I

Rave Cultures and the

Academy
Susan Luckman^
Today, research into post-acid house, post-rave bine sampled sound-bites from Deleuze with ambi-
music cultures is at the forefront of contemporary ent and techno music mixing; a process common to,
research in the field of cultural studies. All this aca- indeed at the core of, techno and house music.
demic interest in "rave-derived" dance cultures Founder of the label Mille Plateaux, Achim
poses the question: why do Szepanski, goes on to state
club cultures present them- that in his opinion
selves so readily as objects
for a Cultural Studies gaze?
Ravers provide a Deleuze's key tropes are
"tailor-made for rave cul-
This paper will briefly
elaborate upon the fact that
model example of a ture" (Reynolds 1996: 35).
And Deleuzean
the answer to this arguably approaches are not alone.
lies in that, following on youth subcultural Like many other youth
from the seminal work of sub-cultures, "raving" -
Dick Hebdige (1979), rave practice, just as and the evolving dance
culture can be seen and cri- cultures it has given rise to
tiqued as the paradigmatic
model of a lapsed subcul-
mods, teddy boys since the late eighties - has
provided a new generation
ture, redeemed via com-
modity co-option, under
and punks have of mostly young people
with a focus for the con-
systems and processes of
advanced capitalism. before them stmction of their own par-
ticular forms of identity
Following the death in and community. Dance
1995 of the eminent French theorist Gilles Deleuze sub-cultures have also provided a new generation of
a number of "ambient house" compilation albums Cultural Studies scholars with an ideal object for
were released as tributes to this influential contem- the discussion of questions of youth identity,
porary philosopher. In a 1996 article first published belonging and resistance. Ravers provide a model
in Lingua Franca - and reprinted in The Aus- example of a youth subcultural practice, just as
tralian's Higher Education Supplement - Simon mods, teddy boys and punks have before them.
Reynolds briefly examines two of these (both Hence, Reynold's article ends with the pronounce-
released in early 1996): In Memoriam Gilles ment: "Just as punk and rap became grist for the
Deleuze, produced by German electronic music cult studs mill, rave music may be next on the acad-
label Mille Plateaux (a name which itself is named emy's menu." (1996: 35)
for Deieuze and Guattari's A Thousand Plateaus: Certainly, a considerable body of scholarship on
Capitalism and Schizophrenia) and the other folds the subject is being developed, particularly in the
and Rhizomes for Gilles Deleuze compiled by Sub United Kingdom. As testament to this, a number of
Rosa, a Bmssels-based experimental music label. significant academic publications on what I refer to
The tracks which comprise the compilations com- as "rave-derived" cultures have been released in the

* Susan Luckman is a researcher and teacher working out of the Media and Cultural Studies Centre in the
Department of English at the University of Queensland.

