Digital Cratedigging Tips

My tips for finding new music:

1 – First off you need to have a few artists that you like a lot. Go onto beatport and find which label they are under and look up artists under the same label. Usually Each label has producers that have the same style of music under it.

2 – Once you have those artists that you like…look up who does remixes of their songs…usually the remixer sometimes not as often as #1 will have music in the same genre.

3 – http://www.last.fm is a great site for finding new artists…best thing to do is type in an artist and there will be a page that shows artists that are Highly similar to not very similar to the artist you are viewing.

4 – Blog Sites…there are tons of great blog sites that always post new music. http://www.mymusicisbetterthanyours.com is one that i use very often and always has good music, in a variety of Genres.

5 – Expand your musical Horizions! Start listening to people that you may not necessarily like…sometimes not very often they will produce a song thats just BANGING in the genre that you like. A great example of this is Hirshee…Hirshee used to be a lot of Dubstep and Drumstep but has been producing BANGING electro Tracks.

6 – Soundcloud, Add all your favorite producers…there are often a ton of bootlegs and re-rubs that are release for free on soundcloud for download and often not a lot of these are ever played out in a club.

I have a collection of labels I tend to like large % of their releases. Then I use charts of DJs I like, and set lists from recorded mixes (Essential Mix, Podcasts, Boiler Room etc etc

Then the rest I hear about from friends, forums, twitter etc….

longmover, post: 19261, member: 1361 wrote: give up trying to be ‘upfront’ there are far to many tunes being released and I cant wade through all releases and hold a full time job.

I 2nd that. Searching/downloading/tagging/prepping new tunes is a full time job in itself, and quite tedious. I hate that part of it, but its definitely worth it when your playing the latest tracks before anybody else even hears them 😎

gonna preach my podcasts again lol. itunes podcasts, hour long mixes from top name producers and djs, all of whom get exclusive tracks (usually from their labels or artists they signed) to be able to play them days/weeks/or months before their released to the general public, beatport, itunes, or any other medium. so i just keep a notepad or my phone notes handy and save the titles and artist names (all of which are tracklisted on the podcast) and save them until they have been released. kinda sucks hunting for them when their not even released and you have to wait, but at least your on top of it and will be prepared when it does come out.

also thanks everybody for listing last.fm. already found a few bangers on there and will be visiting regularly.

I think trying to be Upfront and have all the latest tracks is a little bit of a waste of time…this is my thinking here:

EVERYONE! will have those tracks…and EVERYONE will want to play them out…Really go and look on the Beatport top 100 and there is a reason why “MOST” of those tracks are on there…its cuz they rock…are made by a high level producer…and for the most part deserve to be there due to high production value.

But everyone and their bastard child has those songs…theres no point in keeping all ur stuff right up to date.

I find its more about finding songs that are right for YOU…does that mean you might have a few tracks that are in the top100 heck ya! BUT! its more about finding those secret little gems that no one knows about…that arnt on the charts that are hidden in obsecurity, and you just randomly stumble across and are like WOW WTF!! THIS IS AMAZEBALLZ!! I GOTTA HAVE THIS TRACK!!
Its songs like that which has worked for me and will probably work for you that seperate you from all the other top100 beatport DJs.

Ha, well if you are after the more popular side of dance, Last FM may be the place.
I have been a member of that website for 4 years, and even now they do not rcognise
Hardstyle or Hardtrance as genres.

I suppose commercial over hyped stuff is where the big money is?

Enough said.

I listen to charts and recommendations from boomkat, juno, clone, hardwax, and sometimes beatport. but I think most of my discoveries came from soundcloud mixes. just search you favorite dj’s name + soundcloud on google.

Beatport DJ charts are my favourite method. I start by looking up the charts of DJs/producers well known within their genre, usually deep house, tech house, or techno, but sometimes house as well. Then I’ll look through the charts of some of the DJs a little less well known who have their charts posted up.

I’ll then browse through the ’10 must hear tracks’ of some genres, but at most I’ll only choose usually 3 this way, and same with the weekly exclusive tracks, plus any other charts Beatport may have emailed me about.