Thomas Turner – Building Relentless Beats and Redefining Event Culture on the Virtual Sessions 10/2/25

Thomas Turner, the visionary founder of Relentless Beats, joins from Phoenix, Arizona, to discuss his journey from club DJ to one of the most influential live event producers in the United States. With over three decades in the industry, Thomas reflects on starting as an enthusiast and throwing underground events in old post offices before turning his passion into a full-scale business in the early 2000s. Today, Relentless Beats produces more than 500 events annually, from intimate club nights to massive festivals across multiple states.

 

He describes his early motivations as driven not by profit but by a desire to fill a cultural void in Arizona’s nightlife. Over time, this vision expanded nationally through strategic partnerships, including East Meets West in New York. Thomas explains the evolution of major festivals such as Decadence, Gold Rush, and Phoenix Lights, highlighting the creative process behind curating each lineup and venue experience. For him, every event serves as a reflection of the community, emphasizing both artistic diversity and fan connection.

 

The discussion also delves into the modern realities of event culture, from managing safety operations to addressing cell phone use at shows. Thomas offers insight into Relentless Rangers, a fan-first initiative that ensures guests’ well-being at every festival. He also shares thoughts on “proper house” and his passion for maintaining authenticity in an increasingly commercialized scene.

 

Despite overseeing hundreds of productions a year, Thomas remains grounded in creativity and collaboration. His message to fans is simple: join the movement, celebrate responsibly, and help shape the next era of dance music culture.

Topics

0:13 – From DJing in Phoenix to building Relentless Beats
3:58 – Early rave inspirations and first underground events
7:50 – Expanding nationally with East Meets West collaborations
9:19 – Partnering with country venues like Harold’s 90th Anniversary
12:31 – Decadence, Gold Rush, and festival production logistics
16:39 – UFOs, Body Language, and defining “proper house”
21:31 – The evolution of electronic genres and fan maturity
23:00 – Cell phone culture and crowd experience at events
28:09 – Event safety, Relentless Rangers, and community outreach
37:21 – Future plans, partnerships, and advice for aspiring DJs

Connect with Thomas Turner

Website: relentlessbeats.com
East Coast: emwpresents.com
Instagram: @relentlessbeats

[Darran]
Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the DJ Sessions Presents the Virtual Sessions. I’m your host, Darran, and right now I’m sitting in the virtual studios in Seattle, Washington, and coming in all the way from Phoenix, Arizona. We have none other than the man behind the curtain and sometimes in front of the curtain, Thomas Turner from Relentless Beats.

Thomas, how’s it going today?

[Thomas Turner]
Good, thanks for having me on.

[Darran]
Absolutely, I’m glad to finally have got you on the show. Super excited to be talking with you here today. I did not know that you’ve been in the industry for 30 years.

I thought Relentless was just around for a short amount of time, about 15, 16 years, something like that. But I saw some information that Chad had sent over to me and I was like, 30 years? Wow, that’s about as long as I’ve been going to nightclubs for.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, I mean, you go back, I guess, almost 30 years where I’m an enthusiast and then a DJ at a club for, who’s one of my right-hand guys, Steve Kushner at Freedom and Pompeii with a DJ partner named Timothy Height. And that’s coming up on 30 years ago. So yeah, early in my career as an enthusiast is how I get all that tenure.

I probably start promoting events somewhere at a personal level for my friends around the year 2000, 2001, 2002, and three, but not as a commercial business until more like 04, 05.

[Darran]
Nice, and obviously, what was the first show that you did commercially?

[Thomas Turner]
You know, I’d have to go back and look. I mean, I think it’s somewhere in that 03 time period. I mean, I think that I was still running events where we might have a door cover or something earlier than that.

You know, some underground events where I, you know, took over a old post office up in Flagstaff, Arizona, and, you know, threw a party for my friends. But, you know, I think as a commercial business with an intent to grow a business around 03 or something.

[Darran]
You know, it’s always interesting going back, and if you get that chance, you sound, I mean, now you’ve built it up 30 years later, and you just told me about this. I thought it was 500 events. Your bio that was sent to me said 400 events, but you said 600 events a year.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, I might be pushing towards that, you know, 500 plus, yeah.

[Darran]
I mean, 500 plus events a year, that’s 10 events a week.

[Thomas Turner]
You’ll have to go look now.

