The Chicago Electronic Music Conference SPECIAL POD! John Rynecki and Kim Yeoh Share the Origin Story

Introduction

0:00These guys are all big influences on me and certainly house music.

0:30So let's go on that. I want to talk a little bit about each of your illustrious careers because you guys have done a lot. You've done a lot. All three of you have done amazing, you know, have had amazing contributions to what we call house music. You know, this is the vintage house show. And so part of what that is about is celebration and preservation. This is Lawrence Braydening, but the celebration and preservation of Chicago house legends and Chicago house music.

1:03And welcome to the vintage house show.

Chicago Electronic Music Conference

1:18So 2026 is starting off with an amazing, fantastic Chicago electronic music conference, and it's headed by the two people we are lucky to have on the show today, John Reinecki and Kim Yo. And we are just so excited to have you on the vintage house show. Thanks so much for coming today. Thanks for having us. Yeah, thank you for having us. So you all are fresh off the Winter Music Conference in Miami, Kim. I know you were just there, John. You've been in the past. It's always such a great, you know, it's just Miami is a great environment, number one.

1:57It's a great environment for music and art, all things creative. But for house music, it's fire. That entire city is just house music ever. Every hotel has house music. You go down Miami Beach, everything is house music. It is the best thing ever. You can't say that about Chicago. You can't just go down Michigan Avenue and just hear like house music everywhere.

Kim's Experience in Miami

2:17So I love that. So that whole environment there. Kim, what was your time like? Your first time going? Tell us a little bit about the flow and the vibe there. Yeah, I had a really great time and it wasn't my first time in Miami and I kind of knew where things were, where I was going. I was pretty familiar with the culture in Miami, but I was really pleasantly surprised by how invested people were in the music. Like I went to the thought. I went to the classic hotel where Hot Sins 82 was playing, and I think in a place like Miami I witnessed a lot more artists taking risks.

2:57It feels very exciting to see them playing different things. were so like um correct on any hotel i went to this random hotel where a t-shirt was throwing a free party and then we went to the basement and just heard some really fresh grooves that i haven't really experienced before and i think in a place like miami especially during miami music week people were there to absorb people really wanted to be there to experience what

3:30is new and exciting and one wanted to be impressed and i think artists came to deliver that and you know i think miami has created sort of an environment that encourages that i think what we really want to do for chicago as the birthplace of house is that we also want to be seen as a place where artists can come and be a playground right like for artists to really express themselves for local artists local talents to also bring in new exciting elements um so that our culture and the

4:03sounds keep evolving and not just you know that's why um at cmc we talk a lot about bridging the legacy with um the future sound so like what is evolving what's fresh and what is the root of everything um so that's what we're trying to do and i was really inspired by how miami was able to like really embody that spirit that is so fantastic what a great description of your experience and what you thought about sort of that entire what was going on there in total um john you know we like

John's Background

4:34to begin with history here at the vintage house show so we're going to start with number one john where are you from where'd you grow up and how did that influence you know sort of your music choices early on and then today yeah really great question i think um again thank you for having us i think for myself um i am have a my parents are u.s military so i grew up abroad i didn't actually grow up in chicago chicago's my adopted home as of like 10 years or so actually at

5:042016 and um so i grew up in my mom's panamanian um my dad's polish italian american and so i grew up in panama for 10 years and then then i grew up in germany for six years so i had um most of my life i lived abroad and i think that had a really big influence in like the different music that i listened to like salsa merengue and um also getting into once i got to europe learning about like electronic music and um i was the kid on the bus of the u.s military school system that everybody was making fun of the

5:40electronic music but i was secretly like oh i really like this and i followed that thread and brought me to where i am today got it so you started off your life with a little salsa a little merengue and then it morphed into electronic music uh quickly did you you know did you have interest in sort of the formation of that music it was just here's the music kids were kind of like not into it but you know kind of into it at the same time did you have a sense of where the music began or formed did you think it was just a european music form yeah that's a great question i guess like living

