JJ how is the crowd that shows up to U street? I am so sick of the people that show up to Echostage that its not even worth the 3.5 hour drive for me anymore (we only get 2-3 good shows a year in norfolk/VB). If one more drunken bro grabs my girls ass while she is obviously all over MY nuts, I'm gonna get permaband from that place! I haven't been to U street yet but I read an article not that long ago ranking it as the 2nd best sound system in the country, and the artists booked aren't mainstream compared to echostage, so I'm definitely intrigued.
U Street Music Hall's crowd is fantastic. It's really a no-frills place and an entirely different crowd than Echostage. The soundsystem is unbelieveable. Some places think that throwing together a huge visually-imposing stack of speakers passes for quality but it doesn't. The sound quality at UHall is great no matter where you are on the dancefloor and as soon as you step off the dancefloor, the sound level drops. It's so precise it's almost eerie.
Echostage attracts the "BRO...I'M ROLLING SO HARD AND LOVE EDM LIKE WHOA" crowd. I hate to sound pretentious as fuck, but the music at Echostage is really kinda training wheels. It's the accessible mainstream stuff that is what people tend to get into when they have an attention span of a gnat and are just waiting for the drop. UHall's bookings are consistently excellent and because it's a place built BY DJ's FOR DJ's, artists LOVE to play there. The booking philosophy is entirely different. Echostage thinks..."OK, who will bring in a huge amount of dough?" which UHall thinks "OK, who do WE want to see play?".
There is a fundamental difference in that Echostage events are thrown by promoters like Glow who only make money on ticket sales, and the venue owners reap all the bar income. At UHall, there ARE no promoters for the main fri/sat nights. The venue books the artists and therefore keep ticket prices ludicrously low because the bar defrays the costs. People don't go to UHall to be seen. In fact, it's so dark that it's sometimes hard to BE seen. Friday and Saturday nights are typically FREE for 21+ before 11pm or midnight. For example, tomorrow night I'm taking my girlfriend and her best friend to see Magda, DJ Tennis (owner of Life and Death records) and Beautiful Swimmers. We are going to be there before 11pm so the grand total for admission is NOTHING. That's just awesome.
The audience at UHall are made up of a few different groups on most nights. You have the people who grew up in the rave scene, survived, and over the course of time, their tastes have mellowed. Electronic music will always be a huge part of their lives, even after they ditched the UFO pants. Other people are their guests that were convinced to come out and generally have an amazing time. Some are Europeans that are a little better tuned in to electronic music than typical Americans, but not the type that wants VIP table service and stuff. Sometimes people just wander in from U Street and if they are the dry-humping-in-the-middle-of-the-dancefloor type, they get the evil eye and don't come back. It's a pretty self-regulating crowd.
Bottom line, people at Echostage go out for the party and to hit on girls.
People at UHall go out for the music, and know how to be decent humans.
You won't be disappointed. There's a reason for all the accolades it's received
also if i get a script for valium, will it be easy enough to take through with me? doctors note should suffice right?
