Nov222009
Producing a mix each and every month means that I am always on the lookout for fresh new tracks to play. Quite often I get asked where I get all of my music from and today I thought I would share some of my secrets. All content correct at time of writing.
DJ Download
| Site Name: |
DJ Download |
| URL: |
www.djdownload.com |
| Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
£1.10 |
| WAVs Available? |
No |
| Transaction Fee: |
30p if spending less than £3.00 |
| Accept Paypal? |
Yes |
| Notes: |
Loyalty scheme |
| Rating: |
***** |
Most of my music comes from DJDownload simply because they seem to always get their hands on the most upfront music several weeks before it appears anywhere else.
The prices on offer are the lowest I have ever found for niche music and the customer service is always spot on.
DJDownload also have a loyalty scheme where for every 10 (approx) tracks you buy, you will receive one free download token that you can redeem for a free track. This is very welcome and is a nice touch to reward those who keep coming back.
DJDownload were the first to pioneer the ‘needledrop’ technology in their preview player which allows you to preview an entire track prior to purchase by positioning the cursor anywhere along the waveform. There’s nothing worse than previewing a track only to have the preview stop before it gets to the good bit.
The search facility on DJDownload can be a little bit fussy. For example, a search of “Armind Van Helden” yeilds zero results. You don’t even get a “Did you mean…” option.
The homepage chart can often be a bit too electro for my own personal tastes but usually there are some real gems tucked away in the top 20. Whenever I am looking for new music to purchase I always go to DJDownload first.
Xpressbeats
| Site Name: |
Xpressbeats |
| URL: |
www.xpressbeats.com |
| Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
£1.15 |
| WAVs Available? |
No |
| Transaction Fee: |
24p if spending less than £3.00 |
| Accept Paypal? |
Yes |
| Notes: |
192Kbps MP3s available for 99p. Exclusive tracks and remixes. |
| Rating: |
**** |
I really like Xpressbeats. They seem to be tuned into my style of music. The stuff that charts well on their site is often a reflection of my own musical tastes. This is one of the main reasons I keep coming back to Xpressbeats.
The fairly recent revamp of the site has made it easier than ever to navigate around plus there are a good selection of genres to get your teeth stuck into.
The MP3s on Xpressbeats tend to be the most expensive out of the places I shop (pre-releases and exclusives can go up to £1.85), however I don’t mind paying a little bit more as quite often they will have tracks or remixes that you will not be able to find anywhere else and are exclusive to Xpressbeats. Plus, they are GOOD exclusives too. Look out for the little Xpressbeats sticker next to the exclusive tracks.
You can pre-order tracks prior to their official release to make sure you are right on the cutting edge of your genre’s sound.
Xpressbeats have a Virtual Wallet facility. This allows you to make one large deposit into your online account at a slight discount. The benefit of this means you don’t need to keep digging out the credit card every time you want to make a purchase as the balance is deducted from your Virtual Wallet and does save you time.
If you want your DJ sets to be different as well as cutting edge then I reccomend you shop at Xpressbeats.
TrackItDown
| Site Name: |
Track It Down |
| URL: |
www.trackitdown.net |
| Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
£1.49 |
| WAVs Available? |
Yes |
| Transaction Fee: |
No. |
| Accept Paypal? |
Yes |
| Notes: |
Exclusive tracks and remixes. Loads of niche genres. Great preview player. |
| Rating: |
***** |
I could lose myself in this site for days! The sheer enormity of it is out of this world.
Trackitdown (TID) appear to have the largest database of tracks I have ever seen and because of this they are able to offer extremely genre-specific tracks for you to download. Whereas most MP3 download sites will break down my genre as House > Funky House, TID goes that one step further and have a massive list of sub-genres to go digging into. Niche-specific stuff such as Deep, Electro, Dirty, Hard, Wonky, Disco, Classic, Vocal, Jacking, Tribal, Fidget the list just goes on… And thats only what’s listed under House!
As well as having one of the largest libraries they also sell DJ gear, merchandise and games too.
TID have one of the best MP3 preview players and it’s easily one of my favourites by far. It keeps your last 20 played tracks on standby and also follows you up and down the screen as you scroll which is very useful. Even if you are halfway through listening to a track and jump to another page the player remembers your position in the track and resumes on the next page. Impressive stuff.
TID is reccomended if you have a very specific taste in music or if you’ve just got to have that track in uncompressed WAV format.
