“The DJ is the most important thing in music right now," will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas said in Miami on Saturday as the throb of the Ultra Music Festival vibrated the press tent around him. “In Europe, Australia, Brazil, Los Angeles and New York, electronic dance music really has this new inspirational energy. It reminds me of what hip-hop was in the 1980s."
The Peas chose Ultra, the massive, two-day flagship finale of the annual Winter Music Conference, to play “Boom Boom Pow," their new beat-driven single, being released digitally today.
In terms of A-list talent in Miami, they weren't alone: Although DJs and dance-music mavens have been flocking to the WMC for decades now, this year hip- hop was in the house.
Producer Timbaland DJ'ed on Ultra's main stage Saturday. Diddy -- who has been threatening to make a trance album for at least seven years now -- had a spin-off against Felix da Housecat at the Miami Beach nightclub Cameo on Friday night.
The Miami locale draws an impressively international crowd to WMC week, as indicated by the united nations of flags waved by Ultra revelers. “The people that come to this conference are clued up from four corners of the world," said Roni Size, the drum-and- bass pioneer who played with his live band Reprazent on Friday night, their first U.S. show in seven years, a stellar Ultra highlight.
One of the festival's founders and promoters, Russell Faibisch, said 50,000 people attended Friday night, 60,000 on Saturday.
Unfortunately, not every veteran on the bill was as creatively dynamic as Size. Such headlining DJs as Armin Van Buuren, Tisto and Paul Van Dyk trotted out the same tired techno and trance beats. Van Dyk did introduce a new single, “Home," that, true to its title, had an unusually warm house-music feel and operatic pop vocal.
