Addictive TV

Is VJ culture making an impact on club design? Are owners incorporating the technology and space to allow VJs a decent set up?
Some are yes, especially with new clubs - like Matter in London who’ve incorporated video from the outset - but I’d say in general in the wider club scene, it’s sadly a no.  It still seems to be some balcony at the back of the room for many VJs!

Are clubs and bars attractive to VJs as performance spaces?
Yes, but I’m sure many would prefer a gallery space!  There are clubs though that are very attractive to visual performers, like Womb in Tokyo or Razzmatazz in Barcelona, both have resident VJs, and both have very high ceilings and enough space for huge screens.  With Addictive TV, we’re audiovisual, performing both the audio and video, and clubs like Womb or Razzmatazz handle that very well.  I guess, more often than not though, a music festival with a huge screen set-up would be the preferred choice of VJs and AV artists.


What is (or what would be) the ideal setup for a VJ entering a club?
I guess it partly depends on how the artist has been booked and billed.  If like us, as Addictive TV, you’re an audiovisual act booked to do your own set and are on the bill as a main act, then the ideal setup would be on a stage or in the main DJ booth in front of the screens where the crowd can see you.  And ideally that space would be big enough to comfortably take all the kit you need.  And even if you’re a VJ providing visuals for a DJ, you ideally don’t want to be separated and away from the action, so again in the booth with the DJ is best if possible.  VJing at its best should be a collaboration and it’s always good to communicate with the DJ. 

Technically the ideal setup is one that works with a minimum of effort, so suitable space for your choice of gear is a must, enough spare power sockets ready and waiting, cable runs to projectors should be in place, and ideally the club should provide a video technician - as they do with sound!  A good VJ booth or space could also have a couple of DVD turntables, some preview monitors and a mixer like an Edirol V8 with it’s eight channels for a few VJs to also plug laptops into.

What are the best clubs to perform in from a VJ perspective (in terms of layout and/or technology)?
Clubs that have a certain amount of equipment already installed, clubs with big screens that can be clearly seen by the audience, and clubs that consider video as a part of the clubbing experience - not just an add on.  Great clubs we’ve played in that really fit the bill - and so pretty much all of them have in-house VJs - include Razzmatazz in Barcelona, both Womb and Ageha in Tokyo, Fabrik in Madrid (a massive club with loads of multiple screens and great positions high up over the dance floor to play from), Cocoon in Frankfurt, Brancaleone in Rome and Elevate in Delhi, India.  The reality though of what you can call good clubs for VJing is actually quite thin on the ground, because unfortunately visuals are so often an afterthought.

Is VJ culture a worldwide phenomenon? Are there regional differences in style / demand / popularity?
Yes, VJ culture is very much worldwide; I know VJs from Guatemala to Singapore.  When we produced Mixmasters, our DJ/VJ mix series for UK television, we had mixes from VJs all over the planet - and that was from 2001 to 2005.  Big established scenes include Japan, the US, the UK, Germany, and places like Holland and Spain, but we’ve also worked with VJs in China and Mexico too.  I think if you went looking in most countries where there’s some kind of club music scene you’ll find active VJs.  There are regional differences to some degree and these are often informed by the music that’s popular, as different genres can tend to end up with a certain ‘look’.  Also things like a country’s artistic history can have an influence too.  But there are no rules and it’s really all about individual taste. 

Who is pushing the scene forward (performers, collectives, software producers / technology manufacturers)?
It’s a mixture as to who is pushing the scene forward.  It’s true that the Pioneer DVJ decks were a quantum leap forward in enabling many audiovisual artists to do what they do, but I’d like to see the hardware manufacturers driving things more than they are, getting active in supporting artists, in terms of helping with content creation.  We’re still waiting for a proper audiovisual hardware, or software, sampler/sequencer though, that would be another huge step in the right direction.  Serato with it’s video plug-in is good, software like VJamm Pro is good too for our kind of AV, but there’s also plenty of good visuals only VJ software out there as well.  When it comes down to it, the technology is only a tool and is only as good as what any artist can make it do, so I would always end up saying as with all mediums, after a while, it’s all about the artist, and their creative drive and vision.  They used to be hampered by a lack of good technology, but that’s now no longer the case…

What makes an excellent VJ set?
Good question. I think what makes an excellent VJ set is when it appears to be ‘at one’ with the music - and that means not just stylistic sympathy with the music genre, but it also means the VJ has to get right inside the music and really hear what’s going on and be able to respond, anticipating as well as just following.  A great VJ set will take you somewhere music can’t on it’s own.  Good visual mixing doesn’t have to be on the beat, it just has to work with the music, and there’s no rules for that, a good VJ just makes it happen with his or her skills.

