Afrojack started off his headlining Ultra set by telling the crowd with a raspy voice that he “partied too hard” this week, and we’ll admit he sounded kind of tired. As soon as he picked up the magnum of Grey Goose — “my cocaine” — that was posted up right in front of the CDJs, he sprung to life, admitted he was “nervous,” and said he’d be premiering ten new tracks. When the crowd responded with a passionate roar, he declared he wasn’t nervous anymore and used his “Bangduck” intro as a backdrop. From there, it was full speed ahead: click past the jump for our full breakdown.
We’re no stranger to Kaskade’s music, but his set at this year’s Ultra Music Festival was one that went uncharacteristically hard for the man who brought us Fire & Ice late last year. Rather than playing all of his own tracks in their original form, he paired well-known acapellas from some of his most well-known offerings with some of the hottest songs of the moment. What resulted was a high energy set that went over quite well with the crowd, and as Kaskade put it himself on Twitter, it was “awesome, amazing, unreal… and more!!!” Keep reading for some of his combinations you need to know.
The last time we checked in to the Masquerade Motel, we were inside Madison Square Garden — one of the most famous venues in the world. At that time, we told you that Swedish House Mafia was the biggest dance music act in the world. After attending the latest Masquerade Motel — this time at Grand Central Park in Miami — we can confirm that is still the case. While it wasn’t quite the gigantic event planned for Haulover Park, the usual cast of characters (NO_ID, AN21, Alesso, and Calvin Harris) was out to support the juggernaut that is Swedish House Mafia, and it all came together in one awesome event that only SHM could pull off.
We still can’t quite put our finger on it, but there’s just something about David Guetta that is unparalleled by any other EDM artist on the planet. While he often gets some flack for creating more pop-style tracks and venturing away from pure “house music,” it’s impossible to deny that he is one of the most influential members of the dance music community.
“Do you realize what’s going on in the world — and in America especially?” he asked the crowd about halfway through his set. “Our music is taking over and it’s crazy!” he proclaimed as he prepared to drop his FMIF remix of “Memories.” “I never thought that one day this would happen, but it’s unbelievable.” He went on to deliver a classic Guetta set that combined brand new tracks with established favorites, and the end result was arguably one of the most fun sets of the entire weekend.
Ultra Music Festival 2012 has come to a close, but that doesn’t mean it’s a thing of the past. Full set downloads are available online thanks to SiriusXM’s streaming of the event, and there’s a whole lot to listen to if you haven’t been keeping up on YouTube, or by following us on Twitter. The list of sets is seriously extensive, with biggies like Afrojack, Benny Benassi, Carl Cox, Dirty South, Martin Solveig, Nicky Romero and Swanky Tunes — and that’s just from Friday!
In addition to the sets becoming available for download, festival organizers have officially announced the dates for next year’s show. UMF 2013 will be going down March 22nd, 23rd, and 24th, though we’re not sure whether it will be staying put at the new Bayfront Park location, moving back to Bicentennial, or heading somewhere else completely. If you were there let us know in the comments: where would you like to see Ultra go down next year?
Eric Prydz’s debut album Eric Prydz Presents Pryda will be released on May 21st as a three disc compilation, complete with lots of new tracks and a few established classics. Disc one is full of completely new releases, though you may have heard some of them in Prydz’s livesets over the past few months. Discs two and three pack the heat with some of Pryda’s older tracks, and includes some new re-edits in addition to our favorites like “Miami to Atlanta,” “Glimma,” and “2night.” You can pre-order the album in the UK for £9.99, but we’re sure it’ll be available on Beatport and / or iTunes as well when it’s released in late May.
Yesterday we tried out our very first liveblog at Robbie Rivera’s amazing Juicy Beach, and today we’re going to take on the biggest show of the week: Ultra. While cellphone service and especially data connections are notoriously terrible at huge events like Ultra, we’re going to do our best to bring you up-to-the-minute updates from Bayfront Park where everything is set to go down.
While Tiesto was holding down the fort at LIV Miami — we just won’t go there — a whole different kind of party was going down right below it at Arkadia. We popped by to check out the cave-like club, and were pleased to catch the end of DJ Perfecto and a very solid set from the Bingo Players. They’ve released a solid string of originals and a few pretty nice remixes since emerging onto the scene, and we were pleased with their solid selection of their own tracks and other big tracks of the moment. Keep reading for the five tracks you need to know from their set.
Yesterday we brought you the first installment of our Ultra Music Festival Survival Guide, an easy way to make sense of the insane list of artists populating Ultra’s eight stages throughout the day. Just in case you lost track of the Survival Guide amid the craziness of our live coverage, we thought we’d give you another heads up before you head to Bayfront Park for day one of Ultra. If you’re not in Miami, don’t fret: we’ll be doing our best to live blog on-site, though we’ll be going up against notoriously terrible cellphone service. We also have a ton of coverage from yesterday to keep you occupied, so look no further.
We told you about Avicii’s Levels all-arena tour earlier in the week, but we thought we’d give you a heads up that tickets are going on sale today, March 23rd, at 10AM on Wantickets. There are a bunch of shows already lined up, including Reliant Arena in Houston, Uno Lakefront Arena in New Orleans, and American Airlines Arena in Miami. We’re told that more shows are going to be added as we near the start date, so be sure to keep an eye out for updates. However, if you’re looking to get in on the Avicii arena action and he’s already coming to your city, our advice is to act fast. Purchase tickets(more…)
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