No Time For Sleep: How BLNK CNVS Is Throwing 30+ Parties In One Week

BLNK CNVS Presents’ Paul Reed and Eric Fuller both fell in love with dance music while separately studying in Europe. Fuller, who’s slightly older, went on to work with Florida-based production company Life in Color as COO, where he helped spread what he found in Europe across North American college campuses. Dayglow/Life in Color became the first dance music brand to do a college tour with shows that featured Afrojack, Axwell, Alesso, Benny Benassi and more. The parties were first branded as Dayglow Events, the name hosting its own stage at Ultra Music Festival in 2009 and 2010. In 2012, SFX Entertainment purchased the company.

“It’s interesting that we both found that sound abroad and brought it back,” Reed says. “Eric and the Life in Color guys were really on the forefront of bringing that stuff to a lot of the college markets. That’s how I really got involved in the business side of it. Those guys were instrumental in spreading that sound across the U.S. At that time you couldn’t really find it in colleges or mainstream stuff, not at that level.”

With Life in Color, Fuller and Reed would throw up to four parties each weekend. They credit that experience for helping them juggle all of their events during Miami Music Week, and this year they’re planning more than 30 parties. Fuller says Life in Color taught him how to best manage and delegate. He’s had experience in every facet of the live industry, from running the door to artist relations to talent buying. Six people work with BLNK CNVS full time while outsourcing their production and vendors.

“Last year we had 27 events, the year before that was 18,” Reed says. “We’ve steadily been growing. We threw our first Miami Music Week parties together in 2017. We threw three that year, the next it was four. Then, we picked up another venue and another venue. It’s been growing and bubbling every year. This year, we’re going to have over 30 events – the most venues we’ve ever had. We have eight across the city: three different pools in Miami Beach and five venues in Wynwood.”

Artists coming to Miami Music Week use the opportunity to premiere their new shows and step outside of the box. With Ultra Music Festival the first major event on the calendar each year for those in dance music, the aim is to create something new that sets the tone for the coming months. Deadbeats, who first started working with BLNK CNVS in 2018 and every year of Miami Music Week since, has teamed up with Subtronics’ Cyclops Records for a party that features artists from both labels going back-to-back all night long. This year’s showcase includes sets from Zeds Dead, Tape B and Mersiv, Dirt Monkey and Cyclops and more.

“They have a really good ground operation in Miami,” Harrison Bennett, Deadbeats’ label manager, tells Pollstar. “They have access to venues that we want. We don’t want to do traditional club stuff for Miami Music Week. We want to do something outside of South Beach, outside of downtown. Wynwood Warehouse type, a throwback rave feel. They have a really good infrastructure for putting together those parties. They run stuff from Thursday through Sunday, and they set up the same venues each night. Everybody gets production, which brings costs down because fees and budget in Miami are historically low, especially during Music Week.”

Los Angeles-based promoter Brownies & Lemonade is also collaborating with BLNK CNVS again, the teams having previously partnered in 2022 and 2023. They worked together to get talent on the lineup, with some names already announced, including Alison Wonderland (see cover story) and Apashe. But, true to Brownies & Lemonade fashion, the full lineup will not be revealed until all the artists have taken the stage.

“This is a partnership that’s been established for multiple years in Miami,” says Chad Kenney, creative director for Brownies & Lemonade. “This is the third year running we’ve collaborated with BLNK CNVS for Miami Music Week. All the shows we’ve done with them have been an amazing collection of artists from Brownies & Lemonade history, and also rising artists we want to feature. A lot of artists that we’ve never had play our shows before. And this year is no different. There are going to be several artists making their Brownies & Lemonade debuts. So, it’s really cool that BLNK CNVS helps us realize and execute putting together a lineup during Miami Music Week that holds up and is noteworthy, given the fact there’s so much other stuff going on.”

Within BLNK CNVS, one of the parties the team is most excited about is Above & Beyond’s Anjunadeep and Anjunabeats labels. This year’s party takes place at Oasis Wynwood on March 23 and a pool party at Nautilus Hotel on March 24.

“We’re thrilled to bring the magic of Anjunadeep to Miami once again alongside BLNK CNVS,” Annie Norman, head of events at Involved Group, says. “The Miami crowd is always so good to us, so we wanted to serve up a very special lineup – with unexpected back-to-backs and a who’s who of Anjuna’s finest.”

In the lead-up to Miami Music Week, Fuller and Reed are busy. They’re coordinating with all their venues and setting up the production for each showcase coming through. They’ll have Deadbeats and Cyclops Recordings at Mana on Thursday, March 21, Brownies & Lemonade also at Mana on Friday, March 22 and more. They’re also hosting eight pool parties at the Nautilus Hotel, Surfcomber Hotel and The Goodtimes Hotel.

“We don’t sleep the week up to it,” Fuller says. “And the week of, we don’t sleep at all. I have an office in Wynwood that’s like a loft, so I can sleep there. And I get a place on the beach, too, so I’m napping between there. But I’m usually at the pools until 7, 8 o’clock. By then, everything’s good, the party’s cranking and everyone’s having a good time. I can check out from here. From there, I go to Wynwood where we start opening our doors until 9 o’clock, and we’re there until 2, 3, 4 or 5 o’clock in the morning.”

Fuller bounces around from party to party on his scooter, checking in on each venue and making sure everything runs smoothly. Reed’s days look about the same, but he’ll spend the daylight hours working on ticket sales and crunching data from the night before. He says they sell the majority of their tickets during the week when fans are all out in Miami and trying to figure out where they want to go.

They’re expecting to sell at least 30,000 tickets across all their events. Once the week is done, they’ll take a short pause, slowing down on their focus for Miami Music Week. But, by the time the Fourth of July rolls around, they’re already setting the gears in motion for the next year.