Dance
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A packed crowd writhes along to the buzzing beats thundering from the speakers. It’s a warm Wednesday night in November, and onstage at Brooklyn’s Baby’s All Right, 23-year-old Houston-based producer Odetari is performing one of his first shows. The 300 or so people assembled range from the middle-aged to young adults to actual children — several of whom are perched on their parents’ shoulders and shouting the lyrics to songs like “I LOVE U HOE,” “GOOD LOYAL THOTS” and Odetari’s latest, “GMFU,” an acronym for “got me f–ked up.”
This lattermost track is a collaboration with 6arely Human, a 22-year-old electronic artist from Fort Worth, Texas, whose own shows are similarly hectic and whose audience is similarly age-agnostic. Since its July release, “GMFU” — a dark, thumping anthem about “going dumb” from partying — has accumulated 91.9 million on-demand official U.S. streams, according to Luminate. (Their second collaboration, “Level Up,” arrived Jan. 8.) Odetari’s catalog has racked up 475.4 million on-demand official U.S. streams — a number that swells to 612.6 million when including data from user-generated content on platforms like TikTok — and he has clocked 11 entries on Billboard’s Hot Dance/Electronic Songs chart in 2023. 6arely Human’s catalog has 67 million official on-demand streams, ballooning to 96.5 million with UGC.
On a recent Friday afternoon in Los Angeles, Odetari and 6arely Human make an eye-catching pair: the former in bulky streetwear, his new grills twinkling when he flashes a wide, easy smile; the latter sporting a pink corset, black platform boots, an enviable black velvet duster and perfectly applied black lipstick adding up to a look that evokes both the rave world and of his two biggest inspirations, Kesha and Lady Gaga.
Until this past August, 6arely Human was managing a Panera Bread, slinging bagels by day and spending his nights making music, clothing and TikToks. And until earlier this year, Odetari was a substitute teacher, a gig he says he did purely “for the paycheck.” Now, both electronic producers are TikTok stars, but they’re making significant IRL inroads as well. In 2023, both signed with Artist Partner Group, and they’ll take their high-powered — if not yet totally polished — shows on the road in 2024.
“Our role is to challenge, inspire, support and remove friction points on the path to success,” says APG founder and CEO Mike Caren, who notes that consistency is key to turning internet stardom into more tangible success. “They have the talent, uniqueness, work ethic and originality to achieve huge goals.”
This digital cover story is part of Billboard’s Genre Now package, highlighting the artists pushing their musical genres forward — and even creating their own new ones.
Despite the lyrical content of their music (“Don’t cheat me/Believe me/I am a f–king c–t,” 6arely Human announces on “GMFU”), there’s a sense of purity about both acts. They represent a nascent style of extremely online dance music, defined by woozy productions that speed up, slow down and generally capture the sound of the global online dance community from which they hail, the DIY vibe of the early rave era and the ultra-modern world of TikTok stardom. APG senior director of A&R Andre Herd, who signed 6arely Human, says that the producer “stood out from the crowd of internet artists because he had been building an in-person fan base through underground raves and parties.”
The electronic scene has always been cobbled together from many niche genres and sounds. Together, Odetari and 6arely Human are continuing that tradition while pushing it further — making music forged online that’s now transcending the internet, translating to very real popularity.
6arelyhuman photographed on December 1, 2023 in Los Angeles.
Michael Buckner
Tell me about the first time one of your songs went viral.
Odetari: I always kind of knew that going viral on TikTok, especially with music, is usually a one-time thing if you don’t do it right. The first song [of mine that] went viral [2023’s “Narcissistic Personality Disorder”] hit 256,000 streams in a day, which was crazy to me, because I had never passed 10,000 on a song. I saw how fast it went up and got really excited, but I tried to tell myself, “Don’t get too excited, because you don’t know if this could drop.” Then the next day it dropped by half. So, I was like, “What do I do next? I have to keep this momentum going.” It was like a roller coaster.
What was your strategy when you saw the numbers go down by half?
Odetari: Just rapid-fire dropping [of new music]. Whatever worked for that first thing, you’ve got to keep doing that again and again [while expanding your catalog]. The song that went viral was mostly beats, so the next songs were filled with actual structure and lyrics, so there was steady replay value. That’s what I just kept doing.