6:15in europe you tend to have this um i i didn't know where i came from especially electronic music i think that and i didn't have a natural curiosity at the time to kind of investigate where things came from and even just like my my stepdad who likes rock he served in vietnam and then i remember he would play some rock that he played and it's like some some a lot of music that comes up is redone and repeated so it's like oh this that's the original of this song and there's so many versions of that throughout

6:45like different genres and um throughout like yeah music and um coming to chicago was a really great experience to know i did know before coming to chicago that house music was the home of a house but

Kim's Origin Story

6:56it wasn't something i knew growing up okay kim talk to us a little bit about your background and your origin story yeah i am originally from malaysia and born and raised in the small little island called penang um i grew up very sheltered i went to all girls high school um it you know to be honest with you i grew up kind of feeling a strong sense of um disdain or maybe like misjudgment towards what

7:27electronic music represented um because growing up you know there's a huge culture of like anti-drugs anti-partying you know study go to school have a family your classic you know asian asian family um idea of what success looks like um but when i graduated high school my first job out of college was um of being a nightlife photographer at a club called paris yeah and and i saw the way they were playing electronic music was the kind of music you would expect in like i don't know of like a random

8:05bar where the dj was just playing top 40 remixes right that was my first introduction so i didn't i didn't resonate with that music at all until i moved to chicago i was really craving for a creative community i i had moved to iowa for school found chicago to be a better much much more vibrant place to live um and i was really craving for a creative community and i you know started going to some shows and i brought my camera along with me and i would introduce myself hey can i take photos for

8:39your parties and people liked it um you know shout out to rami from rituals and he was like want to work for me and i just started photographing underground parties and through the introduction i i think i was one of the people who didn't get in because of the music at first i got in because i realized i i don't think i've ever experienced that kind of welcoming joy and love and diversity for people who might not fit in elsewhere or people who are a little bit corkier and it's just

9:14you would never walk into a place where everybody just smile at you and just wanted to be there and and that was what got me hooked and then eventually you start getting to know the music getting to know the dj understand the history um and then you get to know music nerds like john reneke and they start talking you off when the set is playing and you're like oh my god did you hear what he's doing and then you start learning about what wow this is a wonderful kind of music and then i started learning how to dj as well and it it's just it's just a it's just a wonderful genre that carries so much weight

9:51um and and culture um that means a lot for me personally as an immigrant in america well thank you so much for sharing what you know you know asian culture you know not so many people understand that maybe some cultures you know have different um definitions of success you know what is success for an asian you know or a latin or another a black community like what is success and sometimes it includes it does not include being creative you know what i mean so you have to really search that

10:22out so thanks for pointing that out and so we're so excited that you all are have created the chicago electronic music conference and you know we the vintage house show were built to and we've for the last 10 years of really uh looking to make sure that the pioneers uh recognize themselves as legends and pioneers and that that wasn't happening so much i think you know the world was forgetting about chicago's um uh chicago's impact on music on black music on uh world music

10:58and we just wanted to make sure that everyone was telling their story their correct way so anytime someone's looking to illuminate that we want to be in support of that and we just love it so much

Creating the Conference

11:09so dad tell us how you created this so you have a co-creator as well feel free to shout out all the people uh why you decided to create this conference how it went last year and tell us about you know some of the things that we can look forward to this year awesome yeah of course so i think um it definitely didn't do it alone there's a huge team and long list of contributors who helped make this possible um i was two fellow co-founders in 2023 we all came together like july 2023 i just left

11:44my job in tech and myself nikil gudwani um matt pest we're all in the same room one night and we're wondering like why is there no like sort of like networking event or event where we can learn from each other and be in the same room and not just party and without like we'd have to go to like miami music week or winter music conference or amson dance event to kind of get those kind of experiences and why doesn't that exist in chicago and then along the way kim joined as like a creative director and helped uh really tell our story and tell our branding in a really unique way to us

