it was a lot cooler in the early 90s when only a few tracks used the “drop the bass” sample. then came edm and dubstep and their bass drops and, well, they ruined it a little. thankfully we have almost 30 years of radness to back us up! haha.

out on the west coast there’s two names that have always been and will always be the coolest of all. i’m talking about Hardkiss and Wicked . man, even typing those words makes

back in the 90s i loved the west coast house sound. it was rooted in the UK acid house vibes and it showed. it had substance, but more importantly it sounded great on substances. make no mistake, this was mindfuck music as much as it was dance music. one of the single greatest collection of tracks ever is Hardkiss’ “Delusion of Grandeur” . check it out if you haven’t, my favorite is track 11 Top Secret Track.

however, this spotlight is about Wicked , not Hardkiss. that’s the thing. we tried so many times to get Wicked out here, but never could so we ended up bringing Hardkiss more. the Wicked crew, made up of Jeno, Thomas, Markie, and Garth, did things differently. they didn’t just fly to this gig or that gig, they traveled on an old Greyhound bus around the country doing tours with a custom built Turbosound rig. btw that rig in front of your face in the main tent is Turbosound. anyway, if a promoters next event lined up, then great. if not, maybe next year. St. Louis promoters always seemed to line up. lucky them.

well now we’re the lucky bastards! after all these years of trying, after realizing they’re back, even though they didn’t really leave, we are FINALLY able to bring a Wicked dj to our part of the Midwest. even better it’s for an event like Furthur, which was totally inspired by their groundwork. we get to show one of them how we do it! so bring your A+ game to the main tent. side props, Wade Hampton was doing beach parties on Lake Superior with these west coast cats long ago.

there’s always chatter about “who” started this thing called rave here in the US. the fact of the matter is Wicked was living the Summers of Love in the UK in 88 and 89, while making recon trips to the west coast. then in 90/91 they moved to San Francisco and started the renegade sound system scene . in our world their full moon parties are where it all began.

so how is it a hardcore promoter is this excited about house music? just listen. we’re so excited in fact that we asked Garth to close the main stage Friday night for 2 hours, or as long as it takes to tell his story. we didn’t wait this long for something this special to not do it proper.

the story on this booking is these guys are so humble they don’t even have agents, or the ones that do are that same from 25 years ago we’ve talked to so many times. the stars have aligned. honestly, it would be great if it was the stars on the beach of Lake Superior like Wade used to do, but this is literally close enough.