TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Glowball Festival returns to Taipei this weekend for two bass-heavy days of electronic music, audiovisual performance, and club culture programming at Taipei Music Center.
Expect glitter, projections, sweat, and late-night momentum as more than two dozen international and local artists move between club sets, experimental electronics, performance, and visual spectacle.
This year’s theme, “The Planet,” reflects Glowball’s vision of a borderless dancefloor culture connected through rhythm, movement, and collective experience. The program spans club music, live audiovisual performance, experimental electronics, and community-driven cultural spaces, positioning the festival as one of Asia’s most distinctive electronic music gatherings, per a press release.
Founded by Taiwanese producer and DJ Sonia Calico, Glowball was the first festival in Taiwan to bring underground club sounds outdoors, carving out a space distinct from the region’s EDM-dominated festival circuit. Over the years, it has evolved into a platform connecting local scenes with global movements while remaining rooted in the communal energy of the dancefloor.
The opening night party continues a long-running partnership between Glowball and the Lyon-based festival Nuits Sonores. Curated by Nuits Sonores Artistic Director Pierre Zeimet and Sonia Calico, the opening program features avant-pop artist KUKII, alongside B E N N, Dungi Sapor, Sandy’s Trace, and Sonia Calico.
Day two shifts into higher gear with the long-awaited Taiwan debut of Scratcha DVA, who will also perform under his Scratchclart alias. Fellow debutant State OFFF brings a hybrid sound blending gqom, bassline, and Zimbabwean rhythmic influences, while Seoul-based DJ co.kr arrives following a series of acclaimed appearances across Europe’s underground circuit.
Adding further international perspective, MASIA ONE brings a genre-crossing set informed by experiences spanning Singapore, Canada, and Jamaica, weaving together hip-hop, reggae, and dancehall traditions.
Representing Taiwan’s homegrown bass culture, Formosa Sound System, the country’s first hand-built reggae soundsystem, returns to continue Glowball’s long-standing engagement with local soundsystem traditions.
The festival’s experimental program ventures further into uncharted territory. Veteran modular synthesist Ludu joins forces with Scattered Purgatory for a collaborative performance drawing inspiration from Buddhist and Taoist philosophy while reimagining Taipei’s urban soundscape through psychedelic electronics.
Elsewhere, The FVL, the project of Mong Tong member Hom Yu, excavates Taiwan’s lost Favorlang civilization through ambient textures, sampling, and synthesized tribal motifs, per the press release.
Visual art plays an equally central role. Japanese media artist Daito Manabe, known internationally for collaborations with Bjork and Perfume and for his contribution to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic presentation during the Rio 2016 closing ceremony, headlines the audiovisual program.
Tokyo-based artist JACKSON kaki will debut a new live audiovisual work using real-time visual systems developed over several years. Their collaboration with Taiwanese game-engine collective XTRUX also extends into “Dissolving Boundaries: New Audiovisual Horizon,” an exhibition and VJ showcase running alongside the music program.
This year’s dancefloor programming highlights queer, Indigenous, and femme-led collectives. Indigenous party crew isaNight brings electronic reinterpretations of cultural heritage, while younger dryas, a key figure from the FLINTA* party Nectar, delivers percussion-heavy, bass-driven sounds.
Tokyo-based DJ MUNEO contributes a perspective shaped by Japanese and Filipino heritage, while Public Property Princess explores Southeast Asian dance music and overlooked corners of Mandopop through the lens of ADM, or Asian EDM. Taiwanese performance artist and DJ Betty Apple will collaborate with drag collective The Haus of Dimensions for a performance-driven intervention blurring the lines between club night, performance art, and queer celebration.
New this year is Planet Radio, an on-site broadcast platform dedicated to conversations around identity, community, and creative practice. The project brings together members of Taiwan’s drag community, the lesbian-founded Romance Ballroom collective, trans singer Suan6, and other grassroots organizations to create a space for dialogue alongside the music.
The festival will also host an industry discussion titled “From Taipei to Lyon: A Conversation on Electronic Music Festivals & Culture,” featuring Pierre Zeimet and Sonia Calico. The panel will examine how festivals facilitate cultural exchange between Asia and Europe and explore the future of electronic music platforms operating across continents.
For a festival built on underground sounds and alternative communities, Glowball’s ambitions have grown considerably. Yet at its core remains the idea that launched it years ago: a belief that the dancefloor can be more than entertainment.
For two days in Taipei, Glowball becomes a temporary world of its own, powered by rhythm, connection, and enough bass to shake the planet.