12:16um kai castro ken sheldon um and a number of other long list of individuals and from the inspiration for this me personally i think like i was really sort of starting that i really started in 2023 to pursue my electronic music career as an artist as a dj professional like i'm a professional i'm not just like a hobbyist i'm gonna make music i'm gonna release it i'm going to dj and eventually i want i want a tour and i realized it takes a lot of money to really get started in the industry you need a lot of capital it is pay to play in a lot of ways like even like right now i have a release that released

12:50on friday that i'm running ads on to get to make sure people are hearing it all around the world and it's not just something that you can just put out and not expect to put money in and it took so long so much knowledge gathering and traveling to amson dance to kind of get this information and then that's really kind of helped inspire cemc for me and how um yeah i want to help impart this knowledge on others and nakil the other co-founder he mentioned that the culture was really for first and foremost for him and i think like our two visions came together now for me that

13:24the cultural aspect teaches the culture i mean the cultural aspect teaches like everything you kind of need to know in many ways that makes sense got it got it kim you know what we know at the vintage house shows that it's very difficult to put together these kind of conferences like it's so fun and you're so looking forward to doing it you want to see it happen you want to see all things all these things happen but it's extremely difficult and it's certainly difficult to to market as well to market properly globally even locally it's very hard to do tell me about the planning for this how long

14:00it's taking you to plan this put the team together like the teams that are going to reach out to the uh all of the panelists and the performers give me sort of that story because i know that is super hard yes and it like john said it takes an entire village and anyone who has thrown in a party together know how many people it requires to even just tape down cables you know so that's true i really love what you said earlier too about how we we want legends to be able to recognize themselves and i think when

14:38we come together putting together a team or or even a plan um to be honest with you a lot of the time the plan looks like sitting down on a table and just figuring out what to do now and because there's no blueprint like john said there's no ade in chicago yet like and we just have to figure out what is done and you know the fact that john was in tech i i was a journalist and then an in in advertising and a couple of people in media and just realizing this is the beauty of the dance floor

15:12this is the beauty of the genre that there's it attracts so many people with all kinds of different talents that you would need to build a village um to come together and and trusting that these people are bringing your best interest and your best tools and skill set and contributing to one single mission which is like what you're saying giving legends a platform and also inspiring new talents and making sure that this you know house music and chicago's culture continue to live on um you know when we were

15:46putting together branding we really wanted to emphasize on chicago as a feeling right like we initially we wanted to use the chicago color the stars and then when i um i said hey let's ask the people what they want right like this is this is a conference for the people so we did a survey and the way people describe chicago is just so unique and so personal it's never about the colors it's never about the flags it's how the city makes them feel it's how it feels like when you walk down michigan

16:17avenue on the river walk you know you joe has a song right like when i'm back in chicago i feel it there's just it is a captivating city um and we wanted to kind of create this underground

16:32perfection um as playfulness um as our branding so we we try to make things a little bit off center sometimes or make them feel a little bit more like a diy print flyers that you would see back in the day which is how rave started um so we draw a lot of inspiration from all different kinds of little you know lived in experience of just being a chicagoan um and being a house music lover we we try to highlight the human experience rather than what it should look like um and we wanted to create something

17:09very authentic very um tangible and tactile and in terms of the marketing um you know at this state of the conference we are a startup basically and like john is saying a lot of times we have to give money to we have to like pay things you know we're all full-time artists trying to make ends meet on our own um so it is a huge challenge and just i wake up every day feeling so grateful that i'm on a team

17:39of people just coming together and just trusting taking the leap that this is going to work out um and contributing everything that that they can um and i think that's what our biggest marketing marketing tool has been is leaning on our community right like we for our panels we have people like laurie branch we have people people like these are hyperactive um we have people like from do you want to and just leveraging local community resources and being like hey this is a really cool thing that we think you should be a part of and we want to highlight your story

