Behind the Media Pass: Raffi Santos on Covering Festivals From the Inside
For this edition of Voices, we caught up with someone who sees festivals from an angle most attendees never do. Raffi Santos is a Vancouver-based festival journalist, creator, and music industry professional whose work spans Stage Hoppers, Edmtrain, and Monstercat, covering Coachella, Rolling Loud, Decadence Colorado, Boo Seattle, Anyma at Sphere, and hometown events like FVDED in the Park as official media.
You wear a lot of hats. Walk us through them.
Right now it's three. I'm Content Manager at Stage Hoppers, I write as a journalist for Edmtrain, and I work at Monstercat as Sync & Partnerships Coordinator. Monstercat is an electronic music label based here in Vancouver, so on that side I'm helping get our artists' music placed in games, shows, and brand partnerships. It means I see the same scene from three directions: the fan coverage side, the editorial side, and the label side. A festival lineup reads completely differently when you know what went into getting some of those artists there.
How does writing for Stage Hoppers compare to writing for Edmtrain?
Stage Hoppers is built around culture, speed, and audience instinct. You're thinking about what fans are saying in the comments, what part of the story matters socially, and how to make coverage feel native to the scene. Edmtrain is more editorial and utility-driven, so the writing has to be tighter, cleaner, and useful for people deciding where to go next. Both sharpen different muscles. One keeps you tapped into the conversation, the other makes you slow down and structure the information properly.
Your byline shows up in a lot of places.
It does at this point. My work has been published across DJ Lovers Club, 1001Tracklists, RAP, Decadence and Global Dance, Dubsteps Finest, Stage Hoppers, Edmtrain, The Festive Owl, and a bunch of others. Every outlet has its own audience and its own voice, so writing across that many keeps you sharp. What works for a tracklist deep dive is not what works for festival coverage.
What does covering a festival as official media actually look like?
Less glamorous than people think. You're working the whole time. At Coachella, which I've covered across multiple years, the days start before gates and end after the headliners, because that's when the writing and editing happens. Rolling Loud and Decadence Colorado are their own kind of intense: hip hop crowds and New Year's Eve rave crowds move very differently, and your coverage has to capture that. The pass gets you access, but the job is translating the weekend for everyone who wasn't there.
You're based in Vancouver. Make the case for the Pacific Northwest.
Easy. FVDED in the Park is one of the best city festivals in North America and people outside BC still sleep on it. Boo Seattle has become the Halloween event for the whole region. Shambhala is a completely different kind of pilgrimage, with its own culture and mythology. Then you have Seattle, The Gorge, Vancouver, and the rest of the corridor feeding into each other all summer. People fly to Vegas and Miami and forget there's a scene up here that's been building for a decade. Covering hometown events matters to me as much as the Coachella weekends do, honestly more.
What makes Vancouver's rave scene interesting right now?
Vancouver is smaller than people expect, but that makes the scene feel concentrated. When something hits here, you feel it quickly. The city has always had strong bass music roots, but house, techno, and melodic events have been growing too, especially as more international promoters and touring brands look at the market seriously. There's also a real cross-border culture with Seattle and the wider Pacific Northwest, which makes the region feel bigger than one city.
Do you have a favorite festival to cover?
Coachella is the benchmark because it sets the tone for so much of the year, from production to fashion to surprise guests. But Shambhala is probably the most special from a BC perspective because it feels less like a standard festival and more like its own world. From a media standpoint, those are totally different assignments. Coachella is about scale and cultural impact. Shambhala is about community, sound, and identity.
You also spoke at UBC recently. What was that?
Yeah, I was on a panel for UBC's Creative Industries Network talking about working in music and social media. Speaking to students was a full-circle moment, because there's no clear roadmap into this world. Nobody hands you a guide on how to end up backstage at Coachella with a media pass. If sitting on a panel demystifies even a little of that for someone trying to break in, it's worth doing.
What's one thing attendees get wrong about festivals?
Planning every minute. The sets you remember are almost never the ones you circled. Pick two or three non-negotiables per day and let the rest of the weekend happen to you. Every good festival story I have started with a wrong turn.
What should people watch for the rest of 2026?
Shambhala is always the answer if you're in BC, it's a pilgrimage. Closer to home, FVDED in the Park in July and Boo Seattle around Halloween are the two I'd circle. The back half of the year in the PNW is stacked, and covering it from inside the region never gets old.