8th May 2012: “The success of the Deadmau5, Bingo Players and Avicii SA tours demonstrates the long-term future of brands aligning with international electronic dance music (EDM) acts in South Africa”, says Shaun Duvet, MD of branded entertainment company Anything Goes.
Anything Goes is the Cape Town-based branded entertainment agency responsible for bringing the three aforementioned artists to South Africa in the past year.
The Deadmau5 SA Tour visited Cape Town, JHB and Durban in 2011 and drew crowds in excess of 30 000 people. The headline sponsor was Olmeca Tequila and other sponsors included: JTI, Red Bull and SABMiller. Anything Goes, H20 and Showtime Management presented the tour, including booking, marketing and production. Olmeca saw a massive increase in social media awareness – their Facebook profile page alone grew from 400 – 8, 000 in three months.
The Bingo Players tour was in March 2012, following on from their smash hits ‘Rattle’ and ‘Cry Just a Little’ which turned the group into household names globally and in SA. The national tour (CT and JHB) was a huge success and attracted in excess of 6, 000 people.
Following on from these, a feat easier said than done, Avicii toured South Africa in March 2012. Tickets once again sold out in all 3 cities (CT, JHB and DBN) and in excess of 25 000 people attended the events. Headline brand sponsor was Lovoka and other sponsors include: SABMiller, JTI and Red Bull, the booking, marketing and production again brought to you by Anything Goes, H20 and Showtime.
The Anything Goes team is headed up by Shaun Duvet who has been entertaining South Africa for 15 years; he started out as the stereotypical bedroom DJ before expanding his musical interests to include promoting and has, since then, opened up and run four night clubs in Cape Town and Johannesburg. He has also promoted shows at every major venue in South Africa and Europe including the likes of Ministry Of Sound, worked with every major local act that matters and is responsible for bringing a number of stellar brands to SA. Shaun has also worked and toured with a plethora of established international artists including: deadmau5, Avicii, Lil Wayne, YMCMB, Fatboy Slim, Rick Ross, The Bingo Players, Martin Solveig, Kaskade, Gilles Peterson, Todd Terry, Craze, Shortee Blitz, Norman Jay, Roger Sanchez, Steve Angello, Chris Lake, James Lavelle, Blackalicious, Erick Morillo, Mowgli, The Stanton Warriors, Goldie, Cut La Roc, Krafty Kuts and the list goes on.
Shaun has built up a strong team of like-minded people at Anything Goes, consisting of some of the hottest up and comers in the entertainment space, people who live and breathe the youth market (following Shaun’s example of office executive by day, and successful DJ by night), and a few seriously talented creative and strategic minds.
They specialise in pairing brands up with international and local entertainment acts to get the brand name out there in a way that makes people want to listen. Anything Goes has the largest reach in SA for local and international DJs and artists through their existing talent roster, and they utilise this fully for all large events (with crowd attendance up to 30 000). Their primary audience is 18 – 35 year old, upwardly mobile, mixed race, middle – upper LSM market in SA and their database is one of SA’s biggest in SA with over 150 000 active users.
“I have always loved and focused on EDM as a DJ and promoter, and have been realising more and more over the last few years the power that it has over the youth market globally. EDM has an influence that, when harnessed correctly, can catapult a brand’s stature amongst this traditionally hard to reach audience overnight,” says Shaun.
For more information on Anything Goes or to see case studies of their work, visit www.anythinggoes.co.za
