Latest / The Price of Music / The battle to keep one of the UK's great grassroots venues alive, buying the venue with the help of the community, and the many challenges small venues face in 2026 – with Ricky Bates of The Joiners

Transcript

The battle to keep one of the UK's great grassroots venues alive, buying the venue with the help of the community, and the many challenges small venues face in 2026 – with Ricky Bates of The Joiners · The Price of Music

• 0:02
  Hello and welcome to The Price of Music, brought to you by
• 0:06
  Music Ally. It's the show that looks at both
• 0:09
  the finances of the music industry, but also some of the
• 0:12
  stories and the comments which has passed in the the last week
• 0:16
  in the pop business. I'm Steve Lamackey, Stuart
• 0:18
  Dredge if you want an easy guide to what's going on in the music
• 0:21
  industry and how it all works. Here we are this week, something
• 0:25
  slightly different again this week, actually we we will run
• 0:29
  through a few of this week's big stories, but we're also going to
• 0:32
  be speaking to Ricky Bates from the venue The Joiners in
• 0:35
  Southampton. The Joiners has been one of the
• 0:38
  linchpins of the grassroots live circuit over the past three
• 0:42
  decades or so. We'll talk to Ricky about, well,
• 0:45
  last week's Music Venue Trust reports.
• 0:48
  Also just what the reality of running a venue has been like in
• 0:52
  the past year, what he thinks the future holds as well.
• 0:55
  I think it could be very informative before that.
• 0:58
  Well, actually, here's a live music related lead story.
• 1:01
  The Live Trust, the charity set up to manage the money collected
• 1:06
  from the 1 LB voluntary contribution on gig tickets.
• 1:09
  You probably know about this already.
• 1:11
  This is a 1 LB contribution for shows above 5000 capacity.
• 1:17
  Well, the money that's arrived from the artists and the
• 1:20
  promoters who've contributed so far is now going out to a range
• 1:25
  of organisations. The first round of Live Trust
• 1:29
  funding we'll see half 1,000,000 lbs being distributed to say a
• 1:35
  variety of organisations which hopefully will go on to support
• 1:41
  venues, artists, promoters and festivals at grassroots level.
• 1:46
  Obviously for for Full disclosure, I am one of the
• 1:49
  trustees who's been involved with this, so maybe Stuart,
• 1:52
  maybe you should take this one for starters.
• 1:54
  Give us your view on this. Yeah, should I tell you what
• 1:56
  you've done? Yes, if you could just remind
• 1:59
  me. Yeah, well, it's, I think it's
• 2:01
  really interesting because, yeah, like you say, it's half
• 2:02
  £1,000,000 being distributed from the living.
• 2:05
  And what I thought was interesting was it's broken down
• 2:07
  so you can see where the money's going.
• 2:09
  So to bring it down to 200,000 lbs is going to music venue
• 2:13
  support from the Music Venue Trust.
• 2:15
  So that will go to grassroots venues.
• 2:16
  I think it's under 125,000 is going to the UK Artists Touring
• 2:21
  Fund. So that's going to focus on
• 2:23
  artists who are touring and need some help with the cost of that.
• 2:27
  There's an independent promoters scheme, it's getting 75 grand, a
• 2:31
  micro and very small festivals development programme, it's
• 2:34
  getting 50 grand. And then there's there's some
• 2:36
  money for programmes in Belfast and in Scotland and a music
• 2:40
  production scheme for young people.
• 2:43
  So it really for me, I mean you can tell me if I'm right here,
• 2:46
  but it just felt like a really interesting announcement because
• 2:48
  it wasn't just saying we're giving away money, but it was
• 2:51
  just just outlining the full breadth of it.
• 2:52
  It's not just venues, it's the people how it's breaking down.
