Holiday Madness Featuring Showtek!

Some of the biggest parties every year are the ones that have the right promotion, the right DJ's, the right people, and the right venue. Caffeine Promotions did all of the above and beyond with Holiday Madness featuring Showtek as the headliner.

Showtek by: Reptar

Lets start this off with promotion. With a name like Showtek, everyone is going to be going crazy to come and come them out. This event had the most intense amount of promotion I had ever come across. Everywhere you looked on facebook, the Caffeine promoters were doing there thing letting people know about the show. Even other promoters got in on the action with promoting and hosting, like Kyle Kingzly, showing that the PLUR doesn't just exists within one group, but the community as a whole. And the hype didn't stop with that. Everybody who is anybody in the scene was talking about it. Either for a DJ they were going to support, or just the fact that they wanted to see this spacious beautiful venue fill up, which it did. On top of that, you had everyone chipping in to make it a success, like Kevin Carpet working the door making sure that all the DJ's, photographers, VIP's and pre-order ticket holders got in quickly without keeping everyone waiting outside for too long, and we are talking a long line down the block. It's always a positive to see things run smoothly.

We're Getting Wild Tonight! By: Reptar

Wish You Were Here By: Taylor Flash

Having a Great Time! By: Reptar

The Amazura Lounge. From the outside it looks nothing more than just a regular building. But the second you take a peek inside from the front door, you immediately take notice to how huge this place is. It looks like a basketball court, or an ice hockey ring converted into a concert venue! The main floor is massive, boasting two full length bars on either side of the dance floor, and enormous stage that could fit an entire orchestra on it, and a sound system that would leave your body bumping to bass for three days after the party. That's just the downstairs.

Upstairs there was another room, and it was like walking into a jungle. There were faux trees and animals all over, a green tint laid over the room, and it was a much more intimate setting with the closer quarters. There was a bar up here too, as well as a raised dance floor, ideal for bands, but since it was raised you need to watch your step!

Hulk By: Ronnie C.

Just A Touch Louder Please! By: Ronnie C.

The music was rocking all night long. The bass was just insane and had everyone dancing to the beats. For me, I like a little treble to actually hear the music and all the sounds. It didn't stop me and anyone from going wild. For the first time ever I shuffled on the dance floor, I did not think it was possible, but that's just what the music did to you. There were so many amazing DJs at this event. From Hocus Pocus, Hulk, Droid, Johnny J (I gave my first show to his set, and he's also featured as this week's mix I'm listening to!), to legends like Frankie Bones, S-Factor, X-Dream, Ritalin, John Bas, and of course Showtek, the lineup shined all night.

Put Your Fucking Hands Up! By: Ronnie C.

The Bass Makes Me Move By: Taylor Flash

It Just Got Real By: Taylor Flash

God Mode? By: Ronnie C.

Yes God Mode! By: Taylor Flash

Showtek is very crowd interactive. It's amazing watching them get the entire room jumping at the same time, they are the ultimate hype machines constantly keeping the people going. If you've never seen this duo live before, I suggest making sure to put that on your to-do list.

Raiden! By: Ronnie C.

Lets All Glow Together By: Reptar

Now the Amazura holds upwards of 4,000 people, and it was pretty packed. You still had the cuddle circles lining the outsides of the dance floor, some people were even ballsy enough to hang out right in front of the speakers too. You had face painting by Pixel, as well as a vendor selling glow toys and such. There were a lot of people dressed up in costumes, but one that really stood out of the crowd was a dude who dressed in a complete Raiden costume. People were loving him and his ice blue contacts! It was a wonderful vibe in the room, everyone was having a blast.

Eddie Skilling By: Taylor Flash

Glow B Andit By: Ronnie C.

Going HAM By: Taylor Flash

Star Dust Will Melt You By: Ronnie C.

And due to the volume of people, it was only appropriate that there were enough people throwing lights to accommodate all those eager eyes. There were probably about 20-25 glovers on the scene this night. The gloving community is like a niche community within the rave community. They will all talk to each other, to find out where everyone will be. That way they can trade shows, do doubles, and crazy things like a glovers circle! I was so happy to see many familiar faces, and to meet all the new ones as well, these people had mad skills! Not to mention, all of Team [OWL] (obsessed with lights GO LIKE!) showed up, as well as some members of [MD] (mind destroyers), and the Sprout Family. It's just wonderful having everyone doing their thing while showing each other what PLUR is all about!

