If you’re passionate enough about music to become a DJ, you likely love it enough to get your tracks legally. But what is a DJ to do when money is tight and they want legitimate music? Simple! Sign up for a record pool. We last reviewed online record pools over three years ago, so today we’re taking another look at the lay of the land with a comparison review of four popular online pools.
What is a record pool?
“A music pool or DJ pool is a regionalized and centralized method of music distribution that allows DJs to receive promotional music to play in nightclubs. The music industry sends its newest releases to the pool of DJs; in exchange, the pool provides feedback on each release as well as exposure in their clubs.” – Wikipedia.org
These days most pools provide unlimited downloads of high quality digital music (MP3s) for a set monthly price. In return for the music DJs are often required to provide feedback on either individual tracks or on a group of tracks before being able to download them.
Record pools are both a market research and promotional tool for record labels so they often have rules requiring the members to be working DJs (clubs, radios, etc) so that they get a return for their music in the form of play time in front of a wide audience.
Over the years I have been a member of a number of different record pools – including back in the day when they actually sent you records! I wanted to go over four popular online record pools to give you an idea of the services they provide and to get you started on picking the right one for you.
Introducing The Pools
In case you don’t have five minutes to read the whole article, we’re starting out with a quick summary of each – click on the titles to jump to each individual review!
ZipDJ: a pool with over 1,000 major record labels behind it, unlimited downloads, 320Kbps MP3s, batch downloading, with a wide variety of music genres.
DJCity: one of the most recognizable pools online, unlimited downloads, 320Kbps MP3s, sells vinyl and gear, with a focus on the mainstream.
Late Night Record Pool: a smaller name online with a focus on hip-hop and open format DJs, mostly 320Kbps MP3s, unlimited downloads, and an impressive back catalogue from years of operation.
Digital DJ Pool: home of the $1 trial membership, mainstream music focus, unlimited downloads, and one of the lowest prices in the market.
ZipDJ
Website: www.zipdj.com
File format: MP3
Bitrate (Kbps):320 with the rare 256.
Price: $50/month; $420/year (+ more options)
ZipDJ is the only pool I’ve ever been a member of where I can get my music for both the club and for festivals/raves/after hours. The selection of house, tech house, and techno on ZipDJ is unbelievable for a record pool. They also have a huge selection of drum & bass, dubstep, breaks, and trance among others. ZipDJ also has the largest selection of Top 40 remixes I have ever seen; in direct comparisons with other pools, ZipDJ comes out with more remixes per title in the majority of cases.
Aesthetically speaking, ZipDJ has a more modern-looking layout with a three column layout. Each section shows different things, with the center column showing the actual releases available for download. ZipDJ is designed to be browsed without tabs, which can sometimes be confusing with the number of bread crumbs (clickable links like artist name, and record label) but it’s something that you adjust to quickly.
One of the features I really appreciate about this pool is the sheer number of ways to find popular music for my club audience. ZipDJ provides a huge number of sorting options for their top downloads and club charts, allowing you to narrow them down by country, date range, and genre. If you’re in a hurry and need the most popular music right this moment, it’s really easy to track trends on ZipDJ.
ZipDJ has a persistent preview player with a history of what you’ve previewed in your current session. The previews are just over one minute and thirty seconds and the quality is high. Once you’ve previewed a song, provided your quick feedback, and decided to download something it’s placed into their download manager along with everything else you’ve selected and you can download the whole lot as a .zip file (individual track downloading is possible when needed).
ZipDJ has an amazing selection of music alongside lots of sorting and searching options. If you play top 40, top 40 remixes, house, tech house, techno, progressive (and more!), and want lots of ways to find trending music this is the pool for you.
DJCity
Website: www.djcity.com
File format: MP3
Bitrate (Kbps): 320 with the rare 256.
Price: $90/three months
DJCity is one of the more recognizable names in online music pools with mainstream club DJs. If you are looking for Top 40 originals, electro house, and mainstream dubstep, it’s the bread and butter of DJCity. I found the selection to be great for its target audience and have no trouble recognizing the commercial appeal of their content. The only thing I found lacking on was house and more bouncy remixes, as in my experience, most of their content leans towards the harsher electro house side of things.