6arely Human: I relate to him. My first viral song was also doing this up and down thing. But it started to really go [up] when I would see a bunch of videos from people that were creating things and making edits with their own ideas with the song. I remember specifically that one of the things that helped a lot was a [fan-made] South Park edit [that played the song “Hands up!” over images from the show]. [Virality] is a lot about what people do with the song once it comes out.
Odetari: Also, a lot of people making music similar to ours were not showing their faces. We definitely made sure to also attach [our] image to [the music], because a lot of songs that blow up on TikTok, people will scroll and hear the song, but they don’t really care about it or the person who made it. I feel like we really nailed it on that, [by each of us] attaching [our] images and connecting with the fans.
You’re both from Texas. How much of what you make is a product of where you’re from versus from being on the internet?
6arely Human: A lot of my inspiration is definitely from the internet, but I feel like there’s something about where you’re from that you put into your music, and it just adds the salt and pepper element. There is that little Texas spice.
What specifically makes it Texas?
6arely Human: The way I say things on a song, and the words I use. I don’t know if everyone’s going to be saying “y’all” on an electronic song, but it sounds cool.
Odetari: I definitely have influence from Houston, especially with the slow, chopped-and-screwed stuff. A lot of my music slows down toward the end. When I was growing up, I looked up to Travis Scott. Me and his sister went to the same school, and we were pretty close friends. She kind of took me along the journey when he was first starting, going backstage and stuff. Seeing where he was with [debut solo 2013 mixtape] Owl Pharaoh to where he is now just really shaped a lot of the things I want in life.
Odetari photographed on December 1, 2023 in Los Angeles.
Michael Buckner
Let’s talk about the sound of your music itself — because sure, it’s electronic, but it’s something else, too. What do you both call your sounds?
6arely Human: I call mine “sassy scene.” Sassy Scene was [the name of] my first album, and a lot of the songs that were on that project had a similar sound. The word “sassy” is just the feeling you get listening to it, and then “scene,” that could mean the style, because there’s different subcultures of the way that people dress that connect to the music. “Scene” is the community as well, because there’s a lot of people that make similar stuff. Everyone’s making up different words for it — the most common one is obviously “hyperpop.” And then “scene core,” “crush club.”
Odetari: Some people call it “sigilkore.” I call my stuff “Odecore,” but I would just categorize it under electronic dance music.
What are the characteristics of the people in your scene who are consuming your music and making similar music?
6arely Human: There are really colorful outfits; a lot of people love the fur [raver] legging things. I see those a lot, and then arm warmers and a lot of accessories — fur and pink. Scene fashion is almost emo, too, that kind of mixes with ravers.
Is this scene happening everywhere? Or is it centralized in Texas? Or is it mostly on the internet?
Odetari: It’s really well respected in the U.S., but overseas they really love it. Poland and Germany, where they have those underground raves that just go crazy, I feel like they’re the ones that really like it. They really get it.
What do your shows look and feel like?
6arely Human: Very lively. There’s a lot of energy. It’s mostly younger people, but there are also people that maybe get a nostalgic feeling, too [for the early rave days]. There is a wide range of people. Everyone’s really excited, and it’s really fun, honestly.
Odetari: Sometimes you have to scream in the mic. They’ll scream over you. They know the lyrics. They’re really dedicated. It’s an awesome fan base for shows. The age range is pretty wide.
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Within your scene, is there a particular worldview or set of values or a philosophy?
6arely Human: I’m not sure about that one.
Odetari: It’s so new, so we’re learning it, too. It kind of goes back to everyone who has made similar music to ours but never shows their face. They’ve never really taken it to a performance level. We’re some of the first to be performing music like this, so we’re figuring out what the best way to do that is. It’s experimental.
Have there been hits and misses in translating your music to a live setting?
6arely Human: For sure. Some of my songs are sped up a little bit, and it’s hard to key the music, too, if you’re using live Auto-Tune. Everyone’s doing the sped-up thing, or slowed down, or even both.
Odetari: My music speeds up, then slows down and then is normal. For performances, it’s not ideal unless you do a DJ set, I guess. But again, we’re figuring it out.
6arely Human: A lot of the people that are there at the live shows, I feel like sometimes they just want to see you on the stage singing. Even if you’re not giving the best vocals in the world, they just love the song so much that they just want to see you up there having fun as well.
Since you’re both so deeply online, maybe it’s just exciting for people to see that you both actually exist. Do you feel like underground acts?
Odetari: I don’t know. The numbers are not really underground.
