Burning Man This Year: The Eighties Never Ended

From recent posts, you might get the idea that I think music at Burning Man is all about techno. Actually that's no so. Techno is a huge part, is the dominant genre is the big clubs and the art cars, but there is plenty of other (recorded) music, especially in the smaller clubs, art cars, and during the daytime hours.

What do you hear? Pop music, specifically oldies. Much of it is from the late 1970s and early 1980s, songs I recognized from my junior high and high school years. Especially one hears songs with a good bass line and a danceable beat, not surprisingly.

The artist one hears most at Burning Man is Michael Jackson, by a mile. "Billie Jean" is quite popular, for example. The second most popular artist, by my experience, is Hall and Oates. Yes, you heard me. Burning Man is a big Hall and Oates dance party, among other things.

At one time this would have made me barf---Hall and Oates? But I've long since realized the deep error of my ways about Hall and Oates Burning Man has helped me understand that they were genuises[see note]. The strong bass line and danceability of their songs is impeccable, from the perspective of 2013.

The best oldies dance party of the week that we attended was certainly the annual Apres Ski party, hosted by a Canadian camp using the Apres Ski name. Last year it was one of the highlights in my memory, from early in the week. We went there wearing white (since later we would go to the blacklit-lit rave called the White Party at Opulent Temple). The small courtyard of their camp was buttressed on one end by their large bus. From the top a fan billowed fake snow and a cool breeze in which one could dance. Snow bunnies wore full body suits. We limboed underneath ski polls.

This year the Apres Ski party was just as fun. The bus, and the fake snow, was the same. They also used the same soundtrack of 70s and 80s hits. I recognized a song from the year before, that I had spent the entire year trying to figure out the name of. This year I listened to enough of the lyrics to find out later that the song was "Every 1's a Winner" by Hot Chocolate from 1978.

A couple songs later, I had another flashback when a remix of M's "Pop Music" came into the shuffle.

So what don't you hear at Burning Man? Hard to say, but I went through the entire week without once hearing almost anything from the last fifteen years of pop musical history, except in remixes and dubs by a DJ. You never hear the straight versions of recent releases. At least I didn't. I guess that's part of the "default world."

Special bonus note: Here is the video that turned me into a Hall and Oates fan.