• 2:56
  Yeah, I think the, the, the, the overview of this is that the
• 3:00
  money should go somewhere where you can see it make a
• 3:05
  difference, you know. And so the, for instance, the
• 3:08
  music venue trusts money, as you say, they're getting 200,000
• 3:11
  lbs, but that, that will be spread across various plans they
• 3:15
  they have for it. Obviously some of it will go to
• 3:18
  their emergency response team who are by the coalface of
• 3:22
  keeping venues alive. But then there's there's things
• 3:25
  like they're going to try, they're going to put some money
• 3:27
  towards taking venues off the grid to bring down their energy
• 3:32
  costs. There's going to be money
• 3:35
  available for improvements to venues and also there'll be some
• 3:39
  money going into, well, this is the, the idea is that there are
• 3:45
  venues that have, you know, spare floors upstairs or
• 3:48
  something. And then the idea could be, and
• 3:50
  some money will go towards, if this is possible, converting
• 3:53
  parts of venues into what can become accommodation for groups,
• 3:58
  thus bringing down the cost of, you know, the overheads of
• 4:01
  touring. So, yeah.
• 4:03
  And with all those things, I think you'll see an immediate a
• 4:08
  result of the money going in. So it's, it's really the money's
• 4:12
  there targeted at delivering, you know, identifiable goals.
• 4:18
  And I think that's the thing, there's a lot of money the, the
• 4:21
  schemes in Scotland and Belfast at the OO yeah, Centre that a
• 4:27
  lot of the schemes are also based around trying to get more
• 4:31
  young people into the industry and in education really and
• 4:35
  hands on experience. I think that's important.
• 4:39
  And the UK Artists Touring Fund, that's, that's partly to, it's
• 4:44
  almost partly making up for the fact that record labels now
• 4:47
  offer or very rarely offer any kind of tour support for bands,
• 4:51
  which has made it really incredibly hard for some artists
• 4:56
  to get out on tour because it costs them so much.
• 4:59
  So they'll be looking into ways of, you know, reinvigorating the
• 5:02
  touring circuit and helping artists who might not have been
• 5:06
  able to go on tour to go on tour.
• 5:08
  So I mean, there's a lot in it. It has been, it's been 2 years
• 5:12
  in the making this from the original discussions which we
• 5:16
  had with people involved in live music.
• 5:18
  And then of course, working out the mechanics of the
• 5:20
  contribution and how that would work.
• 5:23
  And then explaining the concept of managers and promoters and
• 5:26
  agents, you know, and securing their, their backing.
• 5:29
  It's, it's been a long process. And then even after that,
• 5:32
  obviously setting up the of the Live Trust charity itself and
• 5:36
  working out, you know, what the what the plan is going to be.
• 5:41
  Yeah, it's taken a while, but it's a bit of history this I
• 5:44
  think, and hopefully marks a new era for grassroots music in the
• 5:48
  UK. If you'd like more information,
• 5:52
  including there'll be updates on the timeline for the next wave
• 5:55
  of funding, that'll be announced shortly, I think, but there's
• 5:59
  more information on the Live Trust websites.
• 6:02
  It's also, it's worth mentioning, isn't it, that as
• 6:05
  this money goes out, there's obviously more money coming in.
• 6:09
  Who's the latest artist who has signed up to support the Trust
• 6:14
  by committing a pound of their ticket price to this project?
• 6:19
  It's Harry Styles. Step forward, Harry Styles is
• 6:24
  going to contribute a pound of ticket from his shows to go
• 6:27
  towards this. You know this, this attempt to
• 6:30
  reinvigorate grassroots and support grass live music at
• 6:33
  grass at the grassroots level. Harry Styles, who's doing what
• 6:37
  is it now? Is he up to 8?
• 6:39
  I think it's 8 Wembley stadiums now, isn't it?
• 6:42
  Every time I look, it's a new gig.
• 6:43
  Yeah. But I saw, I saw a post from
• 6:44
  Mark David actually sort of talking about this as being a
• 6:47
  really good thing as well because it's I think Live Nation
• 6:49
  are involved in this. Aren't.
• 6:50
  Yes, they are and. There's been some discussion of
• 6:53
  whether they're supporting us or not.
• 6:54
  And he was, he was like he did his post saying I want to credit
• 6:58
  where it's due. And that was nice to see as well
• 7:00
  that you know. There's yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 7:02
  Very big nod to Harry and his management and the promoters for
• 7:07
  making that happen. He joins the list.
• 7:08
  I can't I can't read out everyone who's contributed, but
• 7:11
  you know, respect to basement Jackson, Biffy Clyro and Diana
• 7:15
  Ross, Florence, the Machine, Ed Sheeran, of course, Foo
• 7:18
  Fighters, The Cure, Only the Poets.
