Winter Music Conference and Miami Music Week Pool Party Guide

Photo by Yesenia Hernandez

Pack your swimsuit for WMC and MMW.

​Ostensibly, Winter Music Conference and Miami Music Week provide thousands of very serious electronic dance music fans with an annual opportunity to meet, mingle, and discuss the current state of EDM.

But c'mon, that's bullshit. The truth: Both WMC and MMW are just excuses for totally out-of-control beat freaks to strip down, oil up, and shake ass at a pool party while chugging too many mojitos, popping too many pills, and humping too many strangers on a pile of soggy hotel towels.

So stop using words like "zeitgeist," forget setting up a "symposium on glitch-house," and just slip into a string bikini or padded banana hammock. Here is New Times' pool party guide for Winter Music Conference and Miami Music Week.



Shelborne Beach Resort's Pool Party Marathon
Friday, March 16, to Sunday, March 25, noon, The Pool at The Shelborne Beach Resort, 1801 Collins Ave., Miami Beach; 305-531-1271; shelborne.com. A week pass costs $325 plus fees via wantickets.com. Ages 21 and up.
Have you ever spent ten straight days at the Shelborne, getting wasted while busting moves by the pool? Well, it'll only cost $325, plus a $26 service charge and a full paycheck's worth of booze money. The dangers: A nasty alcohol-induced case of sunstroke and an unidentified STD from that skeezy mid-afternoon hookup in a pool cabana. The benefits: Gettin' wet, wild, and weird for an entire week and a half with Nervous Records, Def Mix, Carl Craig & Friends, DJ Mag Recession Sessions IV, Luciano & Friends, Steve Lawler's Viva Music, Marco Carola's Musci On!, and Pacha Ibiza's Annual Classics Pool Party.

Dream Sessions
Friday, March 16, and Saturday, March 17, 11 a.m., Highbar at Dream South Beach Hotel, 1111 Collins Ave., Miami Beach; 305-534-8455; highbarmiami.com. Tickets cost $35 plus fees via wantickets.com. Ages 21 and up.
According to the official hype, Highbar's Dream Sessions is the "#1 hotel rooftop party for WMC." It'll splish and splash for a total of "10 days!" or "170 hours!" There will be tons of "A-listers" and "South Beach socialites" in attendance. And if the flyer isn't lying, you can expect at least one beach ball.