Gil Perez/ Onionskn

Candyland at Avalon

Seven Lions, Flinch and Candyland
Avalon Hollywood
May 17th, 2013

An abundance of young dubstep/electro aficionados and the stench of cigarette smoke dominated at Avalon in Hollywood on Friday night as the Santa Barbara native Seven Lions (born Jeff Montalvo) unleashed a slew of original tracks and remixes carefully spliced with everything from dubstep, trance, electro and progressive house. Despite playing three shows in three different states in just 24 hours, Montalvo was all business and completely on point as he headbanged with a mop of long, brown throughout his entire set. The 19-and-over "CONTROL Fridays" crowd went wild for Seven Lions' Avalon debut as well as opening acts At Dawn We Rage, Candyland and Flinch. Being that it was also promoter/artist manager Ryan Jaso's birthday, everyone was in attendance including Skrillex, Peacetreaty and Whiiite and there was plenty of cake throwing shenanigans to go along with the epic beats.

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Jeff Allen / Trilogy Events

MAKJ at the Yost Theater

MAKJ
Yost Theater
May 11, 2013

On Friday night, Mackenzie Johnson, better known by his stage name MAKJ, made his Yost Theater debut in downtown Santa Ana. The 22 year-old DJ and Icon Collective producing school graduate has quickly risen in the EDM ranks with mash-ups, bootlegs and originals that were quickly supported by the likes of Tiësto, Afrojack and Nicky Romero. Recently just headlining the Eco Village stage at Ultra Music Festival in Miami an playing the infamous Juicy Beach alongside Juicy Music owner Robbie Rivera, MAKJ continued his momentum this weekend, bringing his electro house sound to OC with opening support from OC-based DJ Henry Fong.

The pedigree he showed at the Yost was developed through some solid teaching early in his career. MAKJ met the late DJ AM through mutual friends DJ Marshall Barnes and DJ Politik in 2008. Mentored by AM, he learned the art of scratching and deejaying to diverse crowds and through a blend of different genres. He developed his own take on EDM, employing his hip-hop influences, signature edits to classics and remixes which quickly caught on to some of the biggest names in dance music. "I was making tracks that were very easy to use," Johnson said in an interview prior to his set. "They could play it everywhere, from a bar mitzvah to XS in Las Vegas." Learning a lot about producing format, arrangement and what the biggest DJ's like Mackenzie combined his deejaying skills to create his alter ego, MAKJ.

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Matt Oliver / OC Weekly

Sander Van Doorn

EDM is a tough genre to stay on top of, even for the most devout kandi kid. The explosion of festivals like Electric Daisy Carnival, the abundance of DJ residencies and tours around the world and the mammoth popularity of sites like Beatport, its not always easy to decipher between the next big star and the flavor of the month. Many change their musical styles and every popular DJ has their own world tour now. Not to mention the slew of young new producers dominating YouTube views and the Beatport charts.

In an effort to make things easy for you, we've scouted out a few of the names you should definitely keep track of during the summer so you can stalk their Sound Cloud pages, learn their backgrounds and memorize their tour schedules. Once festival season took off, we traveled to Miami for Ultra and then came back to town for Coachella and interviewed the top three EDM artists you should definitely start paying attention to right now.

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Jorge Meza / OC Weekly

Armin Van Buuren at the Sold Out Palladium

Armin Van Buuren
The Palladium
May 3, 2013

This weekend, the super-star DJ/producer Armin Van Buuren launched his highly anticipated tour for his new album Intense at the legendary Hollywood Palladium. Armin chose Los Angeles ,believe it or not, even after his famed "A State of Trance" radio show is broadcast through more than 62 radio stations to 52 different countries and has an average of 20 million listeners each week. Naturally the show, put on by Van Buuren's Armada label and through Insomniac Events, sold out in less than five minutes--proving that trance is still a major player in the North American "EDM" craze. With opening act Antillas and a slew of live singers joining Armin, the evening proved to be worth the wait as fans got a preview of what to expect when he comes back for his famed "Armin Only" experience.

