Ringing the New Year with the boyfriend in Gold

On New Year’s Eve there are thousands of events to attend all over North America, but those lucky enough to attend USC Events’ Resolution were in for a NYE of a lifetime. The event sold out a week prior to the doors opening and this left last second buyers scrambling for tickets in the hope that they’d be attending Seattle’s best event of the night.

We finally scanned our tickets and entered the doors at 7:30pm in a panic. We had planned to make it to the main stage – Time Capsule – before Slushii started at 8pm but the lines for the bathroom and coat check were excruciatingly long. We quickly rushed through the line in the restroom and then found a better alternative as to where we could place our jackets in as little time as possible. We caught a quick glimpse of the bass stage – Enchanted Forest – just to see what it looked like. It was at the end of a long hall and was literally just a giant, long linear bass cave filled to the brim with lights along almost every surface.

We immediately went back to the main stage just in time for the start of Slushii’s set. The crowd slowly started getting more condensed as Slushii’s multicolored mascot came onto the screens. He hit the room with remixes of George Michael’s “Careless Whisper,” popular tracks by Galantis, a coveted remix of the theme from the hit anime Naruto, and of course some of his bangin’ original hits.

Yellow Claw was next and everyone started slamming to the beats that were being thrown down as the DJ kept yelling “YELLOW! MOTHER! FUCKING! CLAW!” Which seemed to get the crowd more and more hyped each time. Filthy track after track was played but sadly only accompanied by some generic Resolution visuals.

As soon as Tritonal got on stage the energy of the crowd was shifted from grimy to pumped up. Tritonal’s visuals were unlike anything I had seen at previous music festivals. A gorgeous mix of mind bending Aztec patterns and confetti penetrated the screen. They then paused for a moment and announced that they were going to play “Getaway” and the visuals shifted from the Aztec pattern to a beautiful tie-dye splash of butterflies and spirals.

Then it was time for the New Year shifters Above & Beyond! The crowd roared with excitement as the DJ’s played some of their most popular tracks with visuals of a colorful oasis accompanying them. When they played A.I., every single raver in the room began to dance with the beautiful convergence of trance and bass. Then came the countdown, I put a member of my rave family on my shoulders (it was her 21^st and I wanted her to celebrate PLUR the best way she could) and my boyfriend put her best friend on his shoulders. As soon as that clock counted “3” my boyfriend and I kissed into new year surrounded by (and carrying) our loving rave family as fireworks shot down from the ceiling.

A bit after the countdown Adventure Club came onto the stage to finish the night, and boy did they do it right! The first set of visuals was a city full of skyscrapers and lights glowing in the night sky as they played their remix of Flight Facilities’ “Crave You.” As the song progressed the night sky of the city started becoming a colorful aurora of graffiti and flashing lights as the song appropriately stated “I walk into the room, dripping in gold.” They finished the night with a remix of “Destiny Awaits” by Figure. Getting down to one more filthy low end grinder was just what the crowd needed to start the New Year on a positive note.

As the crowd dissipated you could already see the post rave depression settling in. However, we knew that there wasn’t a better way to start the year than of course, dripping in gold.

CLICK HERE for more pics courtesy of USC Events.

-Jeffrey Davis