It's hard to encapsulate 2012 musically into one blog post as this is finally coming to fruition as we said goodbye to 2012 a few days ago and welcome 2013 with open arms and legs stretched ready for new adventures. The six of us at DPC have put together an ode to 2012 highlighting some of our our favorite EP’s, experiences, concerts and mixes. While we've collectively seen, listened and scoured for more music this year than humanly possible, it was hard to pick favorites. But here's to a great year of music; many thanks to our readers, guest mix contributors, and friends for joining us on the ride! Let's boogie!
After being in Detroit for 3.5 days and taking an entire week to recover, I think it's safe to say that I am ready to recap what was the best music festival I have ever attended. It was just the right amount of weird...add in some great company and 72 hours of music that literally. never. stopped. And you have a recipe for one amazing Memorial Day Weekend.
Photo from Megan Matteson
Tyler did a great job giving you an idea of what happened at DEMF on the first day, but I thought I'd school everyone through tips on what you should and should not do, what I loved and did not love, and what to expect or not to expect when you're dance partying your way through Detroit in case you’re wondering if you should go next year. Spoiler alert: YOU SHOULD.
Well where do I begin....?
The beginning perhaps...
August 19, 2011 Identity Festival Camden, NJ
My DPC partner and I got chance to check out this stop of the tour. Unfortunately, a few delays prevented us from catching a few of the acts we very much wanted see. Not to mention, set times and act locations were shuffled throughout the day. But I’m going to do my best to stray away from some of the less positive aspects of the fest. I think Becca pretty much nailed it in her post. No worries though; there was still plenty of day and music left for us to get down to.
We weren’t exactly sure what to expect from the festival overall. We quickly got the gist of it though:
Oh yes, people came here to RAGE! And with the hormone-powered, angst-driven energy of thousands of glow stick toting teenagers...RAGE was had in this place.
What about the music you say? There was some of that too...
My first stop was to check out:
Still early in the day, the crowd was a bit thin but the energy was definitely rising. Admittedly, I am not too familiar with their material. But it was just what I needed to distract me from picture taking long enough to get my first dance on of the day. That’s what we came here for, right? Yeah, that....and the people watching!
Next...Booka Shade!...who, for whatever reason, got moved from the mainstage to a smaller one. No comment on that. What I will comment on is how they absolutely tore it down with a crowd of just a few hundred of us who could: 1. Find it. 2. Tear ourselves away from whatever generic electro that was happening at the other stages. (Sorry, that wasn’t too positive was it?).
These guys bring so much energy and creativity. No pressing “Play” then screaming and running around on stage while the track rides. They touched on a large portion of their catalogue and not only played their songs well, but played them differently from their studio counterparts. The live improvisation was an exciting relief from the non-stop untz happening at the other stages
There was downtime after Booka, and some rain-time for a while. This quickly became "exorbitantly overpriced beer" time. Then I heard it:
“WAKE THE FUCK UP!”
Hey, don’t tell me what to do Rusko.
I enjoyed a good portion of his set. He screamed; a lot. But brought a metric shit-ton of energy (see what I did there?..”metric”...he’s British...ok sorry). He womped it out, threw it back to some early stuff, some housey stuff, and even dropped an "unreleased" Rhianna track he produced (which he told us not to tell anyone about...sorry Rusko!).
Next up..: Avicci
This was probably one of the more exciting acts of day as far as production value.
I’m into House music as a whole, and he hit the spectrum of it. There were some cheesy moments, but there was enough quality stuff that even a snob like myself could find enjoyment in a good amount of the set. The crowd as a whole absolutely loved it!
There's a lot more that could be said (and shown) about my experience at Identity Festival, but for sake of highlighting what I actually enjoyed and keeping with focus of this blog, I’ll wrap it up. In all honesty it was a great time overall. The range of music was enough grab the attention of anyone who likes current electronic dance music. It just didn't quite hit the nail on the head as far as my taste go...
I am really sorry. This is a day or two late, it will probably be a snoozefest for you guys to read, but I felt like I needed to address Identity Festival in one way. We did hype it up somuchlastweek.