• 7:23
  Who else? Mumford and Sons, My Chemical
• 7:26
  Romance. So I mean the the list is ever
• 7:29
  more impressive and we hope more people join us on on our cruise
• 7:33
  side. Actually, I mentioned Harry and
• 7:37
  his management. Here's a here's a story about
• 7:40
  management. There's well, there's a couple
• 7:41
  of thoughts actually. These next two stories both came
• 7:43
  out of music allies connect conference last week.
• 7:47
  One of them was the was the observation that managers are
• 7:51
  doing much more of the work that record labels used to do.
• 7:56
  And maybe they're not being paid fairly for the amount of work
• 8:00
  that they've picked up the managers, because the
• 8:03
  traditional 20% deal that they often have with artists doesn't
• 8:07
  really cover everything that they're putting into the
• 8:09
  project. That's essentially it, wasn't
• 8:12
  it? It was, yeah.
• 8:13
  I mean, it came partly from your interview with Neve Byrne,
• 8:15
  didn't it? Manager and long time Blair and
• 8:18
  Damon Orban. And she just, I mean, do you
• 8:20
  know, I've had so much good feedback about that session
• 8:22
  because she just got up and talked with experience and
• 8:26
  knowledge very clearly about what's happening and what trends
• 8:29
  have changed and what she's doing and people loved it.
• 8:31
  I think we need more manager the conferences.
• 8:34
  Well, well, more honesty I think as well.
• 8:36
  More actual, you know, more, more yeah more experience, more
• 8:41
  stories, more explanation and the applying truth and.
• 8:46
  Everything like you say, I made one of her big points was that
• 8:48
  managers are doing a lot more of the work, liberty to do,
• 8:51
  particularly around planning album campaigns and marketing
• 8:54
  for releases. And she was talking about the
• 8:57
  idea of that, that labels that might actually hand managers the
• 9:02
  marketing budget for projects because they can do a better job
• 9:05
  with it. Because not because they aren't
• 9:06
  good people at labels, but they are often overloaded.
• 9:09
  There's a lot going on, a lot of artists to handle.
• 9:11
  And she was saying we have to succeed for artists and we have
• 9:14
  a smaller roster. I know it's kind of interesting
• 9:17
  because I think you could you could go to this conference and
• 9:19
  you could have said, oh, you don't need a label anymore,
• 9:22
  Managers can do it all. But actually what also came
• 9:24
  through was Nieve saying, well, actually funding is difficult.
• 9:27
  We don't have the money necessarily to do the stuff we
• 9:29
  want to do. The labels still provide the
• 9:31
  funding. And later on, people were
• 9:33
  talking about how labels are still really good for helping
• 9:35
  you break internationally, helping you kind of do do things
• 9:38
  around the world. So it was this next picture of
• 9:40
  like, actually, yeah, we're doing some of the stuff labels
• 9:42
  need to do, but we do still need them for things.
• 9:44
  Even if we were, we would like to be able to do them on our
• 9:46
  own. But yeah, the other thing that
• 9:48
  came through, and I think we've talked about this before,
• 9:51
  haven't we, that this idea of the way managers that get paid
• 9:54
  for what they do and the fact that I guess traditionally they
• 9:58
  were deal makers, weren't they? They'd strike the record deal
• 10:00
  for their artists, they strike all the load and then they would
• 10:02
  get paid. I think 20% is a standard thing,
• 10:04
  isn't it, of deals they made. And yet nowadays, and this came
• 10:09
  through from a panel later on in the day as well, they're doing
• 10:12
  so much work in between that that's not deals.
• 10:15
  It is planning the campaigns, it's running things and but the
• 10:19
  way they get paid hasn't necessarily moved on.
• 10:21
  So that was a big theme. I think that how should manage
• 10:24
  that. And the other thing I picked up
• 10:25
  from it was that, OK, if managers were to earn in a
• 10:28
  different way, they would get more of the money that artists
• 10:30
  earn from all their stuff, not just deals they strike.
• 10:34
  Does that money come from the artists share or does it come
• 10:36
  from the labels share? And that was the other
• 10:38
  discussion here about, you know, managers don't really want to
• 10:41
  take money out of their artists pockets if they can help it.
