The Year Was 1997...
 

The year was 1997... what were you doing when Hulla was created?

The year was 1997... and coming from Sudbury, I didn't even know what a rave was.

During my first year in TO, I was living in college residence on the all-male, "Macho Roadhouse 2" floor. I wasn't comfortable with the macho thing, so I decorated my outer door with posters of drag queens and the Mona Lisa smoking a bong.

After a few months, I was told to take the blinking christmas lights off my door because of the fire hazard.

In my quest to become more Torontonian, my first goal was to eliminate jeans from my wardrobe, and to replace them with things from Le Chateau.

My favorite outfit featured silver PVC pants with a shimmering, body-fitting, fuzzy, electric-blue velour shirt. My Airwalks were made out of black PVC with holographic sparkles that gleamed rainbows in the sun.

Every Friday, I'd take the complimentary limousine shuttle that left Church and Wellesley for the Guvernment, the newest million-dollar club to open up. Us queers actually had the main room, not just the dinky little Orange room. Cover was only $10.

I would dance to the track "Storm" very seriously. My other favorite club songs at the time were "Sugar Is Sweeter", and "Spin Spin Sugar". My CD collection included every Much Music Dance Mix ever released, at least 12 musical soundtracks, and things like Right Said Fred.

I went to my first after hours, "Joy" in December, and my first circuit party, "Titanic The Party", on New Years Eve.

I didn't go to my first rave until Destiny threw a party at Radius Nightclub sometime in January of 98'. An acquaintance I met there invited me to Hulla's "Into The Blue". The rest is history.

My GPA was the worst ever that school year. WORST.

great topic, I often wanted to ask people what they were doing "back in the day" before they even knew we existed.

i was going to community college and working at walmart (blech).......dating a bi sexual boy, met a few ravers but never really went to anything.....i was 20 years old....

well i was YOUNG... way young.. and in more trouble than i could handle.

in 97 i would have been 14... i had just started raving a year earlier... the summer of 96 i went to my 1st rave... after stealing a friends car and driving it into detroit to check out a rave. It was called welcome to our house in detroit... after that.. i continued going to parties.. when i could... and eventually got quite involved in the scene in the detroit area. By the summer of 97 i was thick into it... working for local promoters... trying desperately to sell as many things as i could to all the random school kids i knew... using highschool as a means to gain a younger crowd base... pushing attendance and profits UP... in the D, money was the key.... shady shady shady

none the less... that was the summer i met all the kids from BioKidd, Dubtech, Hazzard-S, Havoc, Syst3m, and the infamous PLUS8... (hawtins now defunct promotion company) that was an amazing summer.. Giant parties... awesome headliners... amazing music... God what fun...

things went strong for several years after that...
detroit was alot of fun back then =)

when i was 17....
i was drinking & often skipping highschool classes. i started attending "raves" the summer of '98. i knew of hullas, but didn't go to one until "rush hour".

I would have been 15 or 16 and a sophomore or junior in highschool, depending on what part of the year Hulla started.

I'm pretty sure I was stoned most of the time, and just trying to get through highschool.

Didn't go to my first rave until '99 and didn't get into hardcore until 2000. Anabolic Frolic was supposed to spin at two parties in Colorado that year, but he was denied entrance to the US both times, and that's about the time I heard about Hullabaloo.

I finally got to see Frolic spin at my first Hulla event, "All Good Things". It was worth the wait.

I was 15, i was in and out of the hospital worried I wouldnt survive the year. I had spinal and brain surgery that year....it was a great year....I learned what it meant to be alive...

In 1997 I was 15, going into my sophomore year of highschool as a country bumpkin in Vermont...I didn't know what a rave was (aside from the poisonings of dateline and the like on TV) It'd be another 6 years almost before i went to my first party (Power of Dreams) and haven't looked back since :)

I was 17. I got my first car a 1989 ford escort. bought a nice stereo for it at the time. 2 12 alpine vr subs with a 600 watt amp (cant remember what kind it was) with a jvc cd deck that talked to you. with remote. hung out with friends and smoked alot of weed. heard of raves in general, but didnt know were to go. it would be 3 more years till I went to my first rave, and only regret not starting sooner.

i was only 11...a very young sheltered boy who knew nothing of a rave. it took me another 4 years to even find out about them.

I was 17, living with my parents in Barrie, and in Grade 11. I was just getting in to the all-ages nightclub 'scene', with regular trips to Toronto to hit up Abyss, Club 108 & Goddess, as well as every Roxx all ages night in Barrie. It was plenty of fun, but a little too snooty, and I knew there had to be something better out there.

I would listen to Chris Sheppard's radio show on Z103, and hear the names of all the clubs that were having the big parties, and swore to myself that I'd never sit at home on a Saturday night as soon as I got my ID.

As soon as I turned 17, I put in my paperwork to join the Reserves, although I didn't swear in until January of 1998.

I weighed 133.7 pounds, and wrestled in the 134.5 weight category. I played hockey for the Barrie Police Association team, I was Alternate captain, and was the top defensive player in the league. My teammates called me 'The Physical Beast'. :lol: (I was actually just reminded of that last week too!)

MCED

I was 13, wearing a lot of black and makeup and listening to metal.

Some older friends went to raves (mostly for the drugs...actually entirely for the drugs). They dragged me out to a couple. I wasnt havin' it. Spent them sitting in the corner with my discman on.

