Sat home and listened to music/drank sparkling wine with my mom.

Alej said:

lavender1983 said:

My 21st sucked ass. I cried most of the day. I'd rather not relieve it.

Made up for it on my 25th. I had a blast.

That sounds like my 18th birthday.

for us all that ever had sucky birthdays

sextonseven said:

We had a big family do, and I drank the traditional yard glass. I had to come home from college and miss 2 days lectures as it was in the middle of the semester. I remember too, I got to choose all the music and some one gave me a copy of Emancipation to replace the one that a 4 year old cousin accidentally poured soft drink all over, we played Prince music all night, it was great.

The date was April 30th 1997, but we held the party on April 25th as it was Anzac Day and a Public holiday.

[Edited 7/11/11 20:12pm]

JerseyKRS said:

PunkMistress said:

"Private dances" in Mass are nothing like the lap dances in Florida.

I soooo agree with KRS

Had a boring birthday party with my family.....did the same for 22nd

My friend picked me up in her bad ass Cadillac and my other friend followed in her

Suburban. Then we picked up a few of our other friends. We drove side by side,

and around each other, on the freeway with music blasting- all of us dancing

and making faces etc.

We then had dinner and then went to a tequila bar where we all drank it up.

I ended up sucking whip cream off of penis shaped tequila bottles and flirting

with one of the bartenders. My friend handled the other bartender and we ended

up paying a $15 dollar tab instead of the $200 tab we owed.

We then drove back to my place, getting out of the cars and dancing like tramps

at the stop lights, switching out drivers, etc all the way.

That’s where a few of the guys met up with us…let’s just say one of my friends

woke up sore and in a puddle of lotion.

I was 21

Alej said:

lavender1983 said:

My 21st sucked ass. I cried most of the day. I'd rather not relieve it.

Made up for it on my 25th. I had a blast.

That sounds like my 18th birthday.

SAME.

ZombieKitten said:

sextonseven said:

I remember mine very well even though it was over 20 years ago.

I did nothing.

I was away at university and very against celebrating my birthday back then. If I could make it through the whole day without once hearing "happy birthday", I win!

And this is your prize

I wish I had known you when I was 21.

Got my license; won a couple hundred at the casino...I think I might've went out with my brothers. Can't really remember (strange, since it was only three years ago and I didn't have a drop of alcohol).

I didn't celebrate on my actual birthday, but I did a few days later because my best friend turned 21 also. We went out to some of the local bars and lounges, but they were pretty boring. We ended up at Lucky Strike Lanes and just played some pool and had a few beers

My friends tried to have me drink 21 shots of cheap tequila. I made it to about 11 and then I puked my brains out for about 2 days... Fun times!!!

bboy87 said:

JerseyKRS said:

I soooo agree with KRS

What, fuckers?

You know what's interesting? People who celebrate their birthdays for a whole week.

People saying happy birthday for, you know, one day is awkward enough.

My mom threw me a surprise birthday party at her house. She told me she wanted me to come over for a family dinner and the house was full of my family and friends. Once that was over, two of my friends took me to Benigans to drink, since I was the only one old enough to drink.

sextonseven said:

I didn't want to hype up my 21st and was only keeping a few friends around at the time, so I ended up doing dinner and a movie with my family. We saw 13 Going on 30 which was playing at the time, and probably went out for pizza, though I'm not really sure if we went there or not or just the movie now. I do remember wearing a nice new top I had chosen as my birthday gift. However, I went all out for my 25th and about 30 people came for dinner and then out to a lounge, one where Prince has hung out at in fact when he lived here.

I won't be 21 until two years lol. My brother just turned 21, but we just hung out and ate cake. He doesn't drink

sextonseven said:

I was away at university and very against celebrating my birthday back then. If I could make it through the whole day without once hearing "happy birthday", I win!

Yep.

2003, mid term season, my GPA was getting ass kicked and I sure as hell wasn't in no mood for a birthday. Somebody should've told me to lighten the hell up

Enjoy your upcoming birthday, OP.

[Edited 7/12/11 19:17pm]

It was a looooong time ago, and obviously whatever I did

couldn't have been too exciting, or I'd probably remember

Alej said:

You know what's interesting? People who celebrate their birthdays for a whole week.

People saying happy birthday for, you know, one day is awkward enough.

My brother, his wife and his friends all do that. I'm sure it's fun, but I just can't hang. If I go out a handful of times a year, I'm good.

