i was thinking the other day about groups in society, especially those who follow dj culture...and i was wondering; does everybody who's part of a certain societal movement/group think that this movement began and ended with them?
take dj culture for example; or ravers if you will. i started going to parties about 6 years ago, just about the time when this culture was fuckin' booming! i mean macleans magazine even had a full spread about the newfound 'underground music' fascination. flyers were everywhere, and there was a rockin' party to go to EVERY weekend! they were so popular, the train station downtown even opened up their doors to us!! yes, that's right...yours truly 'indulged' and danced away till the wee morning hours in halifax's own lil' train station! anyways, they were HUGELY popular!
and they remained that way for the next few years...then, suddenly our fair little city just kinda turned on them...venues shut their doors and there just weren't any places to have them anymore. they started having weekly bar nights...but they just weren't the same. picture the electropolis (on lower water street) packed to the tits with 1500 to 2000 people, with the most slammin' dj you can think of spinnin' the craziest records, all atop a 10 foot high stage with a trippy light show complete with lasers for all our viewing pleasure. not to mention the fact that you couldn't even see the ceiling, and when you could you might even catch a glimpse of a few left-over props from "lexx" that were being stored there overnight. (once they had this ginormous lobster hanging from the ceiling...trippy, just trippy!) and compare all that to a silly lil' night at reflections where you're kicked out at 3:30...and there's just no comparaison!
so now all us veterans are left with only pictures of that time, and a few fuzzy memories where we're all a little sketchy on the details! but looking back, the narcissist in all of us takes the credit for making this scene so popular back in it's day. and if you ask me, i'd say we were!! but were we really? did the rave scene really begin and end with us? were we responsible for making it as big as it really was? and then for letting the scene die?
it's funny looking back at old photos of that time; even funnier to run into an old raver on the street cause everybody has changed sooo much. we really were like a little family. i mean when you hang out with the same people every weekend, you kinda get used to having them around.
but what happened? did this sudden halt in raves happen all around the world? or is it just because halifax stopped having them that the interest suddenly wained? well the answer my friends, can be seen all around you; why just google "ibiza" and you'll come up with millions of links to the most jammin' party island in the world where the culture is alive and well. and not going anywhere! or at the very least look in the electronica section at hmv the next time you visit; cause it certainly still thrives!
therefore the conclusion i come to is that halifax just wasn't ready for such an underground culture to be a part of it's day to day society, and thus the culture died off. well at least part of it did. the music part is still thumpin' (pardon my pun), and not just on the east coast. electronica will be around all over the world for as long as time. the scene has simply evolved into something a bit more vast and less concentrated.
poser-lovers of electronica music will come and go, but the trained eye can always spot a 'lifer'; we're the ones you see on the street tappin' their foot or bobbin their whole body, to a beat that can only be heard in their head!
and ps, the painting at the top is by justin bua (my favourite artist) entitled appropriately "the dj". i urge you to check out his urban art (justinbua.com)
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