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Upfaders - any tips


MadAbbott

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Kind of always avoided these like the plague... (scratching with them at least)

 

Not really sure why...the motion for quick stabs with both hands going in the same direction makes them easier to do with upfaders, and obviously fades and echoes are great fun, but everything else seems more natural for me with the xfader.

 

Anyone really use them to their advantage and care to share any tips, settings/calibration tips etc...either for scratching or within juggles?

 

Not asking paul to divulge his awesome Euro secrets but just some opinions/basics!

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Fading one clicks flares are pretty easy to do, especially on a Rane with the slightly shorter fader throw

 

Hell yeah. I've been up on these for a long time and use that "mule/tru-fade" technique pretty often. I've always been surprised I don't hear others use it more. Basically, you can cross fade and volume fade at the same time. Works well with chirps, one-click flares, chirp-flares, etc. I cut regular so what I do is use the channel swap on the TTM-56 so that the volume fader is closer to the side of the cross-fader I'm cutting with. The TTM-57mkii has the "channel swap" feature too but its not implemented as well as the 56 in my opinion. I can post some examples if you want.

 

Honestly, other than fades I've never been too jazzed about cutting with the upfades. It just takes extra time to preposition your hand so why do that unless you absolutely have to? I know Short and Q do it out of old habit (when they had mixers with no cross-faders). With juggling I think it makes more sense because you have times when you want/need to use them (because the cross-fader alone won't work for what you want to do).

 

That euro-scratch can sound really dope too but I never learned that. DJ Jeff posted a file on skratchworx way back when where he did that cut and it sounded super ill.

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Guest Symatic

I'm in the process of upping my upfader gayme right now.

 

i'm working on getting chirps down (or the closest thing to a chirp) and one clicks that dont sound too soft.

 

its slow progress but im getting there.... its actually helping to define fader clicks in my head so its good to do definately. its making me understand the importance of the off and the on motion. seems stupidly obvious but theyre both separate things - you notice when you do it real slow that you have to really make an effort to put the ON fade in the right place. everything has a start and a finish....

 

Ive learned some really useful concepts so far.

 

one really good one is doing the Delete Scratch with the ups.... 8 quick notes out of 2 clicks.....

 

(fwd baby followed by fwd 1 click followed by backwards baby followed by backwards 1 click.)

 

/\ /\ /\ /\

\/ \/ \/ \/

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For upfader techniques I think it strongly depends on the mixer. A Vestax fade with more of an exponential curve is my preference. The volume drop is sharp enough to give the illusion of cutting the sound out at the top of the fader but gradual enough for you to do fades as well. The upfaer curve on the 08 is the bomb. When I tried the S9 that was pretty good too. Im not a fan of the Rane volume curves at all - you can't really get a good balance between cuts and fades like you can with other mixers.

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Yeah ive been learning all of the above too, agree the rane is not as nice as vestax but the shorter faders do work well for some other stuff. Ive been cutting with techniques like simple flares on the xfade, but bringing the fader all the way over to the cuttingg side instead of the middle for "on", if you get it right it chopps the beat as well so youre controlling both channels simultaneously

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For upfader techniques I think it strongly depends on the mixer. A Vestax fade with more of an exponential curve is my preference. The volume drop is sharp enough to give the illusion of cutting the sound out at the top of the fader but gradual enough for you to do fades as well. The upfaer curve on the 08 is the bomb. When I tried the S9 that was pretty good too. Im not a fan of the Rane volume curves at all - you can't really get a good balance between cuts and fades like you can with other mixers.

 

Yep, totally Mike. The old 05 and the Technics mixer had that short fader at the top of the fader's travel that seemed to allow both smooth fades and sharper chops - I remember watching DJ battles in the 90s and lots of DJs had sharp up fader moves that got a bit sloppier as Rane mixers crept in. The shorter overall throw of the Rane faders set to smooth fade allows a little bit of breathing room, but it's still really a choice between fades and making it cut in sharply at the bottom of the fader's travel like another crossfader.

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Guest It'sPhilFromThursdays

^ I've made a fair few of the above points in the past so i couldn't be arsed to reiterate them, lulz.

 

Also, if you are doing like one or two quick cuts if you do it in a one handed tiger paw style rather than holding the fader or putting you thumb on it. it makes it a bit quicker.

 

Hey, guys, watch battle dudes prior to 95 for nioce up styles. Q used to be even better on the ups if you peeps the Rock steady era stuff.

 

It's funny, when watch Q the other night i kept thinking how outraged Pete TTM would have been at Q's tech, cos he kept pushing the fader way over to the other side like when faders had long cut off curves.

 

Anyway, just to be a big contrarian, I was doing some decent sharp stabs earlier on my weak side on my 56. Cut hamster guys and it's easier to learn on the ups :p

 

Damn, though, i used to be pretty flipping great on the ups compared to now when i used to juggle loads (and the era was shortly after i change to vestax mixers from regular old style faders). Nice transforming and everything. We were all at it, with our great flapping wrists. Ed's pretty nice on the ups. RIP my upfader cuts.

 

I seem to remember Klever being good on the ups from the more modern dudes.

 

The ups on the technics mixer were really nice, too.

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Guest It'sPhilFromThursdays
Not asking paul to divulge his awesome Euro secrets but just some opinions/basics!

 

Paul showed me this a while ago. It's not as hard as it looks, but is as hard as it looks to do them as good as Paulo does them :)

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It's funny, when watch Q the other night i kept thinking how outraged Pete TTM would have been at Q's tech, cos he kept pushing the fader way over to the other side like when faders had long cut off curves.

 

Totally spotted that too! It's not just Pete either, I've heard a lot of people saying small movements are more efficient and make you faster and cleaner... which does make sense. Yet QBert was pretty wild with the fader and seemed not to be having any trouble with either clean or fast.

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 2 years later...

DJ Klever has some crazy upfader skills too. I read a comment on a video of him practicing with Chris Karns where Chris Karns left a comment like "Klever broke 2 of my faders that night". I think Klever and IQ, Noize and these guys are so good at those upfader cuts because they are so sharp and quick, it requires a sudden burst of movement because of the longer throw which you have to experiment with and try to create, its like a popping of muscles suddenly.

What also helps is to set the fader curve a bit less even from start to finish and have most of the volume come on at the top (if you do this too much, it's effectively cheating). Even on the older mixers like the 06's, the faders inside should have a black switch on them for fader curve to assist with this also.


Another thing to consider would be if your someone who uses the fader 'regular' not in hamster style, you have a massive dissadvantage for performing 'line fader cuts' over someone who uses 'hamster style', because the hamster style movement for a cut is the same for the crossfader and the line input.

Edited by DJRidm
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An idea would be to try and perform whatever scratch it is your trying to do on the line faders, slowly and record it into a sampler. Then speed it up in the sampler and listen to hear if your executing it right. Because if you are then all your really lacking is speed which you can build using one of the 'tempo increasing' speed tools where the tempo of the beat goes up 2 or 3 bpm every few bars.

 

Another thing i've noticed when performing cuts on the upfaders - not that i'm that good at it - is using tears to break up each movement and cut, as the 'break' you get in the record movement as you do a tear, if you can combine with the cutting with the line faders can sound really cool and gives a much clearer and solid cut. Maybe thats cheating though.

Edited by DJRidm
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  • 2 weeks later...

I really like doing tears with the upfaders, as yes, it does sound dope and I'm not really doing much. Almost felt like it was cheating too, but in any case, it sounds cool and makes me work on my tears more 'cause it's more appealing to the ears.

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  • 3 weeks later...

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