Is It Pronounced "Re-Ducks" or "Re-do"?

When I got the call from my best friend telling me she was able to snag us two tickets to Kaskade’s Redux tour stop in Vancouver, I was overcome with emotion. This is a guy I have been following since I was 16 and didn’t even really understand what house music was yet. All I knew back then was I loved the music my older sister would bring home once in a while, and 90% of that was Kaskade.

The way I see his music is a monumental movement for dance music around the world, and something I respect so much about this human is his authenticity. There is no part of his brand or image that you could say came from an outside influence. This is a man who built his career from doing what he loves and sticking to what it is he loves without adapting to the newest dance trend. Something amazing that he has been able to do is create festival sets that incorporate both his signature low key tracks over top of big room popular drops. This is a way of making everyone happy which is essential for such large crowds.

This is where Redux comes in. Yes Kaskade plays the largest and most popular festivals around the world for crowds in the hundreds of thousands, and he kills it every time. But Redux is something smaller scale, something closer to the heart and personal. It’s a symbol of where he came from as an artist and where he plans to go next. It’s a way of honing in on who he is as a person and not get lost in the madness of festival life. Redux is a chance to show this generation that the roots of house music are still here and still very present. Everything in this industry has fed off another source and created this growing and evolving culture that has left us with crowds of thousands all chanting the words to every major summer hit being played over and over by DJ after DJ. Does this culture still represent house music? Or has EDM as a subgenre completely taken over.

The night had arrived and we were glowing with excitement as we made our way down to the teeny intimate venue he was gracing us by playing at. The club holds 200-250 people MAX. This was a tiny space. We got inside and looked around, people from all walks of life were there which made me smile inside. This was the type of crowd I loved. Every single person is there because they LOVE Kaskade. The club and the event company did not promote this visit AT ALL. And let me say the main dance music event company in Vancouver does an aggressive job with advertising usually. (Including bombarding HIGH SCHOOLS with info on their “all ages events” aka 14 year olds half naked and high on who knows what hanging off dudes old enough to be their dads…but that’s a story for another post) So zero promotion in the city for this show, which lead us to believe it was going to be a chill night with only real fans and a bunch of PLUR splattered around the room. This view was quickly skewed into the proper direction of completely NOT what I thought it was.

As soon as we arrived he was already playing, and the crowd was tight. Now I know I explained this crowd was tiny, but when you have max capacity of humans in tight quarters, it’s worse than being in a huge venue with thousands because at least at those shows you have room to breathe. My friend and I decided to try get within 25 feet of the front to be able to see him and take a quick video. Haha…

As soon as I asked a girl if I could squish past her, she proceeded to smack my beer bottle up into my face, which then poked my eye, and caused me the most pain I’ve ever felt. Now looking like I’ve been crying for 10 hours, we tried again. There were about 6 extra large dudes blocking the way with cement feet. And the worst part is they weren’t even dancing, swaying or even moving. Just standing there like giant statues and the chances of us sneaking through were absolutely impossible. My 90 pound friend happened to knock into one of the 300 pound giants accidentally who then proceeded to almost get into a FIGHT with her…I'm sorry what?

I’m not here to complain, the set was incredible. Absolute euphoric feelings were running through my veins listening to my favourite songs being played in such an intimate venue by one of the DJs I call king. What I’m trying to express here is the scale of these events are not completely doable any more. When you have a following the size of Kaskade’s fans, it’s hard to differentiate between the “real” fans and the people who call themselves fans. But why would we do that in the first place? If your music has touched people old and young, from 10 years ago or from yesterday, why wouldn’t you want to share your roots and where you came from with all of them?

This is where I know I’m a complete hypocrite. I continuously complain about the demographic of people at events and accuse others of having less musical knowledge than I causing them to be “less of a fan.” I’m stupid. There is always going to be someone who knows something you don’t in this industry, it’s just hard for people to accept and that’s because everyone in this culture is so PASSIONATE about every aspect of it. They all want to feel like it belongs to them and by doing that we are segregating each other into these smaller genres that create distance between us. This is a stem off an article posted by Your EDM two days ago showcasing where PLUR has gone. This industry has become so huge it’s impossible NOT to have people who butt heads on different opinions and genres.

Bringing it back to Redux, my point is there are so many fans that didn’t get to experience the emotional and intimate feel of what Redux really is. Which is a huge component of house music and where it came from. If we want to bring everything back to the roots of EDM and educate people on where their new favourite song really came from, maybe more artists should start considering the route Kaskade is going. That being said, I think Kaskade could have filled a much larger venue allowing more people come and witness real house music and the vibe it’s supposed to feel like without sacrificing his deep sounds. It’s almost a little bit selfish of Ryan to play these tiny clubs because of course he’s going to love it from the booth, looking out to a tiny group of chilled out Redux lovers, but from the crowd perspective and educating people on house, I feel larger venues with the same style could have been beneficial. That way perhaps I wouldn’t have gotten a beer bottle to the eye.

Love,

Tabitha

#kaskade #redux #vancouver #edm #culture