Sven Vath on 30 Years of DJing

[Max Kane]

http://www.cocoon.net/popups/30jahresven/30jahresven_eng.html

Slightly pretentious in places but I love the passion with which he speaks & he is a legend so I'll let him off

[Quadrant]

Overall comes across as a very strange person and very German... but that could just be the translation. Interesting read this sir!

[milkybarkid]

He's a bit of a loon isn't he? Some of the video's of him on You-tube are mad, he obviously like his, erm, 'partying'.

Found that a good read, he's a fierce defender of the vinyl aspect isn't he? While it was actually quite sad to see that he's gonna have to admit defeat in it, regardless of how much he choses not too. As he said, it's like forcing a grand pianist to use a Casio.

I think he makes a good point about to much re-editing and playing with tracks while dj'ing. As he (sort of) says how would an author feel if you did a book reading of his book, and had left bits out, and put your own bits in? I know its hard to put in context, but I think he has a point. Thought he made a great point about mixing too, half the excitement about mixing is worrying are the beats perfect, what adjustments need to be made. The synch button takes that element away.

[Max Kane]

Vinyl mixng will always be the truest form of mixing. It's iconic in a way that no nother format could ever be.

I think some of what he says represents the fact that he has taken a few too many disco-biscuits over that 30 year period but I think he's probably as big as he has ever been at the moment. The Cocoon label and events are massive at the moment.

[Moonman]

he is right though. For me personally, i feel that its no coincidence that the rise of mp3 has resulted in the general quality of music not being as it was and, dare i say it, more disposable.

I also do still use vinyl, well, timecode vinyl. But i'm going to get myself a midi controller in the coming months. It's a sad time but you have to keep up with technology.

[Max Kane]

For me a major problem with the vast amount of mp3 music available is that tracks never seem to take on that special anthemic quality anymore.

DJs (both famous and not) have such a wide range of music available now that they very rarely play the same track for very long (unless they have a vested interest) and so tracks have, as Moonman quite rightly puts it, a disposable nature.

What made so many of the huge tracks from years gone by so big is that they have that universal appeal and DJs played them a lot to build hype before they came out. Once you got your vinyl copy for £4-£8 you made damn sure you got your money's worth and played it, dare I say, treasured it.

I can't think of many tracks from the past few years that have a long term 'anthem' ability. Possibly 'On Off' & 'Dark Flower' but that's it for me

[Briggsy]

I think the last Trance tune I could regard as being an anthem and still being recognised in a few years time is O'Callaghan & Kearney - Exactly, which was back in 2006. Since then, I can't think of a single Trance tune that has jumped out at me as being really strong. The whole Trance scene is stuck in a bit of a rutt at the moment - everything seems to be produced around the 134bpm mark and sounds really samey.

It doesn't help when you've got so-called "up-and-coming" producers (that don't produce) paying either Ben Nicky or Steve Allen to produce a tune for them. No wonder it all sounds the same - they're all using the same 'template'

The digital era has been great in some ways - but in other ways, its started some horrible trends that aren't going to end anytime soon

[Number2Fan]

Well trance is never gonna be at it's peak level again, and clubs most definitely aren't what they used to be.

I'm right off trance now and rocking the dubstep, that coupled with the brilliant tunes I've experienced in their heyday is all I need.

It's like every trance tune that comes out now has been done already- only better.

Bpms are to slow on trance too atm.

[Briggsy]

Bpms are to slow on trance too atm.

This is the biggest problem really. It used to be great when club nights built in style and tempo - but now, there's only a few bpm difference between the warm-up set and the rest of the sets.

You've got DJ's like Markus Schulz playing peak time sets at 133bpm now. he's a superb DJ and one that I really like - but he's not a 2am DJ. By then, the night should be in full swing - not plodding along at a slow pace. A few years ago, his style would have been perfect just after the warm-up DJ - but now times have changed, he can play quite late and not sound out of place all the time (he does occasionally, but not very often).

I'm also well off Trance now - I prefer Techno.

[Max Kane]

This is the biggest problem really. It used to be great when club nights built in style and tempo - but now, there's only a few bpm difference between the warm-up set and the rest of the sets.

You've got DJ's like Markus Schulz playing peak time sets at 133bpm now. he's a superb DJ and one that I really like - but he's not a 2am DJ. By then, the night should be in full swing - not plodding along at a slow pace. A few years ago, his style would have been perfect just after the warm-up DJ - but now times have changed, he can play quite late and not sound out of place all the time (he does occasionally, but not very often).

I'm also well off Trance now - I prefer Techno.

Schulz is a casuality of this imo. He's lost what made him unique and just plays slow trance now (by and large).

When he was booked in the slot that Briggsy suggest he should be in now he was awesome - post 2006 he has slowly declined and plays more and more trancey now - which he has to as he is a 'genuine headliner'.

The same happened, to an extent, with Jon O'Bir