They answered our prayers, yet we didn’t even bother showing up.
When word first came around to me about the idea of this ground-breaking event, I couldn’t help but be completely extatic about the entire concept. I mean, what have been the issues we have been looking to address in this culture for the previous years? Decent venues in which to spend our nights out, and a drop of respect from mainstream culture and media.
I believed Renaissance would be a stepping stone to bringing some of those aspects to our embattled scene. To some extent it was, however to a greater extent it was not.
The actual event itself was well drawn out and executed with precision. The helpful staff and abundant staff of Roy Thompson Hall fitted quite perfectly with the elegant building to which they were employed.
Ryan was quoted in The Toronto Star on Friday as this being an event catered to the 21+ crowd. And from what I saw, it most certainly was. The attendees took the dress code to heart and showed up with a degree of sass and sophistication. Although it would seem even with age and maturity, a great deal of people seemed to forget to leave their lavish drug lifestyles to their wreckless youth.
After a slow start at the tables, DJ Heather rocked the joint in her last 30 minutes at the tables. The ‘house’ area was stagged in the lobby, right across from the out door “lets see if we can finish a smoke in less than 4 minutes before we freeze our asses off” area. Big daddy Sneak hit the decks as excepted at 3:15 and blessed us all with the funky sassy ass over-the-top house we know and love him for. Sound in both rooms was golden and crisp, nothing less would of been acceptable of course. I had some seriously issues trying to get anything together on the carpeted dance floor, which mostly consisted of me tripping over my own feet for most of the night.
Attendance must of been somewhere between 500-700. That is a lax judgement call, I couldn’t exactly put my finger on an amount with everyone being spread out throughout RTH. Not to mention there it seemed like a 2:1 ratio of staff per guest.
This leads me right into the biggest shame of the night, and its directed to the party scene of Toronto.
What the hell is the matter with you?
We as a community have been screaming out of our ears for years for an event like this to be put in motion. We have complained and whined till our faces turned blue over venues and lack of respect from the mainstream media. Now a group of ballsy and vision guided promoters put together a night like this, and who shows up? Next to nobody! Whether this was just a solution that came too late, or a serious lapse of judgement on behalf of the Toronto community, I don’t know. But regardless, these gutsy promoters put their asses on the line for us, and we stood them up. We failed ourselves.
Top to bottom, a exceptional and groundbreaking event. It is truly a shame Toronto didn’t turn out to support what could of been a turning point in our bewildered and lost scene.
PaRtYKiD
Corey
