EDC NY 2013 Part 3/3

Saturday morning.  11:00.  My hotel room at the charming LaGuardia Airport Hotel.  I woke up still in a half-daze to my weekend roommates Jenna and Sarah jumping on my bed, making me feel genuinely sorry for doing that to my parents all those times growing up as a young lad.  After struggling for another hour and deciding if I actually wanted to get out of bed, I staggered myself to the bathroom, brushed my teeth, and showered.  As I threw on my jean vest, we called down for an SUV to take us to the parking lot at Citi Field.  After waiting out front of our hotel for the SUV, a white stretch limo pulls up to us and asks if we were going to Citi Field.  After unsurely answering yes, we soon learned that all the SUV’s were being used currently, so we had to settle for a limo to bring us to EDC.  I really don’t know how many times I’ve had an opportunity to ride in style to a parking lot, so this was a pretty sweet surprise.  I’ll tell ya, pulling up to a stadium in a limo really lets other people know that you’ve made it, even if the stadium you pull up to is where the Mets play.  Our limo driver was a pretty chill dude who apparently liked to party, and after snapping a few pics for us, we were on our way to the wonderland that is: EDC Day 2.

Radical Rick likes riding in style.

One of the parts that worried me about Day 2 was that it sold out.  I spent all 30 minutes of my slumber that previous night tossing and turning, having a nightmare about drowning in a sea of people in neon.  Nonstop pushing and shoving while the bass kept dropping.  It was freaking me out, man.  After spacing out while thinking about this impending clusterfuck, it hit me that I would be able to do more people watching.  I never look on the bright side of things, so this kinda took me aback that I was looking for the good in something: the more people there, the more weirdoes present to blog about.  Speaking of weirdoes, as we walked over to the entrance, we ran into my ex-roommates Ryan and Sean, which really added something to our group.  With Ryan, the group added a much needed boost of common sense.  With Sean, we were blessed with his EDM street cred.  You see, Sean aka DJ Party Shark is a rising DJ on the EDM scene, and by this time next year, he should be dropping the bass at the Neon Garden at next year’s EDC NY.  It was such an honor to spend the day with a rising DJ. 

Hanging with DJ Party Shark

Also, he wore some of the most impressive shorts I have ever seen in my life:

These bad boys would've made Elton John blush in the 70's!

As we made our ways inside, we smartly made the move to go stock up on food now since the lines weren't long.  This meant my brunch consisted of chicken and pork kabobs, and it would most likely have to last me all day.  After our group of like 40 friends got settled in, we went and hung out with the Manufactured Superstars over at the Circuit Grounds stage, and we all really got warmed up EDM style.  I know what you’re thinking:  What does “warmed up EDM style” mean?  Mostly just swaying your hips back and forth and throwing your hands up when the dj’s ask you to.  Also, a lot of head bobbing.  I’m serious.  You can never underestimate the power of the head bob.  My neck muscles got such a work out that weekend from head bobbing that it would make Fitness Made Simple guru John Basedow jealous.  Moving on, we stayed at the Circuit Grounds for a good chunk of the day, listening to Manufactured Superstars, Bassjackers (who really impressed me), AN21 & Max Vangeli, and a DJ set from Feed Me.  One confusing thing to me was what exactly needed clarification for Feed Me to be doing a dj set instead of what he normally does.  It wasn’t like he was going to be playing us a 80’s setlist and we’d be jamming out to Talking Heads and A Flock of Seagulls, it would still be songs he would use and remix anyways, right?  Maybe I’m lost here and someone can set me straight since I’m too lazy to google the difference now, but it just seemed kinda concerning that a DJ would need (DJ Set) next to his name on a schedule.  If I went to Lollapalooza and saw Modest Mouse (DJ set) it would kind of make more sense.  I give up.

