EDM stands for electronic dance music. Personally and historically, I am and have been a baroque music fan, but some nights call for EDM. Saturday was such a night – Elvis is singing “Such a Night, ooh what a night it was, it really was,’’ in my head right now which gives you a glimpse into my musical mind. Saturday night was Igloo Fest in Montréal. Igloo Fest is an outdoor EDM party on the pier in the Old City. I don’t remember how it happened, but we heard about it and had to go.
What the hell? Why the fuck not? These are the kinds of questions that preface many activities this time of year in these temperatures in this part of New England. It’s true. Why the fuck not?
Montréal is vibrant and alive and filled with people of all genders and musical tastes who know how to do winter with verve and panache. Dancing outdoors at night in the snow is the perfect demonstration of what it means to be Quebecois.
And for a night we were. We rented our favorite Airbnb in the Gay Village the night before and laid low in preparation for the big Igloo. We stayed in, read books, and had an early supper of pasta and wine. I should preface this supper note by saying that January has been a gluten-free, dairy-free, dry month for me with the following caveat: these freedoms must not make me an asshole – not to myself or to my friends. Thus, I allow myself Gluten and Dairy and Wine whenever I am a guest or out of the country. And so, I am 90% gluten-free and dairy-free, and only semi-dry, but some fine champagnes are semi-dry, so I am in semi-good company.
On the couch Friday night, I practiced my French whilst arguing with Babble on my iPhone. Je vais passer l’aspirateur. I will vacuum the appartement. J’aspirerai les ordures. I will take out the garbage. My husband says I have a great accent. I say merci, it’s the vocabulary I lack. My ‘great’ accent gets me into trouble: those hearing me assume que je parle francais. Mais c’est seulement presque vrais. It’s only almost true. I am able to ask for parking or for wine (I was out of the country after all), I’m able to order vegetarian food, make sure my allergic friend doesn’t get peanuts in his dinner, not get a plastic bag at the grocery store…stuff like that.
It turns out I am also able to dance to electronic music outdoors in the snow. Un petit vin rouge s’il vous plait. I ordered a small red wine from one of the many kiosks at the Igloo Fest. {If you are hearing this story and not reading it, you will not know that my spellchecker is now spellchecking me in French. My French is that good, apparently. Ha!}
Back to the dancing! We dressed in long johns and jeans, extra socks, scarves, down coats and hats, insulated boots and headed down to the Pier. In our exuberance, John and I got there unfashionably early. At 7:30.
Sure. We were the only people there at that ungodly hour. All the other EDM dancers were home dropping Molly and drinking Vodka Red Bulls in their hotel rooms, but there we were on the pier, totally amped.
We sipped wine and played games in the igloo-tented outdoor video arcade until the music started. At the smaller stage, a young woman with long dreadlocks and a white balaclava was at the helm, spinning (I don’t even know if that is the right word for what she was doing) the tunes. She was amazing, encouraging us with her mittened black-power fist pumping circles in the air. More. More. More. More dancing. We obliged under huge, wet snowflakes reflecting a colorful laser light show.
The music was surprisingly delightful. A driving bass made the foundation for repeated crescendos of energetic melodic waves, the tops of which were so exciting, the crowd jumped as one into the snowy air on the down beat of each new plateau. Who knew such a simple repeated pulsation could generate such frenzy?
Wait a minute. I get it. EDM is the rhythm of climactic sex! Wow! That’s perfect. Dancing, even before this realization, was so delightful, I experienced such bliss that a nearby dancer asked me for drugs.
“As-tu des drogues? As-tu de l’extase? I smiled and laughed harder than I have laughed in a long time.
“Pas des drogues,” I said. “Voulez-vous un petit vin rouge? »