Los Angeles claims USA’s dance music crown

Los Angeles claims USA’s dance music crown

9 September, 2008 | 2.46PM

• Written by: Industry Boy
• Filed under: Music News: avalon, compression, droid, droog, ellen allien, magda, modeselektor

As Hunter S. Thompson might say, Hollywood is a cruel and shallow money trench, a plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There’s also a negative side.

Ever since the booming 1930’s movie industry, Hollywood’s reputation has been double-sided.

It is the glamour capital and dream factory; but people also “come to California to die,” wrote Nathanael West in his novel ‘Day of The Locust’ (1939), a book that revolves around characters whose dreams of success have effectively failed.

Today the divide between those who see Hollywood as a place for ruthless self-advancement, and those who view Tinseltown through cynical, deluded eyes is still there. 

The red carpet is packed with stars, and celebrity magazines are one of the few genres of print publishing to have not lost circulation to the advancing internet; but baying paparazzi and stalkers seek to kill its idols (the former through scandal, the latter literally).

Los Angeles’ electronic music renaissance

Los Angeles and its Hollywood then, are an unlikely setting for an American electronic music renaissance, especially considering the music’s counter-culture roots.

L.A. has a rich history with rock & roll, but a rather paltry dance music one compared with Detroit, which gave us techno, New York, which in the early 1990s had the most exciting nightlife in the world, and San Francisco, which has always blossomed in its liberalism.

But today, Detroit has lost its enthusiasm to party due to a mass exodus of creative young people in the wake of the city’s economic downturn, and New York continues to suffer from a continuation of the Mayor Giuliani era that has seen most of the Big Apple’s clubs closed or subject to over-zealous police attention.

The time has come, it seems, for Los Angeles to claim America’s electronic music crown.

In late 2007, Los Angeles’ media began to report on the city’s burgeoning electronic music scene.

Electronic music was back, they said, like never before.

Huge dance festivals like Electric Daisy Carnival and Nocturnal Wonderland were pulling upwards of 50,000 attendees each and were no longer confined to the dusty, poorly served San Bernardino area, now taking place right on centre stage at Los Angeles’ Exposition Park.

But where did all these electronic music fans suddenly come from?

“The scene has picked up in Los Angeles for two reasons,” explains Andrei Osyka, a DJ who is part of the Los Angeles-based techno DJ crew Droog.

“Hipster music, an umbrella sound that encapsulates electronic and rock music by artists such as MSTRKRFT, Justice and Daft Punk is absolutely huge in Los Angeles right now.

“Daft Punk played in front of 20,000 people at L.A. Sports Arena recently, and there’s a new generation of younger, perhaps 16- to 21-year old fans who are driving new energy into the scene.

“On the other side, underground techno and the European techno sound of Berlin have become popular and more viable in the city.”

Whilst electronic music megastars such as France’s Daft Punk and Justice have influenced the tastes of music fans who would otherwise be listening to rock or hip hop, electronic music’s development has been proven time and again to take a bottom-top approach.

It is the underground connection, the slow-moving fly-wheel of committed DJs, promoters, record label owners and aspiring producers that fuels the industry.

Disco got burned in ‘79

This is especially true in America, where dance music has been reviled ever since Chicago DJ Steve Dahl and baseball promoter Mike Veeck organized the ‘World’s largest anti-disco rally’ in 1979 at Comiskey Park in Chicago.

Thousands of disco records were burned, ‘disco sucks’ became the slogan for many teenagers, and through the scattered ashes of disco the future failure of electronic music was set in stone.

Even Hunter S. Thompson himself once said during a speech in 1977 at Colorado University, “I feel the same way about disco as I do about herpes.”

Warehouse Parties

In Los Angeles though, a small committed group of underground techno promoters that includes Droog, Droid and Compression have kept the fire burning.

They operate like small interconnected cogs turning the city’s electronic music fly-wheel one click at a time and it is their energy and passion that has helped elevate L.A.’s scene to the position it stands today, above the parapet of mainstream consciousness.