Glovers Unite! By: Reptar

Does This Even Need a Caption?! By: Taylor Flash

Epicsauce By: Ronnie C.

Smurf Throwing Beautiful Lights By: Taylor Flash

PHOTOS:

The Pros:
Reptar Photography: Set 1//Set 2
Ronnie C. Photography: Set 1//Set 2
Taylor Flash: Set 1//Set 2
Sam Freund: Set 1//Set 2
Fresh Mix: Set
Delineation Digital Media : Set

And that about wraps it up for 2011. This was easily the biggest party of the year, and was a great foot for Caffeine to stand on going into 2012!

USA Beatboxing Champion: JFlo

For those of you watching the genre mix, you've probably came across JFlo at some point, after all he was dubbed the #1 beatboxing champion in the US for 2011. Not only does he beatbox, but he also get behind the mixing board to spin his own tracks, featuring loops of himself beatboxing and some instrument tracks. His stuff is pretty catchy, check it out!

Mini mix, live sampling-nothing prerecorded by jfizzelsound

All his mixing, like any other dj, is mixed in real time, with him adding his on beatboxing on top of the loops. To me, that means he's using a ton of brain power to keep on top of everything that's going on, it's pretty intense.

I actually had the chance to meet JFlo back at Power Ravers, and he gave me a personal show of his skills, and I apologize for video quality, I only had my phone to record, at least it was earlier on in the party not too many people were outside. Enjoy!!


And that's all for today kiddies. Don't forget to click the links and like the pages, listen to the mixes and keep it 100.

X-Mas Glow, A NYCR Banger!

There's nothing more magical than Christmas. All the pretty lights on everyone's houses, presents waiting for you under the family Christmas tree, honey glazed ham, or maybe some goose...but nothing, NOTHING beats that wonderful glow of after Christmas. New York City Ravers (NYCR) and Original Brooklyn brought that feeling last night at the Morgan.

Getting Crazy BY: Ronnie C. Photography

Glowing After X-Mas BY: Taylor Flash

X-Man Glow! One word to describe this rave is epic. Or maybe, unforgettable. There were just so many factors that were brought into play that made this event one of the best I've had the pleasure of going to
yet.


One, the music. Oh my god the music was all so amazing! All the DJ's there killed it. I need to give it up to DJ X-Dream for providing me with the mix of my life. Check out his sounds, and here you go, I'll even make it easy for ya.

Hard Bass Massive - Mixed By X-Dream by DJ X-Dream

DJ X-Dream BY: Ronnie C. Photography

 
Two, the promoters. If there's anything I've noticed about NYCR, is that they go hard with everything they do. One can appreciate the time and effort they put into the parties, and half of that is promotion. If you're an NYCR promoter, you probably have messaged and posted on everyone's wall on FB there's a huge event going down. This party was originally supposed to be on a boat, the Nautical Empress, but due to issues out of their hands, they had to move it to the Morgan, and within a week of the party. That brings me to...

Tiffany Reptar! By: Taylor Flash

Rock Out! By: Ronnie C. Photography

Sweet Glowsticks By: Taylor Flash

Three, the people. This was truly an event that was made successful by the greater community.  Even at the very beginning of the party, there must have been 100 people in the house, incredible! Everyone was fantastic, I didn't get any negative vibes! There were people from Jersey, Cali, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, way upstate...  It was pure bliss being able to talk to anyone, enjoy dancing, jumping, and of course gloving.

Lefty is Nasty with it! By: Taylor Flash

The Most Epic Light Show I Gave By: Ronnie C. Photography

Reptar Manipulating Diodes By: Ronnie C. Photography

YoYo gogo Gloving By: Ronnie C. Photography

He Takes Photos and Spins Glow Sticks! By: Ronnie C. Photography

BaBAM By: Taylor Flash

 

Let me tell you, the New York gloving scene is blowing up! A good 15-17 glovers came out to this party. It was an amazing opportunity to learn from other styles, do doubles, triples, and even a quadruple! But it all comes down to one thing; good people, similar interests, and the greater feeling of community and love.



PHOTOS:

The Pros:
Ronnie C. Photography: SET
Taylor Flash: SET
Reptar Photography: SET 1//SET 2
Sam Freund: SET
Pacman Photography: COMING SOON
Bluecrash: COMING SOON

Others:
D3bst3p - PHOTOS

Big shout-outs to Morgan Freeman on the visuals, all the photographers (it's awesome seeing all of you there), Kevin Carpet (all rolled up!), NYCR and Original Brooklyn. Thank you for taking this party and making it saweet! The next need-to-go-to event is going to be Holiday Madness this Friday, headlining Showtek!

