The Vibe Industry: Music, Affect, and Materiality at EDM Festivals

Abstract

In electronic dance music cultures (EDMCs), the concept of vibe is ubiquitous. It is at once multiply defined and discursively legible. It is a synthesis of the subjective and collective experiences of festival participants, performers, and production crew members. These vibe-makers appraise EDM events on the extent to which a vibe is present or absent, and generate social intimacy by discussing the transient qualities of that vibe. Qualities that are perpetually renegotiated. For many members of EDMCs, vibe is an affective adhesive. It is the connective tissue that binds the temporary community of the festival, as well as the enduring communities that emerge. As an object of study, vibe is beautifully messy. It is inherently dynamic, relational, and contextual. In that vibe represents a synthesis of material, sonic, and social conditions, attempting a precise definition of vibe would be impossible, and as I argue, unproductive. I am concerned with the poetics of vibe, and the stories of its authors. Five chapters offer an ethnographically galvanized tableau that highlights the conditions in which something like a vibe can emerge, as well as the affordances and ruptures that result from such emergence. My work formally took shape during five US festivals between 2021 and 2025, but leverages nearly 30 years of experience in a variety of roles within EDMCs. It shares in the lives of DJs, music producers, production crew members, promoters, and participants who continuously move and are moved by the material, sonic, and social conditions of/for vibe within the context of what I call The Vibe Industry. I argue that vibe, while hard to pin down, remains the core organizing principle of EDM festivals, the foremost motivation for the labor and participation of the members of EDMCs, and plays a critical role in the contentious relationship of EDMCs with commercialization.