Amusement abounds at the leaked contents of Steve Aoki’s DJ rider – which includes (but is not limited to) four hotel rooms, a director’s chair, two bottles of Cristal, two large fans (placed in stereo) to keep the booth cool, 1/8 oz of ‘local grass’ and, um, six pairs of men’s underwear (sizes apparently not important).
The Dim Mak main man clearly enjoys his (mostly organic) food, with ‘hospitality requirements’ including a large cheese pizza, four Odwalla Omega B Smoothie drinks, a plate of organic fruits (to include mangos, blueberries, strawberries and peaches) and either $100 for dinner, or a promoter-paid meal at an organic restaurant serving local foods, grass-fed meat and non-refined sugars.
Tackling the inevitable – and obligatory – social media backlash, Aoki took to his blog to defend the rider. He tours “with a small crew”, they travel light so need more stuff at each venue; and the two bottles of Cristal? “Definitely a ballin’ move. Do I need it? No, but if I can get it… sweet!” For a man recently named at number 13 in Celebrity Net Worth‘s list of the world’s top 30 richest DJs, it’s clearly less about getting his hands on free goodies than it is about testing the limits of what he can get away with.
Which is surely the point. And it places the Regard Magazine ‘Man of Style’ in good company. The Smoking Gun‘s list of riders celebrates considerably more extreme examples of this unique performer’s artform, including Van Halen’s infamous demand that brown M&Ms be removed from the bowl, AC/DCs three oxygen tanks and three masks, Christina Aguilera’s police escort and Sarah Palin’s private aircraft (that must be a Lear 60 or larger).
Steve’s demands – those pairs of pants excluded – would barely raise an eyebrow among promotors used to the myriad requests of A-grade stars. If he can get away with it, then why the hell not ask the questions? We certainly would.
02.46 PM
Kinda agree with your point bu then kinda not. As a promoter I get sick of this kind of antics. We’re trying to make a living too. If you take advantage then there’s less I can spend on other DJs etc. Advocating trying to get away with whatever fine I guess, go for it, isn’t that what the bankers have been doing? Are we better as music people?
08.19 AM
A very good friend of mine is a booking agent/stage manager, worked with indie bands on their first break right up to AAA legends your nan will know and love. As echoed above, everyone else stage manager, lighting, sound etc etc are all there to do their jobs and it makes a tiring job worse when the talent is screaming about brown M&M’s.
The thing is artists only get away with this while they are hot property and it is in everyone’s financial interests to put up with it. As soon as sales or interest flags they’re dropped faster than a whore’s knickers when there’s a big ship in port.
At the same time artists who are professional and accept gourmet prosciutto might not be available at Glastonbury at 1am tend to find themselves being offered gigs despite the difficult 3rd album not being that well received. The old adage “Be nice to people on your way up” rings very true.
That said Steve Aoki is a trust fund kid playing around, which probably accounts for his place on the DJ rich list (rather than earnings) and I doubt he’s particularly bothered about career longevity.
Finally back to my mate, who’s dealt with Axel, Elton etc, when I asked who was the worst, the complete and utter nightmare that made you want to walk out there and then…..
08.25 AM
Yes, Hamish, who was it? Spill those beans…
07.57 PM
Hurts_two – Seems like it’s easy enough to avoid those kind of ‘antics’ by being a better curator of your promotional abilities. If you don’t like the kind of antics presented by someone like Aoki, why not instead promote artists that avoid that behavior. There are plenty of talented artists who wouldn’t put you through the wringer to be promoted: in fact, they might actually be grateful for your abilities, and not squander your good will. The only reason you are experiencing the kind of behavior described is because you are choosing to do business with a certain kind of artist.
Hamish McAlpine – Isn’t it well known at this point that the whole ‘brown M&M’ story is really about vetting the people they have to be around? If im not mistaken, when Van Halen was asked about those rider notes they said something along the lines of ” If we walked in to a room and saw brown M&Ms, we knew immediately that we needed to check on the more important rider elements: like that the lighting was properly secured and placed, and that the pyrotechnics weren’t gonna blow our faces off… If there’s brown m&ms, somebody isn’t doing their job, and shortcuts are being taken”
While there are certainly many elements of needless excess presented in some artist’s riders, aoki’s seems pretty mild in comparison. Perhaps it’s only news in electronic music circles because that is an attitude normally thought of as a rock and roll thing? I wonder what some other ‘top tier’ pop-tronic artist’s riders look like…