A DJ is not a live act it is simply a person with Windows Media Player and a laptop. Infact I am going to turn on iTunes on my work computer right now and be a DJ by playing my music collection, I'll be called "DJ Wicky Wicky What!?"

McFail, you fail. Go see a real live electronic act up close. Many of them create the music in realtime from banks of samples or from their voices. Learn to use AbletonLive, tell me what an ADSR envelope is and do all of that stuff in time and with a well defined style and then maybe you can comment.

Until you can do that, I suggest you stop hanging around in sh***y bars that don't care about the music and just employ playlist djs / human cd changers.

of course a DJ is a musical act. even though they play other peoples tunes, sometimes mixed in with bits of their own, the choice of songs and how a dj puts them together is what makes their performance.

a good dj can read a crowd and know what tune to put on next to create the direction they want to take the energy of the set. a good dj will build up a set and in doing so build up people's enjoyment of the night.

international dj's are worth seeing as they have access to tunes that you will never hear unless you hear them played 'live' and tunes that you won't hear again for months to come. That and each locality generates a certain style of djing and you get to hear someone play that has had entirely different influences than yourself.

McFail - I'm sorry, your name says it all.

like a band... a DJ can be fun... inspiring... amazing or crap based on the music they play, the setting in which it is played and their technical aptitude for playing it

can they be live... depends on if they are breathing...

or of course they can be, the tools that a good DJ uses when playing can create an entirely new soundscape from pre recorded songs which is an art in itself

don’t get DJs confused with gramaphones – they are should be more than general playback devices…

McFail.... True a DJ isn't a 'live act' in the sense that they don't create the sound in the live environment.

However if you turned up as 'DJ Wicky Wicky What' to play iTunes or Windows Media Player from your laptop, you'd be laughed off stage.

The best DJs are truly gifted and are often producers also, playing their own creations. It annoys me to no end, people like yourself who get on their high horse with no knowledge about a genre that they don't like and don't understand.

I dont really go out of my way to see DJ's, one of the few i know which I would consider a live act is Alphabethead.

@McFail - um, eat your own words. Sorry. Have you ever actually seen/heard someone good spinning vinyl? Do you know anything about the history of Hip Hop, or Dub for that matter? Call me crazy, but I think when, for example, Afrika Bambaataa started doing his sh!t in the early 80s there was no such thing as Windows, let alone Media Player. And I've never heard of a DJ using that anyway.

McFail McFails....I think Viagara for your personality is needed. Ignorance is bliss. The gig was excellent, as was the fact that the matterhorn of old reared it's head, people smoking spliffs indoors!! WOW!! Killer dancefloor, with loads of people across the ages getting down. I challenge McFail to get his laptop and make a room of people dance.......

McFail #1 - Yet more wonderful open mindedness on the Blog in the Tracks comments.

It is certainly a different experience than seeing musicians reproduce a sound in front of your eyes, but to say anyone with a laptop can do it successfully is like saying anyone with a pen can write a good short story.