This qualifies as 'dancing'

While at the Circuit Grounds, I have to admit I had a minor panic attack.  I believe it was during Bassjackers when a troupe of Mimes came out on stage and inexplicably started to dance around.  This freaked me out, especially the mimes on stilts.  I hate mimes.  They scare the wholesomeness out of me.  Mimes know something that the rest of us don’t, and they just cannot be trusted.  If I want to tell someone something and I’m not a mute, I’m just going to say it.  Not act something out using hands and pretend I’m trapped in a box to get a message across.  What a joke.  I’m all for EDC being a carnival atmosphere, but did the mimes really have to get in on the act?  I was having a nice weekend until they showed their painted mugs up on stage.

:-( 

After this minor panic attack and sudden urge to go jump a mime or two, I forgot about it, mostly because I saw this kid with one of the strangest haircuts ever. 

Hard time telling if the side design was lightning or roots.

I really hope this haircut was a one time thing, similar to me wearing a jean vest out in public.  I believe that some things should just stay in EDC.  Then again that somewhat defeats the purpose of this blog, so forget I said that.  In addition to hanging out with DJ Party Shark, I also got to chill with deadmau5, which was pretty rad.  He was a cool guy.  Not very talkative.  Wasn’t quite sure why he wasn’t backstage or in the VIP area, but who am I to judge a patriotic DJ?  

U5A! U5A! U5A!

Also, it was pretty cool that ET showed up to support the exploding EDM scene. 

E....T....Phon...errr...Drop.....Bassssss

Sometime during the day, I hopped aboard the Ferris wheel with my friend Paula and my foe Chris.  What a moment, you guys.  The view was breathtaking. 

I now have a sudden urge to watch Ferris Bueller

I was somewhat thrown off with two random girls who were in line behind us also got into our vestibule (definitely the first, and certainly not the last time the term ‘vestibule’ has been used in this blog).  It was one of those moments where I’m sure all three of us just wanted to be our normal stupid selves and make awful jokes and say terrible things about each other and our friends, and we couldn't do it with these random chicks in the vestibule (yes!) with us.  It seemed as if we had to put a filter on ourselves because of these weirdos and just shut up and enjoy the view.

After snapping some pics and kinda freaking out by how high up we were, we came back down to earth.  I think it was a solid 7 minute ride after waiting in line for 45 minutes.  Although I’m bitter about this, the view was definitely worth it, as you can probably tell from the pictures. 

If you look hard enough you can still spot Sean's shorts

Fun fact, for the first time during the weekend, I realized that the stage was meant to look like a boom-box.  Attention to detail, am I right? 

After the Ferris wheel, we caught some of Calvin Harris, which was very crowded, and then I made my way over to see Empire of the Sun.  Let me tell ya, Empire of the Sun was a trip and a half, man.  Personally, it was nice to finally see a guitar on stage.  It was also cool being in the front row to see them and their show.  I haven’t been so confused by an onstage performance in a long time (not counting the goddamn mimes).  There was an abundance of headdresses and people in what looked like tin foil, and at one point there was like a second bass player whose outfit kind of blew up like a jiffy pop bag.  I spent a lot of time with one eyebrow raised and my jaw slightly dropped, while trying to figure out how many 9$ Coors lights I had.  It hit me that this is most likely what you get when you have a band where the lead singer is on a bad acid trip that never ends.  That being said, it was quite the sight!  They put on an awesome performance, and seeing ‘Walking On a Dream’ live was pretty sweet.  Fireworks went off during their set, so it was kind of awkward at one point where the band was on stage but everyone was facing the opposite direction to watch the truly breathtaking fireworks display. 

First Jiffy Pop reference I've made since the 90's. Yes, this was part of the costume.

