By Max Plenke
Photo: L.E. Baskow
For the past three-odd years, Joe Borusiewicz has had a hand in everything from rave-like events to a monstrous bass show with EDC producer Insomniac to a booking arrangement with Hard Rock Hotel’s nightlife and daylife venues to the Extreme Thing music festival bass stage, which he’ll curate for the third consecutive year this March.
Which is to say, if there’s been a big, absurdly ambitious bass event, all-ages or otherwise, and it’s gone well, it was probably the handiwork of the sultan of thump himself.
“We’ve been leaning into the bass music for a decade-plus, but [before] it wasn’t feasible because the music hadn’t caught on,” he says. “Think of what happens in different genres of rock. When something gets really popular, people reach deeper for things they haven’t heard yet, and that’s when you find what’s good. Now we have the freedom to push this, and we don’t want people to forget where it came from or where it could potentially go.”
At 8:15 p.m. on a Tuesday, I’m standing at the precipice of that potential inside Beauty Bar, where tattooed jocks, recovering hip-hop addicts and synth nerds sit in on the equivalent of a bass-music IT course. About 30 attendees are learning everything from tech to history to politics in 30-minute group mentoring sessions kickstarting Bleach, a monthly promotion created for the betterment of a generation of noise junkies and complemented with a rumbling, late-night DJ party.
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[MARCHVEGAS] – noun 1. “March to Vegas” symbolizes the humanistic tendency to march, migrate, or advance as a deliberate or organized body in a habitual manner back to Las Vegas. 2. Marriage of March Madness and Las Vegas, especially during tournament time. 3. The “MARCHVEGAS 4-day™ Holiday” (March 20 – 23, 2014) – Sign the Petition.