Remember seeing the awe-inspiring LED robots at Wavefront Music Festival that ran around entertaining you with awesome robot action? Ever wonder where they get their amazing toys? Ever wonder what it\’s like to be a festival performer? After chatting with CEO and performer for The ILLuminautians (pronounced il-lu-mi-naughty-ans) , Kyle Head, I have those answers and more with this behind the scenes look at what it was like to be a part of putting on the show at Wavefront Music Festival.
Kyle began his path to festival performing when he decided to learn the art of Poi 12 years ago. For those of you who are unfamiliar, if you have ever seen people who spin fire, they\’re practicing Poi. He then moved to Miami, FL where he learned he could get paid to spin fire at night clubs to entertain crowds. This was just the beginning of the direction Kyle\’s life would take to amp up the entire party scene in clubs and at festivals all over the world. He now owns and operates The ILLuminautians, which is a performance group that entertains people at large festivals all over the globe (from Canada down to Columbia, even all the way to Australia) as well as in Miami\’s hottest clubs (LIV and Story to name a few).
After getting in touch with John Carlo, a Wavefront Music Festival organizer, Kyle\’s troupe made up of 6 male and 6 female performers were headed to Chicago to bring their art to our beach. If you saw the mermaids hanging out by the Wavefront sign, you saw how talented and beautiful the team of women really are. Soon they will be releasing their Fembot act, which will be their 6 fine ladies in the same style robot suits we saw at Wavefront, but of course done in a much sexier fashion. If you were impressed with this year\’s spectacle, Kyle has tentatively planned to equip his robots with jet packs for an epic performance for next year\’s Wavefront fireworks. \”Are you not entertained!?\” That\’s how Kyle Head works. No face has been melted off hard enough.
Jet packs, laser fingers, cryoguns, specialized stilts, five-figure robot suits–where does he get those wonderful toys? Most of them are custom made by his team of 4 electrical engineers and 2 designers in their Miami studio. You won\’t see another LED robot quite like The ILLuminautians.
The robots have become so popular at every event they have played, they\’ve started their own party dubbed \”Rage of the Robots\”. A show they have coming up soon in Tallahassee, FL is \”Robbie Rivera Rages with Robots\”. Where one robot DJ will play an opening set while the rest get the crowd jacked for Robbie. Kyle\’s dream is to integrate festival performing to the main stage of concert performances. To create \”EDM concept parties\” where big name visual performers are as popular as the big name DJs. Where there\’s more to a show than just the lights and sounds put on by the DJ. He would love to see his dream of an \”adult Disney World\”, as he described it, come to life through breath-taking costumes and character acting. He sees visual performers as the mascots for EDM. Their goal is to bring the crowd together and excite us for all that is to come. Our scene needs to take this kind of direction to give us even more to enjoy. After all that\’s what we\’re there for, to see things we\’ve never seen before and to be blown away by amazing art. I can\’t wait to see what happens in the future with this movement.
When asked if he had advice for readers who may be interested in performing at festivals or night clubs, he only had this to say: \”Ask yourself, \’How are YOU going to wow the crowd\’? Do THAT.\” Meaning whatever it is that you do, do it well. If you\’re really good with fire, practice fire breathing. If you\’re really good at hula hooping, make something amazing out of that. If you\’re really good at [insert something that no one has ever seen at a festival before here] make that a spectacle and make people love it (and you).
I had a really great time talking to Kyle and learning more about what it\’s like to be one of the performers that entertained us so well at Wavefront Music Festival. I loved hearing his ideas for the future of partying and wish him, his fiancé and all of The ILLuminautians all the success in the world. It couldn\’t happen to a nicer guy who holds all of the ideals of PLUR close to heart.
The name \”The ILLuminautians\” means \”the illuminated ones, the ones that search for the light\”. One thing is for certain, if you search for an ILLuminautian, you will find a party.
Kyle and his team are looking for new members and to expand their business to more cities; if you are interested in becoming a performer or would like to book a performance, don\’t hesitate to contact them:
http://www.illuminautians.com
https://www.facebook.com/theilluminautians
