Grassroots music venues are the beating pulse of any music scene worldwide. On the surface, it’s a small, dimly lit room with a stage that creaks with every note, but to artists, it’s Woodstock, it’s the Pyramid stage, it’s an opportunity to project their music to anyone that will listen. As Friedrich Nietzsche once said, ‘without music, life would be a mistake’, so why are we seeing so many venues closing their doors for their final times, and what is being done to help?
Samuel Sweek
Within the last year, 22 million people saw music events in grassroots venues, resulting in it bringing in over £500 million to the British economy. Despite this, the profit margin was a mere 0.2% as running costs sat at £499 million, yet night after night up and down the country, venues still continue to host the backbone of music with no support apart from the love of this sadly diminishing craft.
In April 2023, Jeremy Corbyn’s ‘Peace and Justice Project’ launched the ‘Music for The Many’ campaign to help protect these venues and demand that the government create funding and support to help save the futures of the venues at risk. Music For The Many has three demands in order to help secure the future of these grassroot venues:
- Have a grassroot venue fund to ensure that all communities have access to opportunities in the music industry.
- Tax corporate sponsors of larger music venues.
- Invest in grassroots music venues to secure the sustainable long-term futures of the music venues.
Dom Smith was in conversation with the Music For The Many campaign organiser Samuel Sweek who said:
‘The situation around grassroots music and music venues is dire. The creative industries that got around Jeremy [Corbyn] during his time as lead of Labour Party showed that there was a groundswell of people who wanted to get involved, who wanted to use their arts and their creativity and their talents for something bigger to make the world a better place. That’s what a lot of people are in it for, they’ve got a message to share, and many people are deprived of a platform to share that message. On the most basic level, grassroots music venues in cities and towns provide that. Without them, artists aren’t able to do that. We would live in a world without hope, without art, without creativity. And Music for the Many was set up to utilize what existed and what we knew around a great number of Jeremy’s supporters in the industries.’
Music For The Many was launched at the Lexington in Kings Cross and from the start it was clear how far the campaign was going to go.
‘Essentially, it started off with a grassroots music fund. We wanted the government to put more money in. And after a couple of weeks, we sort of were continuing to shape our demands because it became apparent just how big this campaign could go and what more we needed to do than just simply ask for more money.’
‘It became apparent quite soon after that that actually we had captured something and there was definitely something we could do. This needs to be bigger than just supporting grassroots music venues. We need to actively be getting into communities, showing people how they can lobby their local representatives and the government to do something, essentially, it’s no exaggeration to say to secure the future of British live music because that’s what’s at stake.’
Samuel’s love of music is something that has greatly helped him with the Music For The Many campaign. Here he recalls some of his favourite and influential artists:
Enter Shikari – ‘Rou was actually pretty instrumental in helping me shape this campaign and gave some great advice when we did a podcast with him and Jeremy. A great guy – and who else is really singing about climate crisis, corporate greed or mentioning Palestine by name in their lyrics?
Placebo – Brian Molko’s androgynous image and incredible lyrics were one of my first experiences of genuine self-expression and daring to be bold in mainstream music.
Brand New – Deja Entendu and The Devil & God… are absolutely essential listening for any lover of depressing grunge.
Green Day – American Idiot is one of the best albums ever laid down and is just as pertinent today as it was 20 years ago.
Pulp – My mum has always been a massive fan and Different Class is a masterclass in songwriting and storytelling.
Sleater-Kinney – One of those bands you listen to and sort of wonder why they’re not the biggest band on the planet, just breathtaking.
Music For The Many has spread across the country, with events taking place Brighton, Sheffield, Manchester, Glasgow and Margate, with each event seeing great support. The more people that attend, the more awareness is raised, and the more pressure is put on our backwards, art-hating government. As a country, Britain has always prided itself on out musical output, Queen, Zeppelin, The Beatles to name a few, so why let one of our countries greatest creative fronts fall into a sorrow state? With costs rising, it’s harder for venues to keep their doors open, but artists aren’t the only ones who should be making the noise. Rishi and his merrymen will never understand how important grassroots music is to this country, so support your local venue.
Words: Archie Jackson / Interview: Dom Smith
