At Ease: A Soldier’s Life-Changing Journey from the Battlefield to the Dancefloor

When I was 19 years old, after just a few semesters of college, I joined the Infantry. My job? The guy with the gun on the front line whose sole purpose is to close in, engage, and destroy the enemy. Upon reaching my actual home unit after basic training, I was selected for a specialized reconnaissance/sniper platoon. Other than patrolling, combat operations and standard infantry grunt work, my main focus was reconnaissance.

I had listened to a little dance music when I was 14 or 15, but it wasn’t until I was in Iraq and saw the movie It’s All Gone Pete Tong that my attention really turned to EDM. The rhythm of the drums and the bass got me into a zone that mellowed me out in a very stressful and high-strung environment. The team I deployed with introduced me to Skrillex’s remix of La Roux’s “In for the Kill”—they called it their sniper anthem—so when I became a team leader, I added “One Click Headshot” by FeedMe to the playlist.

Once you get shot at, and friends around you start getting hurt and dying, you start seeing life with a whole new perspective.

The music became a coping mechanism, and I started spending a lot of my downtime online surfing for tunes. I unearthed a world of beautiful melodies, nasty drops, and colorful flashing lights, and I brought them into an alien world that was dusty, musty and crusty. I think the more time I spent in that environment—missing home, missing the little everyday things that people do, missing out on a time in my life where most kids my age were partying—the more I gravitated to EDM. After a while, I found some other guys in my unit who were bass heads, and the music they shared with me got me deeper into house and dubstep. Meanwhile, my best friend Austin went to EDC Las Vegas in 2011 and couldn’t stop going on about how amazing it was. It was only a matter of time before I purchased my three-day pass to EDC 2012.

My deployment to Iraq wasn’t the easiest year of my life, and an indelible footprint still remains. Once you get shot at, and friends around you start getting hurt and dying, and you start seeing life with a whole new perspective. I am definitely not the person that I was before I joined the military. I am normally not one for large crowds. I am conditioned to be vigilant and aware of whatever situation I am in. The habits that you acquire while serving in a combat zone don’t just stop because you come home. EDC 2012 was only my second time coming home on leave since I had left for Iraq. It would be my first live EDM show ever.

I remember the energy I felt throughout each night, going from stage to stage. It was so positive, like everyone in the world just dropped their ego and started dancing. My guard was down, and I let all the negativity go. I remember my friends teaching me about kandi, and on the ride home after the second night, we drove next to an EDC-decorated car on the freeway and traded kandi by throwing them from window to window. I got to see some of my favorite artists and found some new favorites as well. I remember Austin, who I’ve known since I was 14, telling me that he’d never seen me so happy in his entire life. That was my first EDC, and it was life-changing.

After my honorable discharge from the Army in January 2013, I immersed myself even deeper into dance music culture. Living in Las Vegas, it was easy to see all the best DJs, and I continued to meet amazing people that helped me realize just how much this music had changed my life for the better. I spent much of my adulthood being part of an organization that laid out very specific rules for how I lived. Everything from my clothes to my hair was set to a standard. I was a small, replaceable part of a larger whole.

The Army, like dance culture, has its rituals and ceremonies. There is a camaraderie between individuals that is unique to both worlds. Combat veterans will tell you, “I did what I did for the men to my left and to my right.” The dance community has a similar mindset, where looking out for one another is extremely important—strangers helping strangers—whether it’s with a simple drink of water or joining someone else’s group when you’ve lost all your friends.

Being away from the military, I find myself discovering a new, more passionate purpose. I decided that because of everything the rave community has done for me, I wanted to give back. I found that opportunity with Watch Me Rave, a company that my friends and I started to provide the coolest and highest quality rave gear we can find to help each person bring out the unique raver in them. As I mentioned before, the military is very group-oriented, not individual-oriented. I’m passionate about helping ravers achieve that individuality. Mine was suppressed for a long time, but EDC helped me recover it, and I’m slowly paving my own pathway that will hopefully lead to another amazing journey.

Photos by Bradley Meinz

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