So, the results are finally known in DJ Magazine’s ever controversial Top 100 DJs Poll. Armin van Buuren has retaken his crown tonight, the first DJ ever to move back to the #1 spot and a record breaking 5th top ranking for the Dutch legend too.
When David Guetta won in 2011 he was clearly
people’s champion with a slew of chart hits, but critics (particularly
Facebook trance trolls) hated the fact that his votes might have come
from pop fans, people who had never set foot on a real club dancefloor.
Armin’s reinstatement at the top after such passionate campaigning
for votes by his legions of followers should hopefully calm their
accusations that the poll is ‘fixed’ and decided simply by the number of
Facebook fans a DJ has. Yet 2012 has not been without plenty of upset.
Still, the dominance of scary Dutch hardstyle DJs aside, there are
plenty of truly global success stories, like highest new entry Nicky Romero, Alesso’s epic climb and Knife Party’s strong poll debut.
Despite there being more successful female DJs out there than ever, only the Nervo duo at 46 prevent the poll being 100% male dominated. There’s also the now standard placing for Daft Punk, this year down 16 but still doing incredibly well for a duo who have hardly ever DJed!
The rise of EDM showman like cake-throwing, boat-jumping Steve Aoki is also very apparent. Meanwhile former winners like Sasha tumble right out, a real sign of the times, despite the fact he can still pull mega crowds worldwide.
The phenomenon of EDM combined with the internet age means that the
elder statesmen of dance can’t compete in vote terms, despite their
continued draw when playing gigs. Does this mean the poll is irrelevant?
It certainly doesn’t do DJs and management egos any good at all to take
a tumble, as so many established names have in 2012.
If the new artists who are polling so high can go on to genuinely
build global careers then that will show the poll is still very relevant
indeed. But a number of surprise success stories from recent years have
fallen in 2012 too. The current obsession with very young DJs may yet
struggle to prove its worth.
This year has been a vintage one for drama and skulduggery too, with
Swiss DJ Miss Diamond kicked out for an alleged voting scam. Then there
was self-appointed whistleblower/hacker EDM Snob, who gleefully tried to
prove corruption by posting confidential documents online showing large
transactions between some of the world’s top DJs and DJ Magazine… for,
er, adverts.
It shows the level of ignorance about how the real media industry
works that a blogger would think advertising in the magazine constitutes
a bribe. DJ Magazine is old media, it’s been going for over 20 years.
The early Top 100 polls asked readers to fill in a postal vote. It now
has to make sense of the wired world and try and run a huge popularity
contest in a fit and proper way. And after all is said in the aftermath
of this year’s event, it is still a 100% public vote.
-Source: PointBlankOnline
For the full results feel free to visit the official website.
On a personnel note this were my 5 picks for this years poll:
- Skrillex #10
- Hardwell #6
- Alesso #20
- Avicii #3
- Laidback Luke #29