Who’s equipment do you use
We use three Pioneer DVJ-1000 DVD decks and a laptop running VJamm Pro, an Edirol V4 vision-mixer modified to take audio to enable added layers of live AV scratching and cutting, and of course a DJ mixer like a DJM-800.  We sometimes use Pioneer’s new SVM-1000 AV mixer, but it’s a bit big to travel with, but it’s good kit.

Who’s work do you admire most?
On the AV front, I think Bauhouse from Germany are great, always moving forward and trying new things.  All the guys from Emergency Broadcast Network were fantastic innovators and really set the AV scene going back in the day.  One of the best VJs out there I think is TomoGrapher in Japan, their work is great.  I recently saw an AV act in Italy too called Frank Sent Us, they’re beginning to do some interesting stuff.

What’s your favoured medium/environment? What work/projects have you done recently?
I’d say we like to do all kinds of events and environments, from festival mainstages to intimate art spaces - we’ve even played on a beach in Abu Dhabi.  It comes down to the crowd, if they’re having a good time, then so are we.  Cinemas can be great, the bigger the better, when we played the London IMAX it was awesome, having a screen that big and surround sound set-up was both scary and liberating at the same time.  When we’ve performed our live cinema project The Eye of the Pilot, it’s always in a sit down venue, and that provides an altogether different feel to our usual dance sets.  I quite like the big warehouse kind of space as long as the acoustics are good, we did a great show in Moscow recently in an old factory space; fantastic atmosphere really generated by the crowd.  The silent or headphone gig is another great format too, I think it works brilliantly with AV, as it gets the crowd focused on what’s happening (and you can hear them all singing along out of tune which is quite funny).  In the summer of 2008, we actually did a live performance in a transmission suite deep inside Austrian broadcaster ORF’s headquarters in Vienna, when we remixed the Beijing Olympics live as part of an IOC sanctioned experiment in interactive TV.  That was very different, as there was only feedback from the audience via web chat, nothing more direct than that!  Outside of the live shows, we’ve recently been doing more film remixes as virals for different film studios.  We did Iron Man for Paramount, Max Payne for Fox, Easy Virtue for Pathé, and now we’re just working on a remix of Slumdog Millionaire (http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=UXmmwK971V0&fmt=18), the new film from Trainspotting director Danny Boyle, it’s a great film and looks set to go huge…!

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Case study: ADDICTIVE TV


The last couple of years have been interesting for the VJ world as it expands ever more into the DJ world, with the release of equipment like Pioneer's SVM-1000 mixer and Serato's Video-SL plug-in, plus the ever increasing number of artists inhabiting this growing arena.  At the sharp-end of the VJ or AV scene for a decade now, and perhaps best known for their thrilling live AV shows, as well as for breaking new ground with movie remixes for Hollywood, are the UK's Addictive TV.

Described so eloquently as 'next level shit' by Grandmaster Flash, when they recently supported him in San Francisco, Addictive TV are one of those groups who never shy away from creating cutting-edge work or finding innovative ways to present it to new audiences at clubs, events and festivals around the globe, and in 2008 that even included industry rock festival SXSW in Austin, Texas where they supported Moby at the opening event.  In 2008 they also used television as a medium when they remixed the Olympics live as part of a major EU project looking at new forms of broadcasting.  The extended mixing sessions were accomplished using Pioneer's SVM-1000 AV mixer to route and sample multiple live feeds from Beijing, which were then all mixed with a DJM-1000 / EFX-1000 setup and two audio-modified Edirol V4's all strung together!  This remix project led directly to them performing for the London 2012 launch at Wembley Arena.

Though one of the most stunning recent productions Addictive TV staged was a number of large scale audio/visual shows at London's IMAX Cinema, something which had never been done before.  As well as performing themselves on the enormous 25 metre wide IMAX screen, Europe's largest, along with its massive 12,000 Watt surround sound system, they produced a number of shows with artists like Trevor Jackson and DJ Spooky, running two Digital Projection Lightning 20k projectors.

For their annual outdoor summer gig at London's National Theatre, projecting on the theatre's giant concrete flytower, visible from across the river Thames, they used a Christie Roadster S20K, and in November 2008 did a similar show in Liverpool for the European Capital of Culture celebrations, projecting on the historic Mersey Tunnel's Airvent Tower with four 20k edge-blended projectors!

"Good pictures can really make AV, but the big thing is to get the picture-sound syncs correct using audio delays to compensate for the ever-present video delays.” says Addictive TV’s Graham Daniels “It’s often ignored by artists but makes all the difference to a really watchable show."

As hardware, including projectors, gets smaller and more affordable, and more performance software begins to include video as standard, then audiovisual artists like Addictive TV will remain ahead of the curve and in demand.  So take note DJs, just spinning tunes is beginning to look very 20th Century!