Shakin’ it at Shaky Beats ( + BORGORE Interview )

This year was Shaky Beats third annual event in the heart of Atlanta, and they brought out the big guns. Marshmello, who played a 6:05 pm set at Piedmont (Shaky Beats medium sized stage) in 2016, the first year for Shaky Beats, this year closed out the festival at Peachtree (Mainstage) on Friday. The lineup had nothing but fire acts day after day, like Kygo, Zedd, Excision, Dillon Francis, Seven Lions, Louis The Child, San Holo, Borgore, Kayzo, G Jones, Troyboi, Space Jesus, Herobust, Whethan, Ookay Live, and many more.

Shaky Beats, featured 4 stages instead of the previous 3. Mainstage being Peachtree, which included the elevated VIP areas, and the elevated Heineken viewing area that anyone could go view the crowd from. Piedmont returned almost twice as big, with about five times the area for the crowd. They included a tent stage, Ponce de Leon, and brought in a smaller stage that was the size of Ponce de Leon in previous years, hosted by Criminal Records.

One major complaint with a lot of festivals is the amount of time it takes to get through security, but at Shaky Beats even in peak times it only took about 5-10 minutes to get your bag checked and get through, which is amazing. Having to wait an hour or so to get through security like at some festivals can ruin the vibe, so I am glad Shaky Beats knew how to keep their security safe but also efficient.

Bathrooms at some festivals can be the same way, having to wait 5 or more minutes to use the bathroom, on top of fighting a crowd for 10 minutes to get to the bathrooms, can be killer when you REALLY have to go; but at Shaky Beats I never seemed to have to wait more than a few seconds if that, and usually I didn't have to wait at all. As you got to the back area of the stages, the elevation increased, so you were able to have a good view even if you were in the back. Water was the same, it was fairly easy to find and you only had to wait about 5-10 minutes to fill up.

Shaky Beats had a never ending list of after parties as well, so even though the last set ended at 11 every night, there was still things to do late night until early morning. Acts like Minnesota and Herobust on Friday, and Borgore, San Holo, Shiba San, and Ookay Live on Saturday.

I had the pleasure to sit down for an interview with Asaf Borger, known by his DJ/Producer name Borgore, before his after party set Saturday.

( He was a few minutes late to our interview, which when you have a festival set and an after party set in the same day, and your main concern is making it to the stage exactly when your supposed to come on, is COMPLETELY understandable, but I couldn't help but joke with him about it on the first question. )

MusicFests365: "So you've said that you never miss a show, mainly because of your experience in the Israeli army, but did they care if you came late ? . . . and by the way im just messing with you, its not like im not usually late to everything myself !"

Borgore: "I'm always late, but never too late. I will get there like 10 minutes before the show, but ill be on time on stage."

MusicFests365: "Your Jazz album, are you only going to be playing DJ sets or are you going to start playing Jazz sets?"

Borgore: "Not Jazz sets, but to play Live is definitely something I would love to do, we have to see if there is a crowd for it."

MusicFests365: "You've mentioned that you like live aspect of instruments because its never the same thing twice, its not like just 'pushing a button' or just pressing play on the same song, have you thought about doing live EDM, maybe a Borgore LIVE set before?"

Borgore: "I would love to do a LIVE Borgore show, but A: I don't want it to be tokenistic, I want it to be really well made, B: . . . yaknow one good thing about Odesza, or Bonobo, or Flume, what makes their live show so great, is that they mainly play their regular instruments . . . I don't just want to play my regular records when I play shows, yaknow? That's what makes it a little bit tougher. I try to update my set list every week, or almost every show, and to update your music all the time live is a little bit difficult."

MusicFests365: "That leads perfectly into another question, you have 2 sets today, your festival daytime set, and your afterparty set, I know you've said when it comes to festivals everyone is different and its hard to favor one over the other, do you prefer festival sets or club sets? and do you prepare differently for either one?"

Borgore: "It really depends on the crowd, ive got more records for tonight just so I can have a little bit of change, you know its hard to change, like 28 new records just came out between the earlier show and this show, but yea ill try to have some new records for tonight."

MusicFests365: "What about the title for "Adventures in Time"?

Borgore: "It's called 'Adventures in Time' because every record is in a different time signature, and their really weird time signatures, its not the common 4/4 or 3/4, there is some 4/4 and 3/4, but most of the album is playing in weirder time signatures. "

MusicFests365: "Do you think this Jazz album will help your run for president of Israel ?"

Borgore: "Maybe it will help a little bit, I think it will give me more of an intelligent image."

MusicFests365: "Yea, I think the majority of people that have heard of you or seen you but not seen an interview, wouldn't think of Borgore and Jazz in the same sentence.

Last question, I know you do a lot of interviews, your doing a bunch right now before your set, are there any questions you get asked all the time that you hate, or any questions you've wanted to be asked that you've never been asked?"

Borgore: "I like when people surprise me with left world questions, I like to talk about things I don't always talk about. At the same time, I get asked the same questions over and over, understandable, people want to know the same things, what's important. In general I don't love giving interviews, but I see the necessity. I think its fair for people to ask questions and know my answers. Yea I don't know, there's no bad question, well there are bad questions but . . .

I just don't like when people come not prepared, they are just trying to wing it, you came here you did your homework, you asked the right questions, that's good. If you came here and didn't know anything that would piss me off. "