Dillon Francis @ 9:30 Club, 3/25/2013

Dillon Francis at 9:30 Club

If the letters “IDGAFOS” in rainbow pastel colors hung as the backdrop at the iconic 9:30 Club on Monday night surprised you, you were probably at the wrong show. If the inflatable cats holding signs with the expletive “f**k” plastered on them surprised you, then…well…you were definitely at the wrong show.

Dillon Francis’s “Wurld Turr” stopped in snowy Washington, D.C.  Monday night, fresh off of a show in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico and a weekend in Miami at Ultra, but the temperature inside the club didn’t show that anything had changed. Even in the less crowded balcony, shirts and tank tops were quickly removed, most even before Dillon Francis took the stage.

DC based opener Ozker (@OzkerSCP) started the crowd off early at 9 p.m., prepping the audience (which included DJ’s Dave Nada of Nadastrom and Billy The Gent of Gent & Jawns, both D.C. locals) for L.A-based duo Oliver’s (@WeAreOliver) set. Oliver’s music, which they describe as “relentlessly groovy R&B, boom box worthy hip-hop and soaring electro-pop hooks,” mashed together with tracks to span remixes of every genre, blew the audience away, which had swelled to fill almost the entire venue. The set was exactly something you’d expect from an artist on the Fool’s Gold Label, but not in the “I’ve heard this already” way, but more so in that “Did that just happen? That just happened. Can I rewind that?” kind of way. Are you picking up what I’m putting down? Oliver is good.

It was sad to see Oliver go, but not much beats the dimming of the lights that signals the entrance of the Masta Blasta himself, Dilllon Francis. From the get-go, Francis looked like he was having the time of his life. Wearing a hat emblazoned with his signature “IDGAFOS” printed in the American stars and stripes and a shirt that gives meaning to the acronym, stating ‘I Don’t Give A F**k or S**t’ with the Chanel logo replacing the ‘C’, Francis repped his slogan to the fullest. He couldn’t keep the smile off his face as he began his set, and the audience responded kindly, the enormous mass of people swaying and moving in a way that from the balcony looked absolutely surreal.

Dillon Francis quickly launched into a series of fan favorites, mostly from his fellow Mad Decent affiliates. My own effort to remain professional-looking-ish and determinedly unsweaty for after the show, when I would be interviewing Dillon*, was be ruined when Francis played Major Lazer’s  “Watch Out For This (Bumaye)” an upbeat , {insert as many adjectives here for ‘booty-popper’ as humanly possible} track from Major Lazer’s upcoming release Free the Universe.  Francis also played DJ Snake’s cult favorite “Bird Machine” before launching into several of his own tracks, including “Masta Blasta”, “IDGAFOS”, and “Bootleg Fireworks”. “Bootleg Fireworks” was especially memorable, as the crowd was presented with several three feet high cut-outs of Dillon Francis’s head (now blonde, as opposed to last year’s brunette versions) to hoist into the air. Francis continued with a couple remixes, including Moombahton pioneer Munchi’s  “F**k That It’s Bangbros” remix of Francis’s own “Brazzer’s Theme” (It is what you’re thinking, but it also isn’t) and Francis’s Justin Timberlake-commissioned remix of “Suit and Tie”. After playing an unnamed track off of his as-yet-untitled full length, Francis exited the stage, but not for long. In what appeared to be a genuine, unplanned encore, Dillon reentered the stage almost three minutes later. However, it didn’t appear that he came back to appease the screaming crowd, but rather because he forgot to play his newest song, “Messages” which would be released later that day.

The image of steam billowing out of the front doors of the 9:30 Club perfectly embodies the crowd’s descent back into reality and from the hot and packed crowd everyone goes their separate ways, into the cold and wait-no, wow it’s really cold, streets of DC. But it’s okay, because we DGAFOS.

*To hear my interview with Dillon Francis, where we speak on One Direction, possible album titles and what’s next for Dillon, check back soon for a link!

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–Corrine Jones & Helen Jiang

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