Techno Temples: EDM in the Pews

Yes, you read the title right. Recently Hans Daniels aka. Hans Solo, a wedding DJ, replaced the eight-person contemporary ensemble at the Baptist Church at Clarendon in Arlington, Virginia.

Let that sink in for a moment. EDM in the pews.

As a DJ I have played in plenty of god awful venues (no pun intended) to pay the bills: dive bars, sandwich shops… I even DJ’ed a bus once, crazy story behind that one actually but, I digress. The idea of a DJ heading a congregation feels very weird to me, but as always I try to approach things with an open mind. This is one of the rare times where I failed. Dance music in general doesn’t seem to vibe with the message of church. Last time I checked, drugs, drinking, and casual sex with strangers all are not typically in line with most churches’ doctrine. But that being said, apparently the churches are down with EDM now.

Hans Solo is spinning to a congregation of around 150 all of which have positive mostly positive things to say. As a very, non-religious sort of guy I’m really only able to judge the musical content of Solo‘s gospel EDM, which isn’t great. If anything it’s awful, but that’s not the point. EDM has become such a strong force in world culture that it’s beginning to sink into facets of society that once would have be unthinkable, as in this case, religion. In any case, this offbeat news just demonstrates that the fascination over EDM runs all the way to the very top, even God is getting down. Check out Solo‘s mix below. And be sure to head over to the Washington Post article where you can find the video.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/104448255″ width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

@BrettEdgerly