III Points Festival Brought World-Class Dance to Miami’s Wynwood Arts District

What is sleep? Is it the cousin of death? A timeless bard's chance to dream? We wouldn't know, because there is no time for rest when III Points is in town.

The three-day music, art, and technology festival is the babe of Miami's storied cultural scene, but it's the first to base itself in the Wynwood arts district (Art Basel and WMC base in South Beach). It debuted last year with only three months of preparation and left some to be desired, though it managed to make a strong name among audiophiles and socialites alike.

In 2014, III Points had a whole year to get its shit together, and while it wasn't a perfect expedition, great strides were made, minds were blown, and a new Miami institution earned its stripes.

The concept behind the fest is to raise regional and national awareness to the Wynwood area. In case you don't know, Wynwood is the once maligned, bad hood turned gentrified, hip spot where world-class street art decorates every square-inch and rising rent steadily knocks out decade-long residents and ground-floor artists alike. III Points is run by a group of promoters who've made their name at Wynwood's Bardot nightclub and lounge, and it's their way of bringing some love into the streets, even if it does mean continuing the gentrification process.

On the musical side of things, they booked acts Flying Lotus, Duke Dumont, Jamie XX and the like right alongside local DJs and bands from all backgrounds and genres. It aims to shed light on Miami's talented local acts, vendors, artists and art collectives, thinkers, dreamers, doers – all that posi community vibe shit – and it's one of the most successful examples we've seen of a festival actually pulling it off.

During the day, attendees can check out free "activations" in the form of concerts, panel discussions, workshops, tech demos, art exhibitions, film screenings, and more, mostly free of charge or with rsvp. It does offer guests the chance to explore the Wynwood area, though how effective these activations are at motivating the vampiric masses is up for debate.

The real jugular of III Points is situated at Soho Studios. The space is a massive lot with outdoor patios often rented out for big corporately sponsored concerts and exclusive shindigs. Everyone wants to attend and there's never any parking. III Points was no different in that regard.

To its credit, III Points was a whole lot different than anything we've yet to experience in the Miami area. III P's hooked up with locals Design Build Collective to construct a Mad Maxian, post-apocalyptic-themed festival entrance. Here we found vendors as well as the first of four stages. At the Sector3 stage, Local DJs set the tone from a booth constructed from an airplane cockpit. They got a lot of crowd love, which was great to see from a communal perspective. Local coffee connoisseurs Panther had their own hut, and everyone hailed the Shake Shack booth as a game-changer.

Moving from apocalyptica further down the rabbit hole, III Points became a technical wonderland of light, sound, and sweat. Our days of poppin' mollies and tonguing acid tabs are well behind us, but walking into the main stage arena had us wishing for a repeat. We were immediately greeted by a large projection of the III Points inverted triangle. To our left, giant faces projected and stretched into fleshy messes then snapped back into place. Up ahead, the stage flashed streaks of color while over the dance floor hung the largest disco ball we've ever seen.

Dubbed Main Frame, the arena had the feel of an old warehouse rave. Here is where Flying Lotus transported hundreds to new worlds and levels of consciousness with his crowd-pleasing double-screen live production (even Captain Murphy made an appearance). This was where Duke Dumont showered our bodies with groove until 3 in the morning. It's where Metronomy made fans old and new squeal, where Hot Nature pushed the boundaries of dance, and where everyone would basically complain about how ungodly hot it was from beginning to end. It's hot in Miami. Is that a surprise? Protip: don't wear black leather in the tropics.

The best stage of the festival was hands down the Skatespace. A) There was a working roller rink with skate rentals. You don't see that shit every day. B) The mix of local and national acts was so well curated, its sets were a show stealer at any given time. Here we saw Miamians Niko Javan and Telekinetic Walrus turn ignorant bystanders into lifelong fans. Kaytranada was rescheduled here after he missed his flight, but the set was just as head knockin' as listeners skated to futuristic hip hop heat. An old TV installation kept things nice and weird while Jacques Greene showed fans the sexier side of the beat. Skatespace stayed trippy.

Also in Skatespace, Cashmere Cat's unbridled hype was in the top three sets, if not our personal favorite of the whole affair. Future Classics fellow Chet Faker may have been the most name-dropped artist on the streets and won the main stage slot, but no one else had total crowd control or girls dancing on speakers the way the Norwegian long-hair worked that room.

The final piece of the puzzle was the Mind Melt stage, an outdoor alcove where live bands got rowdy and local DJs held their own against Thundercats meandering basslines or Chet Faker's panty-wetting sing-alongs back inside. Headliners Hercules and Love Affair treated Friday to an energetic high. Saturday was topped by DJ Tennis. Sunday, Mac Demarco had the crowd eating out of his hand as he played a stripped-down solo set, throwing cigarettes to his fans because he's a chill dude.

For its second time around, III Points not only outdid itself, it outdid its well-established counterparts. Sure, it's not the size and scope of Ultra Festival, but if you're an intelligent dance fan looking for something more mature and out of the ordinary, it's no contest. It even gives WMC daytime events a run for their money with the Sunday BBQ party series, which brought Questlove, Juan Maclean, and Jerome LOL to bar backyards free of charge (however, there wasn't much smoked meat to go around. BBQ just means "day-time party" in Miamian. See "Pool Party" definition re: WMC).

If anything, the heavily-stacked lineup made seeing everything impossible. When acts like Com Truise and Lykke Li are going on in the first couple hours, shit can get missed on accident. There were also some schedule flubs and hiccups from time to time, which is to be expected at almost any mass gathering. By the time Sunday rolled around, it was a wonder people were even standing, as many festival goers enjoyed post-Points parties at clubs around the neighborhood until well into sunlight. Somehow (drugs), dancers found the energy to go on, and the final hours of III Points set to Tiga and Jamie Jones felt like the most perfect house party Wynwood will ever host. If last year's debut was a simple proof of concept, 2014's follow-up is the bar that begs to be met.

Just don't be surprised if your Miami friends still haven't answered your texts. They're not dead. They're just busy sleeping through Wednesday.