Browsing around their website, the layout is clean and extremely easy to use. Tracks can be opened into tabs, where you’ll find the feedback mechanism and links to other versions of the same title. DJCity is best browsed with tabs, popping each release into a new one after a quick preview so you can come back to it later, which gave it more of the digging feel that you’ll get from a distribution site like Beatport.
As with most pools, before downloading you must provide feedback. In DJCity’s case you need to provide feedback for each version so three remixes of one title will require feedback three separate times. Luckily, feedback on DJCity is quick and easy: score the track out of five, leave a quick comment and click submit. Tracks are downloaded individually and the speed is blisteringly fast. Serato DJs will also appreciate the fact that DJCity has already analysed the tracks and included the first cue point in the file.
My only real gripe with DJCity is their preview player. The quality of the previews is so ridiculously low that they often distort, leaving you to question the nature of the track instead of getting to hear it for yourself. Part of the reasoning is likely the fact you can preview on DJCity without being a member and they want to avoid ripping attempts from their preview player, but with only partial previews I can’t see that being a real problem.
DJCity has an easy-to-use website with a focus on what’s current and mainstream. If you’ve got a mainstream club residency, or are looking for consistent original Top 40, electro bangers, or dubstep – this is the pool for you.
Late Night Record Pool
Website: www.latenightrecordpool.com
File format: MP3
Bitrate (Kbps): 320 with much older back catalogue items possibly lower.
Price: $47/month; $397/year (+ other options)
This is the go-to pool for hip-hop and R&B from today to back a few decades. Hands-down, these guys win if you’re looking for anything urban. Their remix selection is limited and is mostly just intro/outro edits, but the amazing selection and huge back catalogue make up for it. My first residency back in 2004 was a hip-hop club and this pool took me down memory lane. I’m sitting here listening to some old Wu Tang Clan from 1998 thanks to Late Night as I write this up.
My first reaction to the layout of the website was that it looks dated. Overall, the layout works, but some odd design choices like a hard-coded width on the main content area of 800px leaving copious amounts of unused screen real-estate and the use of what seem like iFrames give it the look of a website that has been around for a while without many updates to its design over time. However, once you get in to the member’s area and start looking for music, the site is simple and fast.
In an almost unprecedented move, Late Night allows you to preview the entire track – from the first beat to the last – in amazing quality. If you minimized the page while previewing, you might forget where the music was coming from and assume you left your audio player open. For songs that have intro and outro edits this is especially helpful.
Downloading on Late Night is done individually with the option to download all versions of a single release as a zip file with great speeds. Feedback prior to download is as simple as rating the song out of five stars and then choosing the versions you want to download.
Although the layout of their website might be a little dated if you play urban music there is no better source of music anywhere on the internet for you. The selection of both current and older hip-hop/R&B is unparalleled.
Digital DJ Pool
Website: www.digitaldjpool.com
File format: MP3
Bitrate (Kbps): 320 Kbps with rare 192-256
Price: $1 trial; $12/month; $112/year
Digital DJ Pool has a good selection of top 40 music with clean and dirty versions for most, and acapellas for quite a few. The remix selection is limited, with only the biggest chart-toppers sporting more than one or two remixes. The vast majority of the “remixes” are nothing more than intro/outro edits – but the selection of originals is extensive.
Initial impressions of the homepage: it looks like a WordPress site, but once you actually get in to the pool area the layout is simple and easy to use. The main music selection dominates the page with tabs for “All,” “Charts,” “Trending,” and “Recommended;” the search and preview player are on the right hand side and move as you scroll down the page which has a never-ending scroll.
Digital DJ Pool is the budget option in this roundup, with the lowest monthly subscription fee of any service at only $12 per month (or $112 per year). Although the first three songs I downloaded from Digital DJ Pool were all 192 Kbps and not 320 and it wasn’t until the fourth song that I found a 320 I can still see it as a viable option for small venues and DJs on a strict budget looking to try their first pool. (Editor’s Note: Digital DJ Pool contacted us, and we’ve confirmed that this was somewhat of a fluke – most tracks are 320 with rare exceptions)
Downloading is generally done one track at a time and speeds are decent but not blazing fast; a single track took me 20 seconds to download on my cable connection. They also have the option to add tracks to a crate for later downloading and you can download your entire crate as a zip file. For feedback, this is one of the few pools I have seen with no requirement to add feedback before downloading. Optionally you can rate tracks thumbs-up or thumbs-down for statistical tracking but there appears to be no mandatory feedback anywhere.
