This is Part 2 of our episode with Baseck, as part of our collaborationg with Holly Dicker and her book, Dance or Die. We pick up where episode 1 left off, with Baseck discussing his later journey in the hardcore rave scene, the formation of L.A. crew Dark Matter Soundsystem and his transition from turntablism to using drum machines and modular synths. We talk about his collaborations with Boys Noize, AG Cook and Lady Gaga, his favorite sounds and gear and the resurgence of trance. We also talk about talk about creativity, community and the meaning of this music and culture, plus fun stuff like Terminator, arpeggiators and the mall! This is part two of a two-part episode, hosted by Vivian Host aka Star Eyes. For more info and extras, visit Ravetothegrave.org or Instagram @ravetothe.grave.

In this special collaborative episode with Dance or Die, I'm talking to Derrick Estrada, better known in the worlds of breakcore, hardcore, jungle and sonic synthesis as Baseck. Baseck was raised in Lancaster, California halfway between the Angeles National Forest and the Mojave Desert. As a youth he became intoxicated by car bass test CDs, scratch records, jungle mixtapes, gangster rap, and illegal raves. Put this all in a blender with DIY punk, Chicano subculture and a battle mentality and you get halfway to what Baseck is about. Sometimes Baseck is playing wild shows that combine turntablism, live hardware, modded gameboys and thrash vocals; sometimes he is throwing raves, designing clothes, doing noise shows at the museum, or making synth modules. He's collaborated with Boys Noize, Charli XCX, A.G. Cook and Zach de la Rocha and recorded for too many labels to name. He calls in from his current home in Tulsa, Oklahoma to talk about cutty L.A. raves, Midwest hardcore, sonic transformation and how he became a warrior of the breaks. This is part one of a two part episode, hosted by Vivian Host aka Star Eyes. For more info and extras, visit Ravetothegrave.org or Instagram @ravetothe.grave.

In this special collaborative episode with Dance or Die, Holly Dee sits down with Siuli Ko in the Netherlands. Siuli has been integral to the Dutch free party rave scene since its late '80s acid punk beginnings. From fronting the noisy DIY group MINIGOD to organising some of The Hague’s first basement raves, Siuli was a rebel youth with a diehard love for music and bringing people together beneath the blinding flash of a strobe. Whilst living in one of Holland’s most famous squats and self-managed social centres, Blauwe Aanslag, she organised the infamous Acid Planet parties in the basement where Unit Moebius and the Bunker label forged their cantankerous acid techno punk sound. Linking up with the newly exiled Spiral Tribe in the early ‘90s, she helped establish the Network 23 distribution network, selling records out of her home and on the European teknival circuit, and launching her own labels Grijs and Nocturnal State a.o. to support local talents. Four decades in, Siuli is still playing vinyl and raving, bringing years of free party praxis into her current practice producing multimedia exhibitions and festivals in The Hague. Hosted by Vivian Host (aka DJ Star Eyes). For more info and extras, visit Ravetothegrave.org or Instagram @ravetothe.grave.

This episode kicks off our collaborative mini-series with Dance or Die on hardcore and what better way to start the whole thing than by talking to Holly Dicker aka Holly Dee. Holly is a music journalist and raver who has devoted over a decade to covering the history of hardcore while working for places like Resident Advisor, Boiler Room, Tresor and PRSPCT Records. Then she spent four years of blood, sweat and tears writing Dance or Die, a book that traces the history and evolution of hardcore electronic music. Holly and I talk about her formative experiences from renegade UK drum 'n' bass bunker raves to free tekno parties, breakcore squats and Dutch gabber mega-raves. We also discuss the cornerstones of hardcore, compare notes as rave journalists, discuss changing visual and surveillance culture and explore current women-led, queer and inclusive hardcore movements. Hosted by Vivian Host (aka DJ Star Eyes). For more info and extras, visit Ravetothegrave.org or Instagram @ravetothe.grave.

Rave to the Grave podcast with Hervé Kalongo and San Farafina of Montreal’s Moonshine Crew. The post-border interdisciplinary collective talks about their journey from throwing full-moon loft parties in 2014 to wild international events in Kinshasa, Abidjan, Dar Es Salaam, Lisbon, Paris and beyond. We discuss the collective’s ethos, the music of Africa and the African diaspora and building a brand, creative hub and party institution. Plus we hear how not even power cuts, traffic, police and giant insects can keep them from a party, and we discuss our run-ins with Game of Thrones characters at the rave.