6arely Human: I feel like we were, but since everything happened rather quickly it hasn’t really hit me yet.
Odetari: It hasn’t hit me, either.
Do you see yourselves performing in arenas, or is the preference sweaty underground warehouses?
6arely Human: I don’t know about arenas. You never know. Maybe. But I really do like smaller, intimate shows. They’re more fun. I love jumping in the crowd, starting mosh pits.
Odetari: A 2,000-[capacity venue], those are really the best shows.
Odetari & 6arelyhuman photographed on December 1, 2023 in Los Angeles.
Michael Buckner
What do your friends and family back in Texas make of your success?
6arely Human: A lot of people don’t know. A lot of people where I live might not be as tuned in with internet stuff. I don’t know how to explain, like, “Oh, yeah, we just made this in our room and then put it on an app called TikTok and now we’re here.” It’s weird to explain to people that don’t really get the internet.
Obviously, a lot of electronic music is made for parties. How much do you connect to that partying aspect of the electronic world?
6arely Human: The type of music we make is something people can just have fun to and not really think about everything else that’s happening. Our type of music, whenever you play it, people just want to jump around and have fun and go crazy.
Odetari: You don’t even need to know the lyrics. You can just vibe to it.
Do you feel connected to other realms of the dance music world?
Odetari: I personally don’t, because I really don’t listen to music. I only listen to video-game soundtracks now, so I really don’t know what’s going on in music that much. I think it helps me not get too influenced by anything.
6arely Human: I feel the same way. Anything that’s new, it’s probably just me listening to my friends or someone I actually know. Most of the music I listen to and take inspiration from is really old. From, like, 2010 or 1998.
Cher has filed for temporary legal conservatorship of her 47-year-old son Elijah Blue Allman, according to a petition filed Tuesday in Los Angeles Superior Court and obtained by Billboard.
In the petition, the “Believe” singer cites her son’s ongoing substance abuse battle, which he’s spoken about in the past. She seeks to be the sole conservator of Allman’s estate, arguing that he “is currently unable to manage his assets due to severe mental health and substance abuse issues.”
“Elijah is entitled to regular distributions from the Trust, but given his ongoing mental health and substance abuse issues, petitioner [Cher] is concerned that any funds distributed to Elijah will be immediately spent on drugs, leaving Elijah with no assets to provide for himself and putting Elijah’s life at risk,” according to the documents. “Elijah is currently unable to manage his finances and the distribution of funds directly to Elijah would not be in his best interests.”
Allman is the son of Cher and former husband, the late Gregg Allman, one of the founding members of the Grammy-winning Allman Brothers Band. Allman and Cher were married from 1975 to 1979, and Elijah Blue is their only child together. Allman died in 2017 after a battle with liver cancer.
Like his parents, Elijah Blue Allman also made a career for himself in the music industry. He was the lead singer of the industrial metal band Deadsy. The rockers charted a pair of LPs on the Billboard 200: 2002’s Commencement (No. 100) and 2006’s Phantasmagore (No. 176).
In October, Cher addressed claims made last year by Elijah Blue’s estranged wife, Marieangela King, in divorce documents, which alleged that the pop icon had sent four men to kidnap Allman from a New York City hotel room, telling People magazine, “That rumor is not true.”
Cher’s legal moves come just two years after she took to X (formerly Twitter) to celebrate the end of Britney Spears‘ high-profile conservatorship. “Thank God, I’ve talked [and prayed] about this [for] years,” she wrote. “I’m more than thrilled [for] her!! Bless our [superstar]. #FreeBritney.” Spears’ 13-year conservatorship came to an end on Nov. 12, 2021, after a passionate grassroots movement gained steam online to end the arrangement that gave her dad, James Spears, control of her personal and professional lives.
According to the court documents, a hearing has been scheduled for March 6, 2024. Billboard has reached out to representatives for Cher and legal representation for Elijah Blue Allman for further comment.
Last week, Cher returned to the Billboard Hot 100 for the first time in nearly 22 years. “DJ Play a Christmas Song,” the breakout hit from her first Christmas album, entered the tally at No. 94, marking her first appearance on the ranking since “Song for the Lonely” topped out at No. 85 in 2002. A few weeks prior, “DJ Play a Christmas Song” helped Cher become the first soloist in history to earn a new No. 1 on a Billboard songs chart in each of the seven decades from the 1960s through the 2020s (excluding the Bubbling Under Hot 100). “DJ” topped Dance/Electronic Song Sales on the chart dated Dec. 2, 2023.