This pool has a good selection of mainstream original Top 40 for the DJ on a budget. Although it doesn’t offer anything the other pools don’t the price cannot be beat.
Read part two of this article – five more record pools reviewed in September, 2013!
This isn’t the first time we’ve written about DJ pools – take a look at this older writeup from 2010 for some more options!
Are you a member of a cool record pool you want to share? Let us know in the comments so we can all check it out!
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Hello Here’s The Free Download Link My New R&B Single Entitled “What Ever”
1. MP3 (320) CLEAN – https://www.dropbox.com/s/kiuxbtdiigxs07d/What%20Ever.mp3?dl=0
2. Instrumental – https://www.dropbox.com/s/m2fvn37xvq8ojly/What%20Ever%20inst.mp3?dl=0
3. Acapella – https://www.dropbox.com/s/ztczqlympsask7f/What%20Ever%20ACC.mp3?dl=0
4. WAV LINK https://www.dropbox.com/s/kl9gf9ldmb6p094/What%20Ever.wav?dl=0
We Just Submitted To All Online Digital Retailers Through CD Baby.
Looking To Get “What Ever” In The Hands Of Great DJ’s Who Break Records.
Artist: Bobby Washington
Song: What Ever
Tempo: 63 or 126
Contact Info: 305-992-8009
Music Page: http://bobbywashington.bandcamp.com
Facebook: http://facebook.com/bobbywashingtonmusic1
Twitter: http://twitter.com/bobbywashtweet
Instagram: @bobbywash
Official Site: http://bobbywashington.com
Latest Music Videos:
1. Paradise – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVHbM_-BPpk
2. Come Over – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_av0UZgSEKg
3. Romantic Vacation – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtvBsFThT0A
4. Bobby Shots – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVP9LsPtvNg
https://soundcloud.com/chrisxxpierre/art-of-seduction-rough-cut
@ClaytonKimber – How do you know Promo Only’s Sources are lossless?
[…] ??:DJTECHTOOLS […]
Hi,
Does anybody know of any Bollywood (Bhangra, indian remixes, etc) DJ pools that have both audio & videos? Any help would greatly be appreciated!!!
MERCI!!!
Does any one know we’re I can get top 40 from 2000 onwards?
what is a good pool to get into, for jsut radio remixes hits top 40
I use a multitude of Record Pools, But have found that Whitelabel.net and DJ City as well as X-mix for Variety has been great! PLUS!!! Whitelable is FREE!
Great article! Any chance that you would amend this article to include latino record pools? i’m specifically interested in finding a pool that remixes Latin such as bachata, salsa and merengue. Most of the pools that I’ve found offer the standard mix, but no remixes with intros or breaks.
LatinosUnidosOnline.com
What pool do you recommend to start building your library. I’m just starting so I need a pool that can take me back a few decades?
Thanks.
i recently subscribed to DMS because they have a great selection dating back to the 50s and the latest releases. I’ve also promo only, which I liked, but DMS definitely has a lot of options to build up your collection.
i recently subscribed to DMS because they have a great selection dating back to the 50s and the latest releases. I’ve also promo only, which I liked, but DMS definitely has a lot of options to build up your collection.
i recently subscribed to DMS because they have a great selection dating back to the 50s and the latest releases. I’ve also promo only, which I liked, but DMS definitely has a lot of options to build up your collection.
i recently subscribed to DMS because they have a great selection dating back to the 50s and the latest releases. I’ve also promo only, which I liked, but DMS definitely has a lot of options to build up your collection.
Hey Mario, check out DMS (DirectMusicService.com), they have music & edits from all decades (1950s to today) & genres. They also have an iphone app that allows you to sync the music you want on the go directly to your Dropbox… pretty cool! They have different monthly & yearly packages depending on your needs. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed, I certainly wasn’t… been a member since 08!
I found one worth the mentioning http://www.urbanheatdjpool.com
Although I think the site is undergoing maintenance and is only accepting payments for current members ($25 – $40/mo), I didn’t see any mention of BigCityDjs. http://www.bigcitydjs.com.
this is an awesome write up!!!!! I don’t know how accurate it is, but i suspect that it is on point.
