Social media carry EDM to the masses
DJS ARE THE STARS IN THE REALM OF ELECTRONIC MUSIC
DAVID GUETTA TURNS THE TABLES AS EDM ROARS INTO MAINSTREAM
It’s dinnertime in this desert fantasy land, and the hottest DJ in the world is just waking up.
“Jet lag,” says David Guetta, 44, running a hand through a mop of messy hair. Where was the Frenchman last? Blank stare, then a puzzled smile. “I honestly don’t remember,” he says.
You excuse Guetta’s foggy state upon learning that most of his global performances happen during the early a.m. hours. But also taking its toll is the thundering revolution he has happily helped foment.
Electronic dance music — everyone calls it EDM — has gone from an updated version of ’90s underground raves to a mainstream, crossover phenomenon that’s turning DJs into celebrities with rockstar cred. For proof, look no further than Guetta’s performance at the Encore hotel here, where NFL running back Reggie Bush and actor Benicio del Toro are front row as thousands of revelers salute the DJ as if he were Mick Jagger. But other evidence of EDM’s rise abounds. Sonny Moore, aka Skrillex, went from sleeping on friends’ sofas to three-time Grammy winner this year, including best dance recording for his dubstep hit Scary
Monsters and Nice Sprites. X Factor creator Simon Cowell has announced he’s joining with Will and Jada Pinkett Smith to produce a show that will crown the next great DJ. Mix masters are so in vogue that they feel the need to tweet status updates to fans, as Afrojack and Paris Hilton (still “best friends”) did last week.
And this weekend, 345,000 fans are expected at the sold-out Electric Daisy Carnival (June 8-10) at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, a dance party-meets-Burning Man
blowout that solidifies this gambling mecca as EDM’s emerging American base. That’s just one of many EDM gatherings dotting the summer concert landscape, which includes the 15-stop IDentity festival, Electric Forest in Rothbury, Mich., and Electric Zoo in New York. Last August, deadmau5 became the first EDM artist to headline a mainstream festival at Lollapalooza.
“The EDM scene in Europe has always been huge, but what we’re seeing now is a complete explosion in the U.S.,” says Dutch DJ Tiësto (Tijs Verwest), part of a gaggle of EDM superstars including Skrillex, Calvin Harris and Armin van Buuren who came to entertain Strip partyers on a recent weekend.
“What I love about American fans is they’re open to anything,” Tiësto says, surveying a throng of scantily clad fans ( male and female) pumping their fists during Guetta’s set. “The energy here is huge.”
And it’s potentially unlimited, Guetta says. “Hip-hop went from the ghetto to trendy to mainstream, and the same thing is happening with EDM,” says the two-time Grammy winner, whose career exploded when he created the beat for the Black Eyed Peas’ 2009 smash I Gotta Feeling. “It’s the new sound of American pop music.”
Though EDM doesn’t yet pulsate as a commercial radio format, the genre has long had a home at satellite’s Sirius XM, where executives are keen to exploit the gap.
“I’m not sure if every Mom and Pop realizes how big this is, but EDM has the potential to stick around a very long time,” says Scott Greenstein, chief content officer for Sirius XM, whose channels BPM and Electric Area feature sets by top DJs.
“Go to a big show and you see kids getting a live experience that is similar to what Boomers got from seeing rock bands,” he says. “You already know how our nostalgia for rock shows has kept that scene alive.”
Greenstein likens EDM’s surging status to that of alternative rock in the early ’90s: “Pearl Jam and Nirvana were just starting to break out, but once they did, it was huge.”
From the roots of rave
EDM’s precursor — rave culture — failed to flourish partly because of its perception as a sketchy scene of secret venues and illicit drugs. But this time around, the music has fused with chart-topping acts.
Guetta’s hybrid hits are a case in point: Among the stars who have sought his deft DJ touch are Nicki Minaj, Rihanna and Usher. Guetta and deadmau5 (Canadian Joel Zimmerman) both received a primetime benediction this year with performances at the Grammys alongside Chris Brown, Lil Wayne and Foo Fighters.
Also helping fuel EDM’s global spread is technology. Social networking and YouTube allow fans and DJs to stay in touch and share new sounds. Where yesteryear’s electronica seemed like a cult thing, EDM is hunting for the masses.
“Electronic sounds have gone from sounding odd to being completely in step with culture,” says Simon Reynolds, whose 1998 book Energy Flash chronicled the rave movement and has been updated to reflect the growth of EDM.
“You turn on Jersey Shore, and those kids aren’t partying to rock, they’re dancing to what we once thought of as abstract sounds,” he says. “Put on just about any videogame today and the soundtrack is pure electronic music. So it’s all around us.”
Not that the shiny new EDM scene is without its dark side.
Electric Daisy’s move to Las Vegas last year from Los Angeles resulted in part because of the death of Sasha Rodriguez, 15, who overdosed on the drug Ecstasy at the 2010 event.
“There are challenges whenever you have large groups, whether that’s a Dodgers game or a rock festival,” says the show’s founder, Insomniac CEO Pasquale Rotella, who has implemented safety-related changes since the incident.
“No one under 18 can attend,” he says. “We have thorough ID checks, pat-down lines, first-aid and water stations, and more than 800 security (officers) roaming the premises.”
Rotella, whose Electric Daisy Carnival just made its debut in New York, says EDM is best experienced at a mass live event. “It’s not just about the music, it’s about the communal scene,” he says.
EDM shows are one of the strongest parts of the concert business today, says Jonathan Ringen, Rolling
Stone assistant managing editor. “Part of that is the simple fun of gathering with others to dance to music made just for dancing,” he says. “But there’s also a sense of release from bad economic news, the ongoing wars and just the sense that the world is a scary place.”
From ‘nerd’ to luminary
Watch Guetta on his DJ platform — his hands waving, feet shuffling and smile beaming — and you’re seeing uninhibited joy.
Looking like a digital priest behind his high-tech altar, Guetta twists little knobs to the stomping beat as the crowd chants Gue-tta, Gue-tta.
Born Pierre David Guetta to a Moroccan father and a Belgian mother, he became enthralled with such U.S. disco-era staples as Donna Summer’s I Feel Love. As a teen, he set out to make his name in Parisian clubs.
Years of low paychecks and anonymity followed. While the locales he worked in became famous, his status as mere DJ left him shunted off to a darkened booth.
“Cathy and I decided we had to throw our own parties,” Guetta says of his fashionista wife, who guides his career and is mother to their two young children, Tim and Angie.
“She was like the sunshine that brought me out,” he says. “Then people started saying, ‘Oh, look who’s actually making the music.’ ”
Over the past two decades, Guetta’s star has soared in Europe, where club culture never went out of fashion. In 1995, he and Cathy launched F - - - Me, I’m Famous, the brand name of their movable EDM parties that helped make Guetta a star.
When he released fourth studio album One Love in 2009, a hit European single — When Love Takes Over featuring Kelly Rowland — caught the attention of will.i.am, who asked Guetta to throw some beats together for I Gotta Feeling.
Guetta’s stock has soared since. His latest album, Nothing But the Beat, features collaborations with more than a dozen hip-hop and R&B stars. Britain’s DJ Magazine recently named him the planet’s best. Yet somehow, it all doesn’t seem to have gone to his sleepy head.
“We have turned it into a musical movement,” Guetta says in lightly accented and excellent English. “It’s our time now.”
In a few hours, duty calls: a midnight set at the Encore’s XS nightclub.
“Every time someone gives me money to do this, it’s a miracle,” he says. “I was once a nerd in my room making music on my computer. Now I get to share my passion with the world.”
And thanks to the boom of EDM, the world is listening.