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CANADIANA 002: We Explore the HumbleOrigins of the West Coast's Music Mecca

September 8, 2014 Ziad Ramley (//thump.vice.com/en_ca/contributor/ziad-ramley)/

! "

CATHE CHANNELS

Update: Though they fall outside the cultural scope of this article, it's important to

mention the importance of influencers such as the SHAHdjs and Kuma Graham of

Lighta! (https://www.facebook.com/groups/2398007363/) to name a few who,

throughout the early 2000s, established a bass music scene which is still highly

active today throughout British Columbia.

Before electronic music became what it was today, prolific crossover artists such as

Justice, SebastiAn, and Digitalism bridged the gap between live performances and

digital production. In this edition of CANADIANA, we’re going to explore how these

artists made Vancouver what it is today, and how a handful of individuals grew the

scene from dive bars to sold-out stadiums in just a few years.

I reached out to Matthew Owchar (https://soundcloud.com/expendableyouth)

of Blueprint Events (http://thisisblueprint.com/), a veteran of the scene and

unparalleled tastemaker, for a history lesson. “So everybody knows this guy, Paul

Devro,” he tells me. “In around 2005 Paul Devro and his brother Erik were throwing

tons of parties along with My Gay Husband

(https://soundcloud.com/mghmghmgh)(Jason Sulyma), who were putting on

events with these guys Tony and Tyler called ‘Half Alive’. These parties in

Vancouver are really what blew the electro sound up.” The events started off as

hipster parties in East Side dive bars and were completely separate from the city’s

existing scenes; so separate in fact that when ClubZone approached Half Alive to

list their events and boost exposure they told them that they’d pass. Matt recalls

the time fondly: “It was a really crazy experience because all the music was new.

The style of dress was new, the music was new, and it just got bigger and bigger.

Half Alive ended up moving to the Richards on Richards (when that still existed)

and they were the first guys to bring Flosstradamus, Simian Mobile Disco, and

Digitalism. I remember Paul and Eric brought Justice to Vancouver for the first

time. Justice, Busy P, Medhi, SebastiAn, all the Ed Banger dudes. Back then the

landscape was completely different than it is now. This was prior to electronic

music being as big as it is now—right when the first Justice single came out—at the

time, the popular kind of music were mash-ups and electro.”

During a recent trip to LA, I managed to link up with Paul Devro

(https://soundcloud.com/pauldevro) at the Mad Decent HQ and asked him

about his time throwing parties in Vancouver. "At one point I had five nights,” he

explains, “I had a grime night on Tuesdays, I had an R&B and house night at Ginger

62 (https://twitter.com/ginger62) on Fridays. I had a night at Shine, at Section 3.

We also had a party called The Kids that we would do with My Gay Husband and

my brother Erik, and Andrew. Then Alvaro from Blueprint got in touch and basically

said ‘Yo man, let’s just have fun,’ so we did and it was great. I learnt a lot from

Alvaro and we started doing bigger and bigger shows.” If you told a young

Vancouver music-lover today that the head of A&R for Mad Decent used to work

for Blueprint's Alvaro Prol they probably wouldn't believe you at first, but it

certainly explains the company's long standing relationship with the label. Dillion

Francis, Baauer, and many more all got their first showings in Vancouver courtesy

of Blueprint before blowing up in the scene.

Paul Devro eventually left Vancouver to live in LA and help Diplo, Derrick, and

Jasper found Mad Decent, but the city’s love affair with electronic music refused to

slow down. The city's most popular long-standing night, Stereotype Fridays at

Celebrities was founded in October of 2006 and started off catering to

purist trance, techno, and house fans before growing to book acts such as

Deadmau5, Skrillex, Avicii, and Laidback Luke for their first ever appearances in the

city. U-Tern (https://soundcloud.com/u-tern) of DJ duo Oliver

(https://soundcloud.com/weareoliver) played regularly at Shine Nightclub

(http://shinenightclub.com/) along with a host of weekly left-field guests and

then in 2010, Matt Owchar and Alvaro Prol brought emerging electronic sounds

from Hypem and SoundCloud to their largest stage yet with a night called

Youngblood Sundays (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDG9SL3OfxI) at

Venue (http://venuelive.ca/). Youngblood took the best from Ed Banger, Dim

Mak, Mad Decent, and the first big wave of dubstep, and showed the city what

electronic music could be.

From sold out stadium shows to all-vinyl house throwback nights, you’ll be hard

pressed to find a scene that isn’t catered to in the city these days. Like all cities,

Vancouver has an EDM crowd that don neon tank tops at progressive house

shows, but beneath that furry boot-fueled layer that "coolness" of exploring

electronic sub-genres lives on. If we hadn’t started with those dive bar parties, who

knows where we’d be by now.

Instead of our usual current Canadian selections, enjoy these Vancouver artist

throwbacks and look for our full interview with Paul Devro at the Mad Decent HQ

next week.

kiTight.com [music blog] – MAD DECENT - Make It Rain/Source 16 (Paul Devro DJ Edit)

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Ziad Ramley lived in Vancouver and is on Twitter: @bluuuuueeeeeee

(http://twitter.com/bluuuuueeeeeee)

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TOPICS: words (//thump.vice.com/en_ca/topic/words) thump blog (//thump.vice.com/en_ca/topic/thump-blog)

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