Electronic Dance Music – EDM. A pretty new genre of music and everybody has a different opinion on it. I honestly like most genres of music. My iTunes consists of a lot, including Tim McGraw, John Mayer, Kanye West, the Grease soundtrack, Flo Rida, Don McLean, Snails, The Police, The Weeknd, Dillion Francis, and so many other artists. I got into EDM through the mainstream songs, like Calvin Harris and Tiesto. I enjoyed the songs, but I wasn’t obsessed.

Living in Las Vegas, I am very fortunate to have the original EDC (Electric Daisy Carnival), take place less than a half hour drive from my house. EDC is a three night EDM festival (or rave) that happens from sunset to sunrise. There are numerous stages to listen to DJs on and many carnival rides around the grounds. There’s plenty of food and drinks and you have to be 18 or older to attend. Four years ago if you asked me about EDC, I would have told you it sounded like an insane place, and not the good kind of insane either. Over 100,000 people in one area, half naked, shoulder to shoulder in the middle of the Vegas summer. I’m talking lows in the 90s. A packed parking lot that comes alive at sunrise with tens of thousands of people trying to head back to their hotel rooms to sleep the rest of the day away. Didn’t sound like a good time to me.

Then in the summer of 2014, my friend talked me into going for one night. Thankfully one of my best friends who is just as adventurous as me wanted to come too. We had zero idea what to expect, but we decided to dive right into the EDC culture. We spent the night before decking out cheap bras in cheaper flowers and jewels and we made all sorts of kandi (the beaded wristbands). The day comes and we realized we had hot glued flowers to the stretchy part of our bras, unable to fit into them comfortably. We also didn’t realize our kandi was supposed to stretch well to trade with other ravers – ours did not stretch. It was pretty funny.

I had gone to check it out, with a pre-existing thought that it would be lame and not my cup of tea. I was so wrong. Walking in was so cool, everything was lit up and moving. People had on awesome outfits and workers were on unique floats and stilts. The music was awesome, my company was great, and everything was so new to me. That night I met so many cool and amazing people. Raves aren’t just an excuse to party and get trashed; these people were coming together over the love they have of the music. People from all walks of life had traveled to that festival to share a similar interest and to bond through music. They were promoting peace, love, unity, and respect. Everyone was so nice. My mind was blown and I was disappointed I had only gone one night that weekend.

After that I started to go to different music festivals throughout the year: Nocturnal, Hard Summer, Coachella, Life is Beautiful. I guess you could consider me a raver, even though I never would have pictured myself as one. Although the places and artists were different, the kind and amazing group of people were the same.

EDC 2015 I went with a different group of friends, but the feelings were all the same. I was excited and fortunate to be there. That time I went all three nights, and After spending all weekend on the festival grounds, my body was aching. Staying up all night dancing is rough. I didn’t go to EDC 2016 because I was in Peru, with the same friend who had gone to EDC with me our first year. I sold my ticket to a friend and even though I was doing and seeing awesome things in Peru, a little part of me still wished I was at EDC.

This summer I hadn’t planned to go. I was getting older, maybe I should leave the rave to the younger people. Last minute though my boyfriend said he was going and, of course, I couldn’t miss out! We went two out of the three nights and had a blast under the electric sky. Who knows if I will be there next year, but I do know giving it a chance gave me a whole new outlook on the rave scene. What I thought was crazy and lame turned out to be crazy fun. Now I know to always be open to new experiences, even if they’re out of my comfort zone. I already have Coachella tickets for next year and plan on going to Electric Forest in 2018. Hopefully Burning Man will be in my future as well (: