Info

UTevents is Toronto's first all ages upscale nightlife event promotion company.

Notorious for bringing beautiful people of Toronto together, UTevents believe beautiful girls make the place look good, so if you see any girl that looks like Amanda, you don't ask her questions. You let her in.

The Untouchables have been hosting some of Toronto's most premiere all ages events. Having combined some of the most unconventional entertainment in the nightlife scene, we have proven to be a revolutionary force in giving "party-goers" an everlasting experience.

Join, embrace and indulge the UT experience...

For Parents

We provide:

• 1 security to every 50 people
• everyone gets searched
• on duty police for large events
• dress code
• no smoking or alcohol
• a safe place for teens
• experience and reputation

Toronto Star Article

Toronto Star Article
Andrea Gordon
Family Issues Reporter | April, 2007.

For two little words, the phrase "all ages" evokes alot of images.

Free-for-alls. Strobe lights. Pubescent girls in teensy-weensy outfits. Strutting boys. Ringing eardrums. Hordes a kids spilling onto the dark downtown streets. But to a young promoter like Michael Maturine, "all ages" doesn't have to mean all risky. Maturine, and his three younger partners in The Untouchables (http://www.utevents.ca), started their company years ago to cater to a different audience. They run all-ages dance parties at different venues because they think teenagers need a supervised place to hang out.

Gone are the days of high school dances and there aren't attractive alternatives. Increasingly, parents are wary of holding house parties, which can so easily get out of hand, thanks to the instant communications teens have at their fingertips.

"If you supress it... they'll find a way to go underground and it becomes way less safe and a lot more unsavoury, " says Maturine, a human resources student at George Brown College, who moved to Toronto from New York five years ago.

But for parents wrestling with this new stage of development and their teens' demands for more freedom, it's a little more complicated. This new terrain isn't easy to navigate. Are clubs safe? Are they all the same? Is there alcohol on the premises? How young should kids be allowed to go?

The three young promoters have a few words of advice:

• Find out about the places your kids want to go to. Drop in, pick up the phone and ask questions, visit web sites, ask other parents. If you can't find information you need to feel comfortable, that's enough to set off alarm bells.
• Not all all-ages events are the same. Live concert venues tend to attract a much different crowd from the DJ-hosted dance parties. Sometimes they are high school kids out to watch their friends perform in "Battle of the Bands" nights, so the atmosphere is less pickup-joint and more about camaraderie and listening to music. But, at the same time, bad things can happen anywhere.
• Some clubs have restricted areas where aclohol is served and underage kids can't hang out. Others require wristbands indiciating who is of legal drinking ages. Security is required - typically one staff for every 100 patrons - but can vary according to the level of experience and how the venue handles kids. Even if the personnel brook no nonsense, their authority ends once kids step outside the door.

Dance parties can be a whole different scene. Maturine says all-ages dance parties get a band name when club promoters promote them to a hardcore crowd with music that celebrate violence. They way promoters pitch their events has a lot to do with the kind of crowd they attract. Maturine wants to build a rep for being "more respectable", aiming for kids 16 and up and offering a diverse selection of music, including some house, hip hop, R&B, and rock. Promoters need to be up front and their events, he says, because parents have an obligation to know about places their kids go. "If I had an opportunity to talk to a high school gym of parents, I would be happy to."