[Darran]
Well, I mean, it’s just, even that is just phenomenal. Looking at the growth, I always get inspired. I’m a kind of big Gary Vee fan.

It’s Gary Vaynerchuk, and, you know, one of the things I remember seeing was he was talking about basically the nutshell of what he, the article he was doing was talking about starting from the beginning, and as he’s doing his monologue, up in the right-hand corner, there’s a picture and picture, and it’s going through each, like a snapshot of each of his podcasts that he’s doing, and you just saw the quality, and all of a sudden, while he’s doing this, it’s like one every two seconds, but it gets to like 300, 400, 500, and you can just see the quality going back, like first one to 300.

You know, it just gets better and better and growing bigger and bigger, and you’ve got a team of people to do this, and I mean, you’re on both coasts now. I mean, you’ve got operations out, partnerships out in Hawaii, and now the East Coast. We’ll be talking about that in a little bit here, but going back to all this, you said you were an enthusiast before all this.

Do you remember the first party slash rave you ever attended that said, I want to do this?

[Thomas Turner]
You know, when I attended the raves, I didn’t think I want to do this from a, I was always an entrepreneur, but I didn’t look at it as a job or a way to make money. I wanted to do it when there was a void of it in the market, and I felt like, you know, I didn’t have the environment that I wanted to spend my weekend in. I would, you know, industriously go try to create it on my own for me and my like-minded friends, but, you know, it wasn’t as a way to make money or in an industrious attempt at that early on.

[Darran]
Yeah, you know, it’s interesting how you take, my passion was video production growing up, playing with a video camera from the age of six. My dad had the first video camera on the block, and when I started going out to nightclubs, in my late teens, you know, I noticed there were no video cameras in the clubs, and I’m like, everyone would talk about how awesome the night was, how cool the show was, or did you hear that set or that mix? I mean, even if you recorded it, where was it gonna go?

Sit at home and watch it with your friends, drinking a couple of beers, kicking back, partying? You know, it didn’t really live anywhere, unless you were, we had public access, and I was into public access back then, but, you know, when I go to clubs now, it’s very hard for me to not wanna capture that moment, capture that event, and then turn that into a passion. Like you said, it wasn’t ever about really wanting to capture it, to go out there and make money and sell it for tens of millions of dollars and create the next XYZ company.

It was that I wanted to take that experience and put it out there so people could, either one, relive that moment, or two, say, wow, I wanna be there next time.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, it’s good to understand the energy that you felt, you know, to say, I’m feeling this really amazing way of this music and this environment, and this energy is something really exceptional, and I wanna try to convey it. You know, it’s funny, this morning, Kush told me that he had taken a bunch of VHS tapes from earlier in his life and had them, you know, produced digitally, right? And he had found himself at Coachella back in 2003 and 2004, and, you know, the BC Boys are headlining, and this is like on his, you know, he’s got a video camera that he’s carrying around at the festival, and, you know, it’s wild because all these videos in this era have, nobody has a cell phone.

Everybody’s just vibing and feeling it, and, you know, this is back in an era where Christopher Lawrence or Paul Oakenfold or Closing Coachella or BC Boys are playing. I mean, you know, so it was really cool. He said, I’m looking forward to seeing the videos.

[Darran]
I remember those days. I actually have, when I finally get around to making the documentary of the DJ sessions, I have a tape from like 1993. I was at this club called The Underground in Seattle where I first met Donald Glodd and saw Donald Glodd play.

Yeah, and so, I mean, he’s hometown hero up here. Love him to death, and, you know, I would sneak my way up into the DJ booth and be dancing up in the DJ booth, and I had brought my video camera with me one time and was filming him in the DJ booth, and it’s like the timestamp is, there was like 1993, and I’m like- I didn’t include that in my thing. Like you said, nobody does, you didn’t think about the cell phone thing.

I was interviewing a DJ recently. He goes, nowadays, the kids, 15 and up, it’s in their hand wherever they go, you know, and out there. We’ll talk about that in a little bit too as well, but two events that just happened here recently, Experts Only a few weeks ago.

I think that was the weekend of the 26th. No, Gold Rush was the weekend of the 26th, was it?

[Thomas Turner]
Just last- Yeah, that’s right. Gold Rush is about, just about three weeks ago, and Experts Only is just about two weeks ago.

[Darran]
Two weeks ago, that’s right. There, yeah, it was 1-1. I mean, that was your first, was that your first event as the expansion with East Meets West?