“There’s always been a strong warehouse scene in L.A.,” says Vidal Varges, who has been running warehouse parties in Los Angeles with his brother Vangelis under their Droid banner for six years.

“Maybe the cops don’t care or have better things to do, but there’s now about two or three big warehouse parties a week in this city.

“Some of these cater to drum & bass and rave crowds, but there are also some great disco, house, and techno parties.

“Our parties pull between 200 and 600 people each time, and I like to think we have helped to educate people about the real techno sound of Detroit and Chicago.

“Minimal techno is now huge in Los Angeles.”

Droog, Droid and Compression have also been organizing small techno parties at clubs like King King in Hollywood, The Room, and the rooftop of The Standard hotel in downtown L.A. for the last couple of years.

Avalon is pushing cutting edge music

Droog are also residents at Hollywood’s Avalon nightclub on Saturday night, and it is Avalon’s current Saturday night success that suggests quality electronic music is back in a big way.

Avalon can hold 2000 people and tonight’s headliners are not the usual ‘safe’ big name DJs.

There is no trance or progressive house, but rather bleeding-edge techno and electronica courtesy of Germany’s Ellen Allien and Modeselektor.

“We took over the bookings of Saturday nights at Avalon after its former promoters Giant left,” says Garrett Chau.

“We quickly realized that there was no point going head to head with Giant on big name DJs because whoever had the biggest DJ that night would win.

“It’s not beneficial for the scene if promoters compete on big name line-ups as it eventually becomes economically unviable.”

Like a supermarket price war, promoters often cannibalize each other if they compete by booking bigger and more famous artists, so Garrett and Avalon’s director for electronic music Craig Edwards decided to cut their own path.

“I’ve been into techno for many years, and me and Garrett decided to go down that route,” explains Craig.

“It was risky for Los Angeles, for anywhere actually.

“Two years ago when we booked Booka Shade as headliners it was a big risk because back then nobody knew who they were, or at least we thought people didn’t know who they were.

“We used to think that people in L.A. - the clubbers - were fickle and they would just go out for reasons other than the music.

“But the place was packed, and it was very refreshing to know that people were clued up about that kind of music in L.A.”

Following the success of Booka Shade, Garrett and Craig decided to stick with techno.

They installed Matthew Dear as a resident DJ, and now regularly book artists like M.A.N.D.Y., Miss Kittin and Tiefschwarz.

London’s Damian Lazarus, who runs the record label Crosstown Rebels, will also be announced soon as a resident DJ of Avalon having moved to Los Angeles last week.

Craig also believes that Avalon’s line-ups are starting to send ripples up the west coast.

The seeds of a revolution have been sowed.

“People in San Francisco or Washington look at our line-ups, and even though they have no intention of going to the club, it definitely influences their musical tastes, even other promoters.

“We took a risk which paid off, and now other promoters who were previously too scared to move away from big name trance and progressive DJs are hopefully being inspired.”

The trickle down effect

Andrei Osyka from Droog believes that the popularity of electro rock music in the mainstream, plus Los Angeles’ wildly successful rave scene, has given the city an abundance of new electronic music fans, ones that might be tempted to give Avalon a try or even some of the smaller underground events.

“There’s been a trickle down effect, particularly from the massive raves,” he says.

“There are now 21-year olds at our parties who discovered electronic music at raves, before going to the big clubs, and then they graduated, and now want to hear music that’s a bit more subtle. There is synergy between the different experiences.

“I remember a few years ago playing at underground parties where there was always a chance that no one would come,” says Andrei.

“But now, if you put on a good party people will show up. Finally there’s some traction.

“Younger kids are coming into the overall realm of dance music and we’re lucky enough to catch a few of them who are open-minded enough to discover techno.

“It’s a very exciting time to be in L.A. right now.”

