Gaurav Mashruwala on the return of Vh1 Supersonic after a gap of 3 years

Since it debuted in 2013, Vh1 Supersonic has been a refuge for music enthusiasts. The festival has surpassed genres, boundaries, cuisines, artists, and experiences over the years, all in one location! Personal safety issues emerged as the main difficulty for the entire sector following the epidemic, among a wide range of other challenges. After a three-year break, the eagerly anticipated multi-genre music and experiential destination Vh1 Supersonic is ready to make a triumphant return with a grand celebration of all things music to help people escape from their everyday lives and enjoy things that make them feel young, wild, and free. As it makes a comeback after a three-year hiatus, it is set to be the ‘Festival of firsts’ in the world of music and lifestyle experiences.

In conversation with Adgully, Gaurav Mashruwala, Business Head, Viacom18 Live (Integrated Network Solutions), speaks at length on how Vh1 Supersonic has grown over the years, how it is not just a music festival, but a lifetime experience, and much more.

How has Vh1 Supersonic grown over the years?

We started Vh1 Supersonic primarily as an EDM and techno festival. However, over the years, we realized that the consumption of music in India is expanding significantly and we must cater to more genres of music. Given that fact, we started evolving from EDM techno to a multi-genre music festival. The festival now covers various genres of music consisting of EDM and techno, and also has Rock hip-hop, Reggae, and Indie music. So, there’s a whole bunch of things that we've added through our different stages. That is one part of the growth. The second part that we've seen is that when people come out for a two-day or three-day festival, they are coming with a group of friends, family, etc. to enjoy. So while everyone loves music but what they also like is some really nice experiences, and therefore, we got into making this a music as well as a lifestyle festival.

In the art space, we have Super Street, which is our fashion and art IP. Under that, for the fashion bit, we have tied up with Sunday Soul Sante who is doing the entire fashion curation with us. And for the art piece, we have tied up with NRYTA. Together they will bring over 100 young and upcoming designers both in the art and fashion space to showcase their wear. These are all young and upcoming designers which do a lot of cool work in the fashion and art space.

We have also tied up with NRYTA to do an NFT immersive art showcase in trend with what's happening in the NFT space.

Along with this, for food and drinks, we have tied up with Impresario Entertainment and Hospitality. They will be now curating our entire Super Flea and bringing the best of the restaurant pop-ups. They will also bring in their professional bartenders who will curate cocktails. This year there will be a mini cocktail festival within Supersonic itself. We will also have food and beverage pairing.

So, from just a music festival, we’ve grown to a multi-genre music festival, a lifestyle festival that has fashion, art, as well as F&B, all a part of it.

What are the challenges faced to bring VH1 Supersonic back post-pandemic?

I think a festival of such magnitude requires at least a year of planning, which means we went into planning in early February of 2022. During the pandemic, both India, as well as different countries, had their own ups and downs. Each country came up with its own rules and regulations. Now bringing cultures together from different countries a year in advance when you don't know what is going to happen in the next 30-45 days, from a pandemic point of view, was the biggest challenge.

What is the artist line-up like?

Vh1 Supersonic is returning after three years and it’s very essential to keep its soul the same as earlier editions. Over the last two and a half years, the way people are consuming content has changed dramatically. People today are discovering music through a lot of social media platforms be it Instagram, TikTok, and other platforms, so we have brought in our headliners who are excellent with their music and are also very popular through social media.

This is why you see Tyga, Anne-Marie, and CKay as some of our headliners for this festival. Along with that, as the trend in music is changing and we are seeing that a lot of people are now listening to hip-hop music, we have also added some big Indian hip-hop/ rap names like DIVINE, ‘Seedhe Maut’ and obviously, Tyga is also a hip-hop sensation. Keeping this in mind we keep evolving the music to keep it on-point and on-trend.

Furthermore, there has been a change in the way people are consuming electronic dance music (EDM) and the change is moving towards house and techno. So, we are launching a stage in collaboration with Budweiser – called the BUDX Spectrum Stage. This will be our house of techno music where people can enjoy techno music as well as the house and dance music that people like to enjoy these days. Therein we have brought in our headliners like CamelPhat and Bob Moses which go to the tune of our spectrum phenomena.

We have also seen that people are interested in immersive experiences. Innellea, one of the artists, will actually be doing a 3D show on stage. This will be a really good experience for most people who come to the festival.

Could you throw some light on the ticket pricing?

As a festival, we have always been very young. We want people from all age groups to come and enjoy the entire festival experience. With music being the priority, we also want them to enjoy the food, fashion, and art experiences. And keeping that in mind, we have kept our ticket pricing extremely cost-effective. We started with a price of Rs. 2499 for a three-day festival which we thought in today's day and age is extremely reasonable and even today after announcing all our artists and experiences, we are still at Rs 4,299 plus taxes. The way we have been working on the ticket pricing has been such that it becomes accessible to everyone who would like to enjoy the festival.

What are the efforts being undertaken to ensure safety of the visitors?

We have placed numerous surveillance cameras strategically around the festival. We also have female security guards and an internal crew team to help anyone with respect to security and health. We have also set up a mini clinic within the festival, where we have over 100 doctors and nurses ready to help out in need for any requirement that our festival goers or artists, or crew may have.

Is there a shift in the live events category in post-pandemic period?

Instead of a shift, the live events category has further opened up as we witness events happening across multiple areas across art, design, F&B, music, kids and family, etc. At Viacom18 Live, we position Supersonic as a festival that has grown into a multi-genre music and lifestyle festival and also has mini-festivals within the festival itself. In the Live events space, we do work in both the kids and family space and the Youth music space. Supersonic comes under the youth music space. For kids and families, we are doing a musical show called Peppa Pig. We have already done four rounds of the show in Mumbai, Chandigarh, Delhi, and Bangalore. Last weekend it happened in Hyderabad.

How has the audience interest been as Vh1 Supersonic is returning after 3 years?

Over the years, Supersonic has built an extremely large and loyal fan base, and the moment Vh1 Supersonic edition 2023 was announced, we saw an explosion in our fanbase, saying they are so happy to have it back. Along with that, the moment we announced all our new experiences, we saw a whole vast variety of people who want to visit Vh1 Supersonic now. Overall, the audience interest has been excellent.