• 10:44
  But maybe they're talking to labels saying, well, you know,
• 10:47
  can we not have a share of what's happening there because
• 10:49
  we're doing the work? And that feels like a fun
• 10:51
  discussion that's going to be going on or is already going on.
• 10:54
  Yes, that's that interview which we did at Connect.
• 11:00
  We did record it. So I think we might we might
• 11:02
  play it out next, next month because as you say, there were
• 11:05
  some very interesting points and some, you know, good stories and
• 11:08
  observations. So Neve Byrne next month on the
• 11:11
  program, hopefully something else.
• 11:14
  And I missed this particular panel or this particular talk.
• 11:19
  Tell us though about Universal Music Groups Jonathan Dawkins
• 11:24
  thoughts on AI music because I think this may have raised one
• 11:28
  or two eyebrows. Yeah, so this was really
• 11:31
  interesting. He was like the league, you
• 11:32
  know, at the conference and he's very high up in like Universal
• 11:35
  Music's digital business development and strategy team.
• 11:38
  So he's the he's one of the people doing new deals, looking
• 11:41
  for new technologies and he's quite key figure in AI music,
• 11:44
  for example, what they're doing there.
• 11:46
  And yeah, he said, and this, I think we can all agree with
• 11:48
  this. He said what Universal doesn't
• 11:49
  want to see is quote this nonsense, 7 million tracks a
• 11:53
  day, AI slop stuff. They didn't want to support
• 11:56
  anything that kind of just chucks music out and competes
• 11:58
  with human artists. And then he said this quote, and
• 12:01
  apparently he said this quite often.
• 12:02
  And I met some of his team and they were like, Yep, he talks
• 12:04
  about this all the time. It's one of his pet things.
• 12:07
  So the quote is, I really want to hear what it could sound like
• 12:09
  for Jimi Hendrix to play Bitch's Brew Miles Davis Classic, or for
• 12:13
  fellow Cootie to cover Talking Heads or for Jeff Buckley to do
• 12:17
  anything. And before we get into this, he
• 12:20
  did immediately say a caveat and he said these things don't
• 12:24
  exist. Now.
• 12:24
  There isn't an AI thing that lets you do that.
• 12:26
  And they shouldn't exist unless those specific artists have
• 12:29
  consented if they're dead, their estates.
• 12:32
  And he also said he was talking as a fan, he'd like to see this
• 12:35
  as a fan of those artists rather than he was saying this is what
• 12:38
  we're going to make and do and strike deals for.
• 12:41
  But it was it was weird because like some people there were kind
• 12:44
  of like that sounds amazing. And other people reacted quite
• 12:47
  strongly against it. I don't want to hear that.
• 12:48
  They never wanted that. Why would you do that with AI?
• 12:52
  I think it became a bit of a talking point, yeah.
• 12:54
  What do you think? I mean, it's a difficult 1,
• 12:57
  isn't it? There was that point, wasn't
• 12:59
  there, where people were getting, you know, using or
• 13:02
  mimicking Johnny Cash, Johnny Cash's voice.
• 13:06
  And there's, you know, and the, I don't know, and get on the
• 13:10
  songs that they're writing, the Johnny Cash voice.
• 13:12
  It just, it was very uncomfortable.
• 13:14
  I think so. I don't know.
• 13:17
  I do. I don't know what I think,
• 13:20
  really. I'm not, I'm not as excited by
• 13:23
  hearing stuff like this as he is.
• 13:25
  That's what I would say. It doesn't.
• 13:27
  It doesn't. It doesn't get me going.
• 13:29
  The idea of, oh, what about if you had, yeah, I don't know,
• 13:34
  Florence and the machine doing Patti Smith.
• 13:36
  I mean, you could do that anyway, but if Florence.
• 13:40
  And Machine got Patti Smith up on stage for a Glastonbury
• 13:43
  headlining set, for example. And they did a song on stage
• 13:45
  that would be exciting, but they'd be the humans doing it.
• 13:48
  Yeah, yeah. I was thinking about, so I
• 13:50
  always think, let me try something I knew something I'd
• 13:52
  like more, which is not artist decks and artist Y crossed.
• 13:56
  So I was thinking about Super Furry Animals of the band I
• 13:58
  like. I love their sound, their
• 13:59
  songwriting, I love their visuals, everything around them.