British transplant Kazell, a DJ and producer who moved to Los Angeles eight years ago, agrees that things have really picked up in the city.

“There’s now a lot more support going for homegrown nights,” he says.

“The scene here used to be a lot more commercial, but now it’s much better.

“Techno has been taking over in L.A. for years, and the Droog guys are doing a great job pushing the new Berlin-style of techno and they have a really big grass roots following.

“The Droid crew too have also been doing proper original-style techno parties in warehouses for a long time.

“You can hear how they have helped to influence the sound of this city – techno has infected the culture.”

On Hollywood and Los Angeles’ purportedly fake, self-obsessed crowd Kazell says, “That’s pretty much bollocks. People are just people, no matter what city you’re in.”

Saturday 6th September 2008, 23.30

It’s 11:30pm on Saturday night, and already Avalon’s main dancefloor is heaving with bodies as the Droid brothers lay down loopy, bleepy techno rhythms.

The dark, experimental sound contrasts strongly with Avalon’s ostentatious, historic theatre demeanour.

The venue originally was known as The Palace, and used to host film premieres in the 1920s, burlesque in the 1940s, before it became the location for Jerry Lewis’ weekly television program in the 1960s.

In the back, away from the public’s eye, the original dressing rooms and make-up mirrors that used to be home to moustache twirling, cigar touting thespians can still be seen.

Avalon opened in 2002 as a DJ-focused electronic music venue, which in the fickle nightlife scene of Hollywood where new always equates to hot, is an admirable lifespan.

It’s also the only venue in Los Angeles with a 24-hour license, and that gives it the potential to host explosive parties.

In a city where alcohol stops being served at 2am, the late night distinctive pleasures that dance music offers is resoundingly clear in Avalon.

Germany’s Ellen Allien steps up to the decks and begins spinning 12-inch chunky, haunting techno records.

Huge visuals behind her, provided by VJs accompanying Modeselektor, further exemplify her artful minimalism.

Barely visible lines of colour dash across a white background, as glitching patterns swirl in time with the music.

After two hours of driving German techno, Allien plays Larry Heard ‘Sun Can’t Compare’, which is received excitedly by the swaying dancefloor.

Modeselektor, who will soon accompany Radiohead on tour in Japan, begin their live set with bass-driven dubstep and grime, before throwing down relentless synthesizer beats.

The pair use filters and live vocoded-vocals to entertaining effect, demonstrating why Modeselektor have become one of the best live acts in dance music [check them out in the player below].

At one point, the bald one from Modeselektor sprays the crowd with champagne and a bouncer, mistaking him for a drunken fool from the crowd, tries to eject him from the stage.

It’s pure entertainment for Avalon’s clubbers, and quite like any standard DJ set.

After Modeselektor finish, the Droog trio of Andrei Osyka, a Ukrainian-born former investment banker; Bostonian Justin Sloe, a database engineer; and attorney Brett Griffin, step up to decks.

They make for the unlikeliest of techno companions, but their vastly different backgrounds represents the cosmopolitan nature of Los Angeles’ social fabric.

Droog’s first track is the Mole remix of Dapayk & Padberg ‘Pantomime Horse’, and the large breakdown gets the crowd locked into a techno groove.

Mixing flawlessly, the trio continue with a barrage of tightly interwoven minimal techno and tech house.

Unlike some DJ partnerships, the Droog collective work as one powerful unit, taking the mood individually in different directions whilst at the same time always retaining a unique tech-funk sound.

They play one record each at a time, but it never turns into a sorry case of one-upmanship, as too often back-to-back DJ sets do.

Before long the night loses time. The boys finish at around 6:30am.

Incidentally, Avalon can legally start serving alcohol again at 6am, but with a Droog rooftop party set to take place at The Standard hotel in Downtown L.A. in just a few hours, the boys are happy to call it a night.

No tomorrow, only today

About six hours later, Matt Zamias, a filmmaker who moonlights as Droog’s agent for fun, is standing in the ultra-chic lobby of The Standard with no shoes on his feet.

