Rave Music Essay, Research Paper

What is a rave? A rave usually refers to an all night party, open to the general public, where loud “techno” music is mostly played and many people can partake in a number of different chemicals (Official). Raves are fairly decent and you don’t hear much about them on the streets. Yet some people who go to the raves try to sell their drugs to ravers and that’s what makes the word rave so bad. Because of those people Mayor Daley has planned crack down on jailing building owners and managers who let their properties be used for raves where drugs are peddled. They approved of this Thursday, April 19, 2001. The range for jail term runs from two weeks to six months (Rave). But why are raves getting the reputation they are?

Raves are getting bad reputations because of the drug peddlers that go to the raves to sell their ecstasy and stamina enhancing drugs. According to a website called Dancesafe.com ecstasy is a safe drug if you stay away from the listed kinds of ecstasy. The parents of the kids going to these raves are not saying a word about the drug situation there. They still let their kids go because they know it is safer than being out on the street or at some drinking party getting drunk and then having the risk of them driving home. If you ask me raves aren’t so bad, I’ve been to several of them and out of all of the ones I have gone I have only seen two peddlers selling X. They were all-night raves and tons of people and everyone was all wired and dancing and moving around like mad. “It’s a love circle, It’s like a 1960’s scene – all the races together, dancing, having a communal experience.” says Laze (Gracia). At raves there are different rooms. One room is the main room where the dancing goes on and all the music is spun and where most of the people are. Some of the music that is played there is House, Techno (most common), breakbeat, Trance, Tribal, and Progressive. The visual effects and a lot at the raves. Most of them use laser shows, others use laser that goes with the beat, and of course the classic strobe light. Then there is another room called the “cool down room” where you can buy water and energy drinks and sit down and talk to all the other ravers there and meet different girls and stuff. Finally there is a room where you can go for a slower tempo of music where your adrenaline slows down and you start to relax and calm you down.

Now a days people are making the raves illegal, like in Chicago the City Council passed a measure fining the property owners, promoters and even DJ’s up to $10,000 (Kleiner). But, most of the raves around the world are legal and normally is police patrolled and is publicized around town and city permission. It’s because those cities know what happens at those raves and they also have it police patrolled so that makes it even better to go to because that way you will be safer that way. But, just the other day like I said earlier in this paper that Chicago is now jailing people promoting raves. So why don’t they just look over at other cities and just legalize raves all over the world? The main reason I think is behind it is because they would have to hire more policemen and then have to train them and all that takes money away from the city but, I think it would be a lot better to spend the money on the community that way they stay out of trouble. So why don’t groups that want to keep kids off the streets and to stay out of gangs help support the raves that way they do stay off the streets? The reason is probably is that they think that they will just start something in the rave culture and cause trouble.

As I was reading an article in Mothering magazine there was a mother with an article about raves. She said “That this is another one-sided look at the lives of teens and young adults. They act out, of necessity, the dark side of society and are blamed for it when they do.” (O’Mara). I totally agree with this lady, for several points. One, most adults do just look at the outcome and hear the bad things about raves and automatically think raves are bad and should not go on. Another point, is that most of the parents that disagree with the raves don’t have kids attending them so they really don’t know what goes on inside the raves and are just basing their opinion on the word of the street. So if parents looked at the websites and listen to the ravers about what really happens then they might not disagree so much with the commotion over raves. If you listen to the world news or read the nationwide news in some papers there was a court case to ban raves in Canada until 1,500 or so ravers showed up and started telling the judge what they do there and why they go and then they started to play their techno music and danced to it for nearly five hours. After that he judge declared that it was simply all fun and games and did not make it illegal. So maybe that’s what we should do take all our ravers across the U.S. and take it to the supreme court and play the music and dance, I mean what will it take for the U.S. to believe that raves are all fun and games.

People I think under estimate what teens think and what hey are capable of doing. I think if kinds wanted to screw up their lives they would but they don’t. They go to parties to have a good time get drunk and maybe do drugs. Some of them take it to far and are irresponsible and take it to far. Those kids are the ones that are normally the ones that aren’t invited too much to the other parties because they can’t handle themselves. That goes along with the raves if the people who run them see you peddling drugs they kick you out. If you get to rowdy and are getting out of control they get kicked out. So the kids at the raves do take control and are responsible. So I believe that if adults want to criticize it there is an old phrase that the parents tell you about your vegetables, “Don’t mock it, until you’ve tried it.” And I do think that is true. There hasn’t been too many accidents at raves it just those teens that are irresponsible and can’t control themselves. This one kid smoked marijuana and took an ecstasy pill after all that he decided to snort some heroin. That right there is a guy who can’t control himself and after that he was all messed up on drugs, so what does he do? He ended up taking another pill and smoked some more. He was then found dead in a hotel room from overdosing on drugs (Savino). Those are the people who give raves a bad reputation and can try to influence and sell their drugs to others, which we don’t need at these raves.

So with all the stuff happening around the rave community they should cut the crap spend a little city cash and hire some more policemen to patrol the raves and so kids can go. And therefore parents can’t complain and the city wouldn’t have to ban it. Because for all the work they are going to do to stop raves and fine or jail them they might as well have just patrolled it so that its safe and they could catch the bad people as well. So all the fuss the cities are going to go through to stop them, it would be easier to just help them. The raves could also help pay for the new police to be hired. If the city hosts the raves the money goes to the DJ and then the rest to the city, and when tickets range from $25 to $50. So if the normal outcome goes they make around $40,000 a night for one event alone (Oh). So there you go the city could just pay the DJ half then they can take the other half and pay the cops and they still would have profits probably from the rave. So to what so many people say when the night is over and when they’re so exhausted, I’ll say “RAVE ON”

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Garcia, Guy. “Tripping the Light Fantastic.” Time 17 August 1992: 60. Infotrac. Online. Gale Group. 4 April 2001.

Kleiner, Carolyn. “Groove is in their Hearts.” U.S. News July 2000: 56-57.

Oh, Susan and Artherley, Ruth. “Rave Fever: Raves are all the rage, but drugs are casting a pull over their sunny peace-and-love ethics.” Macleans 24 April 2000: 38 Infotrac. Online. Gale Group 4 April 2001.

O’Mara, Peggy. “Rave On.” Mothering Summer 1997 n. 83 p. 4. Infotrac. Online. Galegroup. 4 April 2001.

“Rave Crackdown Gets OK.” Chicago Sun-Times. [Chicago] 19 April 2001, p. 16.

Savino, Lenny. “Police investigate drug related death of 21-year-old raver.” Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service. 4 Sept. 1997 904k6542. Infotrac. Online. Gale Group. 4 April 2001.

Bibliography

Garcia, Guy. “Tripping the Light Fantastic.” Time 17 August 1992: 60. Infotrac. Online. Gale Group. 4 April 2001.

Kleiner, Carolyn. “Groove is in their Hearts.” U.S. News July 2000: 56-57.

Oh, Susan and Artherley, Ruth. “Rave Fever: Raves are all the rage, but drugs are casting a pull over their sunny peace-and-love ethics.” Macleans 24 April 2000: 38 Infotrac. Online. Gale Group 4 April 2001.

O’Mara, Peggy. “Rave On.” Mothering Summer 1997 n. 83 p. 4. Infotrac. Online. Galegroup. 4 April 2001.

“Rave Crackdown Gets OK.” Chicago Sun-Times. [Chicago] 19 April 2001, p. 16.

Savino, Lenny. “Police investigate drug related death of 21-year-old raver.” Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service. 4 Sept. 1997 904k6542. Infotrac. Online. Gale Group. 4 April 2001.