Editor’s Note: This article is a review and includes subjective thoughts, opinions and critiques.
As San Francisco transformed into a Super Bowl epicenter, NPU Live created a parallel spectacle along the waterfront. Its three-night takeover of Pier 80 positioned electronic dance music (EDM) as its own kind of championship event. In one of the weekend’s most anticipated lineups, Friday’s show featured Diplo and Calvin Harris alongside Tyson O’Brien, Kaleena Zanders and Sonny Fodera.
The night opened with O’Brien, whose balanced house rhythms welcomed attendees as they filtered into the warehouse. Though I arrived as his set wound down, that steady pulse established the foundation for a night characterized by progressively layered artistry. Zanders followed with a performance that blurred traditional DJ boundaries. She sang, danced and mixed live, building early momentum and warming up a space that still had room to fill.
By the time Fodera stepped behind the decks, Pier 80 had begun to swell in audience sound and energy. His house-driven sound sent basslines ricocheting off steel beams, and tracks like “No Broke Boys” sparked the first true surges of collective energy. Though I wasn’t deeply familiar with his catalog, his set was immersive and confident, quietly locking the room into rhythm.
Diplo’s set delivered the night’s most unexpected turn. Technical issues silenced the music for more than ten minutes — but instead of engendering frustration, the pause became communal. Diplo typed messages like “idk what happened” on his phone and projected them onto the big screen while crews worked behind the scenes. He even prompted an impromptu acapella rendition of Oasis’s “Wonderwall.”
When the sound returned, so did the energy. Diplo leaned into heavier transitions and familiar hooks, weaving in a remix of “Sweet Disposition,” “Thank You (Not So Bad)” and “Where Are Ü Now.” Bad Bunny remixes, including “DtMF” and “NUEVAYol,” added a cross-genre spark and a subtle nod to the Super Bowl LX halftime headliner. The malfunction seemed to recalibrate the room, and the back half of his set carried renewed urgency.
That momentum flowed directly into Harris’s arrival.
Kicking off with “Sweet Nothing,” Harris’s set signaled the night’s apex. For nearly two hours, he moved through a catalog that has defined multiple eras of dance music, from “We Found Love” and “Feel So Close” to “One Kiss.” Familiar choruses echoed across the warehouse, uniting the crowd in nostalgia. The production was polished but restrained. Backdrops remained simple, but smoke cannons and lasers cut sharply through the air, enhancing drops without overwhelming the space.
The production was polished but understated. Pier 80’s industrial layout, all steel beams and open floor, favored sound over spectacle. Without towering screens or elaborate stage builds, the impact came from bass reverberating through the warehouse and lasers slicing through smoke. The crowd responded in kind. They sang every word and lifted their phones at the right moments, yet the enthusiasm felt measured. It was engaged, but not totally unrestrained.
At Coachella 2023, I watched Harris deliver one of the most transformative EDM sets I’ve experienced. Friday felt different. Not lesser, but less transcendent. A desert festival invites emotional release at scale. A warehouse creates something more contained. At Pier 80, the performance felt less like a revelation and more like an affirmation of Harris’s enduring place in dance music.
Yet “NPU Live” was significant in its own way, with the crowd itself reflecting EDM’s evolution. I encountered seasoned fans anticipating every beat drop; first-timers who came for familiar Harris staples or simply because it was Super Bowl weekend. The mix suggested a genre continuing to widen its reach. My younger brother, attending his first large-scale EDM show, found the night eye-opening: Watching DJs construct and deconstruct tracks in real time revealed the creativity behind the craft. No two DJ sets are identical, and that unpredictability remains part of the artistry.
As the second night of NPU Live’s three-show series, Friday served as both midpoint and crescendo. While football dominated headlines, the waterfront warehouse carved out its own gravitational pull. It was not flawless or transformative at every turn, but it was communal. In a city hosting one of the world’s biggest sporting events, that shared release felt like a victory in and of itself.