Beatport
| Site Name: |
Beatport |
| URL: |
www.beatport.com |
| Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
£1.30 + VAT |
| WAVs Available? |
Yes |
| Transaction Fee: |
No |
| Accept Paypal? |
Yes |
| Notes: |
Feels very compact. Prices do not include VAT |
| Rating: |
*** |
I might upset a few people here but I don’t really get on that well with Beatport. Although they are a hugely successful brand and they seem to stock a wide range of music I feel their website completely lets them down.
It’s far too hectic with so much being crammed into such a small space. Their prices do not include TAX/VAT either so there’s an implied added cost at the checkout. But when you do get to checkout purchasing tracks is a very smooth operation, you get a full on breakdown of all the costs before you pay which is really nice. If nothing else Beatport have my favourite payment screen its just a shame the rest of the experience isn’t as well laid out.
Beatport tends to lean towards the deeper, tribal and electro side of house.
Traxsource
| Site Name: |
Traxsource |
| URL: |
www.traxsource.com |
| Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
$1.99 |
| WAVs Available? |
Yes |
| Transaction Fee: |
$0.27 if spending less than $10.00 |
| Accept Paypal? |
Yes |
| Notes: |
Promos cost $3.99. Tracks priced in $. Audio is watermarked. |
| Rating: |
** |
It’s the same kind of story as Beatport here I’m afraid. Far too much going on, I often feel I am battling against too much information in front of me rather than enjoying previewing tracks to buy.
The thing that’s kept me away from Traxsource is it doesn’t really cater for the Funky Disco House genre that I look for in my music. However for each realease they always seem to have a huge number of mixes and remixes on offer to choose from.
Everything is priced in dollars which is a downside for me in the UK at the moment as the exchange rate into GBP still is not that great right now.
The preview player opens up in its own window which can get lost if you aren’t careful - although DJDownload do this too, the Traxsource player is very tiny and doesn’t have the waveform that DJDownload does.
What IS nice about Traxsource is that each track that you purchase is embedded with audio watermarking technology. So if you go uploading your bought tracks to file sharing web sites, Traxsource will be able to trace who they sold the track to and prosecute accordingly. I feel this is a brilliant idea to stop people from stealing music.
Traxsource offer a very broad, if expensive, selection that focuses on Soulful House and US House so give them a visit if that’s your bag. But watch out for that transaction fee if spending less than $10 in one go.
Amazon MP3
| Site Name: |
Amazon |
| URL: |
www.amazon.co.uk |
Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
69p for up to 256Kbps MP3 |
| WAVs Available? |
No |
| Transaction Fee: |
No |
| Accept Paypal? |
No |
| Notes: |
Cheap commercial music. No 320Kbps MP3 or WAV options. |
| Rating: |
** |
Did you know that Amazon are selling MP3 downloads? You do now! And to be fair it’s not a bad service.
The two main sticking points that let it down are the fact that it’s only really suitable for mainstream music - you won’t find many extended mixes here! Then you are forced to download and use their own media manager software which is a bit intrusive. Why can’t I just click a “download” link like every other site out there? No, I’ve got to use their own shitty donalod manager system. Which blows. Hard.
However, when a track can cost as little as 29p to download it’s suprising that Amazon MP3 downloads are not a hell of a lot more popular than iTunes.
Any tracks that I have bought from Amazon MP3 I have not used in any of my DJ sets. It’s up for debate but I rarely play out any track that is not encoded at a 320Kbps rate because it will sound shockingly bad on a loud club installation sound system.
But if there’s something in the charts I like and I only want to listen to it at home then based on price and the fact that the music is DRM free, Amazon is the place to go.
Juno Download
| Site Name: |
Juno download |
| URL: |
www.junodownload.com |
| Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
£1.49 |
| WAVs Available? |
Yes |
| Transaction Fee: |
10p if spending less than £3.00 |
| Accept Paypal? |
Yes |
| Notes: |
Confusing navigation. Burn tracks to CD option for +£2.00 |
| Rating: |
*** |
Ah, my beloved Juno. Juno is where I went to get all of my vinyl from back in the day. Juno had a top quality service back then and still does today.
Unfortunately when I stopped buying vinyl records I stopped using Juno as a service. I have made one or two purchases in the last 12 months but Juno is always last on my list when I go looking for music. The variety of music for me is not as widespread as other sites although they do often have good album deals.
Navigating the site is a bit of a chore. It feels like every time I click something a new window opens up with the information in it - which I find very disorientating. Nevertheless, the checkout is smooth and painless process.
Go to Juno if you are on the lookout for good value album downloads and you don’t mind a new window opening every time you click something.
