Drugs happen. That was the original phrase in front of the title for this post ... before I slightly edited it due to not wanting to seem, well, just playing into the exact hype I am trying to avoid inciting further! But really, what are we doing to help those who perhaps need it if we ignore or deny that there will always be those who will (not just "use," though!) "use" in excess...whether part of the scene or not, and who can only truly receive the help they need by everyone who is not personally in that group to stop pretending like those with control-issues (i.e., self-control) are leprous, cootie-infested whatever and acknowledge that knowledge is power and that it could really happen to any one of us, given just the wrong tragedy after the wrong tragedy at the wrong time in your life during the worst time of your life ... I'm just sayin' ... Enough of my ranting... just read the article!
"Drugs Happen: Getting Real About Music Festivals"
By Meghan Ralston
July 2013
A couple of weeks ago, more than 70 people in Gorge, Washington were sent to area hospitals after what was initially reported to be a mass overdose on the club drug ‘molly’ (MDMA) at the Paradiso outdoor music festival. One man died from allegedly ingesting it. In keeping with unfortunate tradition, the media didn’t ask many—if any—hard questions about the event.
No one asked if those ‘overdoses’ were in fact dehydration due to lack of ready access to water or lack of shady “chill out” areas. No one asked what role alcohol may have played, or any other drugs for that matter. Very little was said about the over 90 degree heat that weekend. This isn’t the first time MDMA-linked reported overdose fatalities have occurred at outdoor music festivals and it won’t be the last. With more outdoor music festivals happening over the next couple of weeks, including Outside Lands and Lollapolooza, the possibility of more drug or alcohol-related problems is real.
The potentially harmful consequences of alcohol and other drug use aren’t going to change until and unless festival organizers start doing some very basic things. But many won’t—because the fear of being perceived as ‘helping’ people who use drugs at their events is so great.
We need to acknowledge that alcohol and other drugs have been omnipresent at music festivals and will doubtless continue to be. We need to make it socially, and legally, acceptable for festival organizers to anticipate that some portion of the crowd may overdo it and may need assistance in staving off serious consequences.
Young people underestimate how intense heat can exacerbate the effects of alcohol and other drugs. Heat stroke, dehydration, nausea, fatigue and severe headaches are just a few of the unpleasant and occasionally dangerous side effects of being in crowded outdoor areas in high temperatures for many hours. Festival organizers need to plan on how to help keep thousands of people who may be intoxicated properly hydrated and cooled when temperatures soar, sometimes reaching 100-plus degrees at festivals at some festivals, like Coachella in the Palm Springs area.
This isn’t to suggest that the people who use drugs at festivals are not responsible for their own actions; everyone who uses drugs should, at minimum, know what they’re taking and know how to avoid any dangers associated with their drug of choice. Basic awareness of how to negate harmful side effects would go a long way toward reducing accidental overdoses and fatalities.
It would be remarkably easy to include “Have fun, but be very careful” messages with precise, helpful information on festival websites and printed materials. In Los Angeles, the Department of Public Health did just that, in response to a reported Ecstasy overdose at the Electric Daisy Carnival a couple of years ago. They created palm cards explaining the risks of Ecstasy and ways to reduce the dangers of its use. But those helpful, fact-based cards caused such an uproar that they never saw the light of day. Suggestions like, “Take frequent breaks and stay hydrated,” “Watch out for your friends and know the signs of possible overdose,” “Seek medical attention right away if your friend passes out,” “Never buy drugs from a stranger,” “If you haven’t done it at home, don’t do it here for the first time,” etc,, may seem very basic, but to many young people those messages may not be deeply ingrained yet.
Festival organizers can make it explicitly clear that there will be medics roaming the event, wearing a specific colored t-shirt or hat, and advise their attendees to look for them if medical assistance is immediately needed. One simple announcement of this from the stage every hour could save a life.
They can tell people where medics will be stationed throughout the event. They can hand out palm cards similar to the ones from Los Angeles at the front gate. They can flash messages on any “Jumbotron” –type screens they may have.
Some portion of virtually any large crowd of young people gathered all day will use drugs. Festival organizers cannot ensure that not a single person takes a single drug during their event. But they can and should acknowledge reality and take simple, low-cost steps to help save the life of any of their young customers who may make a dumb mistake.
It’s ridiculous to let someone die because it feels awkward to acknowledge that drug use happens.
