DV battle feedback thread - constructive criticism and ideas for the future

[Steve]

This year I went with Silk Kuts for the beats, partly because I knew his beats are popular with scratch DJs (at least the ones of a certain tempo anyway ), and partly because he offered to do all of the beats, which meant that that part of the battle was sorted. I asked a bunch of the DJs from last year what they thought of the beats and some liked them, some didn't, and some said "I'll cut over whatever!", so I wouldn't say that there was any consensus amongst the 30 competitors that they were "all shit" or anything like that. One of Silk Kuts's beats was used last year too.

 

I can understand the argument about giving DJs beats that will bring out their best, but then what beats are those? Does every DJ prefer the same tempos and styles of beats? All 78 DJs? I wouldn't say so. Also, I wouldn't be too quick to judge this year's beats as people have only heard 1 of the 6 that we're using. The beat for round 3 isn't like the beat from round 2 at all, but to me that's part of what makes the battle good and that's why I don't want to change that aspect.

[Mr. Wonderful]

Hear goes!!!

 

I agree that the second round beat is fine and I do not think that the beats would hold back any DJ's from 'showing and proving'.

 

I have an idea that could make the competition a fairer test of ones scratching skills. I think that the competitors should be told which scratch sound, word or phrases to use as well as the beat. You could pick classic ones that everyone would have. This would mean that every competitor would be based on ones ability to flip that particular sound, word or phrase over the allocated beat. This would be a much fairer way to test a scratchers skills and you would clearly see the ones that would stand out.

 

What do you all think?

 

Tags

Edited September 22, 2014 by djtags

[Steve]

I'm not against that idea, but I dunno - I would rather not take away the freedom to use any samples you like. From a listener's and judge's perspective (which are important too), it might be a bit much to have 70+ people cutting up "ahhhhhh" all over the same beat, even though obviously a lot of people choose that sample anyway.

 

If lots of people feel that that's a better way to go though, I would definitely consider running with that next time.

 

What I might do is take some of these ideas and make a short questionnaire online and ask the competitors to fill it out once the battle is over.

[DJ Rock Well]

I agree what Paul and Steve are saying above, I realise that it's gonna piss off some DJs but I think it resulted in some really interesting videos/entries and the winner of such a battle has really had to prove themselves in a variety of situations. What really impressed and surprised me with Fakser last year was his ability to deal with whatever was thrown at him... prior to that, I'd only ever seen him cut to a pretty small range of style and tempo beats and I (wrongly) assumed that was all he was good at.

 

I've met and cut with all manner of different scratchers of wildly different musical backgrounds and preferences and they all have different opinions on what beats are best to cut to. For an example outside of the main DV battle: I made that reggae sampled for the DVBB14 and when I first made it and played it to Paul and Kutclass, there reaction was a unanimous "nice beat, but not to cut to". Then Backtrack posted his scratch entry over it and totally killed it, saying he really liked the beat and do more like this in the future.

 

I'm prepared to accept that my own efforts included weren't the best perhaps - I know my own failings better than anyone, but the Oizo beat D Styles killed in Korea and the Silk Kuts beat? (the beat that Fakser posted on Silk Kuts FB wall about how much he loved it and was going to kill it over in the final round).

 

I like the fact this battle is a bit different to others... why not have something out there that doesn't just conform to current trends and formats.

[Mr. Wonderful]

I'm not against that idea, but I dunno - I would rather not take away the freedom to use any samples you like. From a listener's and judge's perspective (which are important too), it might be a bit much to have 70+ people cutting up "ahhhhhh" all over the same beat, even though obviously a lot of people choose that sample anyway.

 

If lots of people feel that that's a better way to go though, I would definitely consider running with that next time.

 

What I might do is take some of these ideas and make a short questionnaire online and ask the competitors to fill it out once the battle is over.

 

I think a questionnaire would be a great idea Steve.

 

Tags

[Steve]

@Rock Well - My favourite beat of all of them is still that Organ Donor-type one that you did. Also, of the 6 DV beat battles that you entered, you won 4 of them, so some people here clearly like your beats and they were voting on those beats to cut over them, not as stand-alone instrumentals or anything like that. That's why I asked you to provide some beats for last year.

 

@Tags - I'll get one sorted!

[jeljms]

A questionnaire seems like a good idea. Running with Tags' idea for a minute, maybe the samples could be the same from round 2 onwards. Then you wouldn't get ahh or fresh overkill.

 

But I really enjoyed the mix of beats and samples in round 1, particularly with so many entries it allowed DJs to more easily stand out and differentiate themselves from the pack.

[kebzer]

Guys,

 

I think it's time to get over those 70 bpm, double timed beats. Remeber, this is not Beat4Battle,

[Guest broke]

Last year, the beats were all different styles. There was even one that you picked, as I asked you what to use for a classic scratch beat. Perhaps you should have picked one that was a bit more inspiring, then at least that would have been 1 success, eh?