It’s been six years since the #MeToo movement exploded into the mainstream consciousness, and Ellie Goulding believes that the reckoning has changed the music industry for the better. In a new interview with BBC Radio 4’s Today show, the “Love Me Like You Do” singer recounted the evolution of her experiences in the music industry post-#MeToo.
“I definitely think the landscape has changed a bit, especially since the [#MeToo] movement,” Goulding said. “I think that was really, really important for people to keep speaking out about their individual stories, because I know a lot was happening and just wasn’t being talked about.”
Activist Tarana Burke first coined the phrase “Me Too” in the context of raising awareness against sexual violence and rape culture in 2006. The phrase grew into a culture-shifting social movement by 2017 when several sexual abuse allegations were levied against disgraced film producer Harvey Weinstein.
Those Weinstein allegations became a catalyst for more people to feel comfortable coming forward and sharing their stories. In the interview, Goulding recounted an experience that she had “sort of normalized.”
“You know, when you go into a studio and afterwards the producer asks if you want to go for a drink. And I’m quite a polite person, I don’t like letting people down. I don’t like disappointing people. So I was like, ‘Yeah, sure, absolutely, go for a drink,’” she explained. “And then it sort of somehow becomes like a romantic thing when it shouldn’t. You don’t want it to be a romantic thing, but it’s like there was always a slight feeling of discomfort when you walked into a studio and it was just one or two men writing or producing.”
For Goulding, “hearing so many other, similar stories from other female musicians and singers” helped her realize that those experiences — which she described as a “kind of currency” — were not to be normalized. “I [realized] that I wasn’t alone in it at all. It wasn’t just me, being particularly friendly.”
“It was like a sort of unspoken thing where if you’re working with male producers, that was almost like an expectation, which sounds mad for me to say out loud, and it definitely wouldn’t happen now. I mean, very rarely, because things have just really changed,” she said. “Younger artists at Polydor, my record label, will now have chaperones when they go to the studio. And they also have a chance to speak to a [counselor] or speak to someone about their experience as an up-and-coming musician.”
The “Lights” singer’s recent sentiments echo a 2020 Independent interview where she said, “I feel really stupid for saying I wasn’t affected by the #MeToo movement… I [normalized] too much and I am sad about that.”
Goulding is entering the new year with her second career Grammy nomination — best pop dance recording for “Miracle” (with Calvin Harris). In 2023, she earned her sixth career entry on the Billboard 200 with Higher Than Heaven (No. 125), which also hit No. 1 on the U.K. Albums chart.
If you don’t have New Year’s Eve plans, you do now.
In the final hours of 2023, Apple Music is hosting a dance-extravaganza livestream featuring sets from Honey Dijon, Peggy Gou, KAYTRANADA and a crew of other selectors including Apple Music’s Tim Sweeney, Brooklyn collective Papi Juice, French legend Laurent Garnier and more.
The stream was pre-recorded in a sold-out Brooklyn warehouse and will debut on Sunday, Dec. 31 at 7 p.m. PT exclusively through Apple Music and the Apple TV app. See a sneak preview of the show here.
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“A New Year’s Eve mix is a fresh start, we’re going into a new chapter,” Honey Dijon says in a statement. “So I try to bring that sense of lightness, freshness, joy, renewal, and fun. I just try to really bring my culture and my sound. I stand on so many incredible shoulders of black queer people who have created house music, so I always like to teach, entertain, and bring joy.”
“When it’s a New Year’s mix, it’s more of a celebration, you know, for getting through the whole year—whether it was hard or not, you have to celebrate making it through the year,” adds KAYTRANADA. “It’s a different approach than other mixes I do. The way I approach the mix tonight is to go toward more of a house direction.”
The show will close with a set by Gou, whose “(It Goes Like) Nanana” was a huge 2023 hit. “I try to always go to my sets or my shows half an hour before to get the vibe and see how other DJs are playing, and I’m very sensitive to the crowd’s energy and I try to read that as much as I can,” says Gou, who will release her debut album in 2024.
After the stream is over, fans can stream the performances on demand on both Apple Music and Apple TV+ and listen to the sets on Apple Music’s DJ Mixes dedicated space.
One of Ibiza‘s most fabled clubbing institutions is under new ownership.
