In today’s #EDCTales, our hero sets sail under the Electric Sky… with another stinking hashtag…
I admit to being a snob about the superiority of *my* festival* over other peoples’ festivals. Please don’t think I have found some new flavor of Kool Aid to drink. My festival sucks and you definitely should re-evaluate your life choices if you feel like you want to go. But I have been doing it for a while and invested a lot in it. What is so great about drinking some other brand of Kool-Aid?
This attitude was questioned in 2020 related to EDC. For those who don’t know – Electric Daisy Carnival, or EDC as the hip kids call it – is a three day electronic music festival/extravaganza held in Las Vegas. DJs come from all over the world to play techno to tens of thousands of ravers. In other words, it is a rave.
I went to raves back in the late 80s/early 90s. I have always had a “not bad, not my favorite” opinion of electronic dance music… mostly because my lack of sick dance moves. And I didn’t really understand the general vibe of rave culture – citing age and crusty Burner mentality. The older I got, the less I cared about whatever the attraction was.
While we were all locked down and everything was cancelled, I started watching a lot of streamers. Even though all the shows were cancelled, Insomniac (the producers of EDC) were doing “stay at home” raves. And some of the DJs I knew (or at least heard of), but there were more that I hadn’t. I started to listen to the music with a bit closer ear. There was some really good stuff happening here.
I also noticed when the DJs weren’t playing, they were talking about offering full refunds for anyone who needed them. They weren’t making excuses or “partial” refunds – unlike my own festival’s producers. And they established programs to help those in their community who needed help – financial or emotional. The little vignettes they played talked about the core values of their community in a way that made me – a jaded snarky asshole – feel how special this thing was.
I decided that I wanted to go to EDC. Life is about experiences and memories. And I have hundreds of memories & experiences related to my festival – why not seek out some more? Sure, its the same cost as my festival and I know I’ll have to pay $20 for a corn dog. But that $20 corndog is going to taste differently because of all the experiences up to that (and possibly some misappropriated pharmaceuticals). Seeing all these wonders – in some ways inspired by what I have been doing for 17 years – with old friends, new friends, friends I haven’t even met yet, and especially the pretty girl who I like watching dance… that is worth any price.
So… who is ready for some #EDCTales?
*”My festival” is a registered trademark of someone who doesn’t pay me to talk about them, so I’m not going to mention their name.