The art of DJing: Jeff Mills

Courtesy of Resident Advisor, this feature is possibly the equivalent of a mid-90's interview with Eric Clapton about the proper use of guitars in rock.  Lamentations about the sorry state of affairs these days?  Check.  Schooling the young whippersnappers about how things are supposed to be done?  Yes to that too.  It's a sobering thought to consider that techno has been around long enough to produce its share of surly older statesmen just like rock and roll did. 

Nevertheless, Mills is essentially a god and reading this interview firmly established (as if there was really any doubt) that he is on another level completely.  He can detect details in music that would go unnoticed by any ordinary person, and can react and process these details in real time, while DJing.  Two or three minutes to make the subtraction, i.e. to remove a track from the mix completely?  I know the concept and I strive to do the same with some of my mixes.  But cueing three tracks simultaneously, intentionally lagging the beats, and rephasing them in just the right way to build the excitement for the listener?  How do you do that without having it all devolve into, to cop a phrase Mills uses, "a herd of horses"?  Mills can hear differences in calibration between three identical CDJ's, including the effect of room temperature and humidity.  The man simply understands his craft better than most of us will ever understand anything in our lives.  Learning to DJ in Detroit must have been like boot camp, where only the strongest and most talented could survive, and anyone who did was more disciplined than the best DJs from virtually any other place (he talks a bit about this too).  I can't do the interview justice, and literally the entire thing is quotable, you just have to read it. 

My favourite bit actually might have been the part where Mills used to leave records in his crate that he had no intention of playing.  He'd leave a James Brown record in there not to play it, but as a reminder to keep his set funky.  Brilliant.  Or maybe the part about focusing on the last quarter of the track in his mixes, because that's where the track best comes together, where the real groove can be found.  I really must try my hand at that in a future mix.