the key to DJ mixes that get the rewind....

[the first in a series of drops about the art of DJing]

over the 15 years that I've been DJ'ing publicly (19 if you count my ghetto fisher price turntable set up when I was a kid) I've heard a LOT of DJ mixes. Ever since the rise of decent bandwidth, you've seen an even bigger flood of constant downloadable mp3 mixtapes.

I'm not gonna lie, I don't bother downloading very many of them. You know why? Because cats dont bother putting the set together. In the old days it was about being able to beat mix and select the right record on the night, but its even more important when committing the mix to a physical (or digital) medium - why go through all the hard work if you only get one play, or even 10 minutes of a play before someone gets bored.

I'm a real believer in assembling your music so it tells a story - the story can be complex and you can let your imagination run wild with a mixtape cover theme, or it can something as a simple as an abstract beginning, middle, peak and end. If you dont do this, you're relegated to the millions of other DJs out there who think putting together a mixtape of the latest tracks is enough.

bonus: francis grasso, early 70s DJ set