system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: What do DJ's actually do when preforming?
gpt
Depends on the DJ, some will premix a set of tracks at home or a studio, push play, and act the part. What most do, requires quite a bit of skill. DJs get a bad rap but it takes some talent to be good. What you have in front of you is a multi channel mixer. This is ELI5 so let's keep this simple, this is a 2 channel mixer. One song is playing on the first mixer, and the DJ is cueing up the next one on the other side. What he is hearing in his headphones is not what is being played to the audience but either the next song or both tracks at once, and he is trying to match the beat to the current track, find the right time to blend them together for a seamless transition, add pitch, tone, bass, effects, slow one track down, speed one up.. Ect. He/she is working on making sure the beat don't stop because that's what kills the party. Another point to make is he is watching, and playing for the audience, some things work some don't so the DJ has to be reactive to what he is observing with the crowd. Now multiply all that to 4 our even 6 channels and you got work son.