Does anyone remember going to underground rock/rave shows at warehouses?
Used to be a thing back in the 90s/00s.
@atomicpoet I used to DJ at them and help organise them - we'd scout out the warehouses (usually abandoned ones) and prepare them a few days/weeks in advance, finding electricity supplies etc (someone managed to get a load of service head fuses). It all got too much after about 2006/07 as cops started clamping down harder due to edgelord lads hyped up on toxic masculinity vandalising the buildings when there was no need to do so (especially as you could otherwise use them more than once)
@vfrmedia That's what I remember too. They were fun when it really was about the music. But once certain people made it about something else (usually drugs or getting laid or something like that), that's when it became untenable.
@atomicpoet in the end we got way too many middle class, white libertarian edgelords on the scene, which was also being funded by drugs sales, particularly ketamine which doesn't improve your thinking skills and can wreck your body - this made things much worse in the long term (especially as cops/detectives and other authorities were becoming more clued up and streetwise compared to the somewhat naïve Boomers who previously were in charge)
@atomicpoet as everywhere outside big cities in England is highly car dependent and its a 1-3 year driving ban if caught (or licence revoked for young drivers) that discourages a lot of people from attending these events, but unfortunately the change in the law was prompted by a lot of midweek collisions involving sleep deprived party people (often on the drive to work early on Mondays) from mid 2000s onwards..
@atomicpoet meth never got that popular in UK, but we did get strong amfetamine mostly from Eastern Europe with all the other stuff (what really pissed me off was burned out ravers becoming more and more xenophobic, oblivious to where their party supplies were coming from!) Some events still happen but they are closed down quicker and since 2015 cops have new laws against drug driving which mean people can be busted even 3 days later for remnants in their bloodstream even if they are sober >>