The weekend welcomed more than 400,000 people under the electric sky throughout the three-day festival at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Sunday marked the last night of the annual massive, which featured eight large stages and numerous other musical areas at the 21st annual event. Billboard Dance recaps the final night of festivities below:
7:04 p.m.: A guy on a pink moped with a Chicago sports teams flag around his shoulders has the right idea by passing the long line of cars along Las Vegas Boulevard. As we inch forward at a snail’s pace, he zips past us and makes it to the speedway in record time. Maybe whole crews should get mopeds to get out to the event…
8:08 p.m.: Did Burnheart really just sing, “I eat her so much you could call me a cannibal”? Yup, it’s from a new track called “Animal” he has with Reid Speed, who is spinning back to back with Soothslayer. According to Scott Bernhardt, we just “devirginized” Reid Speed to EDC, as this was the first one she’s played.
8:25 p.m.: There’s a DJ party going on as Fred V & Grafix B2B Metrik B2B TC look like they may be having even more fun than the crowd, who’s still a little sluggish from the heat. But free T-shirts woke everyone up and kicked things into gear, especially for a guy near me who caught a shirt and you’d think he won Megabucks. He also knew every word to the remix of TLC’s “No Scrubs” that they dropped in for the ladies. They also threw it back to “Hey Boy Hey Girl” with a drum ‘n’ bass twist. It was also nice to hear some jungle in the set too.
8:47 p.m.: Taking a walk down “Memory Lane,” the thoroughfare by the Carnival Square features walls of video screens playing highlights from the festival’s previous incarnations. The Aussie-accented hype man Nigel Ficke is currently on the screens with his gold pasties and leggings, dancing to white-hot beats. I miss that guy. I haven’t seen him at EDC in a while, and he’s such a gem.
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9:01 p.m.: There’s three wedding areas this year in EDC Town off the Cosmic Meadow and I almost cried watching two gay couples tie the knot with their rave-themed vows. Then I stopped by the EDC post office to send my mom a card. Outside, a Hunter S. Thompson look-alike nails the whole persona. We are definitely in Bat Country.
9:04 p.m.: I finally make my first trip of the weekend to the Cosmic Meadow to see what all the hype about Black Tiger Sex Machine is, plus it feels about 10 degrees cooler in the grass. The graphics for the trio remind me of a less sophisticated version of Excision’s Robo Kitty. All three guys in the booth are wearing black angular tiger helmets with light-up eyes.
9:21 p.m.: Marco Faraone is pumping an infectious groove from the Neon Garden, which is hosted by Drumcode on the last day, and the logo for the record label pulsates on the video screens. He’s followed by Dense & Pika, who start things off with a slow, almost Gregorian chant intro. “Do you like bass?” a later track questions, and by the crowd drawing closer to the stage, they most certainly do.
10:05 p.m.: While cooling off at the media center, the Red Bull TV live stream cuts to Slander at the Kinetic Field. In the front row, there’s a fan with a pretty impressive perler necklace of the DJ’s logo.
10:32 p.m.: I meet up with my friend Milissa and her neighbor at Naked City Pizza and accompany them over to Flosstradamus. The set includes a remix of Alice Deejay’s “Better Off Alone,” Blink-182’s “What My Age Again?” and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' “Head Will Roll” mashed up with Rihanna’s “Work” and later Queen’s “We Will Rock You.”
12:11 a.m.: Over at the Kinetic Field, Marshmello coincidentally plays “What My Age Again?” too. What year is it? Milissa suggests maybe people are trolling Fyre Festival. The stage is packed all the way to the back, but it’s just really not my kind of electronic music and I wanted to stick a fork in my ear, so I leave the stage.
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12:56 a.m.: The sweet melodic trance beckons at the Quantum Valley as Aly & Fila are wrapping up (OK, really it’s just Fadi who does the DJ sets if you want to get technical). He’s followed by the legendary Paul van Dyk and the #TranceFamily is in heaven.
1:34 a.m.: A family that raves together stays together. I met a father and son at the Neon Garden and gave them an extra water I had. The wind has picked up and the breeze is welcome, but all the fireworks are drifting off to the right in the wind, creating an ethereal effect.
1:51 a.m.: Drumcode boss Adam Beyer is properly educating the Neon Garden as giant plush dancing emoji characters groove amidst the glowing mushrooms. A girl walks by wearing an electrical-tape thong and I have to wonder, logistically, what happens when she has to use the restroom? I turn my attention back to Beyer for a second until my longtime rave buddy Johnny Savage in his kandi mask runs up to give me a hug then disappears under the tent to dance as fast as he appeared.
3:31 a.m.: Rumor has it someone big is going to play a surprise set on the Kalliope Art Car. Fans waiting around tell me it’s going to be Kaskade. As the time ticks by, they eventually give up and wander somewhere else, but for those that were patient it is indeed Kaskade that appears at almost 4 a.m. I was hoping for a Redux set from him, but his hits are always welcome and included -- appropriately -- “4 a.m.,” as well as “Angel on My Shoulder.”
4:24 a.m.: On my way out, Green Velvet is doing an extra EDC set at the Neon Garden in lieu of Joseph Capriati who couldn’t make it. As much as I would have loved to dance until the sunrise, it’s been a long weekend and bed is calling.
