'People want happy spots': dance parties and drag shows move online amid coronavirus

Last Saturday night, Amber Valentine got dressed up to play a set, as she has nearly every weekend since she began DJing full time eight years ago. She put on her headphones as a smoke machine and lights filled the room – but this time, instead of walking on stage to perform, she walked into her living room.

Valentine is one of an increasing number of performers moving their work online as nationwide lockdowns meant to slow the spread of the coronavirus force bars and other nightlife spaces to a close. Drag shows, DJ sets, and dance parties have been taking to live streams and chat rooms to keep people connected and pay out-of-work performers as more and more cities in the US go on lockdown.

Valentine came up with the idea to stream her set on Instagram live for a virtual dance party when New York City bars and clubs closed last week , and she’s planning another one this weekend now the New York governor has ordered most people to stay home.

“The response was like nothing I could have expected,” she said. Thousands of people tuned in and hundreds of her Instagram followers sent her videos of themselves dancing to her music in their living rooms. Many used the comment section to chat with one another as they might do in a club, and although she didn’t ask for money she made several hundred dollars via donations through her Venmo account.

“People are trying to find happy spots and brightness because this is a super dark and uncertain time,” she said. “I think the role of nightlife in this pandemic is not unlike what it usually is, which is we can try to create spaces where people can come and hang out in community and have their spirits lifted for a little while.”

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Events at Nowadays, a nightlife space and bar in Brooklyn, New York, migrated to online streams less than 24 hours after the city closed bars and nightclubs last week, said Justin Carter, a DJ and co-founder of the space.

Every day since then, Nowadays has facilitated streams of parties online and it plans to host its famed parties Mister Sunday and Mister Saturday Night through live streams. Traditionally Nowadays has outlawed phones on its dance floors in an attempt to keep people present and connected. Now it is turning to those devices to do just that.

“This is a case where technology is serving an important purpose, when we can’t be in the same rooms together,” Carter said. “The whole reason we ever started throwing parties in the first place was to create an environment where people could connect.”

Other nightlife spaces that previously hosted streaming options are increasing their offerings – including the Boiler Room, an online music broadcasting platform based in London. Previously the collective streamed shows from various clubs around the world, but it is now launching a Covid-19 series, which will stream from artists’ homes and private spaces.

The impulse to stream performances comes from a desire to continue to unite people through nightlife, but also to keep workers in the industry afloat as they go indefinitely without normal wages, said Rify Royalty, a New York City drag queen who is putting on drag shows via Instagram live. Rify has streamed one performance and has two more planned for next week.

“Everyone in the nightlife space – bartenders, barbacks, performers, are all getting hit very hard by this,” she said. “As a community, we need to stick together.”