DJTunes
| Site Name: |
DJTunes |
| URL: |
www.djtunes.com |
| Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
£1.79 |
| WAVs Available? |
No |
| Transaction Fee: |
No |
| Accept Paypal? |
Yes |
| Notes: |
Specialises in House, Minimal, Techno, Trance. You can release your own music. |
| Rating: |
**** |
DJtunes.com is a relatively newcomer to the digital download market. It’s a European focused web site with over half a million tracks in stock for download.
I have not used DJTunes heavily yet but the site is easy to use and everything is laid out extremely well.
The preview player is a slight let down as more space is given to the logo rather than the actual controls which makes previewing tracks a little bit fiddly.
A nice touch is the ability to add labels to a favourites list and with some labels you can send them a direct message straight from the web site.
Upon registration you get to download 10 free tracks, but its from a pre-determined list and in my opinion there’s nothing special there, but it is a nice touch to instantly boost your collection for free. They seem to specialise in the more techy minimal side of House so I don’t think this will be my first port of call when crate digging but I will be sure to check out this site in future.
7 Digital
| Site Name: |
7 Digital |
| URL: |
www.7digital.com |
| Average 320Kbps MP3 cost: |
79p |
| WAVs Available? |
No |
| Transaction Fee: |
No |
| Accept Paypal? |
Yes |
| Notes: |
Option to pay via SMS. Mostly commercial releases. Cheap as chips. |
| Rating: |
*** |
This MP3 download store is very simmilar to the Amazon download store in many ways. It offers cheap MP3 downloads for around 79p and is very commercially weighted. However it was nice to see tracks in this store from Strictly Rhythm, Plump DJs, Defected and Hed Kandi.
I like the fact that you can purchase tracks from this store via text message. Very handy if you do not have your card details to hand or if you don’t have access to a Paypal account.
7 digital is perfect for getting hold of that secret shame track that is in the charts and you shouldn’t like but you secretly do. You know the one. You’re humming it in your head right now, aren’t you?
Worth checking out if your taste is in ever-so-slighly more generic pop-tinged House music.
That’s It!
There you go, nine digital download stores reviewed and rated in my own very humble opinion. I’ve been as honest as I can and although there are many many more MP3 digital download stores out there these are the ones I use most often or are ones I reccommend.
If you have your own favourite digital download store that you would like to share, please let me know in the comments below.
Oct152009
The British Music Experience is excited to present a unique chance to interact with one of the UK’s most successful DJ and Producer teams, the Freemasons.
On Thursday 26th November James Wiltshire (left of picture), Producer half of the dance duo will be presenting the music-making techniques that have made the Freemasons the most in demand dance DJ ’s, Producers and Remixers of the moment.
From producing massive dance hits of their own including ‘Love on my Mind’, ‘Rain Down Love’ and the anthem ‘Uninvited’ feat. Bailey Tzuke, to remixing Whitney Houston’s comeback smash- ‘Million Dollar Bill’, to Kelly Rowland’s ‘Work’, Beyonce & Shakira’s ‘Beautiful Liar’, to producing for Kylie and Sophie Ellis Bextor.
The Freemasons have led the way for dance and house music production and remixing. James will be explaining and taking questions on how they go about creating their trademark sounds in studio and live, including the software and kit they use and how they exploit it. How they got started in music production, started getting access to samples and vocals and how they begun to collaborate with big artists.
Freemasons Music Masterclass
Thursday 24th November
Start: 6.30pm
Get Tickets Now
Hosted by Gaydar Radio’s Maria Peters, this amazing unique evening will give you the chance to meet the individuals behind the music. Find out first-hand how it’s put together and tips for the route to successful production, plus behind the scenes of working with some of the most famous artists of our time.
Get Tickets Now
Sep202009
Tom Upton & Mark Masters proudly presents SHAKEDOWN @ HaHa, Guildford on Saturday 26th September. A new night to tingle those senses and take you on a trip through the biggest and best in all kinds of house music.
These 2 professional djs will be on hand to deliver you the best in Sexy, Funky, Electro House music all night long!!!!
“Starting off the night with some sexual funky house flavours, moving into some upfront funky electro, then working our way up to those big funky bangers and then climaxing in a fountain of uplifting vocal electro for all of you who wish to dance the night away to REAL music!!!”
Free Entry throughout the night, CD giveaways, and photo’s being taken! This is going to be an awesome night!
Don’t forget to invite your friends! Hope to see you there!