• 14:02
  And what if they did something where there was a Super Furry AI
• 14:06
  that would let me play and make my own songs using their kind of
• 14:10
  sound and I couldn't release those songs And I might pay for
• 14:14
  it and they would get paid for it.
• 14:16
  And I could just spend time in their world, like making stuff
• 14:20
  that is more interesting to me. And it it would depend on them
• 14:24
  being up for that and, and letting fans do it.
• 14:28
  That's so I think that's maybe sort of another angle on what he
• 14:31
  was getting at that if, if musicians go actually let's let
• 14:34
  fans play with our sound and our songwriting.
• 14:37
  But again, a lot of artists I think might be quite loathe to
• 14:40
  do it at the moment because it's also early and new and sounds a
• 14:43
  bit weird. That's what I would like, you
• 14:45
  know, But can we get to do it? You must have some.
• 14:49
  Have some Inns in their camp get them to do that if you could.
• 14:52
  You're the one who bought the tickets to see them I think.
• 14:54
  I think it comes down to the actual paying fan to lobby for
• 14:59
  this. Should I make a sign?
• 15:00
  Yeah. Do an AI thing?
• 15:02
  Come on. Right then, any other business
• 15:07
  for this week? Well it's our first interview of
• 15:09
  the year. We are hoping to bring you
• 15:11
  insights into the industry from a selection of guests, hopefully
• 15:15
  one a month if we can sort that out.
• 15:17
  Just to bring you closer to the reality what the industry is
• 15:19
  like. It seemed pertinent after the
• 15:22
  publication of last weeks Music Venue Trust report into live
• 15:25
  music that we should focus on the real life of a grassroots
• 15:29
  venue. The venue in question, The
• 15:31
  Joiners Arms, opened in 1968. It came into its own in the 90s,
• 15:35
  playing host to a number of bands who would soundtrack that
• 15:39
  decade. Since when?
• 15:40
  It's hosted early gigs by Muse, The Libertines, Klaxons,
• 15:44
  Catfish, in the Bottom. I mean, it's probably easier
• 15:46
  making a list of people who haven't played there than the
• 15:49
  ones who have, But what are the financial challenges keeping the
• 15:53
  venue afloat? How do you spot the next big
• 15:55
  thing and who's asked for the most surreal or idiotic rider?
• 16:00
  To answer some of those questions, we are joined by
• 16:02
  Ricky Bates. Hello.
• 16:04
  Ricky Hi, Steve. How are you doing?
• 16:06
  Very good. Thank you very much for joining
• 16:08
  us. Just so people know, just tell
• 16:11
  us a little bit about yourself and how long you've worked at
• 16:13
  The Joiners and what your roles have been there over the years.
• 16:17
  Well, I started in 2013 on a cold November night.
• 16:24
  The first week that I actually started here, I think was I was
• 16:27
  looking the other day we had the 1975 here and they only had two
• 16:30
  songs out. I think they've played like 25
• 16:33
  minutes. But yeah, I got involved
• 16:36
  initially because the venue was in, I was doing my own shows
• 16:40
  here as an independent promoter and the venue got itself into a
• 16:45
  lot of financial trouble, debt, and that was even before how bad
• 16:49
  the music industry is now. So 2000, end of 2000 and twelve,
• 16:54
  2013. So there was a lot of promoters
• 16:57
  that were using the venue and we were kind of like, well, if the
• 17:00
  joiners goes under then we don't have anywhere to do these shows
• 17:03
  and there'll be no scene. So I jumped in temporarily to
• 17:08
  try and help and then I'm still here 12 years later.
• 17:15
  So what, what what did you, what did you do?
• 17:17
  Did you take over? Did you become a sort of in
• 17:19
  house promoter then or just a general general general dogs
• 17:23
  probably trying to just shore up the the workings of it all and
• 17:27
  as you say, just keep it going. Yeah.
• 17:29
  It was kind of like I kind of came into that they had a
• 17:33
  division of they had a nightclub at the time.
• 17:36
  That was when all these alternative nightclubs became
• 17:38
  like a big thing, you know, around that time.
• 17:41
  So they were putting money into that and there had to be a
• 17:43
  divide of business between the live venue and the nightclub.
