The Red Bull Culture Clash Is Coming To Atlanta
It feels exceedingly lame to praise a massive multinational energy-drink company for its cool-kid endeavors, but Red Bull is really good at paying people to do music stuff, and the company’s Culture Clash competition is probably the best thing it’s got going on. Once every year or so, the company will round up four big DJ crews to compete against each other in a contest that’s inspired by Jamaica’s soundclash tradition. Last year, the Culture Clash took over London’s massive O2 Arena, and Brooklyn’s Mixpak label crew, featuring dancehall superstar Popcaan, defeated the likes of Wiz Khalifa’s Taylor Gang and Wiley’s Eskimo crew.
The idea is that the crews, whether or not they like each other in real life, will do everything that they can to stomp all over each other. They’ll bring out surprise guests, debut specially-made dubplates, and viciously clown the shit out of one another. All of them will do everything they can to cause their crowds to lose their shit, and the result is just fantastically entertaining. If you’ve got three hours to spare, you should really watch last year’s show:
Red Bull has just announced all the details for this year’s Culture Clash, and it’s coming to a new city: Atlanta. It goes down 8/25 at 727 Windsor. And while Mixpak won’t defend their title, Popcaan’s Unruly is one of the competitors. It’ll take on hometown hitmaker Mike Will Made-It’s EarDrummers, UK rapper Tinie Tempah’s Disturbing London, and ascendant rap producer WondaGurl’s Enjoylife. DJ Drama will host the whole thing, and it’ll all stream live on Red Bull Radio.