Benefits of Buying Digital Music Files

Streaming has become the main way most people consume music these days, however, it has a few drawbacks when it comes to DJing. The main issue with streaming music through DJ software with integrations such as Tidal or Beatport Streaming, is the reliance on having a stable internet connection. If there's no Wi-Fi, you won't have access to your music library. If the connection is poor or slow, it will take a long time for tracks to load, potentially causing you to miss cue points or transitions.

Another issue with streaming is that each platform may not always have every track you want to play due to licencing restrictions or simply not being distributed to every platform. Sometimes a track you want to play might be an obscure release or free download and not available on streaming platforms.

For these reasons, purchasing and downloading digital music files is generally still the preferred option for professional DJs and considered much more reliable. When you purchase individual tracks or albums, you own those digital files and are able to play them anywhere, at any time, without the risk of internet not being available or cutting out. Digital files will generally load quicker than when streaming, enabling smoother mixes and reducing the chance of missing key moments in your sets.

When you buy music, you own those files forever. Over time, you'll build a large music library that will always be available to you, providing you take precautions to backup your collection regularly. As you don't actually own any of the music when using streaming services, you could potentially lose your entire library and all your playlists if a service were to ever shut down.

Another benefit of buying music is differentiation. DJs using streaming platforms have the same access to the same catalogue of music, while you might be able to build a more diverse collection of tracks by finding rare or unreleased music to buy that was never commercially released to streaming platforms.

Free vs Paid Options

Free downloads can be a great way for beginner DJs to start building a music collection without breaking the bank, especially as you'll probably also be buying a DJ controller, headphones and/or speakers. However, you'll most likely want to start exploring the paid options relatively soon as you run into the limitations of the free options.

Free

Free downloads are a common tool used by upcoming producers to try and gain awareness and to start building an audience. More established producers may also give away free downloads every now and then to expand their fan base or to say thanks to fans for their support, although this is less common. Besides gaining exposure, tracks are generally given away as free downloads for a couple of reasons. Either they're not up to release-standard, or they're bootlegs/ contain samples that aren't feasible to clear. Due to this and the lack of quality control, you'll inevitably come across a lot of average tracks while searching free downloads. But in saying that, you can definitely still find some gems here and there.

Soundcloud

Soundcloud is a popular platform for producers to upload music and contains a lot of free downloads from both established and upcoming independent artists. There isn't a specific way to find or browse free downloads on Soundcloud so you will mainly come across them by following various artists or if you see social media posts from artists mentioning they've released a free download. Artists will usually include "FREE DOWNLOAD" etc in the title of a song, so you can also search "free download" or "free (insert genre)" and browse through the tracks that come up or playlists people have created with free downloads. You can get lucky with generous artists providing instant download links, however, as most free music is used to build audiences, you'll find the majority of downloads are linked to the next free option, Hypeddit.

Hypeddit

Hypeddit is a music promotion platform where artists upload tracks to download for free in exchange for fans sharing their email address, or liking, commenting, reposting or following the artist on various social media and streaming platforms including Spotify, Soundcloud, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube.

It's much easier to browse through free downloads on Hypeddit than on Soundcloud as you can view Top 100 Charts or New Releases for a wide range of electronic genres including House, Breaks, Dubstep, Drum & Bass, Techno and Trance. Aside from the electronic genres, there are also charts for Hip Hop, R&B, Pop, Rock, Dub, Reggae and many more.

While the whole point of the platform is to help promote artists' music and build their audience, it can be a bit of a hassle if you wanted to download a lot of songs as you need to fill in your email address or log in to social media accounts and write comments etc. for every track you download. Some tracks will have 3 or 4 actions to complete before you can download the track. It's fine if you just want to grab one or two songs, but quite time consuming if you're a beginner wanting to start building a library.

Paid

Artists spend a lot of time honing their craft and working on releases and deserve to be paid for their music. Virtually all established and professional producers will distribute their music for purchase on various platforms and this is where you will generally find the best and highest quality tracks.

Beatport

Beatport is probably the biggest and most well-known digital music store for electronic music. Beatport hosts releases from virtually all independent and major labels across a wide range of electronic music genres and sub-genres. Unless it's very obscure or an artist/label is determined to go completely independent, you can almost guarantee the new releases you're looking for these days will be on Beatport. Some tracks are also exclusively released on Beatport ahead of the official release date.

Up until recently, the Beatport website was very slow to browse and search for music, at least in my experience. However, it seems to have undergone a bit of an overhaul and is providing a much quicker and smoother experience now. A couple of downsides to Beatport are that you have to pay extra to download tracks in higher quality formats such as WAV and AIFF, and tracks can be slightly more expensive than purchasing via Bandcamp or directly from labels.

Juno Download

Juno Download is another popular online music store for dance and electronic music and is fairly similar to Beatport with it's structure and catalogue. Sometimes you'll find tracks that are available on Juno Download and not Beatport, and vice versa, so it can be good to check both if you can't find what you're looking for on one or the other. You will also find some exclusive tracks released earlier on Juno Download than other platforms. Juno Download is usually cheaper than Beatport which can be a deciding factor for some when choosing which store to buy from. Like Beatport though, you'll also need to pay extra for higher quality file formats such as WAV.

Bandcamp

Bandcamp is an online store for independent labels and artists selling digital music and merchandise. This is generally the best option if you're looking to support artists, as labels and their artists receive around 80-85% of revenue from sales, whereas this figure can be much lower with other platforms. Bandcamp can be great for discovering underground artists however, one downside is that you won't find a lot of releases you're looking for if they're released by major labels as most major labels do not have their catalogues on the platform. Another great feature of Bandcamp is that some labels have their entire discography available for purchase and often at a discount, which can be really helpful for building a music collection while saving some money. You can also find some free downloads on Bandcamp if artists decide to offer their release with a 'Pay What You Like' option with no minimum value.

Label Websites

Not all labels will have their own websites and a lot might just stick with Bandcamp these days as you get your own page/mini-store to showcase your digital and physical goods. However, for those that do, you'll be able to directly support them with purchases through their store as no other platform is taking a cut of the sale. For this reason, it's also often cheaper to buy tracks from label websites. The main downside to this option is convenience as you'd likely have to buy from a lot of different stores to get everything you want.

What's the Best Option?

To be honest, there isn't one clear best option and I would actually recommend checking out and using all the different options from time to time. Your preferred option will likely come down to a few factors; price, convenience and level of support for artists and labels.

If you're starting out and don't have much of a budget for buying music, free downloads will be fine to get you up and running. Otherwise, Bandcamp and label websites will generally be the cheapest option, although sometimes Juno Download can be the cheapest option. If you're after convenience, and just want to be able to buy everything in one place, Beatport is probably your best bet, followed closely by Juno Download. In saying that though, depending on your tastes, you might still have to find some releases elsewhere. So take some time and explore which platform generally has the most of what you're looking for. Finally, if you're main motive is supporting the artists, then label websites and Bandcamp will be the best options as artists will receive the biggest percentage of your purchases.