Hocus Pocus has become one of Factory Town’s yearly Halloween traditions. It returns for its sixth edition from Oct. 30 to Nov. 1 with more than 100 electronic artists performing across five stages at the Hialeah venue.
This year’s lineup includes names such as Chase & Status, Eric Prydz, Gorgon City, Indira Paganotto, MEDUZA, Nora En Pure, Prospa, Purple Disco Machine, salute and Todd Edwards.
Prospa is the main event for many attendees. “I’m excited to go to Hocus Pocus to hear Free Your Mind in person!” said UM student Eiji Tsukamoto.
Jeremy Hine, an exchange student from Australia, is eager to go for the first time, but he doesn’t know every DJ in the lineup. He agrees with Tsukamoto, saying, “The person I’m excited to see is Prospa, but he’s a bit more house.”
The festival will also have several back-to-back sets, including Joseph Capriati B2B Seth Troxler, Jamie Jones B2B Franky Rizardo and Odd Mob B2B Cassian. Other pairings include Âme DJ B2B Marcel Dettmann, Kevin Saunderson B2B Julya Karma and DJ Boring B2B ATRIP.
But the music is only part of what makes Hocus Pocus different from a regular night out.
This year’s “Dystopia Halloween” theme will turn Factory Town’s seven acre industrial space into what the festival describes as a “decaying industrial ecosystem.” The five stages will be designed as control rooms, ventilation chambers, reactor cores and other pieces of industrial machinery.
The Halloween theme also means costumes are part of the experience. Factory Town’s official guidelines allow costumes and masks, as long as they follow the venue’s safety rules.
Three-day and single-day passes are currently available, although the event is restricted to attendees 18 and older.
For students who have already made Hocus Pocus part of their Halloween plans, the countdown is officially on. And with three nights, five stages and more than 100 artists, the question of what to do on Halloween has an answer.