Wheres iDJPool they been around since 1985
iDJPool – http://www.idjpool.com
Urban DJ Pool – http://www.urbandjpool.com
Country DJ Pool – http://www.countrydjpool.com
do any of these pools let you preview and download to your mobile device
Does ZipDj use intro’s and Outro’s on all there music?
No. There are usually versions for download that have intros and/or outros.
Nobody using DMS anymore?
Promo Only POOL and/or ERG Music definitely deserve mention… especially for Mobile DJs who need a variety of genres.
What do you recommend for Vidz?
any idea in latin music dj pools other than promoonly????
how about latin vids too? thanks again…
http://latinosunidosonline.com is a really good one.
Redesign of http://www.latenightrecordpool.com coming very very soon. Thanks for the write up Nick and thanks for everybody that supports LNRP
I’m on Direct Music Service, DJCity, VJ Pro (for videos). All are top notch.
I really think these are useful for beginners, but it’s good to know on what you can rely on.
masspoolmp3.com great I’ve used them for years
I’m looking for a pool that gives me old school hip hop R&B pop all that. And which record pool will give me access to under ground music.
hey SixOne. Is this you? http://www.serato.com/user/DJ_Six_One?
If so hit me offsite. I been meaning to ask you something hommie antifmradio@antifmradio.com
Promo Only? Pretty much the only service I’ve found that offers Lossless & 320 Bitrate Mp3s and offers HD video all via download. Primecuts, X-Mix, or RPM? All of these have YEARS of legal service and offer a variety of formats and genres…some of these site mentioned aren’t actually legal.
Care to elaborate? Which sites aren’t legal? I’ve read and heard otherwise.
which one would you guys recommend the most zipDJ or DJcity? I don’t care about the price but which one is better! I’ve never used a dj pool before I’ve always bought my stuff in Beatport and Itunes!
djcity….been on it for a few years.
mymp3pool.com is $20 a month and has a good mix of originals, intros/outros, remixes, and a wide variety of genres.
hope they organized all that stuff, that’s why I left it.
how did BarBangerz.com not get a nod it’s been like the fastest growing open format pool of the year. weird.. DMS didn’t make it either?
I wanted to include DMS but wasn’t able to. They are working on updated to the site and didn’t want to have outdated information in the article but their updates sadly didn’t roll in time. I will write a standalone review of DMS when they’re changes go live which will be on DJF and Reddit. As for ClubKillers it completely slipped my mind tbh.
Shout out to http://www.Latenightrecordpool.com also don’t forget about DMS
I wanted to include DMS but wasn’t able to. They are working on updated to the site and didn’t want to have outdated information in the article but their updates sadly didn’t roll in time. I will write a standalone review of DMS when they’re changes go live.
Club Killers hands down is my go to – I use to use DMS, but CK is where it’s at now for my music game! Nice write up though Nick.
>Buy NAS with 16TB
>buy one month subscription
>use website ripper to download whole
>…
>Profit!!!
Have you tried that?
nope.
I don’t think that will work.
Definitely leaving clubkillers.com and dms out of the conversation. Definitely solid pools. You also forgot to include video pools which there’s vjpro and xtendamix… Instead of a waste of time with the 4th pool, you could have rounded out a solid top 5 with DMS and Clubkillers.
I wanted to include DMS but wasn’t able to. They are working on updated to the site and didn’t want to have outdated information in the article but their updates sadly didn’t roll in time. I will write a standalone review of DMS when they’re changes go live which will be on DJF and Reddit. As for ClubKillers it completely slipped my mind tbh.
What about VIDEO pools for video dj’s?!
VJ-Pro ?
I used mp320vip.com mostly for dub house and tech house but their customer service is more than poor. Can some of you advice me substitute with this kind of music?
I mainly spin electrohouse/Dnb, but am not commercial. However, i am mad about browsing music all day. Would one of the record pools be good for me? Are they worth the money if i am not really interested in the top40 or so?
I think you are already established as a DJ with good like and a radio show you can just ask people about mailing lists for top 40 and contact all the artists you want current underground hits from. Beatport is always late to the party with releases going on iTunes at the same time. A real DJ will hunt down per-release for exclusives. You should be getting sent releases early any way. I don’t get DJ pools they are just for suckers who can’t talk to people and you’re paying these guys for that alone! If you have a mouth which you all do just bloody use it!
