they realize who is manually beat matching vs sync’ing? No. Will they care? Probably not. Most are there to hear cool music and have a good time.

This whole sync vs sync=satan is raging within DJ realms, which is fine. There’s always debate within art communities.

Now, I’m all for expanding your skill set and doing finger drumming, manual drumming, scratching, live-remixing, etc etc etc. (no cake throwing, please). But I view the sync button as just another tool.

To be honest here,my opinion on the sync button pretty much is the same as everyone elses here,It’s a tool to be used if you need it and when you need it.I will often use the sync button when im doing 4 deck performance or live remixing heck i’ll even use it when im doing just two deck mixing,granted i’ll try and get the tracks tight as i can by my self manualy but if i ain’t satisfied with it i’ll hit the sync just to make sure it’s tight as can be.This whole sync-no sync argument within the DJ scene is pointless and if you actually stop and think about it very very dumb.Scracth DJs won’t use it and so far they’re the loudest to complaign about it,i say shut up and live with it,use it if you want if not then i don’t care what you do,remap the button,key it,i don’t care just shut up about it.

My 2 cents.Sorry if i came off a bit harsh.

NietzSKY, post: 38501, member: 4553 wrote: So was talking to a DJ friend, and he was telling me how he’s got a show coming up where controllers are banned because of the sync button.

I could hook up timecode on relative positioning and use sync without someone knowing unless they’re looking at my laptop.

So they might go ban laptops then and require only analog music. I say “good luck” then if the popular acts are all using sync and the “keep it real” guys are not drawing crowds.

The reality of life is that this is a business, and if the masses of people in front of the DJ booth could care less, then the anti-sync guys have lost this war. If their events struggle to get a crowd while other events do not, then they either need to adapt or die.

Those guys who ban controllers, ban laptops, require vinyl-only DJs, etc. They’re making a cardinal mistake in event promoting. They’re throwing the event for themselves, not the mass market.

Sync is a tool. Plain and simple. Musicians have had sequencers for decades, and if a DJ thinks beatmatching is the primary ideology of DJing, then he/she has really missed what this is all about. The winners in this world are the ones who wow the crowd with great music selection, imagination, creativity, connection, and charisma. A guy who plays amazing tunes, does some brilliant live remixing, and makes the crowd hang on his every beat…despite he’s using sync…will go further than the guy who still buys analog vinyl and seemingly won’t take things further than A-to-B mixing. Worse if he seems to value his musical taste over the crowd in front of him…thus he clears floors.

I mentioned in the 2013 Resolutions for DJs that it’s time to bury the hatchet between the analog-only guys and digital. It’s done and over. Conventions like NAMM have loads of new controllers and software, and I’m seeing less turntables and CDJs. More new DJs are going straight to digital. In my opinion there might be niche crowds of “analog only”, but the mass market isn’t ever going to one day massively reject digital.

Alex Wray, post: 38586, member: 4521 wrote: Now if we could just get this attitude about Mac vs. PC

I’m a PC guy. Strangely enough I never seem to encounter the problems many claim to have with PCs and Windows.

beatmatching is a skill that is required. point blank, bar none, do not pass go and collect $200 bucks. resason being allot of clubs wont let you bring on a controller. Did a gig here in my home town and last min was told i have to only use cdjs. i dont have live or scratch just serato dj so did i turn down the gig? nopee, transferred my set list to 5 cds and took it back to the old school. no lappy, just me and my headphones with the cds. I banged it out with-out a hiccup. point is, fundamentals are fundamental lol.

It’s possible your friend misunderstood the reasoning behind the controller ban and they just don’t want to complicate the switchovers. If every dj uses the same equipment things are lot easier for the promoter and there is little risk of interruption.