Cadence Culture is an online magazine about international queer and underground electronic music culture, mostly exploring how dance can be used as a tool for socio-political movement and shedding light on the power of the dance floor.

For too long, the contribution that electronic music culture brings to the culture of places has been underestimated and undervalued.

Club and rave culture provide for spaces where for one night, on the dance floor, we are all equal. People come together to celebrate, but also to forget. Some people get lost in these places, while others find themselves. It’s a place where people learn by playing, where they share and exchange stories. It’s a space that’s not bound by time; only in the way that by living the night, it makes daily life more bearable. It’s a place where we listen to others, where we have political discussions, where we heal, where we help, where we find communion, relationships and friendships. It’s a place where we meet people from other countries. It’s a place for work and the beginning for for fruitful collaborations. They are spaces that help us to reflect on the outside world, challenge the existing, spaces that provide the chance to create a new, better world, may it be even just for a bit.

THE WRITER

My name is David Wouters (26), Dutch, living in Amsterdam and founder of Cadence Culture. I’ve written pieces about the crypto-rave, dance and politics, did scene studies in cities like Tbilisi, Kyiv, Paris, Copenhagen, Berlin and Amsterdam. I also write as a freelance journalist for VICE, where I wrote about the war in Ukraine and rave culture and about how psychedelics on the dance floor can be used as a tool for healing and I’m part of WHOLE – United Queer Festival. Moreover, I wrote my bachelor thesis on how Berlin’s electronic music scene copes with tourism and what impact it has on the people, sexuality, the development of the city and the economy, and I was a guest at the talk show ‘future of the night’ organized by the night mayor for Amsterdam Dance Event.

I also give lectures about Dance, Activism & Politics. Lately, I was invited by Ilia State University in Tbilisi to give a lecture about the topic. Please feel free to reach out if you are interested.

BACKGROUND STORY

The dance floor has the potential to change people’s minds, their values and their views on the world overnight. I experienced this myself when I was eighteen years old and just moved a way from a conservative small town in Belgium where I had lived nine years. I visited Berghain for the first time and this is where my interest in music journalism – unknowingly – started. As a small-town-boy of sixteen, I read an article about Berghain. When I was eighteen I went to the club by myself and I was dancing next to a half naked woman. I was shocked and thought to myself ‘that’s intense’. Suddenly I asked myself why I actually found this intense and realized it was where I grew up that made me think this way and the cultural standard we get imprinted in our minds. I no longer wanted my mind to correspond with where I – partially – grew up, and as an act of resistance towards my past I took of most of my clothes off and danced the night away. When I left the club on Monday morning, and felt the spring sun on my face, feeling the cool air on my skin, I felt like I was no longer the same David.

I immediately understood the power of the dance floor and how it could lead to spreading of progressive values in a world that’s turning more right. I realized I wish that dance floor was a reflection of how I would like the world to be, one where you can be free of a society where you have to conform. I started to become more open-minded and accepting of people around me and to accept my queer self.

Today I love diving into underground and alternative electronic music scenes internationally to find out how they are connected, how they differ and how they are the reflection of socio-political themes. I am fascinated by how dance can be used as a social and political tool, how it can be used as a form of resistance but also by how music scenes can shape cities.

For more information you can follow me on socials: Cadence Culture on Instagram or Facebook