A lively crowd, a massive disco ball and a live band are a formula for enjoyment. On Sunday, these things filled The Paramount with contagious energy as a crowd of music lovers danced under the lights while four female artists exposed them to new original songs.

Founded by Kai Tano, a junior at USC majoring in music industry, Next World Collective is a community that highlights independent artists and helps them along their individual journeys in the music industry through live events like concerts, jam sessions and house shows.

“In the beginning, it was for fun, and it turned into something bigger than us,” said Alyssa Aquino, vice president of Next World Collective. “We just became this platform that was a pedestal for uprising artists to share their creativity.”

Next World Collective was not always populating venues like The Paramount; the growth of the collective took a lot of planning and flexibility from the entire team.

Other team members include stage manager Ruby Wu, a junior at USC majoring in music industry. USC students also comprise the entirety of the production team, managing artist relations, production, stage management, visuals and marketing.

“It really takes a village to hav[e] this,” Aquino said. “We’re not alone, because anyone who works in this collective, they’re always supportive.”

Over the last three years, Next World has grown from a Discord server managed by three people to selling 200 tickets to Sunday’s show, their 15th event so far. The show highlighted Asian American women organizations and creatives, including performances from artists like antransax, hyejin, chiabiee and Nicole Han.

“With Next World, you actually get your voices heard. … It’s very encouraging as a community,” Wu said. “This is very exciting to see how everything’s like coming together from the very beginning, piece by piece … It’s really impressive to see how much hard work people have put in to make this event happen.”

Abby Hyejin, known as hyejin on stage, was invited by her friend, chiabiee. Hyejin was especially excited to perform alongside her friends as well as for the benefit of Asian American women organizations.

“I do not believe that [the music industry has] evolved as far as we may hope to think,” hyejin said. “Doing something like this is very encouraging.”

Next World thrives with a community that uplifts their friends’ musical journeys through the opportunity of live music. An Tran, known on stage as antransax, learned about the show through Te’a Lucasan. Lucasan has been involved with Next World as a trumpet player.

Aquino said the collective is hoping to do more events throughout the year. Their goal is to grow in every way they can and continue implementing feedback from their diverse audiences, she said.

“We want to expand our collective with different cultures,” Aquino said. “[We want to] grow our community, grow our connections and overall, grow our platform.”