The DJ's That Stole Christmas

Kingzly. Nuff Said BY: Morgan Freeman (Blue Crash)

With Christmas here, parties were rocking out all weekend. I was planning originally on staying in and enjoying the comfort of my bed and some Skyrim, but the call came in saying I needed to come check out this event that was going to be split between club scene and rave scene. I thought I had experienced this before with Revival, but I was in for a sick surprise...

Go DJ! BY: Ronnie C. Photography

Divine GoGo! BY: Divine GoGo (Paus3)

The DJ's That Stole Christmas taking place in the infamous Electric Warehouse. This event was put together by CJ Milan & Kingzly's Parties, and they did a great job with it! You had the two floors open for people to rock out, along with the outside smoking section. Before I drove over there, I was checking out the event listing on Facebook, and it said that you should "prepare yourself for a new rave experience." Naturally I felt that I've experienced raves and how is this going to be different from others. After all, Revival was a mix of some club stuff, but mostly variations of harder styles.

DJ Dirty Dan Pumping up the room BY: Morgan Freeman (Blue Crash)

This rave was an even mix between club music (trance, house, with hip-hop and other top 40 stuff), and more techno stuff (harder trance, dubstep, hardstyle, moombah). The main floor was the more rave music, and upstairs was the club scene. The DJ's were mixing it up and both rooms had people hanging out.


Being Christmas Eve, it was surprising that so many came out to dance and have a good time. At the peak there must have been about 300 people having a blast. It was so nice to see the scene's mix, it's easy to tell with fashion who is a regular patron to these scenes, but when all together, everyone was experiencing the PLUR, it was a beautiful thing. The light shows were popping, with projectors on the walls, lasers, and even a foam machine!

Dancing in the Foam BY: Ronnie C. Photography

My night was interesting from the start. I helped out with setup a bit, and then I had the Divine GoGo camera taking pictures of the night. Somewhere around 11pm I ran into Tiffany Reptar, and she took some shots of myself and KinkiKitty giving shows. We were talking a bunch, and she really wanted to glove, so we made a trade; My gloves for her camera. This is where things got really interesting.

Yours Truly Giving Reptar a Show BY: Ronnie C. Photography

For the first time ever, I got to experience what it's like being an event photographer. Taking pictures of the energy, people having a good time, light shows!! It was sick, and Reptar was killing it with her shows! She is an extremely talented person, and just like many of the glovers I look up to, she interprets gloving into her own style. Props to you Reptar, and welcome to Team [OWL]!

DJ X-Dream Spinning BY: Ronnie C. Photography

Another couple awesome encounters I had were with Morgan Freeman and DJ X-Dream. Both of them were awesome. Morgan was controlling almost all the visuals and X-Dream was headlining in the main room. They both did an amazing job, EVERYONE was on the floor for X-Dream going wild and Morgan has some trippy-cool visuals. Check out their sites and make sure to catch them doing their thing at another event. I suggest HOLIDAY MADNESS and GREENHILL ZONE.



PHOTOS:

The Pros:
Reptar Photography: PHOTOS
Ronnie C. Photography: PHOTOS
Epic Image WRM: PHOTOS
Taylor Seven-Divine Flash: PHOTOS
Morgan Freeman: PHOTOS

The Others:
Divine GoGo: PHOTOS

Look forward to some awesome interviews coming up!! And don't forget to check out the new mix I'm listening to!

Sensation is Coming to America 2012!!

One of the most popular Electronic Dance events overseas is officially (and finally) making it's way to America 2012... Get ready for Sensation!

Brought to you by ID&T, This party was started in Amsterdam back in 2000. It was heavily promoted, but at the time, just as any new event (or business, or technology, or anything) did not sell out. Not to say it was small pickings, over 20,000 people did come to Sensation, and then in 2001 all 45,000 tickets sold out in advance pretty quickly and in some cases, a matter of hours.

You may take notice that in the video everyone is wearing white. This is actually a mandatory dress code for Sensation. Sensation is the official name for the party, but people sometimes tack on 'white' to differentiate this event from it's sister event, Black, where everyone is required to dress in black.

