Derek Plaslaiko, 2015 (6:00 PM EDT)

Sam Fotias

Derek has been a close friend of Paxahau for almost 20 years. He ALWAYS plays a great set and brings his A-game to every performance. This particular set was a bit of a homecoming, as he had his recently-wedded wife with him and his baby son, who he joyfully hoisted up during his set and showed to a loving and enthusiastic home crowd. It was a very heartwarming and endearing moment that could have only happened here.

Derek Plaslaiko

To get myself in the right head space beforehand, I was just going through my thumb drive, and I was like, “What am I going to open with?” Then I found the coin toss scene from No Country for Old Men, so I thought that would be a cool thing to start with, while I figured out what’s going to come after that. I let it go for a little bit too long. I don’t remember what was happening at that time that made me think that was a good idea, but yeah, I played almost the whole thing, and then snapped in the newest John Tejada record that was blowing my mind at the time, called “Dramamine.”

Typically at the festival you start looking out at the crowd and see people that you haven’t seen in years, dancing and being really happy. Looking to my left, there was my wife and my son, who was 16 months old at the time. It always is emotional, but then looking out and seeing him there, too... Near the end of the set, I was starting to well up a little bit and I was just like, “You know what? Screw it,” and went and pulled him up on stage. I just wanted him to see what his daddy was seeing from the stage.