• 17:47
  And I think the nightclub was draining the joiners quite a lot
• 17:50
  financially. And so they would, they were
• 17:52
  linked together and I kind of came in and was like, well, you
• 17:56
  know, screw the nightclub. The joiners is like the main
• 17:59
  feature here. So if any anything's going to
• 18:01
  survive out of the two, it has to be, you know, the joiners.
• 18:04
  So I had to kind of come in and remodel the way they were doing
• 18:07
  everything. I think they had club promoters.
• 18:10
  And as we all know, club promoters aren't live promoters.
• 18:12
  There's a a massive difference in terms of what we're in it for
• 18:16
  and what we're trying to achieve.
• 18:18
  And, you know, the levels of effort that it requires.
• 18:21
  This isn't Ausb pen, you know, it's there's, if there's
• 18:24
  elements of like production and logistics that require more
• 18:30
  than, you know, just turning up drunk and, you know, hitting
• 18:33
  clay. It's not, it's not one of those.
• 18:35
  So that I just think they had the wrong staffing at the time.
• 18:37
  And yeah, so I kind of came in and was like, right, let's
• 18:41
  figure out a plan. And we had to make the landlord
• 18:44
  at the time said that we owed, I think it was like 67,000 lbs in
• 18:51
  rent, arrears and brewery debt through the brewery at the time.
• 18:55
  And he, he said, you've got three months to pay it or
• 18:57
  you'll, or you'll be chucked out and it will become a shop or,
• 19:02
  you know, retail. So, so we panicked and obviously
• 19:06
  called our old friend Frank Turner.
• 19:09
  He did two shows on his birthday.
• 19:12
  So we made like 15 grand in one one day.
• 19:15
  And then we had the, the, the notorious, infamous vaccine show
• 19:20
  a couple of weeks after that where someone ripped the fire
• 19:23
  door off and there were over 350 people in the venue.
• 19:27
  And it actually fits 200 for those who are unaware.
• 19:30
  So you can imagine the chaos that and then so I, I kind of
• 19:35
  slightly had to build back the business, but I got thrown
• 19:39
  completely in the deep end because, you know, at the time
• 19:42
  pad, I was working at HMV and then another bar job.
• 19:46
  So I was doing 2 jobs and trying to run the joiners at the same
• 19:50
  time. Well, well, you know, save it
• 19:52
  from being closed down completely.
• 19:54
  So yeah, it was a lot of high pressure situations.
• 19:58
  Let's talk about there's a lot of stuff actually, which we'd
• 20:02
  like to get through if we can. I mean, there's some still
• 20:04
  concerned, you know, stuff which of deep concern when it comes to
• 20:08
  the grass roots circuit. But there are some positive
• 20:10
  things I think coming through, including, you know, the the
• 20:14
  news recently to yourself about music venue properties taking
• 20:17
  the venue under its wing. We'll get to that in a second.
• 20:20
  But how how was the venue doing last year as a snapshot?
• 20:25
  How were? Bringing the story up to date,
• 20:27
  how were its finances? What is the reality of running a
• 20:31
  venue in, you know, in 2025 going into 26?
• 20:35
  I'd say it's, I kind of feel like I've gone full circle.
• 20:38
  It's like not that with that amount in debt, it's just the
• 20:42
  difficulty of it's almost like we've hit a reset button in the
• 20:45
  last two years. So where it's, you know, after
• 20:48
  COVID, there was this flourish of people wanted to go back out
• 20:50
  and go to gigs again. And then I think last year we
• 20:55
  had some amazing shows like we punched, you know, we punched
• 20:58
  way above our weight because we use the bigger venues in the
• 21:00
  city. So that's the model of the
• 21:02
  joiners surviving is, is based on, you know, the, the money we
• 21:06
  make within the joiners itself isn't enough to sustain the
• 21:09
  venue. We have to outsource to the, you
• 21:12
  know, up to 1000 capacity and we reinvest that money from the
• 21:16
  bigger shows back into the joiners.
• 21:17
  So it's kind of like this ecosystem of circle of life of,
• 21:21
  you know, we'd like to bring the bands here, sell the show out
• 21:25
  here and then, you know, go into the 400 cap and then go into the
• 21:28
  800 cap and we'll keep them as long as we can before, you know,
• 21:32
  the national sweep in and take the tours.
