Skrillex
Mohawk, Friday, March 16Dudes. Bros. Chaos. Skrillex. Neon. Tank tops. Drunk kids and out-of-place moms. Passed-out ravers and tatted-up punk kids with their hands in the air. Girls who probably left the house before their dads saw what they were wearing. Janky crew cuts and strobing light sticks. Fence-hoppers and 16-year-olds, mad 16-year-olds, too many 16-year-olds. Mohawk needed all the space it just built when Skrillex, the most unfathomably popular DJ in the world today, brought his dubstep legions out for an AM Only showcase that reached full capacity well before the diminutive DJ took to the stage. Holding court alongside his mentor, 12th Planet, Skrillex didn’t DJ so much as press play and jump around. He actually spent more time raising toasts and hugging friends than he did twisting knobs, not that anyone cared or noticed. That mouth-open-eyes-to-the-sky exultation was about all you got from the hordes upon hordes of devotees, some of whom, like one father chaperoning his teenaged son (“I could have been in Cabo San Lucas”), arrived at 6pm to beat the lines. Was it worth it? Depends on which generation you fall into. Does anybody know the names to any of these songs? You’d be hard-pressed.
This article appears in March 16 • 2012.