I must have dropped the ball on that one.

 

This year, Silk Kuts made all of the beats and you've only heard 1 of them so far.

Silk Kuts does have good beats. That one Chin used last year was sick.

[Steve]

I'm pretty confident you'll like some of the other beats in this year's comp man!

[Guest broke]

Sure. I was also letting you know what had been said. Don't shoot the messenger etc etc

[Guest broke]

And to reiterate - you've put in a lot of work this year and it shows. Respect.

[Steve]

Thanks mate!

[Vet]

Have to echo what Broke said....Steve, have to give due props for the hard work....not too many people would take something like this on (and do it well), so thanks for even asking for feedback and actually implementing ideas when possible.

 

As for my comment about the 2nd beat...you guys have made a fair point too about versatility, have to admit that... ...just my own personal reaction, when I know I'd prob wanna rip into something a bit different...it will be interesting to see how people approach the next round.

[stingray]

Probably going to have something like 100 DJ's enter next year = need to have more rounds. It was difficult for me to genuinely give a top 8 with that many entries this year, spreading the first "round" over time should make it easier. I like the online DMC how they spread it over a few weeks, that will also increase traffic and opportunity to post on social media often. Just have everyone enter VIA email, then they get put into a pool, then groups of DJ's are selected at random and are notified which First Round week they will be entering. Or you could have the contestants vote for their top 1/2, eliminating half the first round, then do a second round to find top 16/8 etc.

 

I think the 80% technical thing should be dropped, just vote for BEST or FAVORITE as flow and creativity are also very technical aspects.

 

The VS round should be 3 minutes to push DJ's harder, a winner of the 2 should be pretty obvious, if not, rematch with a different beat.

 

Entry could be $5-$10. That will stop non serious people from entering, also will be a nice cash prize or other prize for the winner(s). Your $5-$10 will be going to the winner, I think that is pretty cool and deserving.

[Guest Symatic]

Yeah the fact the round 2 beat was not my favourite bpm is neither here there or everywhere...

 

It levels the playing field really, after all its supposed to be a challenge! And when you hear people ripping it up over such a plain beat, it shows their skills off even more i think. So while i did get tired of the rd2 beat, i like that we all had to overcome the same challenge

[mfsop]

I like pretty much everything about the format and some good advice has already been given but maybe this is an idea for the next battle:

 

Instead of choosing your Top 8, you could give points to all contestants (maybe 1 to 5). I assume that everyone has watched each video anyway, so it shouldn't take longer to vote. Also, if you give some sympathy points to someone who's not going to make it anyway, it shouldn't bring that guy into the Top 8 but it will allow people to give equal points to their favorites. I think that selecting the Top 8 was the hardest part and leaving out great scratchers was a bit of a shame.

Then just average the points and in case of ties give the higher rank to the DJ with the lower variance of the votes.

 

Edit: And probably make the vote private (more PMs for Steve, yay), so you're not as influenced by what the others have voted.

[Steve]

Regarding the format, you have to take into consideration that it's only me handling the competition once it begins. With DMC, they're a business employing a bunch of folks, but with this it's just one person doing it for free - in fact, it costs me money to run this, cos I'm paying to ship out some of the prizes. With the format as it is now, there's a hectic bit in the run up to the round 1 deadline, but then it becomes manageable once round 1 is over, but if we went with groups, not only does it spread the competition over a longer period of time, it also means a lot more for me to do.

 

It's the same with your proposed scoring system, mfsop. I think it's a good idea in principle, but having each person submit, say, 100 scores each, puts a lot of extra burden on them and me. With the way it is now, people can pretty easily chop the pack down by at least a half I would say, but with your system they would have to consider what score every single person should get.

 

The solution to that would be to get more people on board to help run it, so someone could be responsible for checking the entries and adding them to the YouTube playlist if they're accepted, then someone else could be the score keeper etc.

 

I proposed using groups once before, but some people were against it as they felt that taking the top X number of DJs from a certain number of groups doesn't necessarily give you the top Y DJs overall, because it really depends on who else is in your group.

 

What I would rather do is get rid of the peer voting system and just have a larger pool of judges judging throughout, but it's a case of finding people willing to do it who aren't going to go AWOL. The reason I went with the 5 people that are doing it this year is because they're DV regulars who aren't just going to disappear and stop responding to me. The more I put into the hands of people I don't really know, the more chance there is that things go wrong and that affects the credibility of the competition. Last year we had 2 judges go AWOL who didn't submit their picks on time and didn't respond to my emails, and they had to be replaced. That doesn't look good.

 

I'm not writing any of these ideas off, but with this kind of thing you will get people saying "it's fine the way it is", then others will say "you should do X and Y", but then you get others saying "no, don't do X and Y, that's a bad idea!", so A) it's not just a case of taking 1 or 2 people's comments and thinking "OK, I'll do that" and B) whatever I do, I have to consider whether it's manageable/workable and whether it increases the potential for something to go tits up.