With better drug education and the simple presence of experienced medics, young people can make sure that a mistake made during the day won’t mean they won’t get home safely at night.
Meghan Ralston is the Harm Reduction manager for the Drug Policy Alliance.
(originally posted at http://www.drugpolicy.org/blog/drugs-happen-getting-real-about-music-festivals)
What makes the below festival unique is its location - Portugal, Europe - a country where the use of drugs - like everything pretty much - has been "decriminalized" ... Thus, instead of even the best approaches taken by festival-hosts in the United States and other countries, uniquely in Portugal they are able to acknowledge and "treat" (in a very broad sense of the term, to say the least) substance-use related issues with festival-goers
(originally posted 10.13.13)
By Ted Hesson
Two concertgoers died after taking what they believed to be molly -- more formally known as MDMA -- at an electronic music festival in New York City this past weekend.
The New York Post has been particularly critical of the event in the aftermath of the deaths. One anonymous law enforcement source who spoke to the Post said that organizers of the Electric Zoo festival were trying to cover up illnesses by providing emergency medical tents and ambulances at the show. “It was just another way to keep the cops from finding” out what was going on, the source said. “[The organizers] had tents set up all over. It was like a MASH unit.”
Organizers called that idea “obscene” and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg stood behind the event coordinators, who he said had a good track record and made adequate preparations. That raises a fundamental question, though: who does a better job keeping drug users safe? The police or medical professionals? One festival in Portugal has banked on the latter, with good results so far, according to the event’s founder. The Boom Festival is a biannual electronic music gathering that takes place at Idanha-a-Nova Lake, a secluded area near the border with Spain. If you’ve ever been to an event like this in the U.S., it might sound familiar. Here’s how one blogger described it: “Boom’s dominant subcultural tone is neotribal: a rave-inflected millennial florescence of hippie shit like long hair, dreads, feral fashion exotica, chai shops, massage booths, copious cannabis consumption, and paganish New Age tantric mysticism.”
You get the point. There’s one major difference between this festival and the ones that are happening stateside: Portugal decriminalized all drugs in 2000, and takes a more laissez-faire approach to drug use in general. The Portuguese police focus on pursuing drug traffickers as opposed to chasing down people smoking joints, according to Diogo Ruivo, a 41-year-old who founded Boom in 1997. That’s allowed the festival team to set up what they call a “KosmiCare” center at the show. The center, which is located near medical personnel, is “for what we call a psychedelic emergency,” Ruivo said. The idea that if you’re having a bad trip or if you’re a “newbie,” you can get advice or an explanation of how the drugs work. If the KosmiCare staff think you might be sick, you can be sent over to the medical team on site. Rather than ignore or suppress drug use, the organizers are acknowledging that it’s going on and trying to deal with it when problems arise, he said. “For us it wasn’t really logical anymore to keep on looking to the side,” Ruivo said. According to organizers, they consulted with the local hospital, a fire department, paramedics, security personnel and regional harm-reduction experts to develop the plan. The Boom Festival isn’t without its problems. One person died of cardiac arrest in 2008, but Ruivo says it wasn’t drug-related. Two people died at a related festival in 2012, as well. And the KosmiCare attendants aren’t all medical professionals or paid. Some are volunteers and “shamans,” Ruivo said. We can’t vouch for the overall safety of the event, or any event along these lines, but it presents an alternative to an enforcement-oriented approach. That’s “super impressive,” in the eyes of Rick Doblin. He’s the founder and executive director of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), a group that believes psychedelics and marijuana should be legally and safely available to the public. The group helped the Boom Festival come up with its approach to drug education and treatment. “It creates a whole climate of comfort at an event,” he said. “I think that there’s a general sense the U.S. has been on a punitive, counterproductive approach, and people around the world are exploring different options.” Update, 12:30 p.m.: I updated the piece to include two deaths that happened at a festival related to Boom in 2012.
Last year in Playboy, Frank Owen skillfully dissected the Legend of the Causeway Cannibal, explaining how people around the world came to believe that the synthetic stimulants known as “bath salts” caused one man to eat another’s face, even though it turned out that the assailant had not actually consumed any of those drugs.