Sex galore for me. But I had been doing it since I was 14. This time is was with a women 10 years older than me that I would constantly flirt with, & she finally gave in....such a magical day for me.

yeah school was probably the reason I didn't do something big, though it was just a spring course, I really didn't balance work and social life well then, you have to have a social life, or you're going to go crazy just focusing on school or just work

I never celebrated for a week, but I celebrated it 4 times last year, which was cool, and some of it was partially My university friends planned a little get together, and it's so obvious it was cause of my birthday, and a week in advance too. I had gotten a cake and presents. A week after that, there was an MJ and Janet jam the night before my birthday, before midnight, and I went with a bunch of acquaintances that are big fans but didn't really advertise it was my birthday, but for me, it was the perfect way to celebrate being another year older after all the stress and to my favourite music. After that, I went for dinner with my family the next day, and then the day after, for dinner with my dad. This year I was in an awful mood during my birthday and the day just got worse, maybe now I feel a little tired of them. The only thing I like about them is that it's nice being remembered and that I don't look my age.

MyNameIsPiper said:

Alej said:

You know what's interesting? People who celebrate their birthdays for a whole week.

People saying happy birthday for, you know, one day is awkward enough.

My brother, his wife and his friends all do that. I'm sure it's fun, but I just can't hang. If I go out a handful of times a year, I'm good.

Yeah, I could never do it. I hate receiving attention from people. It makes me very uncomfortable.

ZombieKitten said:

sextonseven said:

I wish I had known you when I was 21.

But I wore sweat pants!!!

I was not goth yet. I wouldn't have cared.

A little DMSR

I didn't do shit I don't think. I had a celebration dinner somewhat but that was it.

sextonseven said:

at a venue in town for around 150 people.

me and george

me without a clue lol

everyone dancing

me talking crap

me being 21 lol

yum yum

it was a great night. good memories. 21 years ago.

I went to a Little Wicked (the very best raves ever!) in some DIVE ass location South of Market and took far too much insanely good acid (probably why I don't remember exactly where it was, but it was SOMA and it was indoors, because it was January, and I have a clear memory of it being a dive). I didn't really drink from around 18-25. I certainly never got drunk during that time.

Below is what I did several times a week from Dec 90 to mid 95, less from late 95 to mid 2001, almost never since.

San Francisco

The west coast rave scene, while today being the most active and diverse scene in America, was one of the later scenes to get started. At first, small underground parties sprung up all over the SOMA district of San Francisco in vacant warehouses, loft spaces, and clubs like DV8 (on Howard st between 3rd and 4th) and 1015 Folsom (on Folsom St. between 6th and 7th), and the basement of Jessie Street that had permits to run to 6am as long as no alcohol was served. The zero alcohol rule fueled the ecstasy-driven parties to a much larger crowd, and soon followed were the first large-scale raves.

Rave promotion crews began achieving notoriety not only for their choices in musical entertainment, but for the entire experience as a whole (sometimes referred to colloquially as "the vibe"). Unlike concert promotion, rave promotion adds another dimension of creativity: the decorations, visualizations, theme and demographics of a party. This extra requirement that must be satisfied had small underground raves were just starting out and expanding beyond SF to include the East Bay, the South Bay Area including San Jose and Santa Clara, and Santa Cruz beaches (where the notorious 'full moon raves' took place at Bonny Doon beach every month).

One of the first regular rave nights in San Francisco was DJ Pete Avila's Osmosis. Held on Thursday nights on the top floor of the DV8 club, this event got started with a bang in the Fall of 1989. The original regular DJs included Pete Avila, Markie Mark (Wicked), Neon Leon, and DJ Ghost, now of Renegade Productions. When Markie went back to the U.K in 1990, another U.K. DJ took over as a regular, Jëno (Wicked). DJ Doc Martin was a frequent guest, and many other notable DJs of the day played there, including DJ Dimitri (Dee-lite) (Cerebus insert: I danced with Lady Miss Kier during one of Dimitri's sets ) and Keoki (Limelight).

Another notable early San Francisco rave dance was the Smartie Party, which took place on March 23, 1991 at 1052 Geary near Van Ness. Admission was $5 and the featured DJ was Markie Mark of London, UK. Several hundred people attended this event. In late 1991 raves started to explode across Northern California into cities like Sacramento, and other parts of the San Francisco Bay Area besides San Francisco such as Oakland and Silicon Valley were taking off every weekend. This proved to be the turning point in Northern California's rave history. No longer were raves a secret, where one had to know the right people to gain access to map points. Now rave flyers were to be found up and down Haight Street at stores like "Anubis Warpus", "Amoeba" clothes, "Behind The Post Office", and newly opened "Housewares". Raves were exploding at an enormous rate and no longer were hundreds of revellers heading out, now there were thousands of ravers living for every weekend. The second generation of raves were just starting to be realized.

The Toontown Club New Year's Eve of 1991 rave which took place in the basement of the Fashion Center in SF was the first 'true' massive in the bay area. Over 8,000 people helped welcome in the new year and at the same time put SF as a must visit city for the burgeoning world wide rave scene. This was the first of many subsequent "Toontown Club" rave dances over the next few years (all organized by rave dance promoters Dianna Jacobs, Mark Heley, and Lawrence Sutten, along with a host of dedicated partners and volunteers). The Toontown Club was notable for having the best light shows—five different light shows, each of a different type, the most beautiful and largest psychedelic black light murals, and the best go-go dancers (both female and male). The superb excellence of the production standards of the Toontown Club became a touchstone for all future promoters to follow. Similarly, a year later, The Gathering held New Year's Eve of 1992 in Vallejo had over 12,000 people in attendance. The massive parties were taking place every weekend now from such disparate locations as outdoor fields to the aeroplane hangars and hilltops that surround the San Francisco Bay.

