4 best effects for a beginner

subtractive effects – ones that take away sound, like eq’s and high/low pass filters are the best with which to start. Phaser, Flanger (kind of), high/low filters, and wet/dry are examples of this.

additive effects – effects that add sound/chop up the original song take much more practice to execute live. This includes the infamous beatmasher2, echo, loop rolls, and cue point juggling. These are much harder to use well.

And on another note, you’re not going to get very good at beatmatching if all your songs are at 128 bpm… I may have misunderstood the OP, but you need songs of different bpm to learn beatmatching.

I would say:
Skip the effects if you are a beginner!
Try to learn your music and try to learn how to beatmatch first.
After that learn different technics to blend the music.
And after that you can try to learn to mix by key.

After e few years if you manage to learn all of the above you can add effects.
But effects should be kept to a minimum otherwise it will do more harm than adding something for the ordience.

I started DJing approx 1980 and if I play music for 4 hours I add effects 4-5 times in a total of 1-2minutes!
This is my personal point of view and all might not aprove so take it as it is….

DJ Hessler, post: 11280 wrote: I would say:
Skip the effects if you are a beginner!
Try to learn your music and try to learn how to beatmatch first.
After that learn different technics to blend the music.
And after that you can try to learn to mix by key.

After e few years if you manage to learn all of the above you can add effects.
But effects should be kept to a minimum otherwise it will do more harm than adding something for the ordience.

I started DJing approx 1980 and if I play music for 4 hours I add effects 4-5 times in a total of 1-2minutes!
This is my personal point of view and all might not aprove so take it as it is….

This!

I think one thing a lot of beginners don’t realize is, you can do cooler and more technical stuff with your mixer and decks than you can with effects (chopping, blends, etc.). learn to use those effectively first! also one thing you might notice, especially when you start playing out, is that using effects too much doesn’t sound good.

Instead of effects, I would recommend playing with the crossfader to do some cutting and playing around with the different beats you can cut in every 4th beat, or something similar. If you throw in learning some basic scratching and cutting, you can give your sets a pretty personalized feel. Also, you can cue point juggle on one deck while letting the track play on the other deck (in moderation, of course).

And as for preventing train wreck mixes, drop new songs in on the downbeat. If they still sound clip-cloppy, nudge the side of the jogwheel in one direction until your tracks are aligned (in your headphones), and then move over the crossfader.

filtering and delays….

Dayvue, post: 11320 wrote: And as for preventing train wreck mixes, drop new songs in on the downbeat. If they still sound clip-cloppy, nudge the side of the jogwheel in one direction until your tracks are aligned (in your headphones), and then move over the crossfader.

As well IMO its better to use the Volume faders to transition into a new track oppose to the crossfader.

The Volume Fader has a lot mor accuracy than the Crossfader, and often has more resistance than the crossfader enabling to set exactly how quick/volume of the transition you are making. Crossfaders are better for chopping up the song from one to the other if you are doing mashups etc. or as we all know for Scratching

I have to say I’m also of the thought that less is more when it comes to effects, especially when starting out. I’ve seen some songs just get absolutely massacred in clubs and it just sounds terrible…producers spend a lot of time getting their tracks right and usually they sound better if left alone or very minimal effects used.

I think the focus should be on blending and making your own mash-ups to begin with because you learn far more that way and it teaches you to beat match , key & tempo match as well. Although I must admit that when starting out with Traktor and being confronted with 30+ effects its tempting to go crazy but just have fun with it and record your mixes and play them back…your ears will tell you what works.

Please note this is just my humble opinion as a predominantly trance DJ..other DJ’s from other genres may feel differently about this and I totally respect that…

This may help you too:

http://www.digitaldjtips.com/2011/03/beginners-guide-to-dj-effects/