Brent Eccles On New Zealand’s Global Success (Q1 Special)

The achievement has been electrifying for the New Zealand music industry, says managing director Brent Eccles at his office in Auckland.

“It’s been a noticeable boost. When one gets through, they pull others through as well.”

Once NZ acts were happy to sell out 5,000 seat venues. Now Christchurch rock-surf outfit Mako Road, Wellington-born R&B jazz pop act Drax Project and reggae electronic blues band L.A.B are taking the same risks SIX60 took years back to double those figures. And Eccles Entertainment pulled significant numbers with earlier tours by other acts.

Brent Eccles started out a drummer, promising himself he’d give up the sticks once he had a No. 1 hit. His first act, the glam-pop Space Waltz who got signed to EMI after a controversial appearance on TV variety show “New Faces,” went on to top the charts with debut single “Out On The Street” in 1974.

Nevertheless he continued drumming. With The Citizen Band, with two former Split Enz members, he relocated to Australia in the 1980s. He joined top drawing hard rock outfit The Angels and stayed with them for twenty years, taking over their management for ten.

Eccles also managed R&B outfit Johnny Diesel & The Injectors and hard rock band The Poor.

“I wouldn’t go back into artist management again, that’s not where my skills are,” he explains when asked about future plans. “I’m more of an entrepreneur.

“But there were highlights. On the day The Injectors’ debut album went on sale, I asked them ‘how many do you think we sold?’ They thought a couple of thousand. It was 40,000, and the record went on to do 400,000.”

Another high was The Angels’ 1990 album Beyond Salvation reaching #1 in Australia and #3 in New Zealand.

In 2000, he and wife Helen returned to New Zealand to jointly set up Eccles Entertainment.

“The very first tour we did was with (singer songwriters) Tim Finn, Bic Runga and Dave Dobbyn called Together In Concert. We were told promoting NZ talent wouldn’t work and it’d be a mistake.

“It ended up the biggest tour of the year, we just kept adding shows, and did 40,000 tickets.”

The resulting live album reached No. 2 and charted for half a year.

Eccles followed up with another tour everyone warned him against: Putting Runga into a national run of 800 to 1,000-capacity churches and cathedrals. It also shifted 40,000 stubs.

Eccles additionally represents the late Michael Gudinski’s Frontier Touring and A Day On The Green, and with promoter Campbell Smith, runs Civic Events which promotes the annual Acoustic Church Tour and Winery Tour.

In October 2018 he received the Fullers Entertainment Award from the Variety Artists Club for his contribution to NZ entertainment.

Eccles’ relationship with SIX60 began in 2011 when he was appointed their agent. “Two weeks later they fired me,” Eccles said. “Then they parted ways with their management and (booker) Dave Munro from our company jumped in and we started working with them again.”

The team up of Eccles’ risk taking and the band’s ambition proved lucrative. 

After growing to double-nights at 1,000 seat clubs they opted not for three nights, but for a 5,000 space in the 12,000-seat Sparks Arena and sold it out. A national arena run followed.

Then the band wanted to headline Auckland’s Western Springs, which had 50,000 for concerts, but only sold out for tourists as David Bowie, Eminem, The Rolling Stones and ZZ Top. 

SIX60 told Eccles they could probably manage 20,000 for the February 2019 date if they made it their only NZ date of the year. General admission tickets were for NZ$69.90 ($48.69) to A$99.90 ($69.60), while VIP tickets began at NZ$249.90 ($174.11).

Recount Eccles, “They sold 20,000 in pre-sales…and moved another 20,000 on the first day. It was unbelievable, the adrenalin was pumping, we were like, What just happened here!

“The show sold out, we just turned New Zealand on its head, this has never happened before. A year later they sold it out again.”

SIX60 are on April 24 becoming the first act to play the iconic 50,000 capacity sports stadium Eden Park in Auckland. The band and Eccles Entertainment had been among those lobbying for six concerts to be held there a year. 

Permission was granted in February and SIX60 were determined they be the first to play. This was just months after shifting 125,000 tickets in a country which has a population of 5 million.

“We only had a six week window to announce the show. We had a lot of cups of tea over this one, ‘Are we insane to announce a stadium show six weeks out?’ ‘Yes, we are insane, let’s announce it.’”

Almost instantly, 40,000 tickets were snapped up. On April 1 the high profile support acts were announced – Dave Dobbyn, Drax Project, singer songwriter and actor Dave Kingi, RnB star JessB and indigenous Maori act Maimoa.

“They’ll do 50,000, there’s no doubt of that. SIX60 have really driven this. It’s phenomenal. As a promoter I’m just so proud. We’re already having discussions about what they want to do next, it’ll be interesting and unexpected.”