Malaysia'€™s Future Music Festival Asia (FMFA) 2014 has all the ingredients to be the region'€™s flagship electronic dance music (EDM) festival.

A-list DJs spinning the decks before crowds of up to 45,000 on March 13-14 in Bukit Jalil National Stadium, Kuala Lumpur, only served to bolster FMFA'€™s credentials, as the biggest rave to hit Southeast Asia'€™s shores took shape.

Thousands of local and international revelers flocked to the venue at around 4 p.m., with the stage for day one of the festival dominated by the long-awaited arrival of outspoken, progressive-house music producer and performer, Deadmau5.

The crowd had already experienced a dose of musical carnage with performances from Will Sparks, B.A.T.E, Adventure Club and R3hab, sending partygoers wild with a wicked cocktail of trance, dubstep, house and breakbeat.

'€œThe event speaks for itself. That'€™s why we'€™ve returned to party here again,'€ said Bruneian Fauzi, 32, who flew to Kuala Lumpur with a dozen of his friends.  

Malaysia is the only country outside of Australia to host a Future Music Festival. This year'€™s FMFA was organized by Future Entertainment Australia and Livescape Asia Sdn. Bhd.

'€œTourism Malaysia is constantly looking for ways to support activities that can boost tourism for the country. With a proven track record over the past two years, we believe FMFA is a dynamic new approach to attracting tourists,'€ said Tony Nagamaiah, the general manager of Malaysia Major Events, a subsidiary of the Malaysian Tourism Ministry, in a statement.

While partygoers were already overwhelmed with the first day'€™s mind-blowing spectacles, day two left the crowd mesmerized as globally renowned DJ Armin Van Buuren, a Dutch national,  transported fans of trance music to intergalactic heights with his epic '€œA State of Trance 650: New Horizons'€.

A host of internationally acclaimed trance DJs, handpicked by Van Buuren, hypnotized the crowd. They included young gun Andrew Rayel and veteran DJs Markus Schulz and Paul van Dyk.

They all starred in a one-stage, 10-hour trance spectacle imbued with hypnotic visuals that swarmed over the spaceship-shaped stage.

'€œI like to play full on electro-house because that'€™s more popular and that will keep me at number one,'€ Van Buuren said in a press conference.

Mass prayer: Globally renowned DJ Armin van Buuren leads the crowd in a brief moment of silence to pray for the safety of passengers and crew aboard Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which went missing en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8.
Meanwhile, Van Dyk, whose career can be traced back to the early 1990s, ended the night before thousands of revelers who kept the energy of the event alive for more than two hours after it closed at 2 a.m.

'€œMy music connects with my audience. This has enabled me to continue to do what I love doing,'€ said Van Dyk in a press conference before the event.

However, despite the success of the event, which also drew thousands of foreign tourists, FMFA organizers abruptly ended the festival on its third day following the death of partygoers from a suspected ecstasy overdose.

'€œIn the interests of public safety we have heeded the authority'€™s advice to [end the event],'€ said Livescape in a statement. '€œThis is also to help the ongoing investigation.'€

As reported by The Star, Kuala Lumpur Police chief senior deputy Comm. Datuk Mohammad Saleh said nine people aged between 21 to 28 collapsed during the State of Trance showdown.

Saleh said one person died at Bukit Jalil while another died on the way to hospital. Four others died at hospital.

Livescape, however, said it could only confirm that one death, not five, took place within the festival'€™s grounds on the second day of the event.

Grammy winner Pharrell Williams was on the lineup for the third day, with the main stage set to play host to the likes of Eric Prydz, Sweden'€™s top house music producer.

Photos courtesy of the Future Music Festival Asia 2014