In a new Playboy article, Owen and his wife, Lera Gavin, go “Chasing Molly,” searching high and low for some decent MDMA sold under its latest brand name. Spoiler alert: They fail. Although MDMA-as-molly (powder in a capsule) is reputedly better than MDMA-as-Ecstasy (a tablet), Owen reports, it is vastly inferior to MDMA-as-adam, the compound that excited the psychonautical chemist Alexander Shulgin and his psychotherapist friends back in the late 1970s, before it became known as a party drug, prompting the Drug Enforcement Administration to ban it in 1985.
Some of the molly that Owen and Gavin buy in Miami Beach and New York does contain MDMA, but it’s mixed with a bunch of other things that consumers probably are not expecting: synthetic cathinones (a common ingredient in those “bath salts” that supposedly turn people into flesh-eating zombies), methamphetamine, even the narcotic painkiller oxycodone. Often the stuff sold as molly contains no MDMA at all:
According to the Miami Police Department, methylone and mephedrone, along with another synthetic cathinone called 4-MEC, account for the vast bulk of the molly seized by narcotics cops in the area. A DEA spokesperson told me that in the first six months of 2013, the DEA’s Miami field office seized 106 consignments of molly, which contained 43 different substances, 19 of them so obscure even government chemists couldn’t identify them.
It looks like many people who report MDMA-like experiences of openness and connectedness after consuming molly are providing further evidence of the powerful impact that “set and setting” (expectations and environment) have on a drug’s perceived effects. Yet this interesting experiment drug warriors have set up has a cost: not just disappointment but potentially deadly hazards for consumers who get something different from what they thought they were buying, as tends to happen in a black market.
Prohibition not only makes drugs more dangerous by creating a situation where people are swallowing iffy pills and snorting mystery powders; it blocks attempts to ameliorate those hazards. Owen and Gavin note that music festivals such as Electric Zoo, which this year was cut short after two drug-related deaths, “refuse to allow organizations such as Dance-Safe to test molly on-site because organizers fear they will be accused of condoning drug use.” Such accusations can trigger serious legal consequences, including forfeiture and criminal prosecution.
Tablets sold as MDMA may contain other chemicals (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
So...I personally know the gentleman who is the Techno Viking -- the World's Best Dancer, Matthew Churney!! Matt is an amazing man who is not only an awesome dancer and hackey sack-er (see below for videos!!) ...he is also an amazing artist designing intricately designed and hand-made/cut clothing (see photos below for examples) which has proudly graced many talented artists including Aerosmith (I've seen the pics!). Anyway, he's an awesome guy and I hope all our readers may at some point have the opportunity to meet Matt (if you haven't already, as I assume many of you have) at an upcoming show and when you do - let him know just how important he is to the scene! PPLB loves you, Matthew!! Read the full interview below...
(January 2014) By Patrick Clough-Androes
This year I turned 26, and EDM is already making me feel ancient. You know what they say: every year we get older, and the ravers stay the same age.
In fact, the scene's age demographic seems to fall drastically each year, and my refusal to wear floral-printed five-panel hats isn't helping me assimilate with the sweaty hoards getting dropped off in their rave family's caravan. While I seem to spend more time hesitating over the "buy now" button for an all-ages Zeds Dead show these days, none of this seems to bother 54-year-old rave legend Matthew Churney, who lives on the other side of Chicago.
A child of the 60s, Matthew has become a fixture of the Chicago electronic music scene. From Pitchfork to Lollapalooza to shady warehouses, Matthew and his twin brother, Max, never fail to become the stars of any impromptu dance circle. Outfitted in homemade clothing and protective body armor like back braces and knee pads, both Churneys have their own distinctive dance styles and like to get dirty. This video of them from Lollapalooza 2009 has racked up almost three million views.
Every time I run into the Churney brothers, my curiosity about who they are and why they do what they do only grows. So on one recent glacial night, I finally arranged to meet up with Matthew (who wears the blue bandana in the above video) for coffee in Chicago's Logan Square. It quickly became clear that Matthew Churney is just as fascinating in conversation as he is from afar—I noticed several patrons taking breaks from their laptops and eavesdropping on our discussion, mouths agape.
Our chat roamed from his early adventures at Woodstock to his recent decision to go sober, before turning to his theories on Philly's Nitrous Mafia murders, 9/11 conspiracies, Michael Jordan's role in his brother's injuries, and when he plans on finally slowing down.
THUMP: You are 54, is that correct?
Matthew Churney: 54 going on 55.
As an experienced reveler, what was electronic music’s greatest era?