Social Alternatives Vol. 17 No. 4. October 1998 45

 last seven years: they include Steve Redhead's The
End-Of-The-Century Party: Youth and Pop Towards
2000 (1990); the anthology he edited: Rave Off:
Politics and Deviance in Contemporary Youth Cul-
ture (1993); Sarah Thornton's Club Cultures:
Music, Media and Subcultural Capital (1995);
Matthew CoWin's Altered State: The Story of Ecsta-
sy Culture and Acid House (1997); plus, the recent-
ly released anthology. The Clubcultures Reader:
Readings in Popular Cultural Studies (1997). Fur-
ther, that bible of cutfing-edge British youth style.
The Eace, has had an anthology compiled of its
club-related writing over the period 1980 to 1997.
Richard Benson, current editor of The Eace, put
together Night Eever: Club Writing in The Face
(1997) ironically, in response to a request from a
Ph.D. student undertaking research in the field of
club cultures. In her 1990 letter, the then postgrad-
uate Sarah Thornton requested reader's feedback on
their experiences of "raving" and clubbing. To
quote:
Writing a thesis on dance clubs is not
as easy as it may sound. So I was won-
dering whether FACE readers would
write to me to help me with my research.
The question I'm puzzling over , is
why do you, or don't you go to clubs?
What is their appeal? The music, the
crowd, dancing, drinking, drugs, hiding
out, watching or being seen? What has
been your best club experience? (Benson
1997:11)
Raves, Acid House clubs and music, the drug
Ecstasy and techno music generally have in the
nineties become synonymous with cutting edge
youth style. The potential for rave culture's popu-
larity to be reconceptualised as a desirable and
street credible
youth identity has
inevitably led in
Britain, Australia
and elsewhere to
the mainstream
adoption of rave
style and the
widespread com-
mercialisation of
dance parties.
Raves per se. Acid
House, dance par-
ties and the reju-
venated club
scene they facili-
tated have evolved Photograph courtesy Susan Luckman
46 Social Alternatives Vol. 17 No. 4, October 1998
in a number of different directions, giving rise in
part to well worn subcuhural discourses regarding
the loss of the perceived authenticity of the original
experience, valorised in rave circles around contin-
uing reference to 1988 as the so-called second
"summer of love". Mid 1988 marks the point at
which the all-night dancing and concurrent sense of
carefree abandon felt by British holiday-makers in
Spain's Ibiza began to be replicated in Britain in the
form of all-night raves. Additionally, and as previ-
ously mentioned, fundamental icons and tropes of
the subculture were seized upon by more main-
stream organisations. The movement provided a
boon in particular to those companies keen to
develop lucrative youth niche markets for their
products. Hillegonda Rietveld, one of the leading
cultural theorists of the "rave-derived" dance scene,
has written in some detail regarding the rave-relat-
ed product proliferation; detailing such things as
changing fashions in brand name trainers and other
shoes, brightly coloured and loose fitting long-
sleeved t-shirts. and the ascendancy of the "bum-
bag". Of particular interest she notes that it was:
"only an elite, who often claimed to he the 'origi-
nals', [who] were able to keep up with the financial
demands of this mad consumption race. These were
mostly people in their mid- to late-twenties, with
reasonably well paid jobs in the fashion, communi-
cations or (entrepreneurial) entertainment sectors"
(1993:56). The widespread circulation of the signa-
ture "smiley face" icon of 1988 - the "summer of
love" - signalled the beginning of rave culture's
mass economic exploitability.
The nineties repackaging of the drink Lucozade
is very much metonymic of the acceptance of
"rave" or dance party derived culture into the
advertising mainstream. Lucozade. once the pre-
serve of con-
cerned parents
seeking to get
some form of
nourishment into
the otherwise
unwanting stom-
achs of ill chil-
dren, became in
the nineties the
post-dance drink
de jure. Thus fol-
lowing a well