When you wear all black and find yourself a nice dark spot, you blend in and people dont bother you. ;)

I was 13, extremly preppy and a bitch. (Now I look back at that and LAUGH!!) It wasn't until I was 14 when an older classmate dragged me to my first rave. Needless to say I was hooked and well... here I am!

In 1997 I would have been 17 going through Grade 12 to OAC.

I spent my summer living in Vancouver with 2 roomates and working at a historical site. I was more into metal and punk (which I am more into once again). I had heard of raves and kindof been to one in 1995, but it was in Port hope and It was pretty dead, plus at that point I thought electronic music was for losers (which it kindof still is). I may have had some hair at some point in the year beyond the shaven look I've sported for most of my life. I got my first non-ear piercing that summer as well. Drank alot of beer.

I had never been to a full-on rave and these two people I worked with mentioned that they went to these parties. I was really interested but I would always end up hearing about them after the fact. I also first heard about MDMA for the first time through my boss and would have done it if her roomate hadn't sold it all before we got to their house.

I would discover raves (Hulla 6) in the next 6 months (and randomly run into snuffy at it) and the rest is history.

either that or I was eating my way into morbid obesity.

In 1997 huh? Yeah those were the years when my older brother would come him around 2-3-4 in the morning from raves. Then stay up all the next day and tell me about them. In 97 specifically. I would watch my brother spin his house records in his room, look at all of his flyers, listen to his cds(mainly old skool & happy hardcore I might add). Thats when I really wanted to start djing but then he sold his turntables to some kid and started to mc...we got thos tables back and thats what I use now, kindof djing history in my family :D

Yep, thats my musical life in a nutshell I suppose...

That was awhile ago...
 

I was 16, going to a Christian high school and being a hardcore Christian. I went on my first (and only) missions trip that year, to Mexico. I had bad hair, greasy skin, knew nothing of the real world, didn't know what a rave was, but was happy in my naivete, not yet knowing the harshness that the real world can bring...I was content in thinking that society and the world were good and positive.

I went to my first "rave" (seeing Fatboy Slim spin through one night at Woodstock 99) two years later, and haven't looked back since. And I'm a lot happier now, in my "heathen" life. :)

In 97 I was going to Trilogy in Cleveland. They had a great club night going on Sunday nights. I thought it was awesome that the DJ's actually mixed the music as opposed to just putting some CDs on shuffle.

I got my very first rave flier this year for a Moonshine event in Chicago, but at the time that seemed way to far to go for a party so I stayed at home.

Went to my first party a year later, a week after meeting my now wife. I was such an innocent naive virgin in 97. 1998 came and popped my cherry hardcore (happy-hardcore).

1997
i was 14, didnt' know what a rave was
i didnt even know about hulla till 2001 when i met some ravers in ontario. i was like umm hhc NO WAY I"M A TRANCE ADDICT HERE....
of couse then i loved the dnb
then i turned kandi lmao
i only ever went to one hulla and i must say it was such a unique rave experence

The first Hulla happened about two weeks before my 20th birthday...

That was the summer between my first and second year of university (Wilfrid Laurier in Waterloo). I was still slaving in the shoe mines like Al Bundy at the now-defunct Kinney Shoes at the Conestoga Mall in Waterloo. I'd been going out with my future wife for two years.

I had popped my Toronto partying cherry the previous summer with the United Dance party and in the meantime had been hitting up little Kitchener and Guelph techno jams here and there. Around then I heard a bit of a buzz about a new company that was going to recapture and revisit the oldschool rave party vibe. Someone gave me a flyer for the first Hulla and although I couldn't make the event due to prior family commitments or something, I vowed to hit up their next one.

It would be the summer of my first WEMF, of back-to-back Dubtribe Soundsystem extravaganzas, and that September my partying went from the occasional outing to a full-time occupation - Phryl's first event, the second Hulla (woo!) , Building Blocks 2 and Corrosion (an event in Kitchener). It was my first time partying every weekend. What a time to be alive.

I was 17, had been raving for a little over a year... and was lucky enough to have attended the first Hullabaloo! It was, and still is to this day, the best party I ever went to.

My friends and I had been frequenting thE! Space regularly, but somehow Hulla managed to totally transform that venue for that event. It truly was "Something Good".

I can't believe how time flies!

in 1997 i was only 10 years old! and it wasnt till about 2000 till i heard about raving from my cousin and i was still only 13 years old. i loved the music and lifestyle my whole life but it wasnt till i was 17 that i made it to my first rave i think i was near the end of 2004.. i hate to admit it but its true. :0(
i hear i "missed the good years"
but id like to think i'm making my own "good years" lol

good job kit-e for finding this thread!

97... i was 12/13, finishing the 7th grade..i moved around alot, so i was actually in that school district only a couple years, still making friends
twas a nerd, on the math team, chess club (haha)...i just basically hung out and tried to fit in..
didnt get into the scene till about 01ish

1997 was one of the most important years of my life, because August 1997 was when I met Frolic in a rave chatroom on IRC. We met just before the release of Happy2bHardcore Chapter 2, and just before he threw the second Hulla party. We met in real life a few weeks later and we've been together ever since. So basically, the time before August 1997 was spent working on a home-study program to finish high school (I ended up graduating three months before the rest of the people from my normal high school that I'd gone to previously), and the time after August 1997 was spent chatting with Chris on the computer, talking to Chris on the phone, and waiting for the next time I'd get to talk to him again. :)