18:13it's a win-win right like it's not about like you marketing for us or us marketing for you it's just like we're coming together and creating something that adds value to the city to the community that's the marketing and you know we try to stay true to that because we don't have the money to just be like here you know put a billboard and like put it on this and we all we have is connections and the people that believe in us um so really really grateful people like you know you yourself

18:47are having us on like this is our marketing right it's all just organic and very much people who want who who believe in us so um yeah i think it's so cheesy but it is kind of how we've been been able to push so many content out that is amazing that's a great story and again i think people can feel sort of the passion in your discussion around this conference and your interest in the music and your

19:17need to ensure that people recognize that we're all we all have to come together to put together this story to make sure that the world knows these different things and that not just the world but even chicagoans know these different things and it starts i think with young people like yourself i feel like um you know please never get discouraged by old people not encouraging you because it's only we're stuck in our ways and we think you know this is the only thing which is why i want to give cameron phillips also a shout out we've been very supportive of cameron we want to see these things happen we

19:52know some of these older adults are just not going to make it happen for whatever the reasons are and so love also to david chavez who's tried to you know put together with the city the chicago house music conference and festival we programmed that for three years and assisted for many years in different capacities on that but you know covet threw a few things off it wasn't sort of the set time and dates that people could absolutely know that this thing was happening and i think once we get back to that maybe there's a collaboration that we could all do that suggests that people know globally they

20:27should come here like ade like you know went to music conference so i think that's always a goal put that goal number one work cohesively to make sure that the world knows that this conference and this festival is happening so it's not just education but it's fun it's more music and it's young people moving the music to the next level um tell us who else is going to be at this at this fantastic one day event at the remova theater bless you um tell us about all the other people thanks for shouting

21:01that laurie branch of course and the benita show team will be there in full effect and we have to interview folks as they're coming on and off whatever they're doing and people who are just coming to the event we want to talk to them too but um what else should we expect at this thing what's new what's going to be something that's going to surprise uh the folks um yeah there's a lot i think this is i think the best part about this is that last year the difference i think you asked this earlier what's the difference between last year and this year and i think the first year we

21:34only used the second floor really of the remova and now we're expanded to the full venue so every piece of space at the remova every nook and cranny is being utilized to a um to the nth degree we've gone and measured many times and taken many photos and i think yeah so you mentioned cam phillips from museum of house he's uh the one that the panel that laurie branches on it's called um chicago's legacy and what comes next and it's a panel with laurie branch vince vince lawrence kate simcoe dj

22:06hyperactive and um a number of other panels like kim is also leading a panel on ai tech feature proofing your career um cost of a night out with um yes this one here and um so among there's panels there's workshops there's activations uh kim do you want to talk about any of the activations yes um so you know i wear many pictures while you're talking keep going okay yeah and you know one of the things that we learned last year was um people love the elements of surprise right like when we were

22:43trying to utilize every footprint that we we had um we had like a little site quest area it we didn't even come up with that name but it was just a vinyl cafe with beanbags and the fact that you had to go through multiple doors and then open and come around and to find that people were so excited to find out about that place and so this year we kind of structured experience kind of based on um feedback from last year you know i want to make sure that the flow is better at checked in um and then also

23:18adding in areas where people can network people can rest people can you know go through the more introspectiveness right i think that's what miami music didn't have for me was like a lot of talking and constant stimulation um so this year we also were really we're also very intentional with how we curate spaces where people can have quiet time um and people can also network music all kinds of different things so you know it it i almost want to keep it as an element of surprise but we will have

23:53a lot of you know educational opportunities and you know one of the best thing is um we have so many technological vendors that is taking over the entire removal loft and they're gonna be able to like physically experience a lot of the gears like for example the erica since is bringing in this gear that was co-designed by richie houghton um and they're gonna able to and they're doing a demo on it so there's gonna be a lot of hands-on actual you know producer dj language kind of jargony situation so

