Lagos rave rewrites the rules of nightlife, taking young Nigerians out of club culture

Lagos, Nigeria — On a recent Friday night, thousands of young people flocked to a large hall in Lekki, an upscale part of Lagos.

Inside, it was difficult to recognize the faces of people just meters away. The entire hall was dark, lit only by flashing green strobe lights from the stage. People gathered there gathered together for treatment.

But it’s group therapy, a popular rave in Lagos, where revelers come looking for a different party scene, nowhere to be found in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial heart.

Lagos’ nightlife scene has for decades been dominated by table culture, a club experience where people spend as much on drinks and prime seats as possible. The party environment fosters a competitive environment that youths living in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, say have shut them out amid soaring inflation.

In group therapy, there are no tables. Revelers in Lekki danced shoulder to shoulder. There was only one small bar, which sold drinks for less than a typical Lagos nightclub.

“At raves, there’s a dance floor. You go to a normal Lagos party and there’s no dance floor,” DJ Aniko, founder of Group Therapy, told The Associated Press. “We don’t just have places to dance, places you can literally go to have a good time. The more places you have to reserve or book a table, the more complicated it is.”

Yetunde Onikoye, 28, started rave last year.

“Since then, I’ve been hooked by the neck; it’s like a chokehold. I always want to be here,” Onikoyi said.

Nightclub culture is determined by table culture, where partying is often a rat race of who buys the most drinks at the most expensive price, and seats are reserved in a multi-tiered system, including VVIP, VIP and regulars.

A bottle of drink can cost anywhere between 100,000 naira ($72.34) to nearly a million naira, leaving many young residents navigating tough financial terrain. A parade of bartenders hoisting drinks with an LED board naming the table for the night’s highest spenders. A ticket for group therapy costs just 21,000 naira ($15.19), without the pressure of buying drinks.

Experts say raves grew as a response to table culture in clubs.

“Raves are more democratic,” said Oluwamayoa Idowu, founder of Culture Custodian, Lagos’ leading culture publication. “What this says is that people don’t have the purchasing power to sustain the club lifestyle. Clubs are still open and busy, but generally in today’s environment, there’s more focus on enjoying yourself than enjoying the show.”

Aniko told the AP that several parents have reached out to create separate seats, requests they have denied on several occasions.

“It’s always a blessing to find a place that still focuses on the human aspects of things, as opposed to materialism or collecting as much as possible,” said Dayo Williams, a consultant who came to the party.

Each DJ worked their decks from late into the early hours, churning out an endless loop of high-tempo beats that electrified the hall, rising to a pulsating crescendo before dovetailing into another loop. A sea of ​​heads bobbed rhythmically and bodies swayed wildly.

After the post-pandemic crossover of South African music genres around 2022, DJs infused African sonic elements into house music, a subgenre of electronic dance music, which became the choice for raves in Lagos. More inclusive than clubs, raves have become prominent among the younger generation who have railed against Nigeria’s conservative society.

House music “evokes emotions,” said content writer and creator Zia Yusuf, who was in attendance. “You just connect to music, and you connect to music with other people who connect to music with you.”

Cultural experts consider it one of the crossovers of South African musical influences, similar to the amapiano.

Nigeria, in recent years, has gained attention on the global stage with the explosive rise of its artistes, exporting its music all over the world, but it has also imported several genres in recent years. The choice of house music is deliberate, according to Aniko. Aniko doesn’t want to control the group therapy as musicians often do in big clubs, sometimes previewing unreleased songs or dictating the night’s crowd selection.

“Once you rely on the mainstream industry for music, the mainstream creeps into the space,” Aniko said.