[DJ Rock Well]

I think what you've done this year was good.

 

The only thing I would change is perhaps going from open to all first round, to choosing a top 16 as an extra round (mostly just because of numbers).

 

For this extra "top 16 round", I'd keep it just to judges scores and I'd have it so it's just about finding the top 8 (rather than head to heads) to go into the rest of the battle as is. This extra round could either be contestant's own choice of beat, or maybe their choice of a limited beat selection that covers a few different tempos and styles.

[kut_class]

I reckon groups is a bad idea, as Steve said , you'll end up with a mix of strong or weak groups , where a winner of a weak group goes ahead of someone one better but in a stronger group.

 

I think the judging criteria is spot on. Technicality includes flow imo , it a not just executing a sequence of movements, they have to be on time and make sense. Musicallity is about composition (arrangement of technique) and sample choice .that's it.

 

Regarding public votes, No matter what way you look at it, if there is a public vote people will need to choose a top 8 or whatever number. I don't get why that's to be avoided. Yes its hard, however over the number of people involved it should make the trends statistically significant regardless of variation in that top 8 or whatever.

 

Tbh the system works. I think there was some pretty shitty voting and it's easy to see if you compare against the judges choices. Of all things this battle can't be another popularity contest.

[Mr. Wonderful]

I think the peer voting system should go!!! Personally I felt it was very cliquey and people did not vote honestly. I also think that to run a fair competition, clear and concise boundaries need to be set. I felt that Tech, flow and musicality were to vague and were lost in translation, as my understanding of tech and flow may not be someone else's, vice versa. It seamed to me that composition was the major factor within this competition, not tech, flow or musicality.

 

Please do not get me wrong I think Steve has done an amazing job and would never want to discredited his efforts.

 

This is just my humble opinion.

 

Tags

Edited October 24, 2014 by djtags

[Steve]

I do like the idea of having another round, rather than cutting it down to 8 after round 1. Had I know how many competitors we'd get this year, I would probably have done that this time.

 

As for the time limit, I think 3 minutes is probably too long, but that's one of the things I'll include in the questionnaire I'm gonna ask people to fill in later on.

 

I definitely don't want to do public votes. I know some people would argue that with DMC Online, it kinda works itself out, but I'm not sure that's true. I'm sure Ruftone didn't make it through in one particular round, when there were DJs that were clearly weaker who did, so he had to come back and enter in another round. If it wasn't Ritchie, it was someone else.

 

I don't dislike the peer voting system, but it's not ideal. There were a handful of people that clearly voted for their friends or people in the same crew as them. There were also one or two people that didn't show great sportsmanship with their votes, including 1 guy whose top 8 was just the first 8 DJs in the playlist in order, but the weighting of the votes stops that kind of thing from having any real effect. Without the peer votes, Symatic wouldn't have made it into the top 8, but people were clearly voting for him cos they liked his video, as he picked up points from a whole bunch of folks, so I think that's a good example of the system working as intended. If we keep the peer voting, what I should do is introduce a penalty for competitors who don't vote, although I don't know if that would just lead to more people posting bad choices and by "bad choices" I mean that they pick a top 8 in a hurry just because if they don't, they'll be penalised.

[Steve]

Here's the top 12 competitor picks from the peer votes: -

 

01 - Chinmachine

02 - Chmielix

03 - DJ Biox

04 - Redmist

05 - JesusKut

06 - Symatic

07 - DJ Chell

08 - Celsius

09 - Electrofood

10 - Jimmy Penguin

11 - Dopez

12 - DJ Select

 

The top 8 that made it through were all in the top 11 of the competitor picks, so I don't think there's much evidence there of "cliquey voting" having any real effect, as the judges' picks weren't that much different from the competitor picks.

[Mr. Wonderful]

I guess I must just have different musical tastes than other people, because I felt most of the videos were the same and did not show much tech, flow or musicality, but that's just life. Furthermore this is most proberly the reason I found the judging very cliquey as most of the competitors and judges have a like minded view. If I am to be totally honest I really hate DMC and most of the Dj's that enter it I think are totally wack...

 

Tags

Edited October 22, 2014 by djtags

[Steve]

I don't think that's an example of people being "cliquey". I think that's explained by the majority of scratch DJs having the same (or at least, every similar) opinions on what makes a good scratch freestyle. That's why the majority of the points went to the same few DJs, from both the competitors and the judges as a whole. Having a different opinion on what makes a scratch freestyle great is fine, but that alone is not evidence that there's an issue with the voting/judging.

 

Had there been no peer voting system, the top 8 would have barely changed. VaZee would have been in and Symatic would have been out, but I don't think that anyone could claim that Sy only got competitor votes because of some kind of cliquey bias. He picked up points cos quite a lot of people liked his video and all of those points combined pushed him up the table above VaZee, not because a handful of his buddies put him in first to gave him a boost.