Dispatches From Miami Music Week: Part 1

Imagine all of the best parties you’ve ever been to. Now imagine all of those parties happening on the same day, and on the beach, and with a legion of the most stupidly attractive people you’ve ever seen up close, plus all of your favorite DJs. And imagine that those parties don’t end. They keep going from afternoon to evening to late night to that surreal moment when the sun rises gold and pink over the warm water of the Atlantic. And then the soirees start all over again.

Welcome to Miami Music Week. It’s hedonism, yes, and it’s also work for the thousands of dance music industry professionals who descend upon South Beach for a week of revelry, meetings, beats, beach vibes and schmoozing.

We got in on a red eye from L.A. on Wednesday morning and have been celebrating like it’s our job (it is our job) ever since. It is now Friday evening and we are tired, moderately dehydrated, and nourishing ourselves with Red Bull and Emergen-C. Did I mention we are having so much damn fun?

Here are the haps thus far. Come back daily (and follow us on Twitter) for additional recaps of all the Miami revelry.

WEDNESDAY

11:15 pm: The evening begins with a late dinner at the Drunken Dragon, a trendy as phở restaurant that you would never know was there if you didn’t know it was there, because it is located in a nondescript strip mall and doesn’t have a sign. Inside, the lighting scheme is sexy and the place is packed with industry types. (Industry types are easy to pick out because they exclusively wear all black.) We order a bunch of food, including the best Bánh mì I’ve ever eaten. It’s a strong start.

12:45 am: Across the Bay in a dark warehouse type building, Tchami is playing a set that the crowd seems to very much be feeling. I, however, am in a smaller upstairs room because upstairs there is a dessert table with pie and cookies and other assorted snacky snacks. In here, Posso plays while I eat a cupcake.

2:45 am: We jump in the first of many Uber rides and head back over the bridge to an establishment that has been renamed the Beatgasm Hotel for week. I am personally not a fan of this name, but inside the music is a lot of trap and bass, so that’s good. Flux Pavilion hangs backstage, and everyone in the crowd does trap arms, obviously.

4:00am: Another Uber takes us back across the bridge to Space, where Loco Dice and Marco Carola are playing until some ambitious hour of the morning. Most of our posse head inside the megaclub, while the rest of us call it quits for the night, hop in another Uber (what a damn fine technology) and roll back to our Airbnb, which is a full-on bachelor pad but a totally acceptable place to rest your head when it is 5:30 in the morning and you haven’t slept for 40 hours. Goodnight Miami.

THURSDAY

1:15 pm: I have a long and pleasant lunch with Jeremy Olander and his manager at the lovely art deco Raleigh Hotel. We chat about progressive house (you’ll be able to read the interview a few weeks so get excited) while the guys eat fish tacos, I eat French fries, and Nicole Moudaber’s MOODday party kicks off at the pool located on the patio behind us.

2:58 pm: Walking down the famed Collins Street, the main drag of South Beach, there are loads of massively glamorous tourists and more than one Lamborghini. Basically this place is just like Will Smith’s music video for “Miami.”

Erik Voake / Red Bull Content Pool

3:15 pm: The Red Bull Guest House is hosting Guy Gerbers’ Rumors party, and the crowd that has turned up to check it out is composed of some serious eye candy. A spirited man in a white suit and a woman wearing a red wig are handing out popsicles from an ice cream cart, and when I ask for one, they say I’ve gotta twerk for it. When I do, they say that they’ll give me the popsicle if I stop twerking immediately. My twerking skills are indeed subpar but I am now eating a delicious ginger popsicle so I still win in the end.

3:47 pm: For real there are so many beautiful women in this crowd that the friend I’m with leaves to go call his girlfriend because he feels guilty for just being amongst them.

Erik Voake / Red Bull Content Pool

4:01 pm: Incredible news: P Diddy is here. He rolls in through the backdoor, is wearing a black t-shirt that says “1992” and for a moment dances in front of us in a style many of you might remember from the “Mo Money Mo Problems” video, which in fact was released in 1997. Meanwhile, a friend shows me the swag bag that people staying in the guest house get, and it includes customized Air Jordans and a cool flat brimmed hat and other luxury items. Legit.

4:13 pm: We direct our gaze up the side of the hotel and see Steve Aoki standing alone on his balcony, gazing down at the party and presumably wishing he was part of the deep house scene.

Erik Voake / Red Bull Content Pool

5:48 pm: We walk down the beach towards the ultra chic W Hotel. Red Light Management is holding an industry mixer where us industry types can imbibe free cocktails and talk amongst ourselves. It’s like an electronic music high school reunion up in here.

11:55 pm: Disco nap + shower + new outfit + dinner and we’re ready for the nighttime, which begins at Treehouse, where French DJ Technasia is legit killing it while Cajmere and Josh Wink and a few other guys stand behind him smiling, dancing and intermittently hugging each other.

1:15 am: In the other room at Treehouse, (which is in fact, decorated like a Treehouse) Route 94 is playing a gospel-infused house set. It’s wonderful, and by wonderful I mean there are several women dancing on tables while the rest of us get down until we’re sweaty. Cajmere poses for photos with fans as he moves through the crowd while wearing a cowboy hat and sunglasses.

2:50 am: Nervo and Yellow Claw and Carnage are playing across the Bay at a club called E11even, which is a notable venue because it is both a nightclub and a strip club, and also open 24 hours. If you have never seen 100 industry type men trying to get into a strip club in Miami at 3am during WMC, let me assure you it’s a special sort of scene. Many names were dropped, most unsuccessfully.

3:15 am: Inside the club, the dancers are dancing and Nervo is playing and the whole scene is so fundamentally hectic and primal that it’s easy to forget about the complicated social hierarchy being demonstrated outside by everyone trying to get past the velvet ropes. Also: so much champagne!

4:45 am: After spending a solid chunk of time amongst the clubbers and the strippers and the DJs, we get into a green Mini Cooper Uber being driven a by a guy named Henry who plays super classy jazz as we jet back across the Bay. As it turns out, this is his first ever Uber trip, so we forgive him when he misses a turn amongst some construction and we have to drive back across the bridge and then back once more. By the time we get back to our rented bachelor pad, the sun is rising, the birds are chirping, and it is officially time for bed.