Crush Music Festival: 5 Must-See DJs at This Weekend's Event in Mesa

While Phoenicians are busy planning romantic dinners, exchanges of roses and chocolate, and other sappy Valentine's rituals, those in the local dance music scene are busy with plans of their own. The Crush Music Festival is scheduled to go down on Saturday at Arizona Event Center in Mesa, and its lineup is packed with more than a dozen well-known names in bass music and electro, not to mention a slew of local DJs and EDM artists.

So if you go, it's best to have an idea of who you'd like to see. And since the festival's lineup is quite good, we've got a few suggestions about who you definitely don't want to miss, including the following five acts.

DJ Snake Its reasonable to assume that you've probably heard DJ Snake's popular track with Lil' Jon, "Turn Down for What," either in the clubs or on the radio. Yep, he's that DJ. The EDM producer and proud resident of "Motherfuckin' Paris" also has collaborated with well-known acts like Dillon Francis and Diplo and is gaining a lot of attention in the dance music world. He's definitely an artist on the rise and just so happens to make some of the best new party music out there, like his club-worthy collaboration with Alesia, "Bird Machine."

Excision

Canadian-born dubstep producer Excision met success around the start of current dance music zeitgeist and since has become a leader in the realm of bass music. He's defined by his distinctive, aggressive, dark, and hard style of dubstep, which pounds the subwoofers mercilessly. He was asked personally by Pendulum to remix their track "Showdown," and in 2012 started the EDM supergroup Destroid with Downlink and onetime Pendulum drummer KJ Sawka.

When you see him live, expect a dubstep-heavy set with intense builds and dirty, low drops -- with an occasional hardstyle sample and drum 'n' bass track thrown in for good measure, all of which should sound extra intense coming from the 150,000-watt bass system he's reportedly brought along on his current tour.

Henry Fong

Henry Fong is one of the fresher faces in the electro scene. Based in both Orlando and Los Angeles, releases with such tastemaking EDM labels as Spinnin, Revealed, Hysteria, Skrillex's OWSLA, Steve Aoki's Dim Mak and Diplo's Mad Decent have really helped jump-start his music career in the last year.

When checking out his performance at Crush Music Festival, you can expect a fast tempo set lead by a high-energy, relentless bouncing beat that does not slow down until it's over. And by then, you're likely to be covered with sweat, either from all the dancing you've just done or the pulse-quickening sounds that Fong dispenses.

Dirtyphonics Not one, not two, but a total of three different DJs make up this electronic music group from France that's made waves in the EDM world since 2004. Despite the loss of founding member Thomas last month (who quit the DJ biz in order to launch his painting career) the remainder of the Dirtyphonics have carried on, including being packaged with Excision on his 2014 tour.

Just like Excision, they bring more bass-heavy music to the Crush Music Festival's lineup with their mix of electro-house, dubstep and drum 'n' bass stylings, and whenever they play live, they balance their set well between said genres. The Dirtyphonics may even include a live rapper on stage for parts of their set, before going into instrumental versions of certain tracks and then playing a more progressive, vocal mix.

DVBBS Los Angeles-based duo DVBBS have co-written some of the dance music world's more famous tracks in recent memory, including "Tsunami," their ultra-popular collaboration with Borgeous from last summer. Additionally, they've teamed up with other major names in electro over the last year, such as Dimitri Vegas and Like Mike on "Stampede," Swanky Tunes and Eitro with "We Know," and Vinai on "raveology." We predict you'll hear all four jams during a high-energy set packed with banger after banger.

Crush Music Festival takes place from 8 p.m. to 3 a.m. on Saturday, February 15, at Arizona Event Center in Mesa.

Find any EDM show in the Valley via our extensive online concert calendar.

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