On the heels of the extravagant Life in Color electronic dance music (EDM) festival, scenesters are paying close attention to related events in Costa Rica. From the upcoming German DJ… Read more » Continue reading →
On the heels of the extravagant Life in Color electronic dance music (EDM) festival, scenesters are paying close attention to related events in Costa Rica. From the upcoming German DJ Paul Van Dyk’s set at Vertigo to the Envision Festival in the Osa Peninsula and from the psychedelic dance rock party at Best Fest to the proliferation of radio stations and programs dedicated to broadcasting EDM beats, allow trendsetters looking at certain favorable factors in Costa Rica to put her in the running for the elusive title of the next Ibiza.
The Life in Color festival at the Pedregal multipurpose event center in Belen, province of Heredia, had various signs of a world-class EDM party, starting with high-caliber musical acts such as Dimitri Vegas and Like Mike arriving aboard private jets and providing the soundtrack to hours of colorful and hedonistic pursuits. In a way, Life in Color is an emblematic event of the global EDM circuit that chose Costa Rica as one of its select stops, which is something that is happening with greater frequency in this country.
Although great interest in EDM is an essential ingredient of the secret formula that keeps Ibiza at the center of the scene, there are other aspects of the lifestyle that make Costa Rica a suitable heir apparent to the EMD throne: Great year-round weather, a party atmosphere near the beaches, ease of air travel, a somewhat equidistant geographic location to major markets such as North America, South America and Western Europe. What Costa Rica lacks, however, are the gargantuan dance venues of Ibiza; in this regard Las Vegas and Dubai are way ahead of other would-be Ibizas such as Punta del Este in Uruguay, Cyprus, Bali, Romania, Croatia, and other locales.
Major venues suitable for EDM parties in Costa Rica are mostly concentrated in the Central Valley. Vertigo, in San Jose, is where Paul Van Dyk will spin on February 22nd, but it is a tiny venue in comparison to massive clubs such as Space and Amnesia in Ibiza or the Wynn in Las Vegas, but, it is this lilliputian shortcoming that could actually move Costa Rica up the “next Ibiza” charts.
What some EDM industry observers are seeing is a shift towards smaller and more intimate venues. The ecstasy-fueled weekend-long danceathons of the early 21st century are giving way to smaller and more engaging parties such as Peter Hook’s DJ set at Hoxton in December, or Canadian musician Alice Glass of Crystal Castles at Vertigo also in late 2013. The MDMA is still there, but now goes by a different name and appearance, and the urge to dance all night with a throng of sweaty strangers has been replaced by the hispteresque search for after-hour clubs that virtually no one knows about. If San Jose can pull this off, so can beach communities in Guanacaste with vibrant nightlife such as Tamarindo Beach and Playas del Coco, where tired revelers can enjoy Ibiza-like chillout sunrises.
Two other factors often talked about in hushed tones, but nonetheless intrinsic to the scene, include: Pretty women who enjoy the party life and the ready availability of certain mind-altering substances. These two factors are already present in Costa Rica thanks to a different scene made notorious by sex tourists (who, by the way, are not all men).
EDM has been pumping out of state-of-the-art speakers in Ibiza since the late 1970s. It was in 1988, however, when the Spanish island took the absolute EDM crown when New Order’s Peter Hook convinced his band mates to record the groundbreaking and simply perfect Technique album at Mediterranean Studios. The sound board and acoustics may not have been the best choice at the time, but Hook sold the rest of New Order on Ibiza’s warm climate, the studio’s swimming pool, the small (at the time) seaside clubs, and the party atmosphere.
There is no chance in two lifetimes that Costa Rica will ever approach what Ibiza has done for EDM, and as hard as Las Vegas or Dubai may try, they will never be the spiritual-like EDM status of the Balearic jewel. The idea is to provide a destination that provides an Ibiza-style attraction to EDM scenesters. To this effect, Costa Rica is well-positioned to resemble Ibiza circa the Technique era, and we have already attracted Peter Hook once. It may seem an unlikely place, but the same was once said of Ibiza.