Ha Ha bar & grill
16 - 17 North Street
Guildford,
GU1 4AF
Map
Shakedown is sponsored by House Music Podcasts http://www.housemusicpodcasts.co.uk
Aug282009
Here are a couple of dates for your diaries over the next few days as its a bit of an action packed bank holiday weekend.
First of all, get yourself over to Platform Six where you can download the latest episode of my fortnightly radio show. Special guest mix this week from none other than Electro house DJ Piqué !!!! As always, the special guest mix is sandwiched between two very phat choice slices of hand cut funky house mixed by myself. Its a great show that also includes one of the latest tracks from Shola Ama and a bumpin’ cut from Crimes Against Disco!
Now on to the live events… Kicking off with TONIGHT. Yes yes, tonight you can catch myself on the decks up at the always funky, Funky End bar in Aldershot alongside the hairless wonder that is Tom Upton closely followed by the lanky legend Mark Masters. Free entry all night with music pumping out from 9pm until late.
If you haven’t got your fill of fresh upfront Funky House tunes by then, you can continue the party TOMORROW NIGHT over at the HaHa bar in Guildford. Usual suspects of Tom Upton and Mark Masters will be in control of your dancefloor, plus I will be there too to spin a couple of tunes. Once again, it’s free entry all night so to be fair you have no excuses not to turn up. Saturday will be a good one as I plan to have a couple of beers and dance around like a lemon.
Hope to see you there! Keep it funky.
Aug262009
Getting to the top in this industry is all about getting yourself heard and by using the technology of the internet this is now even easier than ever before. I thought I would share with you below some of my favourite and most effective free ways of getting yourself heard on the ‘net in a shameless self-promotion roundup of some of the better sites out there. All of these web sites are free to join.
Facebook
Get yourself a Facebook account if you havent already done so. This will open up two worlds to you. You can create yourself your own self promotion Facebook Group and invite people to join, plus you can also set up your own Fan Page to allow members to become your fan. Both these options you can use to send out updates, mixes and information about forthcoming gigs.
facebook.com
The DJ List
If you sign up to be a member at the DJ list, you can get yourself listed into the worlds largest DJ directory for free. It is a place that will host your DJ biography and some pictures, but the real beauty of this site is it allows you to get your fan base voting for you to allow you to climb up the DJ rankings.
thedjlist.com
iTunes
Getting your mixes listed in iTunes is not as difficult as you might think. All you need is your mix hosted on a website somewhere and an iTunes account. iTunes is installed on millions of computers and mobile devices around the world and therefore having your mixes listed will help you to reach a global audience. For help and advice on how to do this, check out my post on getting listed in the iTunes directory.
itunes.com
MySpace
I am not a massive fan of MySpace but I do feel it has its place in this list. After all, it does have millions of members plus it launched the careers of artists such as Lilly Allen and Calvin Harris. MySpace gives you the freedom to create your own personal space on the internet, connect with friends and famous people and do pretty much anything you want. It’s a well recognised platform in the industry and one that should not be ignored.
myspace.com
Orkut
If you have yourself a Google email address or Google account then you can sign in and use the services of Orkut. Its a bit like Facebook but without the faff. You can find people with simmilar inerests on there, join communities and use the site like an open networking tool to spread the word of yourself and your talents.
orkut.com
Upcoming
Upcoming is a service run by Yahoo that can best be described as a social calendar. When you have a number of DJ bookings that you want to promote and spread the word, you can list up your DJ dates on Upcoming. This will give you an RSS feed of events that your fans can subscribe to and keep up to date with where you are playing and when. You can also find other like minded individuals and “friend & follow” them much you would with other social web sites. A good way to promote your DJ gigs.
upcoming.yahoo.com
LinkedIn
This social network is a little bit like a business version of Facebook. You get to keep in touch with loads of business contacts and is really good for networking. If you come across a promoter or a fellow DJ that you think you would like to work with in future you can’t go wrong by adding them to your LinkedIn network profile.
linkedin.com
Podomatic
Producing a regular podcast that is available for download is a great way to promote yourself as a DJ. It gives people an example of what they can expect when they come to book you for an event plus you can attract a large following of fans if you podcast on a regular basis. Podomatic takes the headache out of all the technical stuff and gives you a space on the web where you can publish your podcast for free. The paid for version gives you a bit more space but the free version is definitely worth a look.
podomatic.com
Twitter
I grow to love Twitter more and more each day. A lot of people (myself included) failed to see the point of Twitter on their first use. But I feel it is an essential networking weapon that you should have in your self promotion toolbox. You get to find out what people are doing right now in real time and you get to share what you are up to as well. It probably doesn’t sound that impressive right now but if you give it a couple of weeks you will start to understand what it is all about. There are currently thoughts that Twitter is looking to rival Google so this is one online bandwagon you don’t want to miss out on.
twitter.com
Wordpress
Getting yourself an online blog is a great online self promotion tool because of its flexibility. If you have a lot to say for yourself you can keep a blog updated with news, comments, forthcoming gigs and interesting things. If you have nothing to say you can just keep it updated with fresh mixes on a regular basis. A blog gives you the ability to receive feedback on what you do by allowing visitors to comment on the things you do and say plus you will find it opens yourself up to the whole blogging comunity where you can find like-minded people out there who also do what you do - it’s a great networking tool. There are many different blogging tools out there but my favourite is Wordpress. You can get a free Wordpress blog by going to wordpress.com or you can build your own custom blog at wordpress.org
Soonnight
Soonnight is a fairly new online dance community and magazine website dedicated to clubbing. They have loads of great information about events and parties happening around the UK. You can add a profile, pitcures, videos and list events you are/have attending/attended.
uk.soonnight.com
Dontstayin
Dontstayin (DSI) is simmilar to Soonnight but it has been around for a lot longer. DSI recently had a much needed re-design and now everything on the site is a lot easier to do. Again, you can add pics and videos, acknowledge your attendence to events but you can also start discussion threads and interact a lot more with other clubbers/punters. DSI is a great platform for getting to know the people who actually go to the events rather than the DJs who play there. From my own experience I feel DSI tends to lean towards the hard house/trance side of music but they do cover a wide range of music styles and tastes overall.
dontstayin.com
Youtube
Who hasn’t heard of Youtube? Ok, so you all know what it does. Get yourself some footage of yourself DJing and upload it to Youtube for the world to see. Make sure you use music that you have permission to use. If you don’t you might find your video gets pulled down. When you upload a Youtube video you have the opportuniy to add “tags”. Do not overlook this as tags are what lets other users find your video. Make sure you add about ten short descriptive words that are relevant to your video. Choosing the right tags will boost your views and in turn boost your exposure. Youtube also provides code for you to embed the video into your MySpace page or even your Wordpress blog. Also don’t forget you can link easily to your page by sending people to www.youtube.com/[username] for example: www.youtube.com/djpaulvelocity
Muzu
This is a bit of a weird one to describe as Muzu is kind of a mixture of a lot of the other websites mentioned before. Primarily it is used for adding videos much the same way as Youtube. You can add a profile, images and events just like Soonnight and DSI, plus you can modify and manage your profile a bit like MySpace. It describes itself as a new Music TV site where you can watch create and share music video playlists along with behind the scene footage, interviews and documentaries. You can favourite videos you like to create a playlist and in effect create your own personal TV channel of all the stuff you like. But upload a couple of videos of yourself in the mix and get spreading your sound to the masses.
muzu.tv
UkFunkyHouse
Ok, so this site might be quite genre-specific, but I really love the way this website is put together. Someone has really thought about it as all the controls and buttons are in the right places and stuff just makes sense. This is a website dedicated to the UK Funky House scene where you can drop in your RSS feeds, latest gig dates, event and profile pictures and so on. It’s just a really nice niche self-promotion web site and I really like it - I think the future of online self promotion lies in this niche genre-specific style of website. I expect other genres not only of house but Trance and Drum & Bass to follow suit very soon.
ukfunkyhouse.com
This is just a brief summary of some of the online self promotion DJ tools that I use. If there are any others out there that you use, please add them to the comments below along with a couple of words about how they have helped you.
Jul262009
Tom Upton & Mark Masters proudly presents SHAKEDOWN @ Ha Ha in Guilford, on Saturday 1st August.
A new night to tingle those senses and take you on a trip through the biggest and best in all kinds of house music. These 2 professional djs will be on hand to deliver you the best in Sexy, Funky, Electro House music all night long!!!!
Starting off the night with some sexual funky house flavours, moving into some upfront funky electro, then working our way up to those big funky bangers and then climaxing in a fountain of uplifting vocal electro for all of you who wish to dance the night away to REAL music!!
Free entry throughout the night, CD giveaways, and photo’s being taken! This is going to be an awesome night!
Don’t forget to invite your friends! Hope to see you there!
Ha Ha Bar & Grill
16 - 17 North Street
Guildford Surrey,
GU1 4AF
Map
On Thursday 3rd December I will be DJing at club 
) you’d be daft not to come.