I get promo tracks from a handful of producers and one or two smaller labels but it’s not realistic to expect labels to email you all the hottest tracks unless you’re a remix producer, some super big name, or have some other deal with them.
I also don’t think you can expect labels like EMI, Sony, Universal, etc to send promo tracks directly to a DJ in a <500 person club in some small market for example. Pools have a purpose but if you get all of your music sent to you by labels good for you.
one people have not talked about is http://www.breakzrus.com/ i have used it manny times and for hip hop and top 40 its great
I was just reading there FAQ and this caught my attention “The majority of our users prefer Serato Scratch Live or Stanton Final Scratch.” I think their FAQ needs an update, I haven’t seen anyone use Stanton FS in probably 6-7 years especially considering it has no real software support anymore.
I’ll probe around a bit though 🙂 thanks for the recommendation.
I use digitaldjpool its great for current hits but their library only goes back to like 2006. Its great for the price though and since it is my only pool since i started djing i recommend it.
Why didn’t you include Digiwaxx.com?
It simply wasn’t possible to review every pool out there. In the vast majority of cases the pools I have tried over the years I have paid for out of pocket and as much as I would have liked to include 10 pools in a SUPER MEGA review I simply wasn’t willing to shell out for 10 memberships.
As time goes by though I’ll review more pools and as always I’ll post my single-site reviews to DJF and Reddit.
Isnt DJCity a pirate website? I mean honestly they have tracks and remixes for things that havnt been released by the artists which is why I never got a membership there, anyways just did a tour of zipDJ seems legit and they have stuff I cant find anywhere else unless its 256kbps itunes crap, is everything 320 there?
Everything I have read says DJCity is legit and I have no reason to believe otherwise. Lots of record pool contracts get the pool the songs at the same time as they’re being sent to remixers so pre-release tracks aren’t unheard of on pools and can actually be quite common from some labels who want a song to get exposure before it goes on sale. I’ve seen bootlegs and such on DJCity before but bootlegs make it on to a lot of pools so it doesn’t speak to the overall authenticity.
zipDJ is definitely legit as well and everything is 320 Kbps with the exception of maybe 0.01% of releases which might fall at 256 Kbps but it’s very rare, it’s a similar story with the other pools as well… Some releases the labels just don’t give out 320’s but it doesn’t happen often. You could download hundreds of tracks and never see anything below 320.
I honestly downloaded a tune from DJ City last year thinking it was all legit. The track was “Feel The Love” by Rudimental.
Anyway, downloaded, started listening, everything seemed fine. Then I noticed the end of the track seemed to fade quite abruptly, them I caught about half a second of a DJ talking. Knew the voice straight away, it was Zane Lowe from Radio 1… The track was a radio rip!!!
Now, please tell me, how is that legit?
I’m not having a go, because they do a very good job at looking legit, but they are no more legit than piratebay!
What is the deal with FunkMaster Flex record pool, how dose it rate?
crap
it would be helpful if this included which regions are covered by which pools…
I have used many pools and have come down to zipDJ for my music.
“ZipDJ: a
pool with over 1,000 major record labels behind it…”
1,000 MAJOR record label? 🙂
“zipDJ is serviced by over 1000+ major and top independent record labels worldwide.”
That got snipped when I copied it from the site. You are correct, not all of their partners are major but they are partnered with most of the major labels like EMI, Sony, Universal, Warner, etc.
You guys forgot about https://www.franchiserecordpool.com they are great for almost everything I think, Hip hop, R&B, Mainstream/Top 40’s, remixes, Videos (the video section is a bit lacking but they recently started soo it will build up over time) Also, they have cool stuff for dj’s to use. Check it out.
I was kind of surprised that the did not mention franchise either.
can you get house and edm with them
Can i download unlimited music from there?
Also – surprised to see no mention of Serato’s whitelabel.net service (which is insanely expensive for labels, but reaches a lot of djs) and newer alternatives like pulselocker.com (not quite a promo pool – but great way to preview music).
