- In a move to acknowledge that there's no separating politics from partying—or anything else—New York's Discwoman collective teamed up with a crew of local promoters to bring an all-female and gender non-conforming lineup to a D.C. warehouse on Saturday, the night of the Women's March. As has become de rigueur at events since Donald Trump won the election, a percentage of the profits went to Casa Ruby, a local bilingual community centre and shelter serving queer and trans youth. The warehouse was given a 4 AM license for inauguration weekend, and an email was sent out earlier that day marking the party as a safe space. (D.C. police's LGBT liaison would be stopping in throughout the night.)
Security was relaxed. The venue was located at the end of a long row of truck ports, and I arrived around midnight to a short line and a quick pat-down. The vibe felt comfortable, kind of like the march I'd spent the day at. The space had all its permits, so there was none of the nervous energy associated with illegal parties, but it was also less debaucherous—no open drug use, no smashed windows.
Inside, a small room with a coat check and bathroom opened up onto the main dance floor, a cavernous chamber with high ceilings. Richmond artist Claire Elise Tippins, AKA Claire, was playing a live set of dark minimal techno at the back of the space. A crush of dedicated dancers did their thing in front of her, but the room was far from packed and they looked a little nervous. I watched them start to sway, and then stop, and then start again.
Around 1 AM, Umfang shifted into gear with a triplet pulse as lasers swept up and over the audience. The party was underway. Her set was subtle and precise, full of glitchy rhythms and resonant basslines that seem to swell up from the floor. The music enticed the crowd to let loose, swallowing any inhibitions they previously held.
At one point, my dance partner turned to me and said this was the most men she'd seen all day. Later, I ran into a friend from Brooklyn who remarked on how straight the crowd was. But to me, the crowd just seemed characteristically D.C.—bros in button-downs, college-aged queers wearing tunics and chokers, an older guy who said the lasers reminded him of "bowling alleys, but also the '90s." Less represented was the black population that originally made the city's house scene so rich, but that might have something to do with D.C. losing its black majority in 2011. The promoters were almost all people of color.
Never shy, Volvox dived straight into her signature, no-holds-barred techno. Her first bone-rattling beat came moments after a track whose lyrics incited the crowd to rebel against everything. The people obeyed, slamming themselves head first into the music. D.C. staple Juana closed out the night, hitting the decks to a thinning floor at 5 AM. Her set was, for me, the most seductive of all. I gazed at her as she guided the few remaining bodies through pulsing filter sweeps and into the dawn of a new day.
Photo credit /
Erez Avissar