I don't want to go into the details because I don't have too many great things to say about the overall festival. But I hate lying. Mainly because I'm really awful at it, but you'd also see right through my 'glowing review'.
The timing never seemed right. DJ Shadow was completely canceled cause storms/downpour of rain, and the outdoors stages ended up getting shut down for the duration of the festival.
I was also asked a few times to buy beer by underage girls. I was probably the wrong person to ask because I'm a girl - that was your first mistake.You always ask boys first, duh. Your second mistake was wearing (insert any highlighter color that could blind you) tank top and orange hats that said, "RAGE".
**taken by Rashad**
I can't say much for myself though; I was running around the festival in an "I Love You But I've Chosen Disco" shirt, and people probably were actively judging me too.
Please take what I'm saying with a grain of salt because everyone should have their own opinion about music. I'm certainly not judging anyone (but really I am), so don't take my review and think it's the end all, be all. Cause it's not. Even though I wish it was because then disco dance parties would reign supreme and cupcakes would be considered a meal.
I had a great time overall (despite what you're about to read below), and I can't leave this post without also thanking our gracious hosts. You guys rule and you took us to the best places in Philly!!
Our asses were late to the party (Identity Festival being the party, and our asses were late cause we missed these twoacts - womp womp), so here's a good rundown of our experience at Identity Festival.... in numbers.
Cups of coffee consumed by yours truly in the 3 hour car ride - 4
Minutes it took to crack open our first beer when we got to Philadelphia - 2
Whiskeys taken before we left for Camden - 4
Set time changes that occurred before we left to head to Camden - 3
Employees at Festival who had no idea where Booka Shade was playing - all of them
Employees at Festival who had no idea what the different stages were - all of them
Shirts that made me confused and slightly offended - 1
*taken by Rashad*
Beers consumed while Steve Aoki was playing - not enough
Beers consumed before realizing no matter how drunk we got Steve Aoki would still suck - too many
Times I was actively judging people in the crowd - too many
Times Rashad had to tell me to stop actively judging people in the crowd - three; once during Rusko, once during Aviici, and once when we were taking pictures in front of the main stage.
Neon hats I saw with the word 'RAGE' on it - too many
Times I heard Rashad ask people (the ladies) "Who Wanted to be Internet Famous" - too many (haha sorry!)
Creepy cars we saw in Philly - 1
People we fit in a cab ride from Camden to Philly after the show - 6
Crabs we ate at the crab and beer festival on Saturday - take a wild guess
Showers taken by yours truly while in Philly - 1 (gross, right?)
**And I'm sorry about the crappy photographs by me - clearly I was more interested in other things** And by interested in other things I mean I liked beer too much.
The Swiss are Luke Million and Tony Mitolo. My co-author and I got the chance the see the Austalia based outfit live in Baltimore at The Talking Heads Club (a humble "dive" bar below Sonar). As a live band they are accompanied by bassist Sidwho?. I don't think other 20, or so, people there and myself were quite ready for what we about to experience.
But let's pull the record back for sec...
My first taste of The Swiss' bubbly, synth-fused, space-disco sound was on Aeroplane's (pre-split up) classic 2010 January Chart Mix (a DPC favorite). Beeps, Boops, and Untz a plenty, their track "Manthem" delights the ears and hits with one of those "Whoa, who the F is this?!" moments.
Alright, cue it back to last summer...
The 20 something people and I at the Talking Heads Club watched the 3-piece set-up the gear and instruments on-stage. Luke, curly permed hair and all, sets up his assortment of synthesizers and midi keyboards. Tony, a hulking mass of Aussie, adjusts his ironically very minimal 3-peice drum kit. Lastly, Sidwho?, with hair and a bass guitar straight out of the 80's, plucks a few notes to check his tuning. Tony pulls a mic towards himself, and humbly declares in his down-under accent, "Hi, We are The Swiss we're from Australia". He gives the count and the band goes to work.