24:28you you can there's like the broad level panel what the culture is going to go and then there's a very like how to use this specific drum and you know you get like to play with it um and then there's also all the music highlighting local people um and hiding different local collectives and yeah it's going to be a lot of different little areas that people can explore and what i am personally really looking forward to is just being able to um find a way to curate some kind of um collaboration between

25:05people because i think this is what matters to us the most is people leave the conference not just with knowledge but with new contacts in their phones new followers new people that they are going to grab coffee with have studio sessions with i think in the end of the day what keeps the culture alive is really people starting to collaborate with other people like you were saying you know like there's so much to learn from you know we have to meet the professionals which is kind of like a networking dating event there's so much to learn from the professionals and from the people on stage

25:39at the same time there's so many opportunities to learn from the people around you that's how john and i got here right being at the dance floor talking to each other and here we are like starting something something exciting together so that is really what we're hoping to create is an environment where people can learn and meet cool friends that you know turns into lifelong collaborators i mean that's how the world works right now sometimes you just at a networking event and you know

26:09you met the co-founder to you your new venture which i think is fantastic and collaboration and cooperation i think is critical for chicagoans to sort of bring the music you know from chicago back across the globe take it over as a genre that again is chicago birthed and i do like that you're thinking about sort of very tactile ways that folks can be introduced to the music form is there an age limit of you know so people who can attend or tell me about some of the attendees and what you're kind

26:41of thinking the attendee pool should look like or who should come to this like everyone i think the eight the um 18 is the the age to to attend and so 18 and up if you're a student you can get a student discount at the remova also if you're a bridgeport resident there's also a fixed rate ticket i think 30 for that um students 25 and last year our demographic skewed a bit younger so i think like

27:11if you're looking at who attended it was mostly people who were very curious about the industry maybe they didn't really know um where they fit and maybe they they've already started djing but they don't really know if they can make a career and i think even last year i think i was corrected by my co-founder dakil i kept saying that like i'm a music professional it's something that it was a very hard transition that i turned my like i am a music professional and that's not something i think a lot of people use or say in the u.s in in dance music so and i i'm trying to convert a lot of people to like yes this is an industry it's maybe not the easiest it's not the most traditional my mom when

27:46i told her i'm gonna quit my tech job to become a full-time dj music producer she's like john johnny i don't think that's the best idea but honestly it's been a challenging road but the best decision of my life i will not hold we're not i do i don't regret it and i think i want to help other people do that as well and that's something that we're trying to to do here yeah and then adding on a little bit of that too i think a lot of times when people see events like this they might think oh you know like it's only for djs or producers or they might be like oh this is for people who are learning how

28:18to dj or learning how to produce it's really not you know it's industry gathering right like it is about people of all levels coming together and being curious about what is missing in your life and learning from each other and meeting new people meeting new friends in a fresh way in a in a in a setting that is inspiring that is not just a dance floor you know like it's just a different environment for dance music to flourish um so we really want anyone you know we call them um what is

28:51it like rave rave enthusiasts or like um the dance there's music enthusiasts um we want media people to come like i for example i didn't come to the scene as ej's producer like i think it is about what opportunities have you not discovered yet in your creative career in music like as a photographer as as a content creator is this this is a place that you can come and talk to people who love house music

29:23and see what you can come up with together all right house music is fun it's love it is you know music it envelops you but it's also a business and there's all kinds of business opportunities available for people across the board young and old if you find whatever that trajectory is for you within you know if you love the music or if you think a little bit about the music there's a business side to this that some that people should attack in a great way because it is a global music

29:54genre and there are a lot of people across the globe that are making a lot of money on this on this chicago birth thing so i do think it's very important that you know people come together at this event and realize that there's so many different ways to become involved in the music you don't just have to be you know a dj or a promoter or a club owner you know you could be you could just enjoy something else and realize that there's some room in that in the genre for you and your passions

30:26and your creativity especially since we're in the new age of ai there's got to be some way we're going to use all of those that technology to do 20 000 different things in the music protect it protect the music but you know yeah you never know i'm sure you all are going to help us with that uh in a couple weeks as well like how people are going to use these new technologies to move the music forward and protect the music um so guys please give everyone the information on how to get tickets where they