Doing something- I know.

[Thomas Turner]
We’ve been producing events in New York, definitely for the past two plus years, and we’ve produced some notable special events this summer at Brooklyn Army Terminal with Mo Choc, and last summer at Brooklyn Army Terminal with Chris Lake, both of those, you know, the Chris Lake show, a two-day show, and then at Under the K Bridge with Vintage Culture, and then a collab with Brownies and Lemonade last summer as well. So we’ve produced some special events, and this is just another one, but it’s the first time we’ve produced the Experts Only Festival in New York.

[Darran]
It looked phenomenal. Was planning to get out there for it, and just was like, ah! But, I mean, I love New York one, too.

I just was like, eh, I wanted to make it out there for it, and just the lineup looked stellar.

[Thomas Turner]
Stellar, stellar. It was an amazing weekend.

[Darran]
Anything that can be dropped about what’s happening out there with, anything that can be talked about, or is it all- You know, there’s more information that’s about to bubble up soon.

[Thomas Turner]
You know, what I can say is it all looks positive that the event was really well-received, that the city was really receptive to the event, the fans, and everybody around the event. It’s production feels really good about the future.

[Darran]
And then the upcoming events that you have through RB is, you know, I see there’s Herald’s 90th anniversary.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, Herald’s 90th anniversary this year, which is real country culture up in Cape Creek. And, you know, it’s a place where you can go get a real country experience, and we had the opportunity to partner with them on their 90th anniversary, and can hopefully make, you know, an imprint on their business and the country music culture 90, you know, up to their 100th year anniversary. That’s kind of a goal that I have personally.

I, you know, I haven’t shared that with a lot of people, but I’m going, hey, if the next 10 years we can make a big imprint on the country music space for country music enthusiasts to have, you know, a more robust opportunity to celebrate that music on a weekly basis, that’s kind of the goal. And partners like Herald’s are, you know, the perfect partners to do something authentic. But, you know, I grew up in a household full of country and folk music, and, you know, all the country artists and Elvis.

And so, you know, it’s something that, you know, I’ve always loved, and it’s always been a passion of mine too.

[Darran]
Yeah, in our house on Sundays when we cleaned the house, it was either country music or classical music, you know, a kind of break away from everything else. And you don’t, when you’re a kid growing up, you know, and you’re in some white, you know, suburbia, kind of like in this area where you’re, I’m growing up with two brothers who were into punk rock music. And here I am listening to Beastie Boys and Run DMC and rap music.

You know, it’s kind of out of the norm for the normal, but my dad was always kind of getting us, he was into like Super Tramp Queen and all that fun stuff.

[Thomas Turner]
Ah, good stuff.

[Darran]
Getting the good stuff in there. And then, you know, here we are sort of radicals. My brother’s from Redondo Beach, California, surfers, we’re in vans, riding BMX bikes before it was cool.

And that’s, you know, and I grew up like that. So, but having that classical music and country western music on, people will trip out when I’m like the total electronic music show guy and I’ll pop some country music in on my truck and they’re like, what are you doing, Darran? I’m like, this is the, this is awesome, you know?

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ll put me some country music still. You know, it’s been my guilty pleasure.

[Darran]
Now is every event that Relentless Beats produces, you mentioned working in the country western kind of realm. Are they all electronic music events?

[Thomas Turner]
I mean, you know, when you look at our history, we’re an electronic music event producer and promoter, but, you know, we’ve produced events with Tim McGraw around Super Bowls or, you know, an eclectic mix of R&B or pop performers too in our history. You know, being an event producer sees us have a skill. And so different partnerships and different special events in the city will see us involve ourselves in different ways outside of the electronic music realm from time to time.

[Darran]
And you got, you got Body Language, Obsidian, Dusk Music Festival, Better Together, and obviously Decadence. That was really awesome out there. That’s at the Raceway again this year, right?

Yeah, Decadence out at the Raceway again. Did you have, I remember it was outside the last couple of times I was in there. Did you move it inside or was it moved inside?

[Thomas Turner]
It’s always been, it’s always been held inside structures. So- And structures, okay. So there’s outdoor area, but there’s also the structures where the main performances, the performances take place.

And those are put in structures that we erect. Yep. So, so never outside, just inside the structure.

Now the structure may have had more or less walls at the lower levels, you know, as time’s gone on and Decadence has gotten larger, a lot of the structures have more of an open feel so that the crowds can flow in and out and aren’t obstructed by sort of having to choke down into smaller areas to come in and out. Yeah.

