In our search for undervalued forms of power and agency for humans in community, collective dance is something we’ve often championed. (Our inspirers, Denmark’s Alternativet, were a notorious “dance-party” party - and see our dance archive of posts).

So were struck by these passages from The Economist’s review of Electronic, a new exhibition on dance music opening up at the Design Museum in London, conducted under social-distancing measures:

With almost any other subject, such distancing precautions might simply mean more room to view the exhibits. But when it comes to dance music, the emptiness highlights just how ruinous the present pandemic is to this subject’s essence.

Anyone who has been part of the electronic dance scene knows that its heart lies in communality and physical closeness. This is underlined by the photographs the visitor sees on the way in: great blow-ups of huge, happy crowds pressed together in delirium at sweaty raves. That is now, and for an indefinite future, an unthinkable idea.

…“Electronic” shows how both Kraftwerk and The Chemical Brothers have been at the forefront of turning what could be unprepossessing performances, with static figures manipulating electronic devices, into extraordinary live shows that can fill arenas or festival stages with dazzling imagery and light. This, too, seems at present a relic from a bygone world.

Another theme of the exhibition—that of the masks, both literal and metaphorical, behind which such dance musicians as Deadmau5 or Aphex Twin present themselves—has an obvious if inadvertent echo in this new world.

The unknown distance from here to the next dancefloor is emphasised, again in a way the curators could not have guessed, by the final space, a darkened club-like room where the visitor can dance along with projected images of the Chemical Brothers’ stage avatars.

With the exception of those youngsters who are taking after their predecessors 30 years ago, and holding illegal events in the countryside, that’s as close as anyone is going to get to a rave for a while.

But this engrossing exhibition does offer some encouragement. At every turn, “Electronic” reminds visitors how both electronic music and dance culture have responded to technological, political and social developments, innovating as necessary. Like water, they always find a way through, or around, obstacles. They will surely do so again.

Mentioned above are the illegal raves being held across the UK and Europe. DW talks to two social scientists who have deeper explanations about why this defiance of social norms and health warnings are happening:

"The dancefloor is an opportunity to not overthink," says musicologist and sociologist Beate Peter. But with all that's going on, she says she has "no desire" herself to go out right now.

"You would have to completely ignore what's going on, every minute of your life, at the moment. But with my level of awareness of what's happening and the potential dangers, I wouldn't be able to get to a state, where I can get what I want out of a rave," she says.

Academics, says Peter, often focus on a "body-mind dichotomy," and the mind is "favored over the body, time and again." But on a dancefloor, that dichotomy is dissolved or "at least blurred to a certain extent," she says.

"We no longer separate what's happening with the body and what's happening to the mind. They start to form a condition or state, where people express themselves or respond to the music through dance. And dance is the most important element here — you are physically engaged in it. But I'm also convinced that it does something to your mental state. And that is true with or without drugs," Peter says.

Perhaps that is why thousands of people have gathered at raves and block parties in urban Manchester and its rural outskirts, like Carrington, or in London, Berlin, a beach at Porto in Portugal, or the French capital Paris and Nantes. Perhaps it's an opportunity to lose yourself in the dance and forget the pandemic around us.

…"In rave culture, people dance together to the beat. That's something that people can agree on, what's important to them. It's not the melody, for instance, but the beat," says Peter. "So, they're moving in unison. And somehow a kind of muscular bonding takes place with people you've never met before."

The idea of muscular bonding was coined by a war historian called William McNeill.

It refers to a sense of euphoria and connection felt by a group of people, whether that's troops on a march or civilians on a dancefloor, brought on by rhythmic, synchronized movements, performed unison — something as simple as music and dance. Or a repetitive beat, like a 4/4 kick drum. You can feel that in rave culture.

"That's partly what raves are about. You go into an event and you develop a 'norm of connectedness' with people who are complete strangers… In any other context, they would remain complete strangers. But in this context, there is a form of empathy and enjoyment and solidarity."

More here. We note that dance culture in the UK has started a number of campaigns - #LetUsDance, and the work of the Night Time Industries Association - to make the case for at least some support and recognition from the Government. From this report in The Standard:

Michael Kill, the CEO of Night Time Industries Association (NTIA) said: “The NTIA warmly welcomes the announcement last week by the Government that £1.57bn will provide a lifeline to vital cultural and heritage organisations.

“But we are keen to gain assurances from DCMS and Government that dance music venues and nightclubs will be eligible to apply for the funding and that it will not be reserved purely for venues like the Royal Albert Hall and the West End. The UK is home to a rich and diverse range of institutions, all of whom should be fairly entitled to this investment.”

Novelist Irvine Walsh added: “Without the dance there’s only the drab and the dark. We were made to move to the groove. They ought to have started the funding at dance music and worked their way down from there. #letusdance"

This detailed bit of reporting from DJ Mag concludes with a stark piece of economics:

London club Hangar18 shared their capacity planning based on government guidelines in June. The diagram showed their capacity dropped from 370 to 26, an impact the club described as “a nail in the coffin for us”.

Even now the government guidelines have changed, moving the two-metre rule down to one metre+, and allowing socially distant outdoor music events to take place, we’re still some distance off clubs being able to safely, and viably, open.

Finally, this fascinating VICE report (embedded below) from South Korea shows how a dance scene - the Itaewon district in Seoul - became a wasteland, when a cluster of new COVID was specified as coming from this neighbourhood.

The sense of a joyful community just being crushed by events and conditions is poignant. We must stay safe, but we must also remember the collective sentiments that are being tested and shredded by the virus. And think of new ways to safely allow them a voice.

[See also our archive on festival culture and its empowerment possibilities]

We need to fill a dance-shaped hole in us, opened up by the pandemic. But will we ever get back to the club?