A live DJ can loop, skip or reorder tracks at any moment, so one show clock can't work. Today the decks send the tempo, the beat and the track to the visuals, each track can carry its own video, and VJs and lighting crews play the rest live.
Planned shows run on a clock; live sets run on the decks’ data – and a person at the desk.
Facts
- Planned shows usually run on timecode (hours:minutes:seconds:frames): lights, video, lasers and effects are programmed to it in advance. The Kx5 show at the LA Coliseum took about two weeks of programming.
- Before Pioneer DJ and TC Supply linked the decks to show control in 2017, little information reached the visuals booth; Armin van Buuren famously used a chat app to tell his visuals team what songs he was about to play.
- Over Pro DJ Link, Pioneer's players send a packet on every beat with the tempo and the beat within the bar; through PRO DJ LINK Bridge or ShowKontrol, show software also gets the track that's playing and live waveforms. Denon's players do the same over StageLinQ.
- Resolume can give each track its own video, made to match the music: it starts with the track and “will perfectly follow the time of the audio track” – “Scratch, loop or slice, everything will stay sync.”
- Without a video per track, VJs mix clips locked to the tempo (tapped in, or from the DJ's gear), and a lighting desk like the grandMA3 can lock its speed to the BPM it detects in the incoming audio.
- Lighting crews also “busk”: running the lights live from looks built in advance – “being able to light something on the fly”.
Sources
- SMPTE timecode · Wikipedia checked 9 October 2026
- Kx5 at the LA Coliseum: A History Making Evening (Michael S. Eddy, 10 Feb 2023) · PLSN checked 9 October 2026
- Subtronics Tesseract Tour (Mike Wharton, 15 Apr 2024) · PLSN checked 9 October 2026
- Lighting for BPM Festivals: Timecode vs Busking (Ticket Fairy, 23 Aug 2025, updated 4 Apr 2026) · Ticket Fairy checked 15 October 2026
- CDJs Will Send Track Data To Visuals/Lighting Techs With ShowKontrol (DJ TechTools, 12 Oct 2017) · DJ TechTools checked 15 October 2026
- Pioneer DJ co-develops network system with TC Supply (12 Oct 2017) · Pioneer DJ checked 15 October 2026
- PRO DJ LINK Bridge · Pioneer DJ checked 15 October 2026
- DJ Link Ecosystem Analysis: Beats · Deep Symmetry checked 15 October 2026
- ShowKontrol LIVE · TC Supply checked 9 October 2026
- Resolume Avenue & Arena manual: BPM & sync articles · Resolume checked 15 October 2026
- Resolume manual: Sync to Pioneer DJ Players (Pro DJ Link) · Resolume checked 15 October 2026
- Resolume manual: Sync with a DJ · Resolume checked 15 October 2026
- Really Creative Media live with Jax Jones (20 Apr 2020) · PLSN checked 9 October 2026
- VJing · Wikipedia checked 15 October 2026
- Resolume manual: BPM · Resolume checked 15 October 2026
- Resolume manual: Parameter Animation · Resolume checked 15 October 2026
- grandMA3 User Manual 2.5: Speed Masters · MA Lighting checked 15 October 2026
- Video: Zak Al-Alami explains live concert busking with Eos (Kate Foster, ETC blog, 20 Apr 2017) · ETC checked 15 October 2026
- Beat Link Trigger User Guide: SMPTE Linear Timecode · Deep Symmetry checked 9 October 2026
All sound is original: synthesised for the episode, no samples, no licensed tracks. The narrator’s voice is AI-generated. General information. Features differ by software, player and version – check your own manual. Read how facts are checked and corrected.
Script
How does the screen hit every drop? The DJ is picking every track live. Planned shows run on one clock: timecode. Every cue is set in advance, down to the frame. Kaskade and deadmau5's stadium show took about two weeks to program. A live set breaks that clock. The DJ can loop a part, skip ahead, or change the order. Armin van Buuren famously used a chat app to tell his visuals team what he'd play next. Now the decks can tell them. Pioneer's players send the tempo, the beat and what's playing, down a network cable. Lights, video, even smoke and fire can follow it. So each track can have its own video. Scratch it or loop it, and the video follows. No video for that track? A VJ mixes clips live, locked to the tempo. Or the music itself makes them dance. Some lighting desks even listen to the music and find the tempo themselves. And the big moments can be played by hand. Crews call it busking: lighting on the fly. They can watch the DJ's waveforms too, so they see the drop coming. So next time the screen hits the drop, someone may have pressed it, right on the beat.
Sources last checked 15 October 2026.