[Darran]
One of my memorable, most memorable times I have had was at Decadence during 2022 and 2023, when I actually got to interview Dr. Fresh.

[Thomas Turner]
And- Tell me the mayor, what an amazing song, man.

[Darran]
Never forget that interview. And what happened after that interview, he had his tour planned, but he couldn’t announce it. And he was coming to Seattle.

And when he came to Seattle, I showed him a picture of our mobile studio that we have. And he says, when I come to Seattle, I’m playing in the back of that truck. So he came to Seattle on his tour and he played the back of our truck.

And it’s like, I’m not supposed to pick favorites on my episodes that I do with 2,700 of them, you know? But I’m like, that’s one for the record books that I love. And I want to give a shout out to Chad with Karen.

Oh gosh, what is his PR company’s name?

[Thomas Turner]
Karen- Karen West PR.

[Darran]
It is Karen West, thank you. Karen West PR, you know, and setting that up and you all for bringing that in and letting us be a part of that. Though, talking about events, you know, out of the events that you’ve done so far, and I know, again, this is, I, when I ask these questions, I know they’re loaded and I always set it up that I know it’s loaded, but is there one that really stands out in your mind that is like, bam, I can’t wait to do this every year or I’m excited to be launching this every year, but I know you’re doing so many of them, but-

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, I mean, different, you know, different events have different, you know, meanings from the type of genre that we get to book or the way we get to express ourselves, you know, as artists ourselves, booking artists and curation, you know, artists and visionaries of our events and what we want to present to our fan base from a creative aspect. But, you know, Decadence is a really large gathering now.

It’s something we’ve been doing for, you know, we’ve had 12 years of ourselves invested in it and, you know, it makes the most people happy right now. And that’s a really powerful feeling. So, you know, a lot of love and energy is poured into it from the team because we know it’s, you know, our opportunity to service our fans the most through that vehicle.

But Gold Rush is also another one of those, which we got to return to the Western Town this year after not being able to host it there for many years. And it’s something that was created for the Western Town and it’s on brand when it’s in the Western Town. And our fans are most enthusiastic about it when it’s held in the Western Town.

So, you know, those two events are really notable, but, you know, there’s others. There’s, you know, Phoenix Lights, which happens in the spring, which is something that was created around the UFO phenomenon that happened so many years ago in Phoenix. And so that’s, you know, that’s always a fun event to produce.

And, you know, some spaces that we’ve created like Body Language, which is for house music and, you know, Better Together, which is an event that, you know, is meant more to be an eclectic mix. You know, the names that we’ve got on it this year are just, you know, more of that energy, you know, a diverse genre program festival versus something that might be, you know, more in a bass music lane or in an EDM lane. That festival, you know, has some pretty diverse programming that sees some, you know, artists that are more specific about the other type of artists that they play with come together on a cool lineup, you know, in Better Together.

[Darran]
So… I love it when guests do this. I don’t send out questions before the interview, but you hit on two topics I was gonna go right into.

When you mentioned Phoenix Lights, one question I wanted to ask you, have you ever seen a UFO?

[Thomas Turner]
Absolutely. Yeah?

[Darran]
Out there in Phoenix area or other areas?

[Thomas Turner]
I mean, yeah, I know that I’ve seen them in the Phoenix area over the years. You know, just going, that was really strange. I don’t know what that was.

And, you know, it’s happened a hundred times in my life across all the places I’ve traveled to. And, you know, I’m sure there’s explanations for some of them, but there’s no doubt there’s UFOs out there.

[Darran]
Definitely. And then you mentioned doing Body Languages, your house event. And in some of the notes you sent over, you like proper house.

Can you explain to me a little bit about what proper house is? I’m a huge house set myself. I love house music, but I know that us growing up, you’ve been around for 35 years doing this.

I’ve been nightclubbing for 35 years. House music, before the genres got out there and it started splitting up all the ways, you know, that it could. Now you got all the, go to Wikipedia, you’ll find out all the different genres out there.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, I mean.

[Darran]
What’s proper house to you?