Event Details and Tickets

30:56should go social media wise to find out more information on chicago electronic music conference yep so you can go to chicago emc.org and um or you can the removal website for tickets um also we have a offshoot event this thursday at 6 p.m from 6 to 10 p.m we've had these events all throughout the spring and uh in winter they're called cue points and um typically their workshop this one is a vinyl lovers meetup so it's done with the vinyl collective and bridgeport records so basically there's a pop-up

31:31records uh record store with bridgeport the vinyl collective led by virginia um who's a who works with cam every once in a while but um so yeah basically you can bring a record talk to people there's vinyl open decks it's a good way to meet our community and also um you can get a discount they have as well got it where are all the social media handles to reach you personally both of you are personally and the actual um event sites

32:02kim do you want yeah um the our our instagram handle is chicago underscore emc and my personal um handle is pirated kim um it's a whole different conversation about how i come up with that name and then for john i believe it's j r j reneke yeah just yeah the yeah i can tell how you all are you know sort of just getting started at some point you're going to need you know you're going

32:35to have 5 000 people calling you for different things you're going to need your own personal instagram and then your business music instagram so you can funnel people and the people who just want your phone number just to ask you all out that's another instagram that you're going to have to put together like you have to operate like celebrities now guys okay so like level it up and make sure that you have the different path for each one of the people so they don't get mixed up yeah you think you're getting a date and then someone really wants to you know present next year

33:05you know what i'm saying so uh just just a thought just a thought there all the time exactly did you have to be so careful i mean i'm telling you it's like i trust me i know you got to be like wait a minute i've got to give somebody in my day i was i've got to give somebody else that number not this number you know what i mean like i got to put you in this category not the other category guys we look forward to the chicago electronic music conference uh saturday april the 11th what time does it begin it starts at noon um and you know we have prepared a really special way to

33:42open the the the day um we're going to have one of two of our really really good friends who really inspired a lot of this collaboration um um jack hoya and cyclone and they are flying in from la to open with an ambient hybrid set to kind of set this set the tone of like all right you're entering this new new space um for the day and then you know that's when um the panel actual panel starts at 1 p.m

34:12so you want people to get there at noon to experience the first activations the first performances they need to be there uh and i think that's wonderful any other things that we should know that i didn't ask i guess like we also have music all day at off hours um uh beer co which is the beer diner brewery attached to remova um that and that is open to public you don't need a ticket um you know it's one of our

34:44ways of like paying respect to bridgeport as as the the venue um we curated all day music with local djs and that is open to anybody um who you don't need to buy a ticket so just come enjoy the show and enjoy the music and if you feel inspired and you want to learn more please come through you know we would love just meet people for even just getting started and curious um what else and the after party that we're announcing today yes can we announce that can we get the grand announcement

35:20here on the vintage house show please yes uh a partner of ours is um arpea chicago so it's in um yeah in river north and like veronica beckman um like really believes in us and and um yeah the we'll be having the after party there with kate simco and one of the panelists from la adam after hours and yeah it's look out for the post in chicago underscore emc for more details and john is playing close yes i'm playing as well yes that's why we have to come we have to come just

35:53to check you out that's okay so exactly we are going to critique the skills john we're going to be like don't worry i'll deliver so you're going to deliver on the music so guys thank you all so much have a fantastic event we look forward to seeing you there if people have any other questions they are welcome to you know check out and reach back out to the vintage house show we're happy to help them put you in the right direction as well john renecki kim yo thank you all so much for creating this event and coming out of the vintage house show to talk about it thank you for having us much thanks

36:28take it easy bye lauren bye bye i'm trying to golly geez thanks for listening to the vintage house show podcast please subscribe and share and check us out live wnur 89.3 fm wednesdays at 10 o'clock

36:58we'll see you next time