Gustavo – we reviewed whitelabel.net in the past, check it: http://www.djtechtools.com/2010/01/26/digital-record-pool-round-up/
Posting not as a DJ but as a label owner. I run nudephotomusic.com – a deep house / deep techno label. I used zipdj and a few other services – mypromopool.com (now defunct apparently) and releasepromo.com for some of my earlier releases. What I found was that within 24hrs of promos being posted, they would wind up on sharing sites. I stopped using promo pools and started my own promo list. No more piracy problems. Most smaller labels I know run their own promo lists – never hurts to email and inquire. Give good feedback and you could find yourself on several high quality lists. 🙂
yea i am on a few random promo pools for labels (randomly get emails for free music which is nice) def a good way to connect with artists and get some solid feedback
Really surprised that Direct Music Service (DMS) wasn’t included in this article
They’re currently working on a site redesign and didn’t want the old version reviewed with changes right around the corner. Sadly the new version didn’t come fast enough to make it into the article. I will do a stand alone review of their service for DJF and Reddit when they’re new site goes live.
Ah ok.
Why promote the playing of mp3’s!? Why don’t any of the digital pools do lossless? The current state of broadband can easily handle the extra data.
I totally get where you’re coming from but even on Beatport where I have the option to grab lossless I still usually grab MP3s. I’ve played everything from tiny clubs to massive festival stages with MP3s (320Kbps) and the difference between them and WAV files is negligible but the amount of room they take up on my thumb drives is not.
You would think the biggest sound systems are where you need the best quality possibly but the truth is they’re so loud that ear fatigue sets in so quickly that people couldn’t hear the difference even if they were looking for it.
I hear ya, but with 25gig thumb drives costing 20 bucks or less, I can easily and cheaply fit all my lossless tracks for extremely long sets on one drive. Who needs 25 gig of mp3’s for a set? My mo is to torrent mass amounts of mp3’s then buy the lossless version for tracks I want to play out.
I disagree though on sound, and maybe it’s all placebo but I can tell the difference on high powered systems especially. Just this last weekend, you could easily tell the difference when the dj’s switched over, one playing mp3’s the other vinyl. It was pretty dramatic imo.
Thanks for the article though, just wish us dj’s, stewards of musical culture we are would maintain fidelity integrity :). It just allows for further degradation down the line. For example when you stream last weekends show of yourself playing mp3’s. Then we’re getting a 128k transcode of 320k mp3’s, just horrible. The extra space and bandwidth needed in order to play lossless is negligible at this point. The one extra thumb drive you need is a fraction of the cost of one month of these various pools.
Lossless can sometimes provide a noticeable improvement over mp3s but there are many variables at play, including the quality of the original mastered track and the quality of the mp3 compression. Digital music sounds pretty good and it gets the job done. But comparing any digital format to vinyl is another matter.
I’ve been DJing for over 20 years and I made the jump to digital a long time ago: first via CDs, then on a laptop and as much as love the digital formats and all of the benefits and features they provide, I still have to admit that digital can’t touch the sound of vinyl.
I know a lot of digital DJs try to dismiss that as a myth and placebo effect but IMO, they’re just trying to rationalize the truth. EVERY time a DJ comes on playing real vinyl after a digital DJ, the difference is dramatically obvious: much deeper low end, richer and fuller sound across the whole range, less fatiguing – really, you’d have to be deaf not to notice the it and in total denial not to appreciate it.
Some day, digital music may get to match or surpass the sound of vinyl but it ain’t there yet.
Promo Only Online does lossless
Awesome! Thanks!
thx
zipDJ is probably the best… 😉
These record pools are nice services but they are not for me. None of them carry any of the artists that I spin. I rather go dig for tracks like Nick James mentioned. But if your looking for popular and don’t want to dig for tracks these services are for you.
Haha, I hear you, and don’t get me wrong my monthly Beatport bill is still excessive. I get a fair chunk of my House and Tech House from ZipDJ but they don’t have a few of the labels I love like Toolroom Records, that I have to get from Beatport.
I mainly use Junodownload or go to the record label’s website to grab my music and yes my monthly bill is up there too lol. I spin mostly dark D&B so I usually have a hard time finding what I like without going through tons of tracks that I don’t really care for. But again don’t mind my ranting I like the idea of these services provide for us DJ’s.