[Thomas Turner]
I mean, proper house are guys who look to, when they play a set, you know, unsuspecting, you know, musical journey and put house records together in an era where, you know, playing something that was distinctly different, each and every set was important and a badge of honor. And, you know, we’re in an era now where playing songs that, you know, people might really know well as a high percentage of your set might be what’s well-received in most cases. And it’s very different, you know, from an era standpoint, you know, I am a fan of, you know, neoclassical progressive house and, you know, sequencing that is progressive in a night and, you know, proper opening sets and proper closing sets.

And, you know, I was, you know, at Knockdown Center in New York this weekend and went and saw Sasha and Big Weed play for five hours, you know, and, you know, that’s something that’s very different than what most people are experiencing on dance floors each weekend in North America and in a lot of places in the world.

[Darran]
It’s funny you bring up Sasha and Big Weed. I remember seeing them, gosh, I wanna say 2000, maybe 2001, somewhere around there. And I went to their show and it was not at all what I expected it to be.

The people were not, they weren’t dancing. It was like they were watching a show being put on as opposed to like a nightclub event. I was kind of standing in the crowd going, how come nobody is dancing?

And that was after I was, you know, completely had probably memorized every beat on those global underground CD, double disc CDs that had come out. You know, the Tangelia, I hope I said that right, but the Oak and Fold 007 one and those global underground discs were just monumental to my- Yeah, that whole- When you get to the electronic music culture, but what was, was it a little more upbeat? What did you expect to see from a Sasha and Big Weed show?

[Thomas Turner]
I mean, I’ve been to a hundred of them. You know, I’ve followed them all over the, I’ve watched them all over the world the past 25 years. So it was spot on for what I expected from them.

What they do is definitely very niche and spot on what they’ve always done. And the space is probably more underground than ever as a result of such a huge broad list of genres that have successful artists in them. So, you know, where there used to be a lot less DJ content, there’s so many shows every weekend in every city and they’re all very broad and diverse.

So, you know, the people that are coming for Sasha and Big Weed know what they’re coming for. It’s not just like a pop culture thing where, you know, oh, we should go see Sasha and Big Weed. I mean, you know, for some who are newer in the space, maybe, but a lot of very mature fans that know exactly what they’re coming for.

[Darran]
Yeah, definitely. It felt a little bit more of a mature audience, even back then.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, it always has been. It always has been.

[Darran]
It wasn’t like a rave that I was expecting to go see, you know, Candy Kids, well, back in our day, Candy Kids, you know, or that kind of time. Is there one type of sound in electronic music that you’re really excited about right now? It’s like, this is what we see popping up.

We’re really looking to push this genre down that avenue.

[Thomas Turner]
I mean, it’s always house music, because, you know, if you go back to the origins of electronic music in North America, we were always trailing behind international movements that were more, that were further along in, you know, their fans’ base being more mature. You know, I would go to Europe 15, 20 years ago and be in, you know, 15 years ago or something, be in Amsterdam and go to shows, and the average age of the show might be 45-year-old people seeing a legendary DJ, and they are like you and I now, you know, here. But, you know, now you’ve got this, you know, each generation spawns a larger base of people to be interested in other musics.

So, you know, that’s how guys like Sasha and Digweed continue to have a career, too, is because as people mature and find their way through the genres, they do get to someone like a Sasha and Digweed or another artist that’s, you know, a Heritage-type act and, you know, want to see it or have love and appreciation for the music and the way they produce it, because, you know, there’s a lot of music that’s produced and a lot of music that’s consumed that’s a lot more simplistic in its musical theory.

It’s not so complex. And then there’s some that’s complex and brilliant. And, you know, as a fan, you’ve got to find your way to that if that’s important to you.

[Darran]
You know, talking about the genres and the change, we touched on this a little bit earlier in the show and I wanted to come back to this, is that, you know, we’ve obviously seen the rise of more cell phone use at events. And, you know, having some artists that I speak to, I mean, I was watching a video the other day and I kind of, I laugh, I’m the last person I’m going to want to sit there and pull my cell phone out at an event and go like this. I do video for life.

I want to enjoy myself at a show, put my phone away. But other people, they want to capture that moment. You know, not trying to plug anything.

I’m not paid by Apple to say this, but the new iPhone that came out allows you now to film and have both your front and rear camera at the same time so you can capture your experience while you’re watching the show.

[Thomas Turner]
I didn’t even know that. That’s really cool.

[Darran]
Yeah, so I mean, it’s cool, but you know, you have people, I was watching a video the other day and this girl’s up at the front of the DJ booth and she’s standing there texting on her phone and the DJ goes, and the girl’s just like, he’s like, oh, you know, and I’m like, I get it. People want to capture those moments. Do you have any personal take on cell phone use at events?