established
process of main-
stream redemp-
tion of previously
exclusively subcultural which seek to prevent the
and/or resistant consumer Raves, ^Acid House' organisation of dance par-
practices, whereby previ- ties and raves outside ofthe
ously marginal cultural clubs andmusiCy the controlled space of already
artefacts or practices are existent licensed venues. In
"[sjtripped
unwholesome
of [their]
connota-
drug Ecstasy and Australia, dance parties
have now attained a limited
tions, [becoming] fit for
public consumption"
'techno'music legitimacy but in light of
the guidelines for their con-
(Hebdige 1979:130). What duct, this legitimacy is
Hebdige refers to as a generally have in the highly contingent and in
"cycle of resistance and practice only really afford-
diffusion" (1979:130). nineties become ed to those events organ-
This opportunity to culti- ised on a commercial basis;
vate a new youth market
for Lucozade was seized
synonymous with the New South Wales:
"Draft Code of Practice for
upon and developed by the
producers of the product,
cutting edge youth Dance Parties" feels it nec-
essary to emphasise in its
particularly in the United introduction the point that
Kingdom where rave and style "[djance parties are legiti-
dance-scene related ideas mate forms of entertain-
ment" (1997:3). As a further caveat on this initial
have filtered into the mainstream to a far greater
statement, later in the guidelines it encourages pro-
degree than here in Australia. While the crest
moters to use the name "dance party" as distinct
declaring the Royal seal of approval of the product
from "rave party" as 'The term rave has a negative
remains, as do the signature yellow, orange and red
and pro-drug reputation, and the image it reflects
colours, the product has otherwise been totally re-
will not help in getting the needed approval and
packaged both literally in terms of the actual bottle
consents" (1997: 8). Needless to say, small inde-
it comes in as well as culturally, with garishly
pendent not-for-profit operators will also have
coloured, pacy and rather obscure television com-
problems obtaining the necessary approvals and
mercials and a widening in the range of outlets
consents.
through which it is sold. To clubbers trying to rehy-
drate their bodies after a long night's dancing and More overt political oppositionality and/or resis-
stimulant taking, the ongoing presence ofthe Royal tance is evident in the often flagrantly illegal
crest, announcing the once unassailable legitimacy actions of political dance collectives, such Aus-
of the product via the pronouncement: "By tralia's Vibe Tribe and the international Reclaim
Appointment to Her Majesty the Queen", on their The Streets movement.
"comedown" nourishment source of choice, is but For these groups, and
another of the amusing ironies of the world of many other avowedly
advanced capitalism. political collectives,
However, despite the development of rave- raves, and dance music
derived cultures into mainstream cultural indus- generally, provide a focus
tries, the consumption of recreational drugs within for creative oppositional
dance cultures still gives rise to a familiar discourse activism in the nineties.
of moral panic within media and governmental por- "Free parties" become a
trayals, which speaks of aberrant and "out of con- site of resistance; they
trol" young people. The co-option of an otherwise provide the space in
marginal youth subculture into a highly lucrative which to explore the posi-
industry has in this instance been aided by the tive collective possibili-
increasing criminalisation of rave culture, particu- ties of the festival or car-
larly in the United Kingdom under provisions with- nival. As the flier for the
in the 1994 Criminal Justice Act and in Australia first Brisbane action
via the development in a number of states of Codes explained: "It's about Photograph
of Practice, together with specifically tailored reclaiming the streets for courtesy Susan
amendments to licensing laws and fire regulations. public use. It's about
Luckman