Spacey synth melodies, grooving soultry basslines, and steady Untz-y rhythm. The result? Dance. Party. (And if you haven't gathered as much yet, we're sort of into that around here)
Fast-forward a year later...
The Swiss recently offered up a little preview of thier upcoming release (due September 5). It's a 1 minute collage of song snippets, and if this tease is any indication of what to expect...we'll all be dancing to the cosmic synth, funky basslines, and body movin' rhythyms of the Aussie trio very soon.
They don't dance. I just made that up. Is that offensive? I'm not sure if it is or not, cause I literally just picked the first inanimate object that popped into my head. I'm sorry I'm not sorry if I offended anyone who just read that. Although, if I did offend you, I can only guess that you either have this weird obsession with lamps, or you're a hipster. I digress.
Welcome to The Dance Party Chronicles. Why? Because we like to dance! (.....Sorry if you don't). God, that's really going to get old. I must admit, my judgment cannot always be trusted. (Full disclosure: I'm usually at the bar, commanding jager bombs). I'm also easy to please (Full dislclosure: give me a cupcake and I'll be happy). I love a good beat. I love anything that makes me want to tap my feet. Maybe twirl in circles, or even bust out a 'carwash' move every once in awhile (Full disclosure: that's my dance move. Come pick me out of a crowd. Trust me, it won't be hard).
Anyway, back to the 'substance' of this post. I just got home from an awesome concert. Actually, my co-author did, too. And I'm pretty sure we both can agree on a few things...
The 9:30 Club is so much more appealing when beer is free for an hour. Especially when you can get four beers at a time. Seriously. I don't know what was better; the look I got from the bartender as I awkwardly tried to carry four beers away from the bar, or the music.
Hipsters don't dance. I think if there could be a math equation that could fit what happened tonight it would be hipsters^squared = I've never seen so many heads nodding.
When going to concerts, you can't ever expect anything like a jam band concert. And this is something I just cannot get over. Wait. You're not playing for 3 hours? With two sets?! How dare you!
Okay. So all jokes aside. Yeasayer was great. If you know me, I love dance parties. I love disco. And I love anything with soulful, deep undertones - and this was not it. I'd like to consider myself (after tonight) a more musically open-minded human being, so I will give myself a pat on the back.
I think the best part about this concert was in the middle (so this means about 20 minutes in...), my friend looks over at me and goes, "ugh, this is the exact same as the Cut Copy show." And it's like Yeasayer knew what we were thinking, "Come on, more energy!" Soon after, the tempo picked up. Our bodies started moving, and we slowly realized that seriously, this band can get weird. I heard something between animal, tribal cries, and undertones of synthy beats (I can't make this shit up - though maybe the four beers in my mind can).
I left feeling rather satisfied. And happy. Because if you didn't already know from reading about three times - I freaking LOVE dance parties.
Please stay tuned for another post. I assure you most of the posts will not be solely 'reviews'. Because let's be honest, and I am a very honest person.... I like to have fun. And my co-author does too. Therefore, most of the time, while we can analyze and appreciate the music, we're there to let loose, and not stress. And that in turn means we're having a blast with some of our closest friends, dancing and drinking the night away. This also gives opportunities for awesome stories. If you know me, I am like the awkwardest person...ever. So I'm pretty sure some embarrassing, awkward, yet hilarious stories will surface at one point or another.
This blog will also feature tons of mixes that are listened to, and other music that we deem appropriate. Disco, funk, soul, deep house, etc etc. You like it, we'll probably feature it. So please, grab a seat, some popcorn, and your headphones. Cause it's about to get weird.
And just because you've read all of this nonsense, I'll leave you with some parting music. This mix features one of my favorite DJs who surprisingly hails from the United States. This mix is very dancy, hence the name, and can get you going through that 2 PM snooze fest you want to take. Around the 13 minute mark it starts to pick up, and it can also be a great motivator whilst on a run! But most importantly, this mix can be enjoyed while changing a flat tire in the suburbs of Washington, DC (**cough cough** HA).