Yay or nay?

[Thomas Turner]
I mean, look, it’s, you know, if I could omit it and do a live feed of all the shows and say, you know, you can go capture it, it’s on the side, it’ll live there and everybody was okay with it, I would probably choose that. You know, I was on the phone this morning with regards to our new club and remarking how I’ve had an experience at Basement this weekend in New York, which is a club underneath the knockdown center and how they put a sticker over, you know, your camera, which, you know, made the phones not be in the air. Now people still might be on their phone texting, you know, as a result of that, you get to keep your phone.

So it’s a clever way, you know, to say, hey, we don’t want you taking videos and if we see you, we’ll ask you to stop or, you know, so putting the sticker over the camera, it sort of mitigates that, I think that energy and I liked it, but, you know, also, I don’t know if it’s the hill that I want to die on because, you know, it does create controversy.

[Darran]
Yeah, I was in Germany last year, went to a club and they said, oh, your phone, they had right at the door, sticker front, sticker back and I was like, I’m cool with that, you know?

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah.

[Darran]
I’m not a person that could have an issue with that, but, you know, I believe I did a little research in this few weeks ago, I was interviewing some people, conversation got up that Lane Eight in their rider says you got to put stickers on the phones and we don’t like cell phones at our shows.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, he has, you know, his brand, This Never Happened and, you know, the idea is that there’s no phone and he doesn’t want them up. I mean, look, you know, it’s funny, John Digweed said to me probably 10, 12 years ago or something or, you know, or more at dinner one night, you know, he’s like, you know, I’m really being driven nuts by these cell phones up in the air. He says, you know, everybody’s up here with their cell phone and he goes, look, watch at the club tonight, they’ll be doing it.

And during the middle of his set, he looked over at me like, look, see the cell phones are all up. And, you know, then the next day I think we were having lunch and he goes, what are they all going to do with those videos? It’s so weird.

And, you know, I understood what they were doing. I mean, it’s a moment to capture what makes you feel good and you want to go back and show it to someone or look at it yourself. I mean, I did it this weekend.

I sent out a batch of, you know, my guilty pleasures. I have a group of people that want to see their videos and the music that they’re playing. And I sent out a bunch of videos last night to that group of the show I was at this weekend.

So, you know, as much as I hate to see all these phones up in their face, I mean, I’m sharing the media and enjoying the media as well. So, you know, it would be nice to see people enjoying the moment more and just not so many phones because, you know, there’s no such thing as a video or a moment without them anymore.

[Darran]
And, you know, it’s obviously definitely helps to create that sense of FOMO for people as well. Because, you know, that video is going to go to social media and people that didn’t make the show are going to be like, that’s what the visuals are like, or that’s the song you played.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, it definitely creates the FOMO. You know, I think that maybe, I think maybe you could, you know, find a way to get people to sort of abandon taking so many videos. If there was a live feed of the shows and they all knew that they could go and take those clips or, you know, each drop was recorded or something and, you know, we could produce.

But it’s just, I don’t know how to overcome the phone problem as a whole.

[Darran]
Yeah, and interesting enough, something that just popped in my head that you reminded me about was, you mentioned Beastie Boys, you mentioned your friend having the camera back, Coachella back in the day there. I remember that experiment that Beastie Boys did where they took like 20 or 30 camcorders and gave them all to the audience members. Yeah, yeah.

And made a video from it. Yeah. That was kind of cool.

I mean, that’d be kind of a cool experiment if everyone logged into an app and then put their videos in and then a video was compiled of the event from all the users that were sharing their videos. Okay, I just gave you guys an idea. I won’t head that one up though.

Yeah. So going back to your events that you do, how important is safety at a Relentless Feats event?

[Thomas Turner]
I mean, it’s everything. Yeah. Yeah, it’s everything.

[Darran]
I mean, it’s- Key factor. And do you have a set team crew, outside crew or internal crew that- It’s a mix of both.

[Thomas Turner]
It starts with executive planning on what each event’s being recommended to have by public officials that we work with. And then our own internal experiences with what’s needed. And it’s layered with everything from police and EMTs and emergency response persons, doctors on site, transportation on site, Relentless Rangers, which are basically a customer conduit to help of any kind, as simple as a bandaid to a medical emergency.

