DJ Advise.. you hearing. Will it last 4 ever?

0:10 You will last forever

Yeah, hearing. It's one of the subjects that a lot of DJs don't discuss, because it's almost as though when you're 15, 16, 12, whatever, it's like you're invincible, nothing can go wrong. You will last forever. You will actually last as long as you live, whether it be a day or the next 50, 60, 100 years, but there are certain parts of your body that will start to deteriorate as you get older. In fact, probably all of your body eventually deteriorates. In fact, that's why we see loads of people on Zimmer frames. You hardly see someone of 14 on a Zimmer frame, but you definitely see people 19 upwards on a Zimmer frame. Now, your ears are a little bit like that as well. The only thing is you can't have a Zimmer frame there.

What does happen though, if you do, let's say, listen to a lot of loud music continually, then you might, you may get something called tinnitus. Now, what is that? The only way of describing it is it's a bit... It's a bit like having a very, very high pitch sound continually. And I don't mean as in it's there in the morning and it disappears or, you know, it'll turn up at 4 o'clock in the afternoon for half an hour while you have a cup of tea and that flies and nips and stuff and then go away. No, it's there all the time. And there are different kinds of tinnitus. The only reason I'm moving back and forwards is so the bloody midges don't hear me. Oh no, I'm getting eaten alive here. I'll tell you what I'm going to do.

I'm going to take the camera off there and I'm going to walk. Otherwise, I'm just going to get eaten. All right, so tinnitus.

It can strike at any time. Now, if you think that you can go to a loud event and be blasted once and think, I'm not going to get tinnitus because it'll take 10 gigs, then you're wrong. If you think that you can stand in front of some loudspeakers for one minute, then you're wrong. If you think that you can stand in front of some loudspeakers for one second and think, I'm not going to get tinnitus, it's only one second, you're wrong. Because you can get tinnitus virtually at any age, any time, not necessarily at any volume, but it does have to be quite high. It doesn't just have to be bass. It could be mid. It could be top. You could be next to a speaker for a fraction of a second and there could be a certain frequency that's coming out at such a high sound pressure level, SPL.

2:56 It is relatively annoying

And all of a sudden, your ear or both of your ears will be affected for the rest of your life. Now I have tinnitus. I've had it for a few years and when I say it comes and goes, it comes and goes as in I can recognise it's there when times are quiet, but when there's a lot going on, there's lots of noise, then you don't hear it as much. But I've got this in my ears. It is relatively annoying. It's annoying when you first get it, but eventually you get used to it, but it shouldn't happen. It shouldn't have to be there. So maybe my me explaining this to you guys out there, it may make you think about your ears before you do go down the path of thinking how wonderful it is standing next to a rather large speaker listening to that sub bass because you may go home that night and all of a sudden he'll think I'm still in the nightclub.

How come? And you realise that you've got that thudding sound in your ears. What I used to get was like a sort of a wobbly sound in my ear. I don't know if post comments on the sounds you get. It was like it was literally like that, almost like a motorboat. And I can remember it's really weird. I can remember lying in bed and thinking, I'm sure there's someone outside driving a car or just a car ticking over. Now that luckily that sort of sound is gone. But I still do have this very high whistle.

4:32 I don't know if I'm maybe contradicting myself now

I don't know if I'm maybe contradicting myself now. Probably am actually, because I'm pretty sure it is with you for the rest of your life. It may come and go slightly, but it will always be there. Please quote me if I'm right or wrong. Now, how do you get rid of it? As far as I know, you can't. But what you can do is that there are. I believe there is something where what they do is they find out the frequency that you're getting and then they fit something on your ear that sends out that same frequency. And what it does, it cancels the sound out. But of course, from a DJ's point of view, if you want to hear the whole scope of frequencies, then you sort of buggered because a few of them will be with you continually.