I’d say the 80s and the 90s. You had everything from techno to trance. And I include a lot of hip-hop stuff in there too. Grandmaster Flash, you know, all that stuff was heavily influenced by electronica.
How were the parties then?
Ridiculous. A lot of my experiences were through the glasses of being altered, if you will… doing party favors. The memory isn’t what I would like it to be. I didn’t hit a lot of outdoor raves. 1994 or 1995 at Woodstock was the one where they did a rave night. It was amazing. It was so much fun.
Many parents would be mortified to see their children's behavior at a rave or electronic show. What does your family think of your lifestyle?
Um, my mom wouldn’t be too surprised by my lifestyle. She knows enough about me and we don’t really have any secrets. When I’m sober, she knows I’m sober. If I’m not sober, I’m a little less in contact with her cause I know she’d be a little disappointed. That’s not cause she thinks less of me, but she’s concerned about me like any mother is going to be. Fortunately I’m sober now, so that’s not an issue.
You have been clean for many years. Is electronic music as fun without drugs?
You know, that’s a difficult question. It’s really fun to be screwed up dancing to it. At the same time, it can be [fun sober], you just need the right music and crowd. I’ve always said you don’t need drugs to have a good time. I live by that. That’s not a load of bullshit.
A pessimistic attitude towards electronic music seems to be the growing trend now that the genre has gained notoriety. Why do you think this is? How do you combat this mentality?
It’s gotten so mainstream that it probably has lost some appeal to those who got in on it from the beginning. Girls get raped, people get their things stolen, people get beat down for drugs. Even worse, there was a guy that got killed over nitrous at Gathering of the Vibes. It was a territorial thing. It was like, Nitrous Mafia types who killed a guy that they thought was moving in on their territory. It’s things like that that give the scene a bad name and take away from the real fun. Some of the innocence has been lost, just like it was when drugs moved into music in the 60s.
What are your thoughts on PLUR?
It’s real. There are a lot of really good people on the planet that care about each other. They care about the partying experience. If they see someone who is all messed up and passed out, they’ll make sure they get medical attention. You don’t bail on a friend who is passed out. You don’t leave them lying on the ground so someone can abuse them. I mean, there is nothing wrong with [spraying] silly-string all over somebody, but that should be the most abusive behavior when someone is in that state.
What does a normal 24 hours look like for you? Do you have a routine?
I like to sleep in a lot. I could go to bed at midnight, or I might stay up until five or ten in the morning. I’ll stay up and watch TV until I’m falling asleep in my chair. Then I’ll recognize I’m not sleeping so well in the chair and I’ll move over to my bed. My bed is nice and cushy. It’s a structural massage table. I was trained in structural massage… but my teacher died. You examine a patient in their underwear to see what their alignment is really like. Over ten sessions you do the best you can to bring them into better alignment.
I don’t have any routines, per say. I try to get out and dance as much as I can. I try to stay up on what’s going on in the city. Dance is my only form of exercise. I used to go through Facebook events. There is so much. It’s just a pain. Facebook is a pain in the ass.
You gotta get some grub going. As skinny as I am, I’ve gotta make sure I’m eating something. That’s been an issue for me. I’ve gotten down to underweight levels. Some of that was a result of going out too much. Some of it was a result of burning off so much energy dancing. Actually, some of it was cause I went through some deep, dark psychological troubles right around the time 9/11 hit. It was really dark. I think some people are more sensitive to stuff that’s going on. I had a premonition that some bad shit was going to hit the fan. I was riding the train and I heard some lady say something about a disaster and something just shook me to the core. I had a feeling something heavy was going to happen.
This was pre-9/11?
Yes, this was before. From that moment forward, I just felt really shaken. I didn’t feel normal. I wound up in the psych ward cause of that type of shit. I did the best I could to pull myself out, got clean, you know, and started partying again and wound back up in the ward. I was like, OK, I’m not going to get a strike three. That’s when I got serious about staying clean.
After that [Lollapalooza] video came out, all these people were making these drug references and I’m like, I’m sober. If I weren’t sober, I would have owned up to it. Having seven years under my belt at the time, it rubbed me the wrong way to have people say, "He’s on crack, he’s on acid, he’s on this, he’s on that." But people see through their own filter of experience. I can’t blame them. If they’re getting high, they tend to think someone else is getting high.
