In Memoriam: Avicii’s Live Bangers
In the late hours of Sunday night, or the early ones of Monday morning, Swedish EDM artist Avicii died. Well, not him, he’s fine…and not his music either, that’s also alive. The death was that of his live performances, or “the play button” as they’re labelled on your 1987 Sony Walkman.
Avicii, (real name Tim Bergling) has decided to finally crossfade out on standing behind a kitchen table after his last string of shows in the Ushuaia Ibiza nightclub. He’d been a busy boy over the weekend however, with appearances at Creamfields in the UK and Tennant’s Vital Festival in Belfast, so you can see why he’s exhausted and over touring when he’s pushing 26.
According to one gurning British tourist who was on the scene of the tragic events, the set was “Tight, fam”. An Australian man, who was being led out of the nightclub after being caught in the middle of a lewd act on the dance floor, proclaimed through a mouthful of bouncer’s fist that it “got him buzzing and muzzing”.
Avicii rose to prominence in the early 2010s after that EDM friend told you the Flo Rida song Good Feelings, which was on your younger brother’s ‘Schoolies’ playlist, was a total rip of of Avicii’s Levels. Avicii’s “original” version did nowhere near as well as Flo Rida’s on the charts (#24 and #3 on the ARIA charts respectively). However, the Swede had the last laugh because you can hear that track every night in Fortitude Valley or King’s Cross, and what’s Flo Rida doing with his life? Collaborating with Pitbull?
2012 was the year of LinkedIn for Avicii as he dropped hot collabs with Madonna (Girl Gone Wild) and Lenny Kravitz (Superlove), but it was Silhouettes that cemented him Down Under. The track climbed to #68 on triple j’s Hottest 100. That’s right, let that sink in Australia. Y’all are weapons-grade savages. He also showed his face and at Stereosonic 2011 and 2012, as well as co-headlining Futuremusic 2013 with The Prodigy and The Stone Roses just to give Australia a taste of the fist pumping that made him famous.
In 2013 Avicii discovered what a guitar was and got together with Aloe Blacc and Incubus’ Mike Einziger on Wake Me Up. Apparently the track angered a few fans, especially when it was played live, but in all seriousness snaps to the guy for literally mixing it up and bringing a live band to an EDM festival. That’s some baller sh*t there!
The track went to #1 on just about every chart on the planet and was 2013’s fastest selling track, beating out Robin Thicke’s Marvin Gaye’s foot fetishist Blurred Lines. Happy with the country twang sound, he then went on to drop the not-quite-in-the-right-time-frame-Vietnam-War track Hey Brother.
Adding to his huge list of collaborations, he went on to co-produce and co-write with Coldplay on their track A Sky Full of Stars as well as reportedly recruiting Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day, Jon Bon Jovi, Serj Tankian of System of a Down, Wyclef Jean, Matisyahu, and just about everyone else bar Mikhail Gorbachev, to work on his second album ‘Stories’. It would also turn out that Shaq collabed with Avicii after being inspired by, and trying his hand at DJing. This collab may be unknown to the Swede…
For all the sh*t people give him, Avicii can sure drop a stack of bangers. We’ve all found ourselves cutting some shapes on the floor of our favourite pub or club to an Avicii track and there has to be something said for someone who can bring together Serj Tankian and Matisyahu in an EDM album.
Avicii announced his retirement over his website, citing health reasons for pulling the plug. It is unknown if it is related to the following news:
Avicii is survived by the entirety of Tomorrowland and his father, Tiësto. It is unknown whether he ever thought Mike Posner was cool, pill or not.
To see when his live dates are, or to hear the track that bought him to fame, check out Levels below!
