The winter holidays are upon us, and with that comes a season of fantastic gift-giving to the people who matter to you. Whether you need to find gifts for your DJ friends, studio producer colleagues, or even just ideas for hints to send to your parents or relatives, we’ve put together another holiday gift guide for your use.
See our 2016 Holiday gift guide here :
Low Cost DJ Stocking Stuffers (<$50)
Headphone Adapter
Price: <$2 (on Amazon)
Ideal For: Every DJ Ever
Why It’s A Good Gift: Yes, it’s back in first place on the gift guide. While we hope that newer DJ gear will soon make 1/8″ headphone jacks standard, until then, this will be one of the top cheap gifts for DJs, alongside spare cables! Gift them by the handful to DJs everywhere.
12 Port Surge Protector + Dual USB Charger
Price: $27.95 (on Amazon)
Ideal For: Particularly mobile DJs
Why It’s A Good Gift: This won’t win awards for a sexy gift, but I can’t think of a single DJ booth that couldn’t use MORE POWER OUTLETS. Bonus points for being a surge protector, having dual USB power, and 4 ports that have enough space for larger “wall wart” power bricks.
The Anchor: Under-Desk Headphone Mount
Price: $14.95 (on Amazon)
Ideal For: Home studios / practice spaces
Why It’s A Good Gift: When a DJ or studio desk is as cluttered as most, where are you supposed to put your headphones? Why not under the desk (or above it, if you have a shelf nearby). This simple solution holds two sets of headphones, one on each side.
Chroma Cables
Price: $12.50 for one / 3 for $30 (on DJTT webstore)
Ideal For: Any DJ with a controller, soundcard, etc
Why It’s A Good Gift: Easily the coolest-looking USB cables on the market, these DJTT originals come in both right-angle and straight varieties. What, you thought we wouldn’t recommend our own stuff? The reviews speak for themselves – these are great cables.
Mixtape Style Sticky Notes
Price: $4.99 (on Amazon)
Ideal For: Organizing with a retro mixtape flavor
Why It’s A Good Gift: Every DJ needs to keep track of notes – from mixes to make to tracks to find – but let’s do it with some thematic class, right? Since you’re not writing on real mixtapes anymore, supplant your desires with these cassette sticky notes.
Higher-end Digital DJ Gifts ($100+)
A DIY MIDI Controller
Price: $200+ (see our supply list)
Ideal For: DJs who need a custom control surface
Why It’s A Good Gift: The best gifts are handmade – now why not take that to an extreme? If you’re feeling crafty and know exactly the type of controller someone might want (get them to sketch it for you!), follow Kyle Mohr’s guide to building a DIY MIDI controller.
Innofader Kits
Price: $99 – $175+ (varies by model – see Audio Innovate’s store)
Ideal For: Aspiring crossfader abusers
Why It’s A Good Gift: A great gift for someone who loves a certain piece of DJ gear but keeps complaining about the crossfader – or who has had it fixed several times. The Innofader is a DIY install but comes with (usually simple) directions.
Xone:23C Mixer + Soundcard
Price: $399 (on Amazon)
Ideal For: DJs who want a two channel mixer + soundcard
Why It’s A Good Gift: Allen & Heath took the formidable little Xone:23 and stuck a 4-channel soundcard into it, making it one of the most solid two channel mixers out there, with external effects control and total kill EQ.
DJ Tech TRX Mixer
Price: $399.95 (on Amazon)
Ideal For: DJs who want a great DVS mixer under $1,000
Why It’s A Good Gift: On the other end of the spectrum from A&H mixers is this turntablist-oriented mixer from Thud Rumble and DJ Tech. Mini Innofader crossfader, curve adjusts, reverse switches, DVS send/return ports for quick mode switching. You can tell Q-Bert helped design it with all of these solid features.
Pair Of Pioneer XDJ-700s
Price: $697 each (on DJTT)
Ideal For: Home Pioneer CDJ-style setups
Why It’s A Good Gift: We’ve heard from a lot of Pioneer controller users: this is the player that might get them to switch to a home set of Pioneer decks . Aside from a smaller jogwheel, you still get all the power of Rekordbox and the workflow you would expect in a club setup. Supply is limited!
Traktor Kontrol S5Price: $799 (on DJTT)
Ideal For: Traktor users who DGAF about jog wheels or beatmatching
Why It’s A Good Gift: The S5 is the pinnacle of control for the Traktor platform. Smaller than the S8, but still with plenty of controls and built-in screens, you can expect to get addicted to Stems, on-screen FX displays, and much more.