You have left hundreds of comments on your YouTube videos, including the one you just mentioned. For someone so seemingly carefree and optimistic, it’s surprising to see you respond to those that disparage you and your brother. Why do you respond to comments like this elegant one?
"Datssocool: 11 months ago
Dat shit was fuckin horrible, wtf was he doin dat shit was so fuckin stupid, dat was a waste of time, n hw da fuck dud he get all those veiws, u make me wanna kill myself doin shit like dat. I hope u fuckn die fuck u who will post something like dis. Who ever put dis on YouTube should die to. N dat guy dat was tryna dance next to him needs ta die to n who ever liked dis video should fuckin die to. Bitch ass bitches . dumb mathafuckas wanna post some bullshit like dis. Die . Die . Die . BITCH"
It’s not that it bothers me personally that much. It boils down to self-responsibility and responsibility to the community. You’ve heard the saying "it takes a village to raise a child"? I’m part of that village, you know? As an adult and an elder, I’m over 50, it’s my responsibility to speak up and hold people accountable. That’s not me trying to prove them wrong. I’m not saying you are a bad person for saying that, but you need to check in with people before you assume anything.
Kids are impressionable. If they think something is really cool and they think the only way to get out and express themselves is to be fucked up out of their gourds, I don’t want to be responsible for the negative consequences of those actions.
I have heard that you were diagnosed as bipolar? When did that happen and what led up to the diagnosis?
2003 but I could have been diagnosed as early as 2001. I’m not even sure when it was. The whole process of even being analyzed and starting to take a deep look at myself and my behavior started then. That was an outgrowth of my lifestyle and an outgrowth of just really feeling down and caught up in all the negativity of the planet. It was a dark time. We were attacked. There’s a lot of stuff out there that says all that shit was set up from the inside.
Are you a conspiracy theorist?
Um, I start to believe that it is entirely possible that 9/11 could have been done from inside.
Any current physical ailments? I know your brother Max has had some issues with sciatica in his back and you were dancing with a torn meniscus in the Lollapalooza video.
The knees still kick up. I’ve had surgeries on both knees. I have a history of back issues which are a combination of injuries from work. The first time I ever had a back issue is when I was working at O’Hare [airport] and picked up a carrier that was really heavy and threw my back out. As a bike messenger, I’ve been knocked to the ground numerous times. One time I entered a lane that looked clear and a car came out of the blue and hit me. I went out dancing that weekend and my back went out on me big time. I couldn’t even stand up.
I think I have back problems but Max has it way worse. His back is constantly in pain. He’s spent a lot of time bed-ridden, just video gamin’ or sleeping cause, you know, he can’t take the pain. In a lot of cases, all you need to do is get out and move around. He moves really well considering the kind of pain he deals with.
You told me once that Michael Jordan was involved in crushing your brother’s leg?
Max was a bike messenger. One time he got on the road and was nailed out of the blue by one of Michael Jordan's restaurant's valet drivers. I think it was one of those situations where Max's lawyer might have gotten paid off… not to settle the case. I know there are lawyers that can be trustworthy, but I know there are others that are shady. The only money Max ever got out of it was workman’s comp. His leg has been hugely compromised… I mean he had to have a hipbone taken out to graft on to his knee to even make it workable. He should have got 50 to 100 grand, minimum.
Are the two of you inseparable?
We’re not always together. That’s kind of what adds to the mystique, that people think there’s one guy all over town. I cover a lot of ground personally, but I can’t cover the kind of ground that both of us can. There’s a lot of people that do know about us being twins, it’s not like we try to keep it a secret. We’ve been musical since we came out the womb. It was pretty natural for us to fall into it.
The 2012 Chicago Mad Decent block party was shut down by the CPD when hundreds of kids rushed the small open-air venue, scaling all facades and walls in a scene straight out of World War Z. I remember you grabbed a kid who had just mowed over some poor girl and exclaimed, “This is Mad Decent. You aren’t being decent and it’s making me mad.” Do you remember this?
[Laughs] I don’t remember the specific incident, but that sounds like something I would say. Ultimately, you can correct somebody in a way that you are checking their behavior without making them out to be a bad person. If you approach somebody the right way, they can take the lesson. You get more done with honey than with vinegar. If I came on straight vinegar, he might have hit me in the face or something.