You forgot thepiratebay.sx
I’m guessing this was tongue in cheek but the whole idea here is to make music accessible and affordable so people don’t pirate. Even ignoring the moral issue of making money as a DJ with pirated music there’s no guarantee of quality with pirated music. I quite happily pay for all of my music minus the stuff that’s sent to me by producers as promos.
Yeah. ‘Cos Digital DJ Pool is 100% legal. Definitely. /s
I looked into it as best as I could before including them in the article (someone requested that I review them a while back). Based on their terms of service and a review I found on another site where the writer had contacted some record labels who confirmed they supplied DDJP I included them.
They do seem to have some bootlegs though which is certainly questionable.
I highly recommend vetting any music source you use before giving them money. Even sources like Beatport may not conform to laws and regulations in some jurisdictions.
i was curious to see if any of my music was on DJ City (labels have been sending my stuff to Rdio and Spotify and all that meaning i get $0) and a bootleg i made a long time ago is listed on the site (made an extended version of Antidote from the preview so i could play it out), made me laugh that they have it listed, doesnt even say its a bootleg, they have it listed as a remix
Sorry to necro-reply, but I’ve been looking for some sort of documentation or proof of the legality of pools – if I’m going to pay money I would like to know that it is at least legal music I am downloading.
The legalese in most of these sites’ Terms & Conditions are too hard to follow for me, and I haven’t gotten any replies back from the record labels. Can you list or link what you have found in your research for this article? I’m specifically interested in DJCITY, Clubkillers and DDJP.
I also think that clubkillers.com is a site that has a big database of music that is worth mentioning. They’re service is as great as djcity.com (I have both).
ClubKillers comes up a lot in discussions about pools on various sites but it completely slipped my mind when I was preparing this article. I’ll have to take a look at them again.
Where is the record pool for club killers? it looks like a clothing company?
You have to be a member to see the record pool portion.
great write up! big fan of clubkillers.com & djcity.com 🙂
I think http://www.i12inch.com is worth mentioning. $500 bucks for a year of access to all their music, or you can buy songs individually. You can’t batch download, but they have a lot of really cool bootlegs that I haven’t seen anywhere else.
Also Promo Only has a (fairly) new service called POOL where you can download your subscriptions using their app. It’s worth checking into if you’re a PO fan.
I’ll have to checkout i12inch and Promo Only is one of the pools I remember from back in the day when pools sent actual CDs or Records so I’ll have to check that out as well. I still have a stack of Promo Only CDs at home from years ago.
I think masspoolmp3.com is one of the best. I used zipdj in a few months. But I went back to masspoolmp3 because I think they had a lot more variety in music and remixes
I’ll take a look, I’m a little concerned that the #1 track on their charts is over a year old though.
Really? I just checked and saw all current music on their charts. I have heard good things about them and I know they get nominated for record pool of the year at the WMC IDMAs, so they must be doing something right. Oh, and the correct link is http://www.masspoolmp3.com.
DJ City also has an App for iPhone to allow you to preview songs and favorite them for later when you are not on your computer.
I believe they also have on for Android but I admit I never checked it out. I like to devote a couple hours a week to digging for music where I sit down and do nothing else so digging on the go has never been a concern for me.
I’ve been told that zipDJ has an app coming soon with their new Version 3.
How does one submit a song to the record pool? Is that one of the functions of the record label?
Yes – a good label will also take care of this for you, especially if you’re making DJ-friendly tracks.
A lot of the pools have submission forms but as Dan said it’s usually on the label to do it for you. Submitting original stuff is generally easier than remixes when you do it on your own as they will have deals with their label partners not to carry bootlegs in a lot of cases.
useless for ghettofunk djs
Haha, find me a Ghetto Funk pool and I’ll review the heck out of it.
the whole GhettoFunk scene prides itself on exclucivity and personal VIPs and re-rubs. A record pool would be silly considering the scene. The old hip hop one would be good though for Ghetto Funk guys. Get lots of ol’skool and such, play outside of what is just handed out in the icons compilation.
I want to know more about the ghetto funk scene…not copy their music…I google nothing comes up…
Exactly my thoughts! But we do have this:
http://ghettofunk.co.uk/vip/promo-subscriptions/ 🙂
We do have this at least http://ghettofunk.co.uk/vip/promo-subscriptions/ 🙂
yep I do 🙂
Nice…thanks DJTT!