[Darran]
Yeah, I mean, it’s definitely key. I work with some people up here that are all, literally are the preachers of safety at events and trying to make more nightclubs and more places to be safety aware, safety conscious. Even if it’s a nightclub of 100 people, two or 300 people, still having something there to really make people aware of how critical it is to have that out there.

That’s cool, y’all. If somebody was interested in becoming involved with doing that, how do they reach out to Relentless Feats and become part of that? Is there a form on the website or?

[Thomas Turner]
As far as being part of the safety teams, that would be if any jobs I think that was in that space existed. Otherwise, it’s something that we’re hiring vendors that we have history with and different companies that we interface to accomplish all those things, public officials, part of that. So just through the general, I think job process would be how you work in that space.

Relentless Rangers, same thing, through the portal on our website for any sort of employment opportunities.

[Darran]
Awesome. And if you’re a DJ or artist, how would one go about contacting Relentless to say, hey, I’m really good or this? Is it through PR channels?

[Thomas Turner]
I think they’re all finding their way to the buyers, the people that are doing the programming of the events. I think that’s the first thing that they have to go figure out is who’s curating these events and it’s publicly evident. And they go out and start to do their best to get noticed.

On one hand, there’s too many DJs. Anybody can be a DJ and anybody can wanna play a gig. And we’ve made a habit the past many years of providing opportunities to hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of local DJs each and every year.

And so we continue to do that, but there sure is an abundance of them.

[Darran]
Yeah, I was explaining to somebody, I frequently explain this to people. Back in the day when I started public access television, we couldn’t get on broadcast unless you had a broadcast quality camera. Those were expensive.

And VHS cameras, you couldn’t get on broadcast TV with, you really couldn’t. And then once that came out, okay, zero barrier to entry there. YouTube didn’t exist.

But once YouTube came out, okay, now everyone can put stuff online. And then basically the barrier entry, same with music or DJing is almost down to nil. You can pick up, be up and running and DJ.

Doesn’t mean you’re gonna be a great phenomenal DJ.

[Thomas Turner]
I mean, you can, anybody can put out music. Yeah. And then any of your friends that are DJs can be inspired to choose the music that you choose because it’s good enough for them.

And that leads to a lot of mediocre DJ performances.

[Darran]
Yeah, and you’re right. It’s sometimes, without the fan, I mean, geez, just looking at it all the time, I remember the DJs were up in a booth. You didn’t have them as the centerpiece of the show.

Now it’s the center stage of the show and the fireworks and all the pyrotechnics. You know all this. I mean, you do this a bunch of times a year.

But you know, the one thing I said, somebody said, look, you’re gonna come to me as a DJ. When I found this the other day, it was this kid. You’ve probably heard him.

I think it’s Pulse. Pulse, I think his name is. He started spinning records at two years old, vinyl.

Then he started DJing at six or something like that. He’s now 11. He’s headlined at ADE and all this stuff, like blowing.

I had to put an interview request for him when I saw this. I’m like, that’s how easy it is. And that’s somebody I want to, you know, that standouts doing something.

It’s probably gonna get creative and blow up and probably start producing tracks and getting signed on and doing all that fun stuff. So, you know, it’s very interesting that when that barrier to entry comes down, you know, what makes somebody stand out? You know, what are they doing that’s different?

And keeping that flavor alive is very interesting. But, you know, we could wrap. I’m sure I could pick your brain with as much knowledge as you have and everything going on out there.

I’m gonna jump up to some other questions here. And just curious enough, if Hollywood were to make a movie about your life, who would you pick as the main actor?

[Thomas Turner]
Oh my gosh. That’s a good question. I don’t even know.

Um, I don’t know. You have to almost come back to that to think about that for a minute.

[Darran]
Maybe this will help. If somebody were to write a biography about you, what do you think the title should be?

[Thomas Turner]
Oh, I don’t know. Independent for life, maybe.

[Darran]
Independent for life.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, maybe.

[Darran]
There you go. Any thoughts about who would play you in a movie?

[Thomas Turner]
Not at this moment. It hasn’t come to my mind yet.

[Darran]
Well, we’ll circle back to it. No worries.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, at this point, it might have to be a historic actor like Vince Vaughn. I don’t know.

[Darran]
There you go. If you could put one non-famous person in the spotlight who means a lot to you, other than your direct family or friends, who would that be and why? A historic person.

No, one non-famous person.