San Francisco has long been a Mecca for ravers from all over the world and true to form a lot of the early promoters and DJs were from the UK and Europe. For almost ten years after the initial raves took place, one could find up to 2 to 4 parties happening a weekend and sometimes on the same night. There was no curfew in place, which allowed the SF scene to explode by the late '90s when venues would have up to 20,000 people every weekend; Homebase, and the 85th & Baldwin Warehouse (both in Oakland near the Oakland Airport) were the largest venues to be used in the Bay Area. Many amazing venues were used by crews that held clout or members that were tied to the city or knew the appropriate ways to navigate the permit maze. Thus, in the late 1990s some of the most memorable raves took place in locations such as the SOMA art museum, 'Where the wild things are' museum on top of the Sony Metreon, and in the venerable Maritime hall that was used for many parties from 1998 to 2002. Some old locations appeared again brand new, such as the Concourse that saw thousands of ravers in '92, now saw the same amount in late 99. The Galleria that once held a 'concert' in '92 with artists such as Moby, Aphex Twin, The Prodigy, and Space Time Continuum was now used for a few one-off events that utilized all 5 floors of the building with a different music style on each floor.

The mid part of the 1990s saw a general loss of the first generation of ravers, causing the scene to take a short dive. In this time, however, and into the late '90s, a new West coast sound was formed and developed by DJs such as Tony Hewitt, Jeno, Spun, DJ Carlos, Galen, Solar, Harry Who?, and Rick Preston to name but a few. Venues and parties such as Stompy, Harmony, CloudFactory, the Cyborganic lounge, Mr. Floppy's Flophouse (in Oakland), the Acme warehouse among many others started to fuse the Breakbeat sound from hardcore trax with the more melodic pace of house. West coast funky break-beat was born from this and stormed the dance scene. By the end of '94 all the people that had left a gap in the rave scene in '93 were long forgotten as twice as many people now found the new sounds completely and utterly funky.

This time period saw the rise of the many facets of EDM. Now all jungle raves, or cybertrance, or Breakbeat, or just good house could be enjoyed by anyone willing to go out to any of these parties. Gone were the days of a basement, and red light and a feeling. Now one could pick an upscale club, or a warehouse, or illegal outdoors as many crews sprung forward and blossomed. Promoters started to take notice and put together the massive rave dances of the late 1990s with many music forms under one roof for huge 12 hour events (There was greatly increased prosperity in late 1990s due to the tech boom.). It was not unheard of for as many as 20,000 people to pack Homebase, or 85th/Baldwin for a night of eternal dancing at massive raves. The two major massive rave dance production companies in the San Francisco Bay Area in the late 1990s were Cool World Productions, which produced the Cyberfest and Planet New Year massive rave dances (sometimes with DJ Keoki as a guest DJ), and Clockwork Eventz productions, which produced the Metropolis and Atlantis massive rave dances (featuring DJs such as Ron Reeser [aka DJ Rktech], Jeno, Garth, and many others). SF was now a fabled and much talked about destination around the United States, if not the world. DJs from all corners of the globe played in San Francisco.

The year 2000 saw the beginning of the decline of massive raves as curfews were placed on permits handed out to promoters throwing parties. Instead of all night and into the next day, parties now had to end at 2 a.m. Another problem was that the Oakland fire marshal began doing meticulous fire inspections of the two massive rave dance warehouses near the Oakland Airport. These two largest venues closed down soon after, and there wasn't enough momentum to sustain parties that catered to tens of thousands of people. As if a nail was driven into the coffin of the SF rave scene, the Homebase warehouse that held massive parties from 1996 to 2000 burned down to the ground in a spectacular 6-alarm fire in 2004. Another factor is that in 2003, musical styles changed and many younger people started to listen and dance to electro and electropop music played in small clubs that served alcohol instead of going to large rave dances that played house music with no alcohol. Rave dances also changed back to the new smaller, intimate venues, which continued just like they had from the start and underground raves became the norm in the years after the tech boom of the 1990s.

While San Francisco's crowd attendance and variety of DJs might have peaked, it still maintains a much smaller but dedicated cadre of various crews, DJs such as DJ Joey Tek from Redwood City, promoters and producers. Every weekend, many events are still dedicated to the various forms of electronic music across the greater Bay Area.

In September 2004, the first LoveFest (Love Parade) was held in San Francisco, and it has been held every autumn(except 2010) since then, winding up with a celebration at the San Francisco Civic Center.