As was rumored this past summer, Pacha Group — which includes the Ibiza flagship club, two hotel island hotel properties and clubs in Barcelona and Munich — has been acquired by FIVE Holdings, the Dubai-based hospitality and real estate group. FIVE encompasses a namesake hotel brand with two locations in Dubai and a property in Zurich, with a third Dubai property currently under construction.
FIVE Hospitality and The Pacha Group CEO Aloki Batra tells Billboard that FIVE’s acquisition of The Pacha Group is worth approximately $330 million, and that conversations regarding the sale started nearly two and a half years ago at an event in Mykonos.
The Pacha Group was previously owned by the private equity firm Trilantic Capital Partners, which acquired the brand in 2017. A representative from Trilantic declined to comment on the sale.
Batra says that as part of the transfer of ownership, Pacha Ibiza will see some light changes, including improvements to the lighting system, slightly expanded VIP areas, enhanced production elements and improvements to the club’s “digital footprint” including systems to track attendance through NFT wristbands.
“If [you’ve] been to been to five or six shows, the next time you show up, we should know that. Now it’s just blind,” says Batra. “[We plan to] increase the quality of experience by getting to know our fans a lot better and then [determining] how we can engage with them and make them feel special.” Batra adds that there’s been a “full continuity” of staff at the club amid the change in ownership.
Batra says FIVE is also looking at ways to revive the club’s longstanding record label, Pacha Recordings with pre-recorded DJ sets delivered to fans globally on DSPs.
“[We’re] definitely looking at that that very seriously,” Batra says. “We have this rich legacy and need to take it ahead for the digital age and the customer of today. I think that’s a huge opportunity for us, and it’s great for the fans, because we intend to bring your favorite club closer to you.”
While programming at the club will remain largely the same — including Solomun’s iconic Sunday night residency — Batra says the plan is to also make offerings “a bit more reggaeton-ey” for the 2024 season. “There’s a lot of demand for it and we’re looking to address that demand,” he says, noting that Maluma and J Balvin have previously performed at Pacha Ibiza. “We want to be well represented in the reggaeton world… We think there’s definitely a trend in that direction.”
The acquisition marks FIVE’s first properties in Ibiza, with the deal also encompassing the resorts El Hotel Pacha Ibiza and Destino Pacha Ibiza. Located approximately 15 minutes north of the club, this latter property will see a series of what Batra calls “significant upgrades” and officially become a FIVE branded property in 2025.
He says that while the Ibiza market is highly competitive, visitors to the island now often come more and stay longer, creating opportunities for property owners. He adds that the same demographic that visits FIVE resorts in Dubai are also likely to travel to Ibiza.
Pacha Ibiza opened in 1973 and, 50 years later, hosts some of the biggest DJs in the world. Batra emphasize that while other clubs in the market offer “a show with a big DJ set” Pacha is still focused on throwing “a party with the DJ right at the center.”
To wit, FIVE will maintain Pacha’s ” bohemian artistic direction…[The plan is] not more pyrotechnics as far as we’re concerned,” says Batra. “We’re more about the party, the atmosphere and enhancing that experience [and not having] people pull out their mobile phones for the entirety of the set.”
“We’re buying into a real legacy,” Batra adds. “It’s one of the greatest entertainment brands out of Europe at the forefront of dance music and culture. The relationship between the success of Ibiza and the success of Pacha is very intertwined; I think it’s almost a definitive story of Ibiza… So it’s very exciting to have an opportunity to be part of this great story and navigate it into a blissful future.”
“I’ll never do New York. America is not ready.”
That’s what Steffen Charles, the owner of German techno festival Time Warp, told New York City dance event producer Rob Toma more than a decade ago, with Charles thinking the U.S. market wouldn’t quite understand the brand of dark, pummeling techno that’s been Time Warp’s signature since the festival launched in 1994.
But eventually, Charles had a change of heart, and Time Warp launched in NYC in 2014, bringing the pummeling, relentlessly heavy genre to a country then riding the wave of kandi-colored EDM boom.
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Nine years later, techno is one of the dominant sounds in the U.S. and Time Warp and Teksupport are celebrating a now-long partnership, with the sixth U.S. edition of the festival taking place Nov. 17-18 at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and drawing thousands of fans.
