Day for Night: The reason the Bay Area is headed to Houston for the Holidays

San Francisco is one of the more prominent hubs for music festivals in the country, if not the world. Starting with Noise Pop in February and reaching peak saturation in the Summer, and early Fall, with Outside Lands, Phono del Sol, and Treasure Island Music Festival, just to name a few, seeing an influential or up-and-coming artist perform live is an easily attainable feat (and a mere Lyft ride away for most people). We’ve even coined the term “Fauxchella” in honor of the fact that most of Coachella’s top headliners flock our way, year after year, in between weekends performing in the Indio desert.

Despite this embarrassment of riches, in a few weeks, I’ll be hopping on a plane and joining a group of Bay Area natives heading to a city in Texas that isn’t Austin, known as the live music capital of the world, for an event not related to SXSW in any way.

Day for Night, set to take place Friday, December 16th, through Monday, the 19th, is offering an experience that transcends the boundaries of the traditional festival circuit. One of many examples: they’ve managed amazing feats by booking Aphex Twin, who hasn’t performed live in the US for over 8 years, and Björk, who doesn’t perform often, either, and left many an Iceland Airwaves attendee, including myself, crestfallen with her sudden cancellation last year. Add in DJ Windows 98 (Arcade Fire’s Win Butler), who’ll be spinning Ticketfly’s annual Holiday bash, the night before he’s set to appear in Houston (let’s hope he doesn’t crash, ha), and the it’s clear that Free Press Houston and New York-based creative agency Work-Order know how to curate a festival fitting for a city that is rapidly approaching the distinction of becoming the third largest in the US.

Add the likes of Squarepusher, Run the Jewels, ODESZA, Kaskade, Ariel Pink, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Liars, Washed Out, SOPHIE, and SURVIVE – the creators of the hypnotic Stranger Things theme music – and you have a stellar, unconventional, and sought after group of artists that are extremely selective about which bills they attach their name. There’s a reason for this and it transcends the musical aspect of this event. Read on to find out why you should purchase tickets and book your flight immediately.

Taking over the historic Barbara Jordan Post Office at 401 Franklin Street, the 1.5 million square foot indoor-outdoor space will host acts on three stages and immerse attendees in interactive installations from world-renowned visual artists set on heightening attendees sensorial experiences. If you were lucky enough to attend VICE’s Creators Project in 2012 in San Francisco, this is a similar concept save for the fact that Day for Night is being executed on a much more ambitious scale.

Imagine Björk’s “digital experience” DJ set that takes place in 5 different rooms or being temporarily consumed in the distorted reality of NONOTAK studio‘s dreamlike environments? These are just a few of the incendiary experience that await. It’s also worth noting that Björk Digital is exclusive to this event, and this event only.

The full line-up of musicians and artists is listed, below. Hope to see you there.

Musicians

Artists

Kara Murphy

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