The atmosphere at this event looks unbelievable. From the sets, to the lights, pyrotechnics, live dancers and their costumes...it looks almost overwhellming. It kind of reminds me of Cirque Du Soleil, but even more interactive. As mentioned before, this will be the 12 year of this event running, they know how to throw this together by now, and every year will probably be great and more massive than the last.

Sensation UK 2011 BY Sensation

Take a moment here to understand what has been happening in this movement. Electronic Dance Music. Some people think it's just techno as a whole, big misconception. Those who listen and love the music know that is not the case at all. EDM is compiled of many different styles, and Sensation focuses on house music (started with trance as well, but now it's all house). Black is all about hard-style and hardcore. The genres are so huge with their followings and such different styles that there is pretty much no way to combine the two in a one day event, there would be rioting!

Insane Jelly Fish Lady Sensation Poland 2008 BY: Sensation

 Black is not as popular as White, although both events do sell out. Not that it's not popular, it's just as big as Sensation, but it takes a few days if not the day of Black for it to sell out. I would be interested to see how quickly Black would sell out in America... only time will tell eh?

Sensation has been around the world, and it's about time that it comes here, it's going to be huge. There have been no announcements for when, where, or who...but in the end we all want to be there.

Check out official PHOTOS from past events around the world.

Bringing You Back to Life: The Revival!

This past weekend I had the chance to check out The Morgan Room for an event that would make anyone get up and dance. It was The Revival, brought to you by Star Party Promotion.

Red Balloon Girls BY: Teddy Bayer

The Morgan was a medium sized spot, with two rooms open and an outside. As I understand it there's also a basement, but for this party there were only two rooms. The first room was a little smaller than the main stage, but a decent amount of room to jump around. The main room was really big, with a ton of lights, lasers and fog... Not to mention a ton of people!

There were a lot of different people at this one. I met people from Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and even Vermont! It's cool to see people coming from all over to party with us in NY, it comes to show show far word gets spread for these events, and the lineup was sick.

Noomi Ra Killing It BY: Ronnie C. Photography

There was a nice mix of sounds and a cool mix of people as well. It was an entirely different feel from other raves I've attended. "There's really good music and a good clash of scenes," one party goer and gogo dancer Jaciee was telling me, "You have two vibes combining into one. There's the club and underground mixing together to make a new underground vibe. A New York party with New York vibes, but a different scene... It's more upbeat with no negativity or hate."

Light Show Battle! BY: Reptar Photography

Getting Into It BY: Ronnie C. Photography

Poi Anyone? BY: Reptar Photography

Yours Truly BY: Teddy Bayer

And she was right. There were so many different tracks being spun, between dub, trance, hardstyle, hardcore and mixes with top 40 and rap, it was awesome. The glovers were out again, but not as many as I've seen in previous parties. I was super lucky for this one, because the infamous Story Time and his cousin Vex were on the scene and giving the most killer doubles ever. Story Time was telling me they never practice and choreograph their moves, it's all a freestyle flow. And along with them were some awesome light shows. I gave one show that earned me the coolest kandy I have received to date!

Skulls and Bones!!

I also had the chance to chill and talk to DJ Georgie Vodkaa, a hardstyle fanatic who went toe to toe with DJ Jake Dukes. Their set was bomb, it made me into a lover of hardstyle, which I genuinely disliked beforehand due to the repetitive beats. While talking to Georgie, he insisted on making a mix exclusively for the site, and as of last night it went live. Check it out, and follow him on Soundcloud, he has mad skills and clearly has a feel for the music. It is also featured up top for the mix I'm listening to!

Georgi Vadkaa and Jake Dukes Lighting Up the Party BY: Ronnie C. Photography

Cant Wear Me Out (ElectricGhostPunk Exclusive) by DJGVODKA
The one thing about this party that got in the way for some people was the fog machine. When it was blasting you couldn't see anything, which may not be a bad thing for this type of event, but on the flip side, it bothered some people with breathing. After all, you're in a room full of moving bodies and it's hot already. The last thing you want is to be "gassed" with fog. Of course there was the outside to go and get some fresh air, but this is the middle of December in NYC, it's frigid out there. Other than that I heard and experienced nothing negative for the event.

Big ups to Star Party Promotion on throwing a sick party, make sure you are at their next one, The Funeral! You've been Reborn, and then Revived, now get ready for your Funeral!!

PICTURES:
Pros:
Reptar Photography: PHOTOS
Ronnie C. Photography: PHOTOS
Red Balloon gogo: PHOTOS
Epic Image Wrm: coming soon
Others:
PICS1