This show marked the third international edition of Time Warp in 2023, with the Brooklyn Yard event following Time Warp Brazil and Time Warp Chile. The original German edition of the festival happened last month as well, and next year, Time Warp will celebrate 30 years of existence at its home in Mannheim, Germany.
Known for showcasing legends and rising stars, the Brooklyn Yard edition featured a lineup including Dennis Cruz, Pawsa, Reiner Zonneveld and many more. Whether you were there and want to relive it, or didn’t make it and want a piece of the action, here we have nearly 10 hours of exclusive music from the event, with sets from rising star Sara Landy, longstanding legends Pan-Pot, Nina Kraviz and Adiel and a special b2b set from Vintage Culture and Joseph Capriati.
Sara Landry
Pan-Pot
Joseph Capriati b2b Vintage Culture
Nina Kraviz
Adiel
All year we covered the deals, the launches, the layoffs, the lineups and everything else related to the wide world of dance. We also tracked the numbers that provide an understanding of how well the scene is doing (with the dance industry growing by a not insubstantial 34% over the last year.) Meanwhile, we looked […]
In February, Fred again.., Skrillex and Four Tet turned New York’s Madison Square Garden into a sweaty rave, performing a body-rattling five-hour show that had sold out in two minutes and, in some ways, set the tone for dance music in 2023. The demand proved the trio to be a perfect replacement for Frank Ocean as Coachella’s Sunday night headliner on its second weekend. And by October, Fred again.. had sold 42,300 tickets and grossed $2.9 million across a three-night residency in New York, according to Billboard Boxscore, later playing an eight-night run in Los Angeles.
“We been practising for monthssss to try n make this show a level up and to like really push ourselves to make it as musical and dynamic and LIVE as possible,” Fred again.. posted on Instagram.
Fred again.., now nominated for a best new artist Grammy, became a bigger star in 2023, but he was far from the only one cashing in on the post-pandemic return to live events. In June, future bass star Illenium played Denver’s Mile High Stadium, selling 47,300 tickets and grossing $3.9 million. Meanwhile, Beyoncé toured the globe on her dance album, Renaissance, selling 2.8 million tickets worldwide. And live electronic maestros ODESZA led the festival circuit, headlining Bonnaroo, Governors Ball and Outside Lands.
“There have been all these moments where I realized that electronic music from a live standpoint is in an incredibly healthy place,” says Lee Anderson, executive vp/managing executive at Wasserman, who represents electronic acts including Skrillex, Zedd and Disclosure. “It might be bigger than it has ever been, including the EDM boom.”
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This surge has origins in the pandemic, when dancefloors were vacant. Prior to 2020, dance shows had declined “from the late 2010s from a ticket-buying standpoint and on the live side,” Anderson says. This was the same era in which house music was replacing EDM as the mainstream dance genre of choice in the United States.
But as artists turned to livestreaming during lockdown, dance music became particularly accessible, given the ease of streaming DJ sets. The sound proliferated on Twitch and other platforms at the same time that a new generation of fans were coming of age — and when live events returned, they wanted to dance. “You had a whole new generation of kids that were like, ‘Oh, my God. What is this? I want to get out of the house and go,’ ” says Anderson.
The pent-up demand drove ticket sales at dance shows across the United States, and by 2022, Anderson says, “I was talking to people at Live Nation and AEG like, ‘The electronic stuff is selling really well.’ We looked at the data and realized this genre was heating back up.”
Contributing to the rise was the general expansion of the U.S. dance market. While there used to be roughly a dozen cities in which techno artists could play, Anderson says there are now 30. Beyond major markets like Miami, New York and Los Angeles, there are now thriving U.S. hubs for bass, commercial dance, trap, house and other styles in cities including Denver and Phoenix. (Anderson says that artists’ social engagement is the best indicator of where they’ll be able to sell tickets.) Meanwhile, festivals that were formerly booking three or four dance acts are now booking four times that many.
While the current dominance of house music has delivered greater levels of live success to veteran artists — Anderson cites Chicago legend Green Velvet as a prime example, saying he is “probably bigger than he has ever been” — fresh acts are also rising. After playing their first major shows earlier this year, San Diego bass producers ISOxo and Knock2 performed four sold-out shows at The Shrine in L.A. in November.
“Between the two of them, the highest-streamed song has about 13 million plays,” Anderson says. “These are not huge numbers, but they sold out 20,000 tickets in L.A. as fast as the cart could process transactions — and we had enough people in the queue that if the venue was available, we could have done another four [nights].”
