Pardon DAD's French, but what the fuck is going on right now? In a recent interview with WildSpice, HARD's Gary Richards (AKA Destructo) spoke on a problem we're seeing more and more of in EDM events both big and small: the lack of a legitimate female presence. According to the HARD line-ups over the last five years, only 8% of the ~300 performers have been female. That's a pretty shocking statistic, but one that's a constant. This weekend's Brooklyn Electronic Music Festival has a great line-up, but you won't need both hands to count the female DJs listed on their website, and this is the same song that's sung for practically every big EDM show throughout America, and the world over.
Richards' plan is to help rectify this, but in a weird way: "I have a concept for a show that's all girl performers...It's not a 70,000 person event. But I do see more females coming up and...I'm definitely going to do it in 2014." We like the sound of that; females definitely rock as hard as the males, from the selection of a B.Traits or Annie Mac to the precision mixing of Gina Turner or Kito. If you need big-name EDM ladies, Nervo's there, or TOKiMONSTA and Maya Jane Coles for the more underground/subversive sounds. But hold up, Richards isn't done speaking about this: "The key to it is I've got to be able to get them (the performers) all in the same place at one time. The thing is I can't pay them as much."
Wait a second - so on the positive, you want to make sure that you throw an all-female EDM event in 2014, because you know that women are "killing it," but you can't pay them as much? Why? Is it because you're pretty sure they won't bring in the crowds you need? That makes sense... ALTHOUGH IF YOU'D BEEN BOOKING MORE FEMALES IN THE FIRST PLACE, THEY'D HAVE MORE EYES RECOGNIZING THEIR TALENTS, THUS WANTING TO COME SEE THEM SPIN MORE OFTEN. You want to be a part of the solution, but you've been a part of the problem for so long that it's hard (no pun intended) (OK a little pun intended) to dig yourself out of that hole, isn't it? And why not go for the gusto, and instead of doing some five-six female DJ show, you book a proper rave with as many females as you would any other party? We'd hope that, if marketed the same way you would one of your other parties, you could turn a profit... right?
We don't want to piss on the beauty that could be (should be) a dope event featuring nothing but females behind the decks, but we hope that these women are properly paid for their work. And not properly paid "for a girl," but compensated the same way males in the EDM scene are.
