If you want to understand Montreal's dance scene, start with Ferias

"I guess I'll try to keep it as simple as possible," Guthrie Drake starts when asked what Ferias is. "I would say the easy answer is that we're a party, or we're a couple of DJs, or we're promoters or whatever, but I really kind of steer away from that."

What he settles on is community: A community that gathers around music, but has spread beyond those gatherings into something as diffuse as the sprawling, almost clandestine range of venues they'll set up shows in. It's a community based in feeling, in a mindset and awareness that persists after the records stop spinning.

It's a fair statement, as to know what Ferias is is to know what Ferias isn't.