Social Aitornatives Vol. 17 No. 4, October 1998 47

 questioning the priorities of our planners who have
already dedicated 40% of the urban space of Bris-
bane to the exclusive use of the car. It's about
demanding serious committed provision be made
for transport that does not denigrate our environ-
ment and does not kill and maim so many members
of our community. It's about questioning the
cogno-intellectual pathology of car addiction! It's
about having a party."
In April last year Reclaim the Streets organised a
London march in solidarity with the striking Liver-
pool dockers. Scuffles broke out between the pro-
testers and police dressed in riot gear. The whole
confrontation was focused around a van containing
a sound system wbich the organisers wished to get
into Trafalgar Square. The police's principal aim
was to stop the sound system from entering the
square, for once it was established they rightly
feared they would have no way of controlling or
dispersing a crowd united by the beat of the dance.
The police were unsuccessful; the crowds were dis-
persed later that evening, only after the music had
stopped. In Australia, Reclaim tbe Streets parties
have been organised in Brisbane, Melbourne and
Sydney, often coinciding with international days of
action by Reclaim the Streets activists around the
world. Other countries - apart from Australia and
the United Kingdom - where Reclaim The Streets
collectives are active include Canada, the Czech
Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Israel, the
Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden and the United
States.
Like mod and punk before it, the practice of rav-
ing as we know it has its origins in the United King-
dom; a readily accessible example - geographically
at least - historically for the theorists of the Birm-
ingham School and today for those whose own
methodological underpinnings are informed by
such initial Cultural Studies approaches. A further
legacy of a British as distinct from a more Ameri-
can approach to Cultural Studies scholarship, is an
emphasis on class which is to be found in much of
the writing regarding rave cultures. Even though
today wbat the original experience of raving has
spawned at the popular level of clubbing and dance
parties generally involves considerable economic
outlay on such things as entrance fees, drugs for the
evening, clothing, et cetera, the early converts to the
movement were not of the comfortable middle
classes, but rather working class young people in
search of an outlet for escape and expression. Here
again the parallels with the manner in which previ-
ous subcultural movements were privileged for
study due to the manner in which they were seen to
48 Sociai Alternatives Voi. 17 No. 4, October 1998
embody oppositional, or just plain marginal, cultur-
al positions are obvious. Certainly, rave-derived
subcultures do fit very nicely into the subcultural
model pioneered in the work of Dick Hebdige in his
original book on the subject: Subcultures: The
Meaning of Style (1979) and subsequently recon-
sidered and revised in Hiding In The Light (1988).
Simply put, rave-derived cultures can be mapped in
terms of a trajectory running a gambit from resis-
tant and exclusive subculture through redemption,
entailing incorporation into the dominant culture by
means of mass commercial exploitation. Tbe com-
mercial co-option of central tenets of the original
subcultures in order to facilitate the renewed prof-
itability of nightclubs, is recognised through grow-
ing deployment of the phrase "club cultures",
instead of the original and more specific terms:
rave, dance party, acid house, et cetera. Rave-
derived cultures ultimately represent complex sites
of both nuanced co-option and resistance; of large-
scale commerciality, as well as community based
and oppositional action. The cultural practices that
have evolved from the original Acid House and rave
scene are today highly diverse and disparate scene.
References
Benson, Richard, eds. 1997. Night Fever: Club
Writing in The Face 1980-1997. London: Boxtree.
Collin, Matthew. 1997. Altered State: The Story
of Ecstasy Culture and Acid House. London: Ser-
pent's Tail.
Hebdige, Dick. [1979] 1991. Subculture: The
Meaning of Style. London and New York: Rout-
ledge.
Hebdige, Dick. 1988. Hiding In The Light: On
Images and Things. London and New York: Come-
dia (Routledge).
New South Wales Ministry for Police. 1997.
Draft Code of Practice for Dance Parties. Sydney.
O'Connor, Justin, Steve Redhead and Derek
Wynne, eds. 1993. Rave Off: Politics and Deviance
in Contemporary Youth Culture. Aldershot: ^ve-
bury.
Redhead, Steve. 1990. The End-Of-The-Century
Party: Youth and Pop Towards 2000. Manchester
and New York: Manchester University Press.
 Redhead, Steve, ed. 1993. Rave Off: Politics and
Deviance in Contemporary Youth Culture. Alder-
shot: Avebury.
Redhead, Steve, Derek Wynne and Justin O'Con-
nor, eds. 1997. The Clubcultures Reader: Readings
in Popular Cultural Studies. Oxford: Blackwell.
Reynolds, Simon. 1996. 'A Philosophical Dance
Stance'. The Australian Higher Education. 11 Dec:
35. (Re-printed from Lingua Franca).
Rietveld, Hillegonda. 1993. 'Living the Dream'.
In Rave Off: Politics and Deviance in Contempo-
rary Youth Culture, ed. Steve Redhead. Aldershot:
Avebury.
Thornton, Sarah. [1995] 1996. Cluh Cultures:
Music, Media and Suhcultural Capital. Hanover
and London: Wesleyan University Press (University
Press of New England).
BLACKWELL
Blackwel! Publishers
has withdrawn
The Clubcultures Reader:
Readings in
Popular Cultural Studies
edited by Steve Redhead with
Derek Wynne and
Justin O'Connor
(reviewed in Social Alternatives
Volume 17 No. 2).
The book has been reissued
(in paperback only) under the
following ISBN: 0631212167
The book can be ordered in Australia Irom
Allen 8i Unwin (pty) Ltd., 9 Atchison Street,
PO Box 8500, St. Leonards, NSW 2065.
Australia
Tel: +61 2 9901 4088 Fax: +61 2 9906 2218
Email: academic@allen-unwin.co.au
In the Midnight Cemetery
Ttiree days buried.Those two lads
were movie-wise, avoided plots
which yielded bones or sludge.
The church said it would be my rebirth,
that I'd be planted like a seed to grow again.
Oh, for the safety of ash in an urn.
I could not have been more defenceless
but they severed my hands,
tossed them in the dirt where the fingers
curled like sleeping worms.
My old bones shattered numbly
but I offered up no blood, just
fixed my staring eyes upon their faces.
The crumbling headstones sponged away
their laughter, their frantic panting
soaked into the patient waiting darkness.
No matter how they tried
the past and future kept its sticky grip.
Eventually they ran and left me
as naked as I entered
and silence was my final blessing,
SherryI Clark
Real-life sci-fi
Sci-fi landscape
concrete and metal
and thick smog.
And oxygen masks
to better keep us separated.
The optimists
are reading to the end
in search of an escape tunnel.
Afrodity Giannakis
grapes
he likes his words
unripe and peeled
his lips pucker on
their pulpy bitter truth
he spits the pips
carefully onto this page-
he is known for his
scrupulous punctuation
Kevin GHIam
Social Alternatives Vol. 17 No. 4, October 1998 49