DJ Diary - Week 4

DIARY ENTRY - 18th December
In todays session I got to progress through the songs on my set, beat matching
through them and trying out which ones I think work well together. I also was introduced to some peer reviews today, where I got some advice on my set. From this, I felt I needed to develop a pattern of song introduction in order to create a vibe for the set as well as add some more interesting effects when mixing.

DJ TASK

WHY IS COUNTING BEATS IMPORTANT: Not counting beats as a DJ would be pretty tragic. You will have no basic music timing but more importantly not counting beats means it will be impossible or extremely difficult to beat match

WHAT IS A PHRASE IN MUSIC: A phrase is a musical thought that is typically four measures long and ends with a cadence that can be strong or weak. ... When more than two phrases are combined, it is called a phrase group. The term phrasing is used in music to signify how groups of notes are played, regardless of the structure of the music.

HOW IS MIXING PHRASES IMPORTANT AS A DJ: This is important as mixing phrases incorrectly or correctly will create a huge impact on the mood/vibe of the set.

IF WE DON'T MIX PHRASES WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO THE TRANSITION'S OF OUR SONGS: will disrupt the flow and will not sound like a set

Decades Self Review

Overall progress:  Where you were at after the first half-term?  How you have improved? How have you learnt from your mistakes?  What areas have you still struggled with?  Are you happy with the work you created for the whole Decades project? Technical skills  What skills have you developed over the course of the term?  What is the technical or musical skill you are most proud of?  Logic skills: How developed are your skills? Where do you need to improve? Has this affected your work?  Compositional skills: knowledge of melody, harmony, rhythm, chords, keys, arrangement Time management/working methods  What problems did you experience in the first half-term?  What did you do differently this time around?  Did you complete all of the work on time?  Did you spend too much time on one piece, to the detriment of the other?  Did you make use of the access time that is available to you?  Are you happy with the music you submitted? Research  Did you improve your research methods in the second half of the term?  How much time did you spend listening to the key artists?  Have you been able to bring their influence into your work?  What have you learnt that you can apply to your own music in future projects? Group Project  Do you feel that the group project (playlist presented online) was successful?  Do you think we reached our target audience?  How we can improve in the future/what should we do differently?  What is your idea of the perfect way to present our classes music?

1. After the first half term, I felt eager to go deeper into composition as much of the first half-term featured most skills that I already knew.

2. This term, I have made improvements in bringing specialities into my track with the aim to make a more unique sound. I feel after olly's and farz's lessons I have learnt ways to branch my tracks out. Before, my tracks were fairly basic and wasn't making the right choices when trying to use more advanced features

3. I have struggled with making most of my sessions as I feel although I wasn't behind I could've slotted in more work with a teacher present. I also struggled with composing chords/melodies as it is not my strongpoint

4. I was more than happy with my final projects as I did a lot better than I thought I would. I expected the sampling of songs to be difficult as it is an untouched area for me but once I had learned tools such as time and pitch flex, I found completing the rest of the song easy once I had that sample finished

5. Skills I have developed: Sampling from songs, arranging tracks, signal grouping, time stretching, reverb, noise gate, modulation. These are all things I have learnt elsewhere but have developed massively during this term

6. With composing, it is not my strongpoint as I came here with little knowledge of conventional music structure/composition but throughout lessons I have gained a lot more information about keys, chords, e.t.c. I've learnt a bunch of chords and scales which has helped me set emotions to my tracks. I've also hugely advanced in melody making and especially stacking melodies with chords.

7. I am proud of skills such as reverb and flex because without learning these tools this term I would not be at the level of making tracks that I'm at now. These skills also have a large impact on my preference of genres, learning these made my tracks fit into the better

8. With time management in the first half-term, I felt like throughout lessons I was developing my skills but not successfully applying them to my tracks as i progressed making me have to finish my tracks in one towards the end. This term I aimed to do one section of the song each lesson, giving me the time to focus and master each section carefully. For example, the first week I created my drums, then the next week I started my melody and chords, then my bass and so on. I did my effects and arrangements throughout all the lessons. I also booked a production room to work on my first track which was helpful as it was refreshing to work on a track I was making in a classroom in a more personal environment

9. Research was vital to me because many of the artists that had been presented to us as stimulus were unknown to me so I had to listen to a lot more songs at home. Before working on my track I would spend 5-10 mins flicking through music videos of the artist I was working on to get into the vibe of their music. I also had to do more composition research when creating my James Brown inspired song as at first I was trying to balance the funk drum beat of my sample with basic scales. Once I had done more research into chords connected to genres, I was finding that using more funk like chords was making my track sound a lot better. without doing this research I wouldn't have found a flow

10. Our group had all made extremely different tracks that have a clear stem from the artists we looked at. everyones tracks was at a good standard of production and all sounded nice. The contrast is a good way of presenting our music but I feel it is better for all of us to create tracks in similar sounds/genres when giving a presentation as I feel it sets one energy in terms of audience satisfaction

DJ Diary - Week 3

DIARY ENTRY - 11th DECEMBER
This week during the session I was able to get a clear vision of what my set will sound like as I was able to perform my first mix between multiple songs. I mixed a couple songs, two were '21 Savage - A lot' & 'Rushy - Trippidy Trap'. These two particularly caught my eye so I decided to place them as the first songs in my set.

I was also able to use some standard effects into my mixes, using the FX and the Hi/Lo pass nobs. When I mixed the tracks mentioned previous, I faded out the Hi bands of 'A lot' when the 2nd verse cam in and then brought in 'Trippidy Trap', turning 'A lot' down while doing so.