When we first talked on the phone, you mentioned you had almost married a young woman a number of years ago? Have you found someone willing and able to keep up with your lifestyle?
Yeah. We had a lot in common, but she wanted somebody that was a little more of a homebody. Towards the end of our relationship I was still too much of a free spirit. I wasn’t able to be there for her the way she wanted me to. At the time when I lost her, I lost my job and apartment all in one shot.
I heard about a Rainbow Gathering, basically a bunch of hippies out in the woods trying to get away from it all. I thought it was just a cult or some crazy stuff, so I wasn’t going to go. Then I thought, I really need to clear my head and my heart… getting away from it all could do me some good. I was falling asleep to the sound of drums each night. It kind of woke something up in me. I said, I gotta get a drum. I wound up losing the lady who would have been my wife, but I got married to the drums instead. I’ve been married ever since and that’s not something that’s ever going to be broken up.
You are a heavy user of emoticons. What’s your favorite emoticon and why?
Uh, probably the tongue out the side of the mouth. When I think I or someone else has said something really funny, it’s not enough to just have a wide smile. [Laughs] I like the heart a lot too.
You are much more active on social media than most 54 year olds. However, you only have one connection on LinkedIn. What’s up with that?
I just haven’t made use of it. I stayed on Facebook thinking it was legitimate. Facebook hasn’t become what I hoped it would in terms of connecting myself with other people. I have close to a thousand likes on my clothing page, but very little comes out of that in terms of real business. I probably should be making more use of LinkedIn, I’m just not as media savvy or motivated.
What is a Spiderbat?
Spiderbat is the name and identity of my clothing line. I didn’t want to be sued by Marvel comics for using Spiderman. It was real obvious to use Spiderman, cause people were calling me that all the time, but I knew right off the bat I was going to have a lawsuit if I ever started making some real money. So I took Spiderman and Batman and slapped them together and came up with this mythological creature that represented my clothing.
Matthew Churney in a Spiderbat design with Kip Winger backstage at the First Midwest Bank Ampitheater
How often do you take a bath? I’ve heard you consider it a sacred experience.
I’d take more showers if I had more water pressure. Bathes are a wonderful thing. They give you time to just be with yourself. If you spend too much time with TV and video games and crap like that… that’s no good. If you deal with the aches and pains I deal with and have been busting ass on the dance floor and playing a lot of hacky sack and working hard on that, a bath is really good thing to take those aches and pains away. It’s good for your mind and body.
Any last words?
As long as my body is able to keep moving, I’ll be part of the scene. Ultimately, I want to be seen as more of a true artist as opposed to this crazy guy that is just out there. People need to know I have a heart and a soul. It’s not just the madness you see on the outside. To be given full respect and the opportunity to express myself on the deepest levels possible is what I’d like.
For everyone who loved this post back a year ago... Being RE-POSTED for all your reading pleasures!! ... Looking for a positive spin on this past year instead of the negativity some of the media has given this phenomenon? Read below for the REAL deal...
(December 2012)
By Jessica Sonabend
Shifts within the music industry have presented its followers with the 1970s disco movement, heavy metal era of the 1980s, boy band melodies of the 1990s, and transcendence of the hip-hop evolution of the 2000s. However, an upbeat and energetic sound has recently dominated the mainstream media in various ways. America is making a rapid transition into the electronic dance music scene, better known as EDM.
According to Forbes Magazine’s EDM series titled “House Music Has Become a Global Phenomenon”, contributor Dan Schawbel says music trio, Swedish House Mafia was able to sell out New York City’s Madison Square Garden within nine minutes in 2011. Ben Sisario of The New York Times writes that music festivals like Ultra and Electric Daisy Carnival draw crowds of 100,000 or more. Electronic dance music has perpetuated the influx of raves and music festivals worldwide.
Recently, electronic music has received a tremendous amount of radio airplay. Swedish House Mafia is a group of three Swedish music producers that have been active members of the electronic music era since the late 1990s. Their most recent hit “Save the World” has over 55 million views on YouTube and numerous plays on the radio.
The term “EDM” is a fairly new phenomenon. Ryan Mac, contributor for Forbes Magazine’s wealth team, says that electronic dance music has begun to exist in various inclinations.
“The phrase ‘EDM’ was born only a couple years ago, even though the roots of the dance music were there for decades,” Mac said. “In terms of how big it can be, coming from a strictly financial standpoint, some people are estimating that this whole industry could be worth about four billion dollars per year at some point in the next couple of years.”
