A trail of glow sticks leads to Marquee Theatre on a Saturday night in October. As electronic music blares inside, a line snakes around the Tempe venue and snapping noises can be heard as the glow sticks are busted open and dripped onto pristine white clothing.
As people file into the theater, they're met with an assault of electronic music. On stage, a half-naked woman dances in fishnets and a white bikini top, gesturing to the crowd to put their hands up. Behind the dancer and the DJ spinning on stage, a huge clock is displayed, counting down until midnight's blastoff — the moment when gallons of paint will be sprayed over the crowd.
Advertised as the “largest paint party in the world," the Dayglow Tour sold all of its 1,500 tickets four days earlier. Event director Eric Fuller says he was pleased with the turnout because this was the first time the international tour has stopped in Tempe.
“We picked Tempe mostly because of Arizona State University,” Fuller says. “It’s one of the top-rated party schools so we thought there would be a good market for our kind of event.”
ASU political science junior Reggie Halstrom says he wasn’t at all surprised when the party sold out earlier in the week.
“As of like six hours ago, everyone was going,” he says. “I bought my ticket two weeks ago, but today people were scrambling to get a hold of one when they found out how big this was becoming.”
Early in the night, Halstrom is anticipating the blastoff but isn’t disappointed with what he's witnessed so far.
“I saw two girls wearing just electrical tape for tops,” Halstrom says. “That was pretty nice, not gonna lie.”
Other students are having less enjoyable experiences. Family and human development junior Crystal Kapuscinski says she was celebrating her 21st birthday when the Tempe Police Department confronted her for trespassing before entering the venue. She says her friend was waiting with her ticket inside the venue. (Sgt. Steve Carbajal says there was no record of an arrest.)
“My friend handed me his ticket stub, trying to get me in so I could get my real ticket,” she says. “I was so mad though, when I was handcuffed, I threw it on the ground.”
However, Kapuscinski says she is still determined to have a good time and will “go crazy” at midnight.
“I’m getting on stage eventually and we’re getting kicked out. Not arrested, kicked out, because I’ve already been arrested.”
As it draws closer to midnight, people vacate the smoking areas and bars, cramming into the glowing black-light lit room. The crowd surges forward as the clock reaches the one-minute mark. Tissue paper confetti begins to rain down and screams of excitement in the crowd grow louder.
As the clock ticks away the last second, bright stage lights assault the crowd as paint begins to pour in all directions. Partygoers who brought their own paint add to the frenzy by attacking members of the crowd around them. The electronic music is turned up as the crowd dances in pulses and people raise their hands to be hit with more paint.
Accounting senior Scott Turner says the unique event lived up to his expectations.
“It took too damn long for the paint to come. But otherwise, everyone was making out on the floor and the whole thing was messy. It was awesome," he says. "A lot of times the parties are thrown by frats and sororities, but this is something for everyone."
After the blastoff, the crowd is entertained by the Devil from Acapulco, a muscular man painted in silver with a feathered headdress, who shoots lasers from his various body parts. The music begins to slow and the crowd starts to depart hours after blastoff.
Outside the venue, a man wearing an Alpha Epsilon Pi shirt sits on the curb in handcuffs, his brown shoes in the street in front of him. He asks the police officer if he will have to stay in jail for days. “That won’t work for me, I have class,” he says as tired partygoers flood past him, their once-white clothes now splattered with color. Marquee security sweeps up glow sticks, discarding them in the trash.
Fuller tells people not to worry if they missed out.
“Tempe is for sure on the tour next year."
Contact the reporter at sheydt@asu.edu.
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