Unlike the rest of the party crew, Matt didn’t get any sleep as he had to pick up Polish techno DJ Magda from the airport at about 9am.

“You cool, all right, let me know if you need a drink or anything,” he says, grinning through his big black bushy beard, talking like there’s no tomorrow.

In the case of Matt, there is no tomorrow, as it’s still today, and Droog’s afternoon party at The Standard is more of an afterparty then a standalone event.

It’s a continuation of last night, and the majority of the people lounging around the stunning rooftop and pool sucking on mojitos are prime examples of what could be called ‘minimal trendy’.

Like rock & roll’s Pete Doherty, the Berlin minimal techno sound too has its own peculiar style of discerning aficionados.

Dark sunglasses, wide flowing dresses, razor sharp heels and bizarre accessories from far away worlds and a different era accentuate emaciated bodies that could only have been created out of diet of organic food, techno rhythms and sleep-deprived hedonism.

Cigarettes and cocktails in hand, the crowd feels more European than anything else, and defies the notion that Americans have no fashion sense.

As the afternoon sun circulates the breathtaking skyline of downtown Los Angeles, different shadows are cast over the rooftop patio bringing a welcomed cooler air.

The Droog trio plus Lee Foss, an Ian Brown-looking producer and DJ who is currently working with London’s Jamie Jones, spin succulent deep house and minimal to a small dancefloor as feet and fingers tap on lounging couches across the roof.

At around 5:30pm, the dancefloor is sufficiently heaving as Minus’ Magda begins her set on Traktor.

Weaving her signature techno sound that pays homage to Detroit and Berlin in equal measure, it isn’t long before the crowd is whistling and responding excitedly to Magda’s music.

Digital cameras populate the air above the crowd as bodies move to the minimal rhythms.

Droog’s Matt can be seen hugging partygoers and buying drinks like a true host.

Later, surrounded by a group of beautifully wasted girls, Andrei Osyka explains Droog’s grass roots approach to promoting.

“We rely on personal promotion a lot,” he says.

“Before a party we make a lot of phone calls, send a lot of text messages, and contact our friends through Myspace personally.

“We want to make people feel like they’re coming to a cool house party with great music, rather than a faceless event. And who doesn’t want to come to a cool house party?”

This house party however ends at 8pm, at least for the majority of crowd.

It is Sunday night after all, and blasting techno music from the rooftops might not go down too well with The Standard’s neighbours.

But like all good promoters, Droog have a rescue plan for its closest friends, and the party continues downstairs in the rabbit-warren of hotel rooms.

Techno music is not so much about the party, as it is about the after party, where you get the chance to socialize in intimate, private surroundings with like-minded individuals.

This particular hotel room at The Standard sees Magda, the Droog DJs, Lee Foss, Jonni Darko (a famous L.A. porn director) and a few friends hanging out till the early morning.

In the car on the way to LAX airport the next day, Andrei sums up the current mood of L.A.’s electronic music scene.

“A lot of the people that come to our parties are like us, from all over the world, and so many times in the last year I’ve heard people say: “Oh wow, I didn’t realize there are parties like this in L.A.  I come from NYC or Miami, or London, but this is just as cool as we have back home.

“There’s a sense that anything can happen.”

And that is, in essence, is what Los Angeles and its Hollywood is all about.

Beyond the celebrities and dream-chasing delusion, at the heart of this town, is that old defining spirit of America - the American dream - the optimism that moves people here from all over the world.

Nathanael West may have written in 1939, “You should’ve never trusted Hollywood, you should’ve never gone to Hollywood,” but for this group of techno patriots, their hopes of creating a thriving electronic music scene have succeeded.

Download Droog mix

Droog warmed up for Booka Shade on July 26th at Avalon, Hollywood.

Click here to download a recording of their set from that night.

[Photo credits: Christopher Soltis].

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