Digital Dreams: Canada’s Major EDM Festival Returns with Bigger Plans and Surprises

Photo Courtesy of VisualBass

We sat down with Ryan Kruger and Mark Russell from Electronic Nation Canada about what they have planned this year's Bud Light Digital Dreams. They guarantee us that you won't be disappointed.

THUMP: 50,000 people came to Toronto last year for Digital Dreams, and from the rate of the current ticket sales, how will Ontario Place handle the space for almost double the amount of fans?

Ryan Kruger: The interesting thing is that Digital Dreams is planned around the site itself, we sort of fit into the settings that exist around the island of Ontario Place. What's actually happening in addition to Digital Dreams on the site next year is they're converting the area that we use our main stage into a park. As a result, we have to reorganize the way we're using the site. This year we're using areas that will expand the footprint of the entire place, which allows us to produce a larger main stage area and add a fourth stage. There will also be a slight increase in the size for the Echo Beach and House of Boom stage.

Besides the line-up announcement for the next two months, what else can you tell THUMP about Bud Light Digital Dreams this year?

Mark Russell: A lot of what we're doing this year is being innovative with the radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags. We're moving to a cashless payment system and a new version of the app that we're currently redeveloping. We're looking to create a much more interactive environment for the audience and they'll be able to interact with the festival and touch the festival in a way that they were never able to do before. For us this year, a big thing is to make it bigger and focus more on the production. All of these things will take the fan experience to the next level. We want to show everyone the most amazing weekend.

Major North American festivals such as Coachella and Bonnaroo have used RFID technology, why did Electronic Nation Canada finally decide to jump on that this year?

R: The main reason why people tend to use RFID in the past was for crowd control and security purposes. You'll know how many people are on your site and if wristbands are fraudulent, removed or resold to somebody else. You also won't need different wristbands to access different areas.

Moving to the cashless payment system, it will be the very first festival in the country to do this. When you put money on your wristband (which is connected to an online account), it allows you quickly get drinks, food, merchandise and also hold your of age status, so you don't have to show your ID multiple times and much more. The whole onsite experience will be much better and the best thing about it all is you're not stuck using tickets, for drinks or food. This also avoids having left over tickets in your pocket. Anything that you haven't used on your wristband will be automatically refunded to you at the end of the festival.

Going back to the music and the city, you both have a long history with dance music here. With your background and knowledge, what do you think the future will be for electronic dance music in Toronto?

M: As a newcomer to Toronto, it's really exciting. We get the question all the time about the bubble and I don't see a bubble. I see this as the starting of something new. For anyone it's exciting to be able to go out any day of the week and see the level of talent that's coming to Toronto. Not only internationally speaking, but also the levels of talent that the city of Toronto is producing. We're seeing so many acts come out of Toronto and to hit that international stage is amazing. I guess I see it from a different perspective.

R: For me, I've been around for a long time in the scene, I've lived through the ups and downs of dance music. Whatever the analogy you want to use, whether it is a bubble, that stuff may or may not be true, I don't think anyone knows they're in a bubble until it bursts. Right now things are only looking positive. The most encouraging thing about the current wave of the love of the music and the scene, is that it's expanded into the mainstream in a much deeper way than it ever was. The good thing about the future is, regardless if this is the number one musical genre, in the end of the day, it's now never going away. It never went away in Europe over the last decade, the last time it was big in North America, it was gone. The fact is that it will never go back to just being a niche, it's here to stay. There is a bright future no matter what happens.

What do you think is the strongest growing genre in Toronto right now?

M: For sure trance, in terms of the number of people talking about it. I mean the techno scene is big, but they have been here for a little while. The outcry for trance is insane right now. Everybody is getting into it, and you just can't ignore it.

R: As with the genre in electronic dance music in general, it works in waves. Trance was the sound, and then it wasn't. Then it was electro, house and dubstep, and now those waves are going down a little bit. Last year we saw the wave of tech house and deep house, and while that wave is pretty high right now, that wave is followed by another wave, and I agree with Mark in that it is probably trance. But does that mean all the other genres are going away? Absolutely not, there are so many genres out there — each with a fan base. But going back to which genre is expected to grow the most in the next year, is definitely trance. It started from a low level of acceptance than when it once was, and now it's got a long way to grow.

You guy had a lot of success in Toronto and London, Ontario. Any future plans to host events throughout all of Canada?

R: The only thing is that Live Nation and Electronic Nation is an international company. We're always thinking of ways to expand the brand and do bigger and better things. What the future may hold, only time will tell.