But electronic music has been around for decades. Ben Sisario, writer for the New York Times, believes there was a pretty established electronic dance music sound and scene in the mid-eighties.
“In the US, there have been waves of popularity and there have always been raves but they have been fairly small by comparison to what is happening now,” Sisario said.
Large music festivals that strictly play electronic music, also known as raves, have become the center of the EDM movement. In the early 1990s, raves were typically kept underground and much of the public was unaware of its existence. Police officers would frequently break up the secret shows to scan the area for illegal substances. Raves are popularly known for its association with the drug, Ecstasy.
“Even when I started going seven years ago, there would be people that don’t really like this music but went because there are so many good drugs there,” said Jessica Sonabend, 23 year old blogger of The Ranting Raver. “At a rave, I have never seen so many people on drugs in one area before.”
Yet, drug use is common at almost every music festival event. Sisario believes drugs have had an impact on the music scene for many decades.
“Look at Woodstock! I think that drugs have been part of this music scene for a long time,” Sisario said. “On balance, I think it is no different than many kinds of pop music.”
Aside from its associated drug use, the electronic music industry is a big investment. The perpetuation of raves is only one of many sources of cash inflow. Mac says huge amounts of money are being tossed around to grow the industry in relation to venues and tours. Raves are drawing thousands of attendees with its headliner acts and special effects.
“Hundreds and thousands of people go and they have state-of-the-art speakers and lights,” Sonabend said. “You pay good money and you get the most bang for your buck.”
Sonabend has listened to electronic music and attended at least 300 raves since she was 16 years old. Her love for the music began before the existence of social media and Facebook updates.
“When I first started going to raves it was word-of-mouth,” Sonabend said. “There would be like an info line where somebody would turn their phone off and change the voice message on their phone to the location of the rave.”
After attending her first rave, Sonabend couldn’t get enough of it. She liked the thrill of sneaking out of her bedroom window of her parents’ house, feeling like she was up to no good.
However, unlike Sonabend, other attendees like to look at raves and electronic music as a time to relax. For MC Romano, junior at the University of Washington, raves act as mini vacations. After attending the Ultra music festival in Miami, FL, Romano associates the beach setting with her love for the music.
“These shows can be up to two to three days long,” Romano said. “You can do other things such as getting a hotel or camp.”
Another reason many believe electronic music has received mainstream media attention is due to the recent collaborations between EDM producers and hip-hop artists. While some popstars are creating their own remixes of electronic music, DJs like David Guetta have collaborated with Akon and Kid Cudi to produce some of America’s Top 40 singles like “Sexy Chick” and “Memories”.
“Historically, DJs have not been very successful as pop stars and their own records don’t really sell too well to mainstream audiences and it’s still pretty much the case,” Sisario said. “David Guetta became a celebrity in his own right.”
Jensen Wong, junior at the University of Washington, agrees that EDM broke through to the mainstream audience through radio airplay.
“Five years ago you would only hear hip-hop or alternative on the radio,” Jensen said.
The electronic dance music scene has impacted America in a variety of ways that people still struggle to completely understand. Music festivals have given many fans the opportunity to experience a type of music whether or not drug abuse is established. However, its growing industry has helped EDM become a widespread phenomenon.
“People want to experience this thing and in a sense, the industry has to accommodate this growing influx of interest,” Mac said.
Skrillex Full Flex Express Tour. A giant concert like event. Credit: Novus Photography
The electronic music community has experienced some explosive growth in the past few years. At the tender age of 16, I recall attending my first all night dance party at an outdoor skate park in my hometown of Calgary, Alberta. Let me set the stage. This was the late 90s. Y2K was looming, Buffy the Vampire Slayer was boss, and local authorities seemed intent on quashing our city’s burgeoning party scene by way of restrictive bylaws that made hosting larger parties all but impossible for the average promoter. The music and vibe had me hooked immediately.
My memories of this party are all good, despite the fact that police helicopters swooped in to shut the event down and send partiers packing only after about an hour after me and my crew had made it past the entry gate. This was fairly par for the course at the time. As a result, the scene shrunk drastically.
