Sweat and steam spread a misty haze above a sea of anticipating ravers. It had rained that day, in fact, it was raining outside now, a fitting stage for the dreamlike haze that filled his mind. Hiding any hint of nervousness behind thick glasses, he followed his entourage of backbeat dancers and musical alchemists onto the smoke-filled DJ stage. The crowd erupted like a living heartbeat, waiting for the drop. His voice waited in silence, cradled in the warmth of green tea, the melody steeping in his chest. One, Two, Three, Four. On the fourth breath of the bassline, something ancient awakened. Reggae met the pulse of the future, and from Kēvens’ vision, ReggaeEDM took its first breath.

Kēvens never claimed to have invented ReggaeEDM, only that he was the first to give it a name. But his role as its earliest ambassador is undeniable. A tireless pioneer, he carried this live fusion of reggae and electronic dance music to stages across the globe. From the roots of Reggae Sunsplash in Jamaica to the massive pulse of Ultra Music Festival, from Tokyo to the frozen lights of Russia’s Ice Palace, Kēvens has been the genre’s beating heart, long before the world knew what to call it.

Critics say ReggaeEDM is nothing new, that its roots trace back to the Jungle movement of the 1990s. And they wouldn’t be wrong. The echoes of dub, drum and bass, and UK sound system culture are all there. But ReggaeEDM isn’t Jungle. It isn’t dub. It isn’t drum and bass. It’s something else entirely, a new branch from the same family tree, grown in fresh soil and reaching toward a different sky.

ReggaeEDM fuses the uplifting messages and rhythmic toasting of dancehall and roots reggae with the high-energy 4/4 beats of contemporary EDM.  This genre preserves reggae’s tradition of social consciousness while embracing the pulsating rhythms that resonate with today’s youth. As EDM festivals like the Electric Daisy Carnival continue to draw massive crowds, with over 525,000 attendees in 2024, ReggaeEDM is carving out its own space, bridging cultural and musical divides.

“It’s a genre that is in the early stages,” says Matt Phillips, Co-Founder and President of Silverback Music. “A few artists have crossed the barriers… both genres work well together; it's about the beat and the rhythm.” His take reflects the industry’s growing awareness that ReggaeEDM, while rooted in history, is carving out its own path of rhythm and reinvention.

Phillips, who manages many of reggae’s modern torchbearers, sees clear signs of its rise.  “The artist I identify the most as pushing ReggaeEDM on the highest worldwide stages is Major Lazer,” he says. “A lot of the rhythms pull from island, reggae, and world music, and they’ve done a lot of great collaborations with Jamaican reggae stars.”

While dozens of artists have shaped the rise of this sound, from Thievery Corporation out of Washington D.C., to Mungo's Hi Fi in Glasgow, to Adrian Sherwood in London, many of them did it without ever knowing the genre had a name. This fusion happened naturally, born from shared rhythms, a universal message, and an underlying love of both reggae and EDM.

Silverback Artist Management first made its mark in the 1990s by helping shape the legacy of the cross-genre-defining band Sublime. That moment cemented their role as architects of the modern reggae-rock movement. Since then, they have continued to steer the sound of a generation, promoting landmark events including the Closer to the Sun festival in Riviera Maya, Mexico, CaliVibes in Long Beach, CA, and Point Break in Virginia Beach. Now, with the rise of a new wave of genre-blending acts, they are pushing boundaries once again.

“We’re trying to incorporate EDM more into our reggae festivals. People go to music festivals to have fun and dance,” says Matt Phillips. “Now that more artists are crossing between reggae and electronic, I see a huge place for it on our shows.”

ReggaeEDM, once a fringe experiment, is quickly becoming the next wave. Silverback is ready, helping to set the stage in the international reggae scene.

In Fort Lauderdale, where every traffic light feels like it was programmed by an enemy of productivity, lives Kēvens, a man with endless talent and endless reasons why he cannot, simply cannot, write a blog post. His fans wait patiently. His website blinks in sorrow. His Word document sits with nothing but a lonely title. Yet day after day, somehow, life conspires against him.

He wakes with the best intentions. Green tea steaming, glasses polished, laptop open. He even whispers, “Today is the day.” Then his phone rings. His mother needs him to drive her to the pharmacy, but only the one across town because it has the exact lotion she likes. His father has misplaced his dentures again, and Kēvens is crawling around the living room searching under couch cushions instead of typing an opening paragraph. By the time both parents are settled, it is dinner time, and the only thing he has written is a grocery list.

The house remodel makes things worse. Contractors appear like ghosts. One insists on cutting wood in the middle of the living room because the garage has “bad vibes.” Another swears the kitchen cannot be painted until Kēvens personally approves thirty-seven shades of white. Instead of writing about ReggaeEDM’s rise, he is debating whether “Eggshell Whisper” is warmer than “Cloud Mist Serenity.”

If he makes it into the studio, he is doomed. “Just one vocal track before I start,” he promises. Fourteen hours later he has layered vocals, rearranged the chorus nine times, and invented an entirely new genre that nobody asked for. The blog is untouched, while his neighbors now know every line of his unreleased tracks because the bass rattled through their walls all night.

Then there is martial arts. He convinces himself discipline is the key. But discipline in Kēvens’ mind means spending three hours in the backyard spinning through katas, shadowboxing the air, and bowing to palm trees. “Once my roundhouse kick is perfected,” he says, “my mind will be clear to write.” The kicks are spectacular. The blog post remains invisible.

And we cannot forget the remote control helicopters. The skies of Fort Lauderdale tremble whenever Kēvens decides it is “helicopter time.” He sends them buzzing over canals, dodging pelicans, and crashing into palm trees. More than once he has had to fish one out of a stranger’s swimming pool. The helicopters bring him joy, but they bring his blog absolutely nothing.

The excuses grow by the day. “The Wi-Fi was too slow.” “The moon was in the wrong phase.” “My tea got cold.” “A lizard stared at me through the window and I lost focus.” “My martial arts instructor texted me a quote and I had to meditate on it for four hours.” Each excuse is more colorful than the last, yet all lead to the same outcome: no blog post.

Friends beg him. “Just write one paragraph.” He nods, promises, and then vanishes into the Bermuda Triangle of distractions that is his life. Fans ask on social media. “When is the new blog coming?” He responds with a cryptic photo of a helicopter hovering over his half-remodeled kitchen.

Meanwhile the Word document taunts him. The cursor blinks like a ticking clock. “Dear beloved fans” it says. That is all. Three words. Three lonely words that have been there since the Obama administration. The document is less a blog post and more a monument to procrastination.