The sophomore year for Viral Fest Asia (VFA) – Asia’s first ever music festival which celebrates digital music evolution – ended with a blast over the weekend, featuring some of Asia’s top performers in the region including Rain, AKB48, Exile the Second, Son Tung M-TP and more!
The event which was initially planned to be a one-day only festival, then transformed into a two-day affair due to popular demand, and we, at TheHive.Asia were there to experience the event and to divulge about everything that happened during the two-day fiesta!
Kicking off on Friday, 2 June 2017, VFA Day 1 was held at the open field of Thailand’s first ever entertainment and retail complex, Show DC, a high-end shopping mall filled with various famous celebrity brands from South Korea.
Though the festival started around 7pm, the crowd had begun to gather at the venue as early as 5pm to fill themselves up with some street food at the night market before the show began.
The night market featured more than 20 food stalls and drink stations as well as food trucks, selling a variety of artistic dishes, from local delicacies to Asian delights and western eats.
Some of the unique brands found include I Fry, Betagro Sausage, Pad Thai Truck, Bloody Drink, Qool and more.
What’s so unique about this night market is that the food here can only be purchased using a special wristband that also works as the festival’s entry pass. The wristbands need to be loaded with cash before purchasing anything, and the amount can always be added on at the top up station.
As soon as the night got darker, throbbing music can be heard playing at the main stage as Japanese dancer B-girl Nao opened the festival with her sick and slick dance moves. Her performance was then immediately followed by fellow Japanese musician, Ayur, who delivered a wonderful piece on the piano.
After the performances by the two Japanese talents, the first runner-up of “Vietnam Idol”, Bich Ngoc wowed the crowd with her powerful voice.
Thai pop rock band Noisy Sure then took over the stage and played some of their hit songs before another fellow Thai performer, Hugo, impressed the audience with his acoustic guitar performance and country-style music.
As the performances were going on at the main stage, some other fun activities were also taking place all around the festival venue.
There was a mechanical bull ride, dunk tanks filled with beautiful ladies, human bowling in zorb balls, cosplay appearances and plenty more!
When we got back to the main stage, we saw the crowd dancing along to Vietnamese star Min’s EDM pop tunes. After singing two songs, the next performer to take up the stage was Malaysian rock band, Mad August, who also delivered two songs and one of them was their most famous hit, “Hey, I Don’t Know” (喂，我不知道).
Chinese singer Hao Ren then performed some slower tempo themes after an adrenaline-rush performance by Mad August and he was joined on stage by Malaysian songbird Pricilla Abby.
Things then started to pick up its pace again when Indonesian EDM trio Weird Genius appeared at the side stage and put on several familiar mainstream tunes and added their very own flavour to them.
Some of the remixes they played include Ed Sheeran’s “Shape of You”, Zedd’s “It Ain’t Me”, Alessia Cara’s “Stay”, The Chainsmoker’s “Closer”, Coldplay’s “Something Just Like This”, Clean Bandit’s “Symphony” and more.
After performing all their unique remixes, the group then presented their first original single, “DPS”, which is inspired by the true beauty of Indonesian Culture, especially Bali. The song even featured the sound of Indonesia's traditional musical instrument, the Gamelan!
Back to the main stage, the upbeat performance from Weird Genius was continued with a rather different upbeat show and in the cutest possible way!
Japanese girl group Juice=Juice began to skip around in their adorable colour coordinated uniforms, singing some of their famous songs like “Romance is on Its Way” (ロマンスの途中), “Goal ~ Tomorrow, It'll Be There” (Goal～明日はあっちだよ) and more.
Fans of the Japanese girl band were so enthusiastic as they danced along to the beat and delivered some synchronised cheers and shouts to each of Juice=Juice’s song.
Thai band Somkiat then wrapped up Day 1 with a couple of mesmerising ballad tunes by midnight.
Overall, VFA Day 1 was really epic and full of fun as it features a diverse range of music genres performed by a variety of music artistes from all across the region.
Check out the video highlight below and stay tuned for Viral Fest Asia, Day 2 review!