Such residencies and one-offs are also indicative of the newly preferred style of touring for dance acts, with teams often putting on a small number of shows that feel special — and which fans are more likely to travel for — rather than grinding it out on the road. Illenium’s stadium show demonstrated the viability of this model (the act will play two more at SoFi Stadium in L.A. in February 2024), as did a set by FISHER and Chris Lake in October, when they shut down a stretch of Hollywood Boulevard and drew 12,000 fans. (Anderson calls the show “one of the biggest stories in dance music this year.”) Pretty Lights’ comeback tour featured a series of short residencies, with 27 shows across nine venues. And on Dec. 16, John Summit will headline the 22,000-capacity BMO Stadium in L.A. — a type of show that Kx5 proved viable last December, when it played for 46,000 people at the L.A. Coliseum.
“When you had the [EDM bubble] era of, ‘Can it ever be that big again?,’ did you see electronic artists selling out stadiums as headline acts?” Anderson asks. “Because that’s happening today, and you’re going to see that continue happening. And that has never happened before. That’s new.”
This story originally appeared in the Dec. 9, 2023, issue of Billboard.
The season of celebration and the season of giving are upon us, and the holiday dance-music party L.A. Gives Back is once again providing attendees with the opportunity to do both.
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Returning after a two year hiatus, the sixth iteration of the dance-focused fundraiser is happening on Dec. 20 at Catch One in Los Angeles. The lineup, as always, will be kept secret until the night of the party, but organizers promise “a confirmed mega headliner.” Past years have featured sets from Tokimonsta, Boys Noize, A-Trak, Louis the Child and Flying Lotus.
Some of L.A.’s best party promoters are curating the bash, with Brownies and Lemonade, Shrek Rave, HEAV3N, Electric Feels, Club 90s, Hack the Planet and Restless Nights all involved. Tickets start at $25 and are available now.
The party will be led by IHEARTCOMIX, with funds going toward organizations that work to assist the city’s unhoused population. Initially running from 2016 to 2020, the party was founded by IHEARTCOMIX in response to the city’s growing homeless crisis. In its first five years, L.A. Gives Back raised more than $200,000 for the nonprofits Downtown Women’s Center, My Friend’s Place and MásForMore. This year, the event will benefit these three organizations.
“It’s so cool that so many of L.A.’s top music curators and creative talent can come together and produce an event that draws attention to this huge crisis in our community,” said IHEARTCOMIX founder Franki Chan in a statement. “We hope that the event can showcase the wide diversity and collaborative nature that makes L.A. so special while raising the funds so desperately needed to address the issue.
“For IHEARTCOMIX, this is our holiday party,” Chan continued. “I feel strongly that Los Angeles is the best city in the world for music and creative energy. Over the almost 20 years that IHC has been around, we’ve seen this town change so much for the better. It’s not just the talent that is incredible, but the sense of community that makes it special and has drawn so many people here. However, the unplanned consequence of that growth has been the rise of the homeless population in L.A., and now in the aftermath of COVID-19, it’s even worse. It’s our responsibility to address this problem and fix it. As we grow, we must bring everyone up with us. Hopefully this event shows our city that we can stand as one to create positive change.”
A survey of L.A.’s homeless population earlier this year estimates that there are roughly 75,000 people in L.A. County living in shelters, tents, cars, fans, RVs or makeshift shelters.
Courtesy Photo
On May 3, 2021, Rob Toma got the call he’d been waiting for. A staffer from the office of New York City’s then mayor Bill de Blasio was getting in touch to inform Toma that live events would be allowed to resume the next month, as the pandemic waned. Toma hung up, and for the next two weeks, barely slept.
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Instead he booked shows, putting 13 events on the calendar for when venues reopened to full capacity. Lineups included The Martinez Brothers, Michael Bibi, Sven Vath and Loco Dice playing in a cavernous (and also packed), Brooklyn warehouse — the venue format that’s defined Toma’s company, Teksupport, since he started throwing parties under the name back in 2010.
“Since [after the pandemic], we’ve been gaining a lot of real momentum,” Toma says, “and we really kind of just [kept] turning it up.” This year, Toma and his 20-person, Brooklyn-based team have put on 164 shows at venues including 99 Scott, Brooklyn Army Terminal, Brooklyn Navy Yard and various warehouses. In the four days surrounding New Year’s Eve, the company will produce six events. Talking to Billboard over Zoom, Toma is tired — “it’s come to a point now where it’s very, very intense … I just don’t sleep, actually” — but focused.