Fast forward to present day. Smaller intentional gatherings still exist, but have largely given way to huge concerts and massive festivals. Newcomers are flocking to the scene in droves, from all walks of life and a fairly wide age range. Bassnectar now draws crowds in the thousands. Skrillex has put dubstep on the map in North America and nabbed three Grammys in the process. Turn on the radio and even the likes of Katy Perry and Lady Gaga reek of electroclash.
Ladies and gentleman, the dance revolution has begun. While exciting, this growth and the mainstreaming of electronic dance music, comes with an increasing need for community-driven initiatives to help keep each other safe and healthy while we party. Enter PartySafe, a reboot of a local harm-reduction organization that was a fixture at Calgary parties from the late 90s to 2004. The president of PartySafe was a volunteer recruiter for the now disbanded RaveSafe. She’s looking to bring an updated version back to the scene, in an effort to ensure members of our dance community have access to relevant information and resources.
“It’s not about condoning or condemning drug use or pushing ideologies,” she says. “It’s about keeping people safe.”
Harm reduction is a public health philosophy that recognizes people will engage in risky behaviours and accepts that complete abolition of harm is not possible or realistic. It therefore works to limit the negative consequences of certain activities.
A rash of deaths this past year across Canada, linked to a toxic ecstasy adulterant known as PMMA (paramethoxymethamphetamine), served as a significant motivator to re-form the group. While chemically similar to MDMA, this compound exerts delayed effects, often causing users to increase dosages, eliciting harmful, sometimes fatal, side effects.
The president of PartySafe says, that in addition to providing individuals with current information on drug and alcohol use, that PartySafe plans to educate people on other relevant issues, including the importance of proper hearing protection, avoiding heatstroke, and preventing sexually transmitted disease.
Credit: Glenn McLelland / Super Sharp Shooter
PartySafe are also hoping to re-establish a number of positive working relationships that once existed with the local paramedics and police. In the past, harm reduction volunteers would help patrol events and served as an important link between party-goers and medical personnel.
Pill testing kits are available online and indeed this service is offered on site at events from some harm reduction groups across the globe. However, this may not be the case with PartySafe due to local laws surrounding the issue. Critics suggest that while drug-testing kits can be useful tools, they are by no means infallible and can create a veneer of safety around drug use.
MacDonald asserts that it is irresponsible to deny users access to this type of information and may result in more unnecessary harm. If PartySafe is not allowed to test pills on site, they will provide information to people on where to get test kits themselves.
Some things they do hope to have available at their booths – earplugs, condoms, gum, and electrolyte-replacing beverages- a virtual smorgasbord of goodies for safe partying.
Here are some tips and tricks to keep you and yours healthy and alive to dance another day:
Take care of your body:
Eat a good meal the day of the party and make sure you get a solid snooze the night before. Above all, stay hydrated, but don’t overdo it. While not as common as dehydration, water toxicity from too much H20 can cause an imbalance in your body’s electrolytes, leading to sometimes fatal disturbances in brain function. And let’s be honest, how embarrassing would it be too die from a water overdose? A good rule of thumb – drink one bottle of water per DJ set.
Save the mixing for the DJs:
If you chose to partake in party favours, avoid mixing. Alcohol + Drugs = Bad News. Taking stimulants and depressants together sends drastically conflicting messages to the body and the results can be both unpredictable and devastating. Think acute heart failure, or at the very least sticking the lit end of a cigarette in your mouth. Boooooooo. Also, ecstasy use in individuals undergoing anti-depressant therapy is ill advised as this puts the individual at increased risk for serotonin-syndrome. I’ll spare you the details, suffice to say it is probably no fun and is potentially life threatening.
A note for you hippie-types:
Artwork by Alex Grey
Before you go play in the stars and discover all the secrets of the universe, which of course you will either forget entirely or realize you don’t have the language to articulate the following day, please make sure you are in a positive headspace and safe physical realm before blast-off.
Engage the buddy system or designate a sober facilitator to make sure no interdimensional explorer gets lost in the process. This is especially important at large festivals where getting trapped in a tent or porta potty can be easily avoided by having someone there you can rely on to fish you out of these complex hippie black holes.
Earplugs, earplugs, earplugs!
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This one is self-explanatory. Protect your ears. Apart from your legs they are the most important partying assets you have. DJ’s and producers are amping up their tours, and the sound that goes with them is getting bigger and bigger. We all want to feel the music and the rumble of that amazing bass line. Wearing proper hearing protection will ensure you can still hear your favorite music for many years to come!
