BPM 2015 hits Birmingham, UK on the 12th - 14th September at the famous NEC.
BPM first started back in 2007, when Marked Events organised an event at Donington Park Exhibition Centre, which provided visitors with equipment demonstrations, networking, seminars, workshops, live performances and DJ sets for 2 days.
With the success of the premier event and word spreading, this success prompted the move to a bigger home at the NEC in the thriving city of Birmingham.
Basically, its a chance for brands to showcase their products to the masses of djs, producers and entertainers in one huge space. Here you'll get to see the vision of your favourite brands and what they have ready to announce over the coming months, so in this blog, we'll take a quick look at some of the products that you can expect to see on our shelves very soon....
Pioneer certainly have been busy this year with the launch of quite possibly the best selling DJ unit to date with the XDJ-RX. That accompanied by new headphones, speakers and a tease of a new DVS system, many wondered what the next move would be?
Well yes, that tease of a DVS was a blatant give away. On the 10th September, Pioneer announced 2 new controllers and the eagerly awaited RekordBox DJ, that will be used with the new controllers, therefore ditching the need to use Serato as a platform. The great thing about Rekordbox DJ from first impressions, is the way that the user will be able to use the same file management and software whether they are using a controller or usb format that they may use in a club situation, using either cdjs, xdjs or djms.
The layout and design is also extremely pleasing, as it seems that they have taken the best parts from Traktor and Serato, put a sprinkle of Pioneer magic dust across them and came up with a familiar but different (I know that doesnt make sense, but you know what I mean) DVS.
This no doubt will give users complete faith that there will be a perfect marriage between the laptop and dj device, as no doubt all djs that have played out using a laptop, has had that sinking feeling at some point that something will go wrong.... Pioneer are the heavyweights of the industry, so I can see this taking off BIG TIME!
REKORDBOX DJ
So with this brilliant new platform, there has to be some brilliant new controllers to showcase it.... So here are the DDJ-RX and DDJ-RZ.
Both of these units are extremely similar apart from the size.... Think DDJ-SX2 and the DDJ-SZ.
The DDJ-RZ has the feel of a Nexus set up fused together as a controller, with the same platters as the CDJ 2000's, so you'd literally be home from home if you were used to using these. The DDJ-RX is just a more compact version, probably more suited to those that would want to carry it around to different gigs or those that were limited for space and couldn't fit the RZ in their booth.
These units are due out in November this year, so until I get my hands on one at BPM, its hard to give a true view on these, other than saying whats on paper.... Which to be fair, is impressive.
Pioneer have also said that they will be unveiling their new mid-range headphone the HDJ-700's. These will come in a multitude of colours and sit in between their current range of the HDJ 500's and the HDJ 1500's. Due to the introduction of these, the HDJ-500 price has now been lowered to allow for the 700's to be sold at a very reasonable £99.
The headphones themselves are extremely stylish and sound superb. Inspired by Pioneers top-flight HDJ 1500 and HDJ 2000 headphones, the robust, fully enclosed HDJ-700s are fine-tuned to reproduce rich, clear mid to low frequencies for monitoring dance music.
These headphones are going to be perfect for those djs starting out, that do not want an expensive layout in cost right from the start, but will be good enough to use in a club environment.
Native Instruments this years are heavily pushing their STEMS, a game changer most would say. So its only natural that they bring out another contro... I mean KONTROLLER ;) to give the masses more of an opportunity to use the STEMS files.
The Kontrol S5 seems to be a little brother of the almighty S8, which has been groundbreaking in itself. The loss of the jog wheels has continued and so it should, as Native Instruments are all about creativity and to be fair, theres only so much that you can do with a jog wheel. The touch strip that has replaced the conventional wheel obviously takes up less space, giving more space to inset performance pads and allow the screen to be big enough to be crystal clear. One thing that you'll notice thats different with the S5 compared to the S8, the 8 faders underneath the screens have disappeared and they now are controlled by a fader knob and kill switches. Another difference that you'll notice is that with the S5 you get TRAKTOR PRO 2, so you'll not get the timecodes etc that you would with the S8.... Other than that, you're getting an awesome bit of kit!
KRK are quite possibly the best selling studio monitors world wide. The product range from their entry point to their full on pro speakers are second to none at amazingly affordable prices. Well, their entry level has just changed as they have announced the KRK Rokit RP4, sneaking in just underneath the RP5. These, along with the rest of the KRKs are surprisingly punchy for their size, but what more would you expect? I guess these will be aimed at those on a little more of a tighter budget or those that are struggling for space but dont want to compromise on sound quality. They'll also be available in 3 colours (well 4 if you count the yellow cones ;) ) Black, Silver and White.
MORE TO FOLLOW AS THE MANUFACTURERS RELEASE THE INFORMATION.