[Thomas Turner]
Non-famous person in my life.

[Darran]
Put them in the spotlight. Somebody who doesn’t maybe get enough time or deserves to be like, this person should be out there.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah, you know, I mean, my whole team. I mean, everybody that works for the company, you know, so many hundreds of people it takes to produce all these events. And, you know, look, I mean, most of them wear their, you know, their pride of ownership of these events on their sleeves.

So they have their community supporters, but just, you know, how important they are. They all make me look really good. They make the company look good.

And it takes a village and it’s, you know, so many years of connectivity with all these people to produce these events. And they’re the real stars.

[Darran]
Definitely. Definitely. That’s awesome.

Good accolades out there. You know, it’s, it’s interesting. People think that I just click on a video camera and do what I do.

And I added it up the other day and I have like 14 to 16 other people to help me do so many different aspects of what goes on. You know, it’s not just clicking a button here and going, Thomas, what’s up? Okay, cool.

You know, I’ve got web dev, social media dev. Yeah, all these people care.

[Thomas Turner]
All these people in my side care so much and they care to, you know, produce events that, you know, the goal is no complaints. The goal is complete customer satisfaction. And they, they grind it each and every weekend to try to get that feedback and to try to produce those results.

[Darran]
You know, I have one, one, a couple of things here. I noticed that at one of your events and you were using the RFID bands. Is that something you’re implementing more at your events?

I had my first experience I ever did that was at Mirage, Brooklyn Mirage 2021. Hadn’t seen it before. And I did remember seeing they were available at, I want to say Decadence.

Maybe they were there before that, but I was only at that event. I think I used one to get up in a booth or two or somewhere around. Or maybe it was Gold Rush.

And then I think there might’ve been somewhere.

[Thomas Turner]
Different events. Different events. RFID is a, is a great tool, you know, from different, from, from create different access points and to control capacities, you know, for verification of different things, you know?

So there’s, there’s a lot of utilization of RFID and different vendors for those products going on in the marketplace. And there’s, you know, always the pursuit for the perfect partner and the perfect technology. But yeah, we’re, we are, we are always looking at those, at those companies and those partnerships.

And RFID has been used quite frequently in our, our events for the past many years.

[Darran]
Yeah, I thought it was just the bee’s knees. I was at Brooklyn Mirage and you type your card in, got your band, you walk up to the bar, you’re like, boop, tip, okay, bye. Yeah, it doesn’t inspect your credit card.

And my bill at the end of the night is this big.

[Thomas Turner]
Yeah.

[Darran]
And they’re like, I spent that much? Okay, cool. But it was- Hey, Thomas, is there anything else you want to let our DJ Sessions fans know about before we let you go?

[Thomas Turner]
You know, just come party with us. Come, you know, spend time with us. You know, as you mentioned, we’ve got partnerships in Hawaii, also, you know, in New Mexico, of course, Arizona, and, you know, in New York, and I think some other places in the near future.

But, you know, come party with us. We have a bunch of great people working to produce some of the best events in the country. And we look forward to hosting all of you and sharing special moments with everybody.

[Darran]
Definitely. I’ve always had a great time being out there for the events. I look forward to being at more of them and talking with you and your team and all that fun stuff in the future.

All right, best place to go, Thomas, for more information about Relentless Beats.

[Thomas Turner]
Relentlessbeats.com, and then, you know, for New York, EMW Presents, which is our company in New York, East Meets West.

[Darran]
Awesome. East Meets West and relentlessbeats.org, emwpresents.com, right there down below, and relentlessbeats.com. Thomas, pleasure having you on the show.

We’ll follow up with you maybe in the next few months, maybe next year, grab ahold of you after the new year, but I definitely would love to come down and check out Decadence again. So maybe I’ll see you in person, shake your hand and say what’s up. Please do.

Look forward to having you. Thanks for being here on the DJ Sessions today. Thanks for having me again.

You’re welcome. On that note, don’t forget to go to our website, thedjsessions.com. Find us there, we have over 700 news stories, 2,700 plus past episodes, new music section being released, all our socials, exclusive mixes, live interviews just like this one and more at thedjsessions.com.

I’m Darran coming to you from the virtual studios in Seattle, Washington. That’s Thomas Turner from Relentless Beats coming to you from Phoenix, Arizona for the DJ Sessions. And remember on the DJ Sessions, the music never stops.

See you next time.