FOAM PARTY

A foam party is a social event at which participants dance to music on a dance floor covered in several feet of suds or bubbles, dispensed from a foam machine.

History

Foam parties can be dated back to A Rhapsody in Black and Blue, a 1932 short film directed by Aubrey Scotto, wherein Louis Armstrong dances, sings, and plays his trumpet in a large area of soap suds. Songs performed in the foam are "I'll Be Glad When You're Dead, You Rascal You" and "Shine". Another film featuring foam parties is The Party, featuring Peter Sellers.

Modern foam parties were developed in the early 1990s by club promoters in Ibiza. Generally, machines were large, ceiling mounted foam generators, that created a large volume of foam that fell from the ceiling onto clubbers. The large water usage and subsequent clean-up required made this impractical to many venues.

As Ibiza foam parties became more popular the craze spread, and the foam cannon was developed by Roy Barlow from The Entertainment Biz and Robin Wincup from Galaxy. In 1992, this was introduced into the UK, where these were the first machines to meet with all UK health and safety requirements.

In the 1990s, the foam parties were performed weekly at Amnesia in Ibiza.

Safety

Lisa Flam, writing for TODAY, catalogued numerous hazards associated with foam parties. And Yael Levi, writing for Ynet News, reported: in 2008, three people were electrocuted and two others injured at a foam party at the Venezia Palace Hotel in Antalya, Turkey.