Subpac M2Ideal For: DJs who want to feel the low-end in the booth
Why It’s A Good Gift: Between this almost-out wearable bass model and the M1, this might have been the most sought-after bit of kit of 2015. This new version is in stores in just a few days, and while most are sold out, there are a few still unreserved in the DJTT store.
Ideal Gifts For Vinyl DJs
Unique Slip MatsPrice: ~$15 – 40
Ideal For: Turntable users who need some flair
Why It’s A Good Gift: We’ve seen tons of really cool slip mats pop up this year, and while there are way too many to list all here, favorites include Jamie XX’s”In Color”, Daft Punk’s helmets, the Death Star, and Technics’ “Lessons In Mixing No. 2”. Have a favorite of your own that others should know about? Dish in the comments.
Serato or Traktor Hybrid Timecode/BreaksIdeal For: Serato or Traktor DVS DJs
Why It’s A Good Gift: One of the least exciting parts about DVS is that you rarely are swapping out vinyl on your decks, aside from at the beginning and end of each set. We like these hybrid releases that allow DVS users to flip their vinyl, play a track or cut up some breaks – plenty more on Thud Rumble and Serato if you dig…
Plastic Record Sleeves for 12″ VinylPrice: $25 for 100 (on Amazon)
Ideal For: Anyone who buys lots of used vinyl
Why It’s A Good Gift: To protect your vinyl collection, having a polyethylene sleeve for each record is a must. But too often these aren’t included with a used purchase or find, or are lost to roommates who want to play your techno records at 5AM. Stock up on plastic and protect your rarities.
Vinyl Cleaning T-Shirt
Price: £40 (~$45) (on Mastersounds)
Ideal For: Vinyl DJs with OCD
Why It’s A Good Gift: Speaking of protecting your record collection, what about how you clean your records? Too often are normal cotton t-shirts used to clean up some dust – so Mastersounds invented this t-shirt with a built in microfiber cloth on the inside for safe cleaning.
Glow In The Dark 45 Adapters
Price: $14 (on Amazon)
Ideal For: 45 affecionados
Why It’s A Good Gift: Where do those pesky 45 adapters walk off too, anyway? They almost always seem to be missing from turntables at clubs. Never lose another one with a bit of glow-in-the-dark magic – pretty easy to spot in a dark club. You’ll never miss the perfect placement of your next deep cut again.
Technics Headshell Bottle Opener
Price: $13.76 (on Juno)
Ideal For: DJs who drink a beer every now and again
Why It’s A Good Gift: I almost didn’t include this on this guide because I wanted to keep it a secret – this must be the ultimate DJ drink opening tool. It comes in Gold and Silver, is made of a high-quality metal alloy, and is actually official Technics merchandise.
Studio Producers + Live Performers
Splice Sounds
Price: $7.99 /month (on Splice)
Ideal For: Producers who use sample packs – or would if the buying experience didn’t suck.
Why It’s A Good Gift: Splice continues to be an impressive company – and this year they introduced a store for samples that allows producers to subscribe and audition any sound from of over 2000 sample packs before making a purchase.
Novation Circuit
Price: $329.99 (on DJTT)
Ideal For: Producers after a sound idea machine
Why It’s A Good Gift: Being able to quickly start a song idea and flesh it out with interesting automation and sequencing has been difficult outside of a computer – but Novation has achieved it with the Circuit. It’s simple and fun, but can also be a part of a full studio rig.
Push 2
Price: $799 (on DJTT)
Ideal For: Hardcore Ableton creators
Why It’s A Good Gift: This is this year’s hot item in the production world – there’s limited stock all over (we just got a few more units in). The new Ableton controller sports a multicolored display, much improved pads, and there’s a new sampling workflow to make slicing beats way more natural.
Mighty Mic
Price: $70 (on Photojojo)
Ideal For: Field recording in a pinch
Why It’s A Good Gift: You already carry a great field recording device in your pocket every day – if only it didn’t have a relatively horrible microphone on it. Photojojo has solved this by building a directional shotgun mic made to plug into headphone jacks on phones.
Even More DJ Gift Ideas (From The Ghost Of Christmas Past)
That’s the end of the list for this year’s holiday gift guide – but if you still haven’t found the perfect thing to nab, or you just want to take a trip down memory lane, here’s all of our previous holiday gift guides.
More Ideas for Parents, Friends, and Partners of DJs
