5 Things from 2015 that should be left behind.

2015 was an awesome year, however there were a few ‘shitty’ occurances and trends that aren’t exactly worth celebrating. As we turn a new leaf over to 2016, it’s a time to think about the past year and dispose of the things that no longer serve us. It’s natural that trends come and go and in light of this brand new year, we’ve covered a few areas and happenings that we aren’t too fond of seeing (or hearing) this coming year. A couple of days ago, we spoke about 5 things that we’d like to see happen this year, but today we’re going to look the other way round at things that trends that should be left in 2015.

1. People dying from drug-overdoses at festivals
This is seriously one of the most devastating issues going on in the general Australian dance music scene, including hard dance. The big debate about how to approach drug use in Australia should seriously be left to people who know a thing or two about it, not a bunch of old prudent dickheads who have been locked in a chastity belt their entire lives.

Clearly what they’ve been doing for the last 10 years hasn’t worked, so it’s time to take a different, no bullshit approach in order to keep festival goers safe. Countries experiencing these devastating deaths should start reconsidering their legislations and how they educate these people; a suggestion is to take on a harm minimisation approach, let individuals be autonomous about their decisions and of course provide drug and alcohol education.

Nevertheless, we should take care of one another and new strategies should be put into place to prevent these devastating deaths at music festivals.

2. Melodic hardstyle consisting of cheesy pop-like vocals and predictable melodies
Ugh, we’ve had enough of this crap in 2015 – we do NOT need it in 2016. Music should be stimulating and unpredictable and a couple of years ago, melodic/euphoric hardstyle offered so many exciting possibilities, however 2015 was a year where every producer just mucked around with wheels of cheese, high melodies and nauseating vocals. It’s time to bring back that power and hardness that melodic hardstyle used to offer; sure, it doesn’t have to be as ‘hard’ as raw hardstyle, but melodic hardstyle needs that stimulating feel back that gets fans dancing!

Maybe because raw hardstyle has been pushing extremes, euphoric producers feel the need to drift further away from it, but still, if we wanted to listen to pop music we’d just turn on the radio…

This cheese actually looks delicious.

3. Sexism
After Belgian female DJ Mandy was signed to Dirty Workz, the whole internet blew up in flames of abusive and sexism comments toward the [now] 18 year old. Amongst the comments posted to her page and the Dirty Workz channels, many were of a sexist nature, accusing Mandy of sleeping her way into the label. Whilst typing this, I can name a handful of BOYS in hardstyle who work with a ghost producer. Do these guys cop abuse online? No, they don’t, so why should females cop it all? Another incident I must bring up is Frontliner’s remarks about females in the DJ Mag Top 100; let’s hope that comments like that aren’t repeated in 2016 and we can see some more gender equality in the scene.

Hard dance has always boasted a tight-knit community that’s built on mutual love for the music and respect for each other; it’d be a shame to see that fade away. Everybody deserves equal respect, regardless of gender.

4. Line-ups that play it ‘safe’
In my personal opinion, hard dance music is popular enough for promoters to start taking risks on their line-ups and putting names on there that deserve to take the next step in their career. I don’t know how people expect new names to build up a fan-base if they’re rarely exposed to an opportunity to do so.

Another thing is; promoters do somewhat have the power to shape fans perceptions about which artists are ‘hot.’ For example, if an artist is constantly booked for mainstages, fans attending that event will have the assumption that they are a ‘top’ name. I’m sure that alongside my own opinion there are others who agree that line-ups nowadays are so fucking predictable. It’s really time that organisations start testing out those wildcards and offer them new opportunities to rise, otherwise it becomes extremely demotivating them, especially if they work hard in the studio.

5. “Bedroom producers” being critical on signed producers music
Don’t you just love seeing unsigned talents critiquing an expert producers’ music online as if they have more knowledge and experience? If one things for sure, Facebook is not anonymous and if these young producers ever expect to gain respect from labels and organisations then continuously criticising the work of big names isn’t the way to go. Of course everyone is entitled to their own opinion and it’s totally fine to voice your disappointment, but let’s face it, I’m pretty sure that Wildstylez knows a hell of a lot more than some random guy on the internet who claims to be a producer.

People working within labels do read what people write on Facebook; I’m sure that they’ll be pretty hesitant to sign somebody who’s constantly commenting “Oh but I’m a producer and I think that this could be better, you should do this and fix the kick, oh and this, I do this in my tracks.”

Another thing that we don’t want to see are “shit comments.” By shit comments, I mean simple comments that say things like “THIS IS FUCKING GAY,” “THIS SUCKS” “ew” “what a shit track,” giving no real or useful feedback to the artist. This has got to stop, if you don’t like somebody’s track and don’t have anything useful to say then don’t say anything.

These were just some of the few “NOPE’S” that shouldn’t be happening this year. Let’s hope that we can leave the negative behind in 2015 and focus on new developments in hard dance music this coming year.