When I first started out

Now this got me thinking, has the evolution made the DJ’s lazy? Lets do the math.

Today I have a CD bag holding 320 CD’s. Every cd has roughly 8 tracks on them, meaning my cd bag at all time holds 2560 tracks.

Vinyl. Heavy music.

Now when I first started, if I wanted to bring 2560 tracks to the club on vinyl, I would have to bring roughly 853 vinyls. Let’s say every vinyl has 3 tracks. The biggest UDG record bag can hold 90 records, meaning I would need something like 9,5 UDG bags. And according to Wikipedia an average vinyl weighs approx 100 grams.

853 vinyls x 100 grams = 85 300 GRAMS / 85,3 KG.

And if we add the fact that a UDG bag weighs somewhere around 4 kgs, the bags it self would weigh in at 38 KG making the grand total 123,3 KG. My cd bag weighs 6kg!

We’ll make this even more fun: A usb stick at 128 GB storage room weight 150 grams. If we say every track is approx 10mb you can fit 13 000 tracks on one usb stick or 26 000 tracks on two!

If you want to bring 26 000 tracks on vinyls you would have to bring 8666 vinyls.

8666 vinyls x 100 gram = 866 600 Grams = 866 KG.

Add that you would need roughly 96 UDG bags: 96 bags x 4KG a piece = 384 KG.

The Alfa Romeo T33 stradale. Two of these vs 26 000 tracks on vinyl. You choose.

Total weight: 1250 KG. To put things perspective; that’s the same weight as 2 (!!!) Alfa Romeo T33 Stradale Cars!!!!

Now I’m completely aware no reasonable dj would actually bring 96 vinyl bags to a gig, but then again most dj’s wouldn’t bring 26 000 tracks on USB sticks either.

If I had the choice I would get one USB stick and one Alfa Romeo T33 Stradale and drive off happy into the sunset, over 600 KG’s lighter.

Tokyo Pioneer shop. Picture by Øyvind Bye Skille.

Some of you might have noticed that Pioneer is up to something new. They are releasing a new product on 17th September 2009 – and they claim it’s something we haven’t seen before.

There’s been some clever guerilla marketing online so far. Using promotional teaser videos and Twitter, they have created somewhat a hype – at least on my opinion. Check out PioneerDjKarl‘s updates on Twitter to get a better overview.

The upcoming product have been introducing some big names relying heavily on Pioneer products when performing live. Armin Van Buuren, James Zabiela, Eddie Halliwell, Roger Sanchez, Laidback Luke, Angello & Ingrosso have said their (sponsored) opinions about the product.

Those videos are easily seen from Pioneer’s own DJ portal djsounds.com, but the announcement of the new CDJ NEXT (if that is the name) is  just in few hours.

Why the hype has been so good then? If someone is trying to get a good view on the product from a reflection from Roger Sanchez’s sunglasses, it has to be something big, right?

But the main thing about the hype is always the product. What can we expect from Pioneer, who have delivered us the industry standards for CD-players (CDJ-1000) and (to my own personal opinion the industry standard) mixer DJM-800, they are most likely to introduce something that will clear the table.

So far in the promotional videos are suggesting the upcoming product is combining the best of both worlds, hardware and software. Most likely it will support mass storage products such as USB-sticks, but perhaps even DVD & blu-ray discs and external hard drives. Could it even be that DJ could plug in his laptop and start performing via the device straight away?

Let’s see if Scandinavian retailer of Pioneer’s DJ gear let’s someone from Innotune have a sneak preview before the release to get a full detailed review.

I learned to DJ with Pioneer’s gear more than 10 years ago, and playing solely on CDJ-1000′s for several years, I’m more than eager to give Pioneer’s new flagship a test drive.