We left a bit before Empire of the Sun finished, mostly so that we could get everyone together to make the trek over to the Kinetic Field to see Porter Robinson.  Just when we got the gang together, my dear friend Steve decided that it would be a perfect opportunity to go fill up his camelback thing with some much need H2O.  We told him this would be okay but to hurry on back.  He didn’t hurry on back.  Like 14 parents waiting on a child, we were starting to grow more and more worried that some guy in a white van had offered him some kandi and took off with him.  We searched a solid 10 foot radius to try to find him and even started to show people his picture asking if they saw him.  “I am trying to find Steve, have you seen him?” we asked the festivalgoers, only to have quite a few people respond with “Don’t you mean molly?  I think you mean molly”.  This brief confusion led us to realize that people assumed that we were looking for molly, the drug, instead of our friend, Steve.  You know, since molly and Steve are so easy to mix up.  One is a drug, or a good Irish girl’s name, the other is a scrawny 22 year old who looks like he could still be singing in a children’s choir somewhere.  People are idiots. 

One step away from putting this on a carton of milk

Porter Robinson was awesome.  It was definitely a performance that kind of let him prove that he should, in fact, be headlining a festival.  The lights and graphics on screens accompanying his music was really helpful, since I was a solid 16,000 rows of people back it was nice because I couldn’t actually see Porter himself.  It was also amusing seeing my foe Chris start weeping when Porter closed his set with his smash hit single ‘Language’.  I laughed and I laughed when I looked at Chris and he was wiping away tears and yelling out insane things like “EDM SAVED MY LIFE!” and telling us how he was going to name his firstborn ‘Porter’.  Porter Rizzini.  Woof.  Sounds like a great name who will one day get his lunch money taken away from him. In the video below, you will see my foe Chris turn around, wipe away some tears, and actually shout "EDM saved my life".  I kid you not, this really happened.

After Porter Robinson finished up playing, my comrade Kyle and I frantically ran over to the portapotties, only to arrive there just in time for a huge security guard who probably played for the New York Giants to yell at everyone that those portapotties were for some reason closed.  This was a very stressful moment.  When you have to go, you gotta go, right, you guys?  We ended up finding more portapotties that apparently stayed open past 11:00 pm and then made our exit out of the EDM Wonderland.  It turns out finding a cab after a music festival is very difficult.  After a few cops told us some really hilarious jokes about walking, we were determined to find a cab to haul all 9 or so of us back to our hotel.  We ended up walking.  It was a nice night for a stroll, even if we did have to cross over a weird bridge and walk along the shore of some body of water and marsh where there is no doubt in my mind a few bodies are buried.  At midnight my acquaintance Matt Rizzini turned 23, so we got to celebrate that by half-heartedly singing him happy birthday while we were dragging our feet to the hotel.  In a it’s-a-small-world-ain’t-it? moment, a kid who was walking a few feet in front of us turned 21 at the same midnight, so we pretended that we cared about him and I think we might have wished him a happy birthday as well.  What a country. 

After finally making it back to the friendly confines of the LaGuardia Airport Hotel around midnight, we were all starving and decided to get some of this famous New York style pizza that everyone always told me about.  We ended up ordering from a pizza parlor called Domino’s who delivered to our hotel room.  First thoughts on New York style pizza: not impressed.  If this Domino’s pizza is like the rest of New York style pizza, then I’m not a fan.  Pizza was subpar, the cheesy bread was quite lacking, and the buffalo wings weren’t even mediocre.  I think that was the most disappointing part of the weekend to be honest.  All of my friends at PC would complain to me that “Providence Pizza is nothing compared to New York pizza”.  You’re all wrong.  I’m taking Antonio’s, Nice Slice, or Crugnale’s pizza before any NY pizza any day of the week.  Honestly I’m not sure how you guys can even call yourselves a pizza city. 

After choking down the swill that was considered pizza with some warm champagne, it was time to retire to our quarters and dream about the hours of driving we had to do the following day.  We ended up departing New York and making it home, with sore legs, hearing loss, a 3 part blog series, some scraped shins, and a whole lot of memories and new friends from a very EDM weekend.  EDC NY, it was a wonderful time.  I didn't know what to quite expect from you, but you gave it your all and so did we.  It was a weekend that will not be soon forgotten. 

Our EDC family

Rage on my friends, and keep dropping the bass.

The End.