All hands on the decks

Eoin Arbuckle is a 26-year-old DJ from Strabane, who has performed all over the country and UK at clubs and festivals with such names as Acid Flex, Marc Blair and Darude.

His style ranges from commercial to techno, trance and hard-house.

Performing under the name ‘Ardbuckle’, he is also the founder and events manager of Electric Arcade – a promotion company that showcases some of the best DJs from all around Ireland and UK.

Electric Arcade has been a massive success in recent years, and Eoin is currently in the process of planning what intends to be one of the most major outdoor DJ events Strabane has ever seen this summer.

Speaking of where his interest in music first start, the popular Strabane DJ said, “I was always very musically-inclined.

“I played guitar when I was younger, and I come from a family of rock music fans.

“When I was growing up, my parents were heavily into the dance music, so it most definitely rubbed off on me.”

Eoin said that at a young age, he started off listening to ‘more commercial’ EDM music, such as Hardwell and Tiesto.

“Then I got deeper into the more underground techo, house and trance stuff,” he explained.

Explaining the hustle of how he obtained his first set of decks, he said, “When I was about 15, I used to sell bars of chocolate in school, and I saved up over about three months, got my first set of decks and started practicing.”

His first big gig as ‘Arbuckle’ was in the Fir Trees Hotel in Strabane, supporting Zedemies – and Eoin hasn’t looked back since.

“From about the age of 16, I was DJing at birthday events, and celebrations locally, and playing in bars… even though I was under-age!”

Eoin said that a stand-out gig he recalls was the first big event he ran in Ruby’s Nightclub in Strabane in 2018.

“I kept pushing for big techno nights in Strabane, so I took on the challenge, did the advertising, made videos and posts to promote it and put word out around the town.

“I will always remember walk into the venue that day.

“It turned out that we got 700 people through the door, bus loads landed from all over the country, and it turned out to be a great success.

“I was feeling ecstatic and received great feed back all round – the whole town was talking about it!”

Regarding plans for the big upcoming outdoor even this summer he said, “I’ve been seeing a lot of successful outdoor local events all around the country lately, and thought it would be great to introduce something in Strabane.

“Most major towns and villages in the country have some sort of event in summer, so my motto was ‘why not Strabane?’

“I’ve been working towards this for about 10 or 11 months now.

“It’s a very highly complex thing to try and organise, but I’m determined.”

Eoin said that safety is a high-priority throughout the whole event.

“We have a few thousand capacity and a three month advertising campaign ongoing,” he explained.

“Tickets are flying out, and it looks like it’s going to be a highly successful event in a safe environment for the whole community.”

The Strabane DJ concluded, “Safety first – it’s all about creating memories.”

The Electric Arcade outdoor dance festival will take place on June 15, and is set to feature such dance music acts as Dense & Pika, Modeá, Jika Jika and Callisto. Tickets are available now via www.skiddle.com.