DECADES

THE 90s

The 90s saw the global music scene taken to new levels of culture and technology. The theme of this era was new wave and featured a diverse selection of new genres which one by one cultivated the face of music. An explosion of positivity in Britain rooted new music with the help of Advancements of Musical Technology put new scenes into the spotlight of the mainstream whilst leaving some behind. Some notable genres prominent in the 90s: Rave, Britpop, R&B, and Hip-Hop

WHAT WAS GOING ON IN THE UK DURING THE TIME?

THATCHER OUT
At the turn of the decade, Thatchers 11 years in office was cut short by her own M.P's before she could finish her third term. For the British public, who only 30% of which would vote for her again, this was a relieving situation. Thatcher's morales and policies of traditionalism were pulled out when her successor, John Major, took her place. John Major was a tory but underwent a Brixton based lower class childhood and was perceived as more relaxed than his predecessor. During Thatchers rule, people turned feelings of anger and oppression into music. After her departure, people (especially the youth) sought a lighter and more joyous way of expressing themselves.

TECHNOLOGY

Technology of the 90s was expanding rapidly with the invention of things like the World Wide Web and 2g Cell Phones. Musical technology wasn't loosing either as things like sequencers and multi track recording systems were developed and sent digital. Musical Equipment was always particularly expensive and the this different change. The difference in the 90's however, was that people in the UK were generally in a better economic situation than they were in the previous decade thus increasing spending money across household's. Musicians could now record a whole album on their own using equipment in their bedroom instead of having to scramble the musicians and rent ridiculously expensive studios.

these pictures are of 90s bedroom set ups and give a very clear picture of what musicians were working with


BRITPOP (1993-1997)

EMERGENCE AND ROOTS
Britpop was an genre that had emerged from alternative rock artists who played a part in the indie scene of the 80s and elements of this is shown in Britpop music. Although musically it was pulled from British music, Britpop is considered to be a reaction to the massive outbreak of grunge music that started in America. Grunge was a genre rooting from punk and metal, featuring dark themes influenced from America's political landscape of the time. Britpop had contrasted these features with brighter and happier sounds. Britain was looking for their own version of grunge and when releases such as 'popscene' from blur and 'The drowners' by suede came out, people appreciated the britishness of it and latched on to it

ELEMENTS
Britpop was a genre that emphasised britishness both musically and culturally. Songs featured a British context with constant referencing to British culture and places. Elements from Glam rock, Punk rock, Indie pop all found themselves some way or another into britpop's sound.

In terms of actual sound Britpop bands went back to a formula of one or two electric guitars, bass, and live (not synthesised) drumming. Keyboards were a feature of some bands but not others. Most songs (with some notable exceptions) were mid-up tempo, played in a major key. A lot of the guitar work uses open chords. Clean or over-driven guitar sounds with limited distortion are typical. String arrangements were used in recording by certain bands 

BATTLE OF BRITPOP
In the mid 90's the two at the top of britpop and mainstream british music were Oasis and Blur. Both had been hugely successful and under a large amount of media attention. The groups had praised each other initially but over the course of 1995 tensions between the group rose and an all out war to be the best begun and by the end of the year both bands despised each other. Hyped by British Media, the feud became the epicentre of Britpop, dubbed as the "Heavyweight Championship of Music". Similar feuds such as the Beatles vs Queen had ignited Britain before, but not on the same level. The Beatles had actually delayed their release so Queen could have space for their song, contrast to the zero mercy race to the top of the charts The Battle of Brit Pop involved. The Divide also went further than music, Blur's members were of middle class upbringing in the south of England while Oasis lived a working class life in Manchester, in the North of England. Fans normally sided with their more relatable band, and the question of wether you were Team Blur or Team Oasis became prominent question in every day discussion 

JUNGLE

EMERGENCE AND ROOTS
Jungle Music of the 90s was a genre attached the greater picture of the rave scene of the UK. Unlike Britpop, Jungle was almost entirely youth based and emerged from Lower Class young people in London. After Thatcher had left, the social structure she created that filled the 80's was starting to crumble and the rave scene was proving itself as a way for youths to escape the disconnection they felt with society of the time. Jungle began as a direct response to the growing commercialism of rave at the time, stemming from breakbeat, house, hip hop, dub and reggae

The number of jungle pirate stations started to increase. Kool FM pirate station was the main source of jungle refreshment to the crowd. Although raided more than 5 times, it still kept going strong. 

The use of new and popular drugs such as ecstasy that had influenced previous rave genres certainly didn't disappear and remained a prominent influencer for the scene. The fast style of music presented in jungle went hand in hand with the euphoria and energy young people were experiencing when taking these drugs and became a popular escape from real life for many

ELEMENTS
London Club's like 'Rage', began to roughen and speed up hardcore music and started to add more ragga like elements to the music. Increasing tempo from 120bpm to 150bpm, the Genre featured less euphoric theme than it's other rave counterpart while also steering away from the standard 4-4 kick and instead focused on breakbeats and deeper sub-basses for rhythm. The Genre also uses a large amount of samples used for melodies and effects but more frequently used for chopped up vocals from other songs



SOURCES

http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/historical-polls/voting-intention-1987-1992

http://www.90s411.com/90s-music.html

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10288312/A-Classless-Society-Britaininthe-1990s-by-Alwyn-Turner-review.html

https://reverb.com/uk/news/how-the-1990s-changed-recording-and-music-production-forever

https://www.quora.com/How-did-producers-create-music-in-the-1990s

https://www.uncut.co.uk/blog/introducing-ultimate-genre-guide-britpop-104939

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4144458.stm

https://www.nme.com/features/blur-and-oasis-big-britpop-chart-battle-the-definitive-story-of-what-really-happened-757277

http://killarecords.com/blog/a-beginners-guide-to-jungle-music/