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Shannon Nehls / OC Weekly

April has come and gone and spring time is officially here. For most of us in Orange County this means great summer weather, beach days, bikinis and world renowned electronic dance music artists making their way through our city week after week. Since most of us are gearing up for the 17th annual Electric Daisy Carnival this means lots of free time to make our way to Las Vegas pool parties, but why not save yourself the drive and enjoy some of this summer's top shows right here in your own backyard? Rummaging through the over-saturation of EDM shows every week, we did put together a list of the five best EDM music shows this month--including some of dance music's biggest legends and the most up -and-coming artist who should be on your radar.

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[UPDATE: As if the HARD festivals weren't surpassing epic proportions as it is, it was leaked this morning via Rusko's Facebook page that there will be a HARD stage at this years Electric Daisy Carnival. More info at the bottom of the post]
With the announcement of the HARD Summer line-up last week, we couldn't help but notice how much they have outdone themselves in terms of bringing the most in the now, up and coming and sought after talent today with a diverse line-up featuring everyone from Dog Blood, Flux Pavillion, 2 Chainz, Empire of the Sun to Baauer. Since 2007 founder Gary Richards, also known by his stage name Destructo, has supplied world renowned acts to his festivals and today he is the only major music festival promoter in Los Angeles. Booking everything from electro, dubstep, live bands, techno and even hip & hop, Richards has helped bring EDM artist like Justice, Deadmau5 and Basement Jaxx to the spotlight.

See Also: HARD Summer 2013 Lineup Announced

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The Eric Prydz protege Fehrplay actually began making music with his first computer at the age of 12. Born Jonas Von Der Fehr, the Norwegian DJ and producer started off listening to trance and then progressed to more funky house stuff in the early Axwell days. Once he found the more progressive side of dance music via Eric Prydz it inspired him to start producing and move to Manchester, England to study music four years ago. His first track, "Meow," was signed by Ministry of Sound and got airplay on the critically acclaimed Pete Tong radio show. Soon he joined the elite record label roster of Pryda Friends and has since embarked on his first US Tour bringing the same dark, sexy feel to the club as Prydz. It makes it's way to the Yost Theater this Saturday April 27th alongside LA local favorite Paul Ahi.

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Timothy Norris

This year's lineup for Hard Summer is out. Headliners include Knife Party, Duck Sauce, Dog Blood (ie Skrillex and Boys Noize), and Bassnectar

This sixth annual edition of the two-day, EDM-focused festival takes place in downtown's Los Angeles State Historic Park on August 3 and 4, 2013.

The full line-up and a promotional video -- starring lots of dogs -- is below.

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Courtesy of Jorge Meza Photography

Bingo Players (missing one) at the Sahara Tent

Amidst the crazy sea of hipsters, hippies, old folks, pre-teens and babies(!), the first weekend of Coachella was also packed with EDM revelers ready to get their fist-pumping music fix over the course of the three day bacchanal. In fact it seems that dance music lovers are growing in numbers so much that every other car in line at the campgrounds checking in on Thursday was blasting some sort of EDM anthem. The festival even dedicated a new stage to the more underground side of house music in the form of the new Yuma Tent this year. So now that we've come home briefly from the dust storms and nursed our massive hangovers, it's time to reflect on the top five EDM Coachella highlights for weekend one.

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Jon Pegnato aka Hot Mouth

Jon Pegnato has carried on by his DJ moniker Hot Mouth since he left the electro duo LA Riots almost a year and a half ago. But really, the project started about five years prior, before the LA native joined powerhouse EDM duo LA Riots and became the whirlwind success that he never saw coming.

Eager to continue his career as his own solo act and get back to the dream he originally created, Pegnato has been busy in the studio focusing on his own original productions and finding time to have fun as a touring DJ. Coming straight from his four gigs and 10 days of heavy partying at WMC, Pegnato is showcasing his skills as a taste-maker and all around hilarious dude at the Yost Theater in downtown Santa Ana for White Rabbit's "Havoc Thursdays." We got a chance to speak to Pegnato as he walked around his LA neighborhood and talked our ears off about his wild days as a kid, how he came up with Hot Mouth and where his music is headed.

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