So when you have that frequency in a in some music, it's sort of cancelled out if you think about it. It's a bit like having You know your vision all of a sudden You just see red all the time and all of a sudden someone shows you this wonderful picture with all these lovely colors And you can't see the red because it's there's just too much red going on. Hope you see where I'm coming from Of course, it's not all doom and gloom because You can get around tinnitus In other words before you get the damn thing You can have earplugs and What these do is Without going into great detail There there is a company or companies what they'll do is they'll put some sort of gel or something in your ear It's totally legit

But make sure if you do go down this line you go to a Reputable person company that does this what they do puts us some sort of gel in your ear That takes a mold of your inner ear now Every single person's inner ear is slightly different. They're all unique Even to the extent of your left ear inner ear could be slightly different to your right in a rear So what they do they take a mold? And then they have a small hole inside that mold now if you think let's imagine the hole to your ear For example is that big it's not gonna be that big the hole will eventually be that big so what's happening It's cutting out a lot of the frequencies Now when we consider That sound frequencies are from Hertz which are really low to kilohertz, which are really high. So for example the human ear I think it hears

Frequencies from about 30 Hertz up to about

20,000 kilohertz, I think it's something like that again, please quote me

When it's very low, it's almost like a rumbling sound. It's a bit like thunder in the background

7:24 These, every single, loud

When it's very high It's it's like a jet taking off that screaming sound and If you have those frequencies too often too loud You may get tinnitus now You can also get these very spongy kind of earplugs And if you squidge them and open your hand open your fingers, they take a little while to open up So what happens is you squish them down? You put them in your ear and then they expand inside your ear That's a good way of blocking out some of the sound and if you go to let's say a DIY store the places that sell You know your general DIY machinery You could theoretically buy some there because it's almost like the equivalent of eye goggles for your eyes protect your eyes They're big ear muffs for your ears, but then you can have these small thing things you put those in as well

Now, let me talk a little bit about sound now. These guys here are from AKG These are known as reference headphones The model number is K 702 you wouldn't necessarily want to use these at a gig because They don't get very loud. What they do do is give you good quality Audio now, these are mainly used for studio purposes Now any person out there who is in a studio who has let's say for example produced a track Production, I'm gonna give you a little tip or a little hint to what's going to be going on later on next month in July But what they'll do is they will have the music low Being low. They'll be able to hear every single Sound every single frequency every single little tiny factor of Instrument every little tweak of the knob and the dial that's gone on in the music

Therefore They'll be able to concentrate on the whole track and get a very good idea as to how the track is constructed As opposed to it being boomingly loud, and it's so bloody loud. You just you don't know what's going on So if you think about it when you're in a nightclub and the sound is booming and whatnot And it's there's sound going all over the place and it's as loud as the DJ can get it Is that good? Well, it may be good because you feel the bass but it's also bad because Your ears are going to feel it possibly for the rest of your life So I advise you and this is my advice from someone who has been in this industry since about 1980 something or other Look after your ears. Just think when you're in that nightclub and whether you're the DJ or the person dancing

10:22 Able hear, hear music, feel bass

Consider that Your ears have got to last you a long time. So look after them When music is loud a lot of people say oh I can feel the bass I can feel it. Well stick some ear plugs in your ears You can still feel the bass because it will be hitting you just there on your chest but at the same time you'll still be able to hear it and The beauty about it is with the likes of earplugs You can continue going to these particular events for many years to come and you'll still be able to hear the music And as I said earlier, you will be able to hear all of the music you will not not be able to hear certain frequencies you'll be able to hear the whole scope as opposed to possibly your mates who've gone to the same gigs have been quite happy to stand in front of the

Speakers because they've thought how clever they are in front of the woofers and go oh look at me oh man this is really good when they go and they'll be going oh shit man there's someone with a ferrari outside going actually that quite nice for our unit whereas you'll be happy thinking well you know i can continue listening to music all the time now producers i am pretty sure any or every producer out there will treat their ears with the greatest of respect because that is a bit like a carpenter and his hands if all of a sudden you chop your fingers off you're buggered if you're a producer and a remixer if you damage your ears you're sort of buggered because you need to have your ears working for you they are tools of your trade so look after them which brings

Me up to the production thing next month on the 13th of july there's something very special happening i'm not going to say much at the moment but it's a do you know what was really good i'm actually squashing the grass around me now what's happening is there's a couple of guys coming from a company from london and we're going to be doing some production they're going to be showing me um production they're going to be teaching me and showing me how to make a tune and also this is under you know we're planning this um you guys you guys out there will have the option if you want to help us make a tune and we're going to be making a track um when they come here that's all i'm going to say i'll let you sort of think about the rest of it but it's going to be good fun

So practice and enjoy and look after your ears you've only got two and they're the only ones you'll have for the rest of your life take it easy

This transcript was produced automatically from the audio of the video and may contain mistakes.