Rave to the Grave podcast with HAAi, the Aussie-born, London-based DJ & producer known for her eclectic, psychedelic take on techno. Topics include wild rave locations, drug trips, fat pants, dinosaur energies and doof sticks; how she selects records and going B2B with The Blessed Madonna, plus her forthcoming record HUMANISE on Mute.

Part two of our interview with legendary house music DJ/producer Junior Sanchez, who tells us rave stories from New York, New Jersey, Boston, Miami and Ibiza from the late 90s until now.

Part of one of our interview with legendary house music DJ/producer Junior Sanchez, who tells us rave stories from New York, New Jersey, Boston, Miami and Ibiza from the early 90s until now.

Vancouver’s Stacey Forrester, head of harm reduction at Bass Coast Festival, joins us for a frank and fun chat about drugs and harm reduction at festivals and beyond.

We head to Perth, Western Australia to catch up with Paul Harding aka El Hornet, one-third of drum 'n' bass group Pendulum. CB radio, surfing with sharks, trading beer for mixtapes, losing a dead person at a Pendulum show, happy hardcore, the Hornet’s Nest and so much more.

Bass Coast Festival co-founder and Canadian DJ The Librarian on the ins and outs of throwing an indie festival, vibe management and partying in British Columbia.

pMoshe Kasher has been a flyering bear, a sober ecstasy dealer, a sign language interpreter, a Bay Area raver and a gate monitor at Burning Man. He is now a stand-up comedian living in Los Angeles.

When 1980s electro and freestyle music from Miami, New York, and Los Angeles touched down in Rio de Janeiro and other Brazilian cities, it ignited a wildfire in the minds of DJs, soundsystem operators, and dancers. In this episode of Rave to the Grave podcast, we go back to the roots of baile funk with Priscilla “House of Pris” Cavalcante. Priscilla grew up in Fortaleza in Northeast Brazil, where as a pre-teen she became hooked on first-wave baile funk. Priscilla now lives in Miami, Florida, where she throws a party called Proibidae and is in the process of collecting and reissuing the lost anthems of 1990s and early 2000s baile funk. We talk about tamborzao, furaçao, pancadao, and hear some of the samples and records that formed the sound.

McKenzie Wark is an Australian born writer, critical theory professor, and 61-year-old trans-femme techno raver currently living in NYC. Her latest book, Raving, thinks deeply about dancing, dissociation, drugs, bodies, and identity as McKenzie, recently transitioned, navigates the queer techno spaces of Bushwick, Brooklyn. On the line from Berlin, we talk about experimenting with language and writing, bodies and the beat, smart vs. stupid drugs, cultural theory, rave utopias, and McKenzie's extraordinary journey from growing up in an Australian mining town to dancing on the bleeding edge of the NYC underground.

Seana Gavin is a London-based visual artist who spent 10 years immersed in the free party culture in the UK and beyond, traveling to week-long parties in the Czech countryside, the mountains above Marseille, or Berlin squats with soundsystems like Spiral Tribe, Bedlam, Desert Storm, and Hekate. Her photos and diary entries of the adventures of these roving cyberpunks are collected in books like Spiral Baby and Spiralling, and we sat down to talk about border crossing, squat raves, politics, drugs, freedom, and just how dirty things can get.

In part 2 of our interview with rave icon Flapjack the Kandi Kid, we talk renegade Burning Man, the business of EDM, the importance of DIY art and culture, haunted weed, and get treated to a steaming handful of wild party stories, including a trilogy of poop-related bad trips. Hosted by Vivian Host (aka @stareyezzz).

In Part 1 of a two-part interview, L.A. DJ, rave archivist, and pied piper fo the underground (happy) hardcore scene, talks about DIY ideals, sacred objects of ’90s rave, EDM festivals, kandi kids, and more. Hosted by @stareyezzz. Follow us at @ravetothe.grave.

Elijah of Butterz on UK Grime History, Bad DJ Gigs, and How to Run a Successful Brand

Noncompliant (fka DJ Shiva) is an uncompromising queer techno DJ/producer from the conservative state of Indiana. We talk Midwest raves, speaker freaking, phone taps, mixtapes, sci-fi and more.

Kurt Eckes put Milwaukee on the map in the ’90s with his Drop Bass Network parties and Even Furthur festival. In Part Two of this interview, he talks to Rave to the Grave podcast about Satanism and rituals, how to throw a rave, the craziest stories from Furthur, the RAVE Act, the Drop Bass label and Midwest hard acid, plague raves and starting a Kult.