destructo

HARD founder Gary Richards has announced a new festival, All My Friends, which will take place in Downtown L.A. later this year. 

Running over two consecutive-days, Saturday 18th and Sunday 19th August, the event will comprise three stages, and host artists ranging from electronic bass DJs to more soulful R&B and hip-hop acts. The venue will be ROW DTLA, the site of a disused farmer's market, with early bird tickets on sale from 9AM Eastern Time on Thursday 12th April 2018, despite no line-up details having been made public.

Destructo (aka Gary Richards) has indulged dance music fans across the globe with news of his newest music cruise, FRIENDSHIP. The concept is a major move for the LiveStyle (formerly SFX Entertainment) team.

After Gary Richards decided to leave Live Nation and with it the day-to-day running of HARD and its spin-off Holy Ship!, Richards has today announced he will be running another Livestyle brand, Electric Zoo.

Last month, a number of Holy Ship! regulars kicked up a fuss online about Richards not being part of the 2018 edition of the cruise ship festival.

In reality, Richards sold HARD Events, which includes Holy Ship!, to Live Nation and part of the deal was for Richards remain the face of the event for five years, with the five years ending this summer.

As the event conglomerate HARD turns 10 years old, and with announcement that its head cheese, Gary Richards — aka DJ Destructo — is set to leave the brand for good, DJ Mag takes a trip down memory lane with a remarkable picture diary from the pages of our US magazine.

Gary Richards, aka DJ/producer and founder of HARD events, Destructo, is set to leave the EDM brand he’s been manning since 2007 to join direct competitor, LiveStyle. 

Run by former AEG executive Randy Phillips, Richards is set to move to LiveStyle (the rebranded version of now-bankrupt promoters SFX), who own mega festivals like Tomorrowland in Belgium and Electric Zoo in the States.

Suwannee Hulaween has revealed the first round of its diverse 2017 line-up. The dance and jam-music event takes place 27th through 29th October at The Spirit of Suwanee Music Park in Live Oak, FL.

Bassnectar, GRiZ, RL Grime, and Claude VonStroke top the electronic-centric portion of the bill. The Polish Ambassador, Keys N Krates, Destructo, Shiba San, Manic Focus, TOKiMONSTA, and Space Jesus will be bringing their eclectic dance vibes to Halloween Weekend in Suwannee as well.

HARD Summer founder Gary Richards, who is also known by the stage name Destructo, has called out EDC/Insomniac head Pasquale Rotella for blocking artists from playing his festival.

Artists are reportedly contractually blocked from playing HARD Summer if they are on the bill for EDC Las Vegas, with what is known as a ‘radius clause’.

Richards addressed the issues on Twitter earlier this week, in response to a tweet from DJ Mila, who expressed her frustration with not being able to play HARD Summer, claiming she just wanted to “play music with all my friends.”

Sometimes it’s not easy to remember that Gary Richards is not only Destructo, a DJ and producer with daily increasing popularity, but that he is also the mastermind behind the massively popular HARD Events. Wrapping up the day in his office at Live Nation’s Beverly Hills headquarters, Richards is dressed like a teenager obsessed with death metal in head-to-toe in black, but talks like an excited raver fanboy. There is not a lot of wall space left in this office which houses Richards and HARD under its corporate umbrella.

Earlier this fall, HARD Events teased the debut of HARD Hawaii to be held at the Hawaii Country Club on Saturday, 17th December.

For the HARD Hawaii launch, HARD Events founder and DJ-producer DESTRUCTO (aka Gary Richards) personally selected the impressive  line-up — you know this one's going to be good, folks!

Joining DESTRUCTO on the inaugural roster is French house producer Tchami, techno producer Rezz, Australian-born DJ/producer Wax Motif, Grammy-nominated hip-hop star Mannie Fresh and SoCal-based band LA Riots.