“10,000 is the new 5,000 and 5,000 is the new 2,000,” he says. “We’re doing like, 25,000 to 30,000 people a month now.”
Toma was born in Brooklyn’s Bensonhurst neighborhood, the son of Egyptian immigrants. His first job was at his grandparents’ bagel shop. He was then a busboy at a catering hall run by his uncle. When the hall hosted a teen night, the lightbulb turned on. “‘What the hell is this?’” he recalls thinking. “Like, I could do this.”
He was right. Toma started hosting dry events for teens at the hall, then graduated to New York’s club scene, working his way through venues like the Chelsea mega-club Crobar. In 2010, he took his first trip to Ibiza (“I was like, ‘What the hell is this?’”) then traveled to Germany, where he had his mind blown at Time Warp, the fabled house and techno festival.
Energized by Time Warp’s musical offerings — “In America, it’s usually like nine EDM stages and a dubstep stage, this had all great artists” — he got in touch with the festival’s owner, Steffen Charles, to see about bringing the event across the Atlantic. As Toma recalls, Charles’ response was icy: “I’ll never do New York. America is not ready.”
It took a few years, but Toma convinced him otherwise, and in 2014 Time Warp made it’s U.S. debut in Brooklyn. The show was a logistical nightmare. Toma lost his license for the Brooklyn Armory days before the festival, having to relocate to another venue, The Shed. The event lost $400,000. Toma considered it a success.
“It was just kind of a dream,” he says. “I looked at it as, ‘This is not a loss, this is an investment.’”
The event helped Teksupport distinguish itself as the company that European brands could trust to introduce their shows to U.S. audiences. Toma and crew could draw the right crowd, book the right artists, pull the right permits and, particularly as an independent operator, provide an experience with “heart and soul,” and a staff that would do anything to pull off a party. (He recalls convincing a friend to let him use the warehouse of the friend’s family business, Utz Potato Chips, for a show, hauling seven tractor trailers worth of chips out, then back in when the event was over.)
In 2016, Ibiza born techno party CircoLoco made it’s U.S. debut in partnership with Teksupport. In 2022, the company presented techno legend Ricardo Villalobos’ first solo New York City show. Last month, the company brought Eric Prydz’s HOLO show to New York City for the first time since 2019. This past weekend, Teksupport hosted the first U.S. events from Dutch dance producer DGTL in New York City and Los Angeles. (Toma is a partner in Stranger Than, which puts on parties in L.A.) The company also books a litany of international producers who less-commonly play the city’s EDM-focused festivals and clubs. (Toma is also a partner of the Manhattan club Nebula, and the invite only Hearsay.)
With its efforts, Teksupport has both catalyzed and capitalized on house and techno’s surge in popularity in the U.S. in the wake of EDM. These so-called “underground” genres are now, by dance scene standard, anything but, with parties from Burning Man to Art Basel focused on the sounds. As they’ve bled into the world of fashion and video games, Teksupport has forged a presence in those realms as well. Toma says one of the most surreal moments of his career was being in a motion capture suit while filming his cameo for Grand Theft Auto V. (Teksupport works closely with GTA creator Rockstar Games, which has a partnership with CircoLoco that has resulted in appearances, radio stations and soundtrack contributions by producers including The Blessed Madonna and Moodymann.)
Despite the cultural cachet, Toma says Teksupport is still a family business, made up of many staffers who’ve been around since day one — along with his actual sister, brother and cousin. He and his business partner Mike Vitacco have been best friends since high school, with Toma handling promotion, marketing and bookings, while Vitacco handles licensing and operations. Given the company’s growth over 2023 in particular, Toma is planning to expand the company by bringing in new employees from locations around the world who are steeped in their respective scenes and fans of Teksupport. (He says this is preferable to “recycling people from other producers’ businesses in the space.”)
“You’re only as good as your last show,” he says. “So you’ve got to figure out how to keep it going. That’s my M.O.”
He’s also got another big event on the horizon. On January 3, after Teksupport’s back-to-back (to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back) New Year’s Eve shows, Toma and his two kids — daughter Celine is six and son Rob is 9 — are flying to the Caribbean for a two week vacation. Toma has a plan for how to finally relax.
“I’m just literally not bringing my phone,” he says.