• 21:35
  But that's that's something that I had to put in place originally
• 21:39
  in 2013, two, 1014, because you know, you sit there and you look
• 21:42
  at the finances even then compared to now and it's
• 21:46
  difficult. So you just can't really make it
• 21:48
  work. What, what, what are the, what
• 21:51
  are the biggest outgoings then for a venue like yours?
• 21:55
  When you're, when you're tossing up all the money that has to go
• 21:57
  out and all the bills that have to be paid, You know, we're
• 22:00
  constantly being reminded of, well, you know, it's, it's rent,
• 22:03
  it's rights, it's energy bills going through the, through the
• 22:07
  roof. Is it?
• 22:08
  Is it that? Is that the reality?
• 22:10
  It is, yeah. That's like, that's the boring
• 22:13
  part of, you know, running a venue.
• 22:14
  It's like you've got to sit there at the end of the month
• 22:17
  and go, you know, the, the, the gas and the electric and the,
• 22:21
  that don't own the PA. So like a lot of venues don't
• 22:23
  own the PA. So the PA and the desk and the
• 22:26
  lights and things, you know, there's, there's an outgoing for
• 22:28
  that. And it's the, the problem is
• 22:30
  with that is if you have like an older venue or a bigger venue,
• 22:34
  you can hide those desks and those light desks and they're
• 22:37
  away from the, the mosh pit area or the beer spillage area.
• 22:40
  But we, you can't really do that here.
• 22:43
  So it's more of a case of, you know, we have to hire our gear
• 22:49
  because things get spilt and thrown and explode and the wear
• 22:52
  and tear and stuff. So that's, that's one big
• 22:55
  overhead. Then the energy bills is a big
• 22:57
  overhead. Then the staff, the staff going
• 23:00
  up the, the minimum wage going up twice in a year, which I
• 23:04
  agree with, but the problem is with that at a business at this
• 23:08
  level or a small venue, it's you know, we're paying people, you
• 23:11
  know, the bar staff shifts now gone from paying someone 45 lbs
• 23:15
  a shift to 60 lbs and you got 3 or 4 bar staff on that then
• 23:20
  pushes up your, you know, your overhead for you got your
• 23:23
  security. And then obviously you've got
• 23:25
  like earlier load insurance and it's just like box office staff,
• 23:29
  show reps, sound guy, lighting guy, like people need to be
• 23:33
  paid. It's like as soon as the general
• 23:36
  wage goes up, the sound engineer, then he needs to be
• 23:39
  paid more. She needs to be paid more
• 23:41
  because it's only fair that the skilled people get paid more
• 23:44
  because the bar staff are getting paid.
• 23:46
  So do you know what I mean? The costs just go up and up and.
• 23:48
  Up, you mentioned that the margins are super tight and I
• 23:51
  know we we talked about the Music Venue Trust report
• 23:54
  recently where I think half of venues made no profit at all and
• 23:57
  margins are super tight. Like how does that impact the
• 24:00
  daily running of the venue and the decisions you're making
• 24:03
  knowing the margins that they are?
• 24:06
  I to be honest, I'm very cautious about the way I book
• 24:13
  now about what I take and what I don't take.
• 24:16
  And then there's a couple of things that kind of eats me
• 24:18
  alive as because I've always kind of been one of those, you
• 24:21
  know, I'm, I'm the venue operator, business owner,
• 24:24
  whatever now and all these other important titles you can give
• 24:27
  yourself. But at the end of the day, I'm
• 24:29
  still on my hands and knees patching up a hole in the floor
• 24:33
  at 1:00 in the morning with gaffer tape because people have
• 24:36
  gone so crazy at a hardcore show.
• 24:37
  They've ripped it up. But you know, it's or, or, you
• 24:40
  know, you're in the drain trying to unblock something because
• 24:43
  someone's stuck a pint glass down toilet.
• 24:46
  It's it doesn't matter how important your role is.
• 24:50
  It's still like it's all-encompassing at this level.
• 24:52
  So it's. Yeah, very difficult.
• 24:55
  So the margins have become so tight that I'm, like, looking at
• 25:01
  bands that I want to put on, but we have to be, like, so careful
• 25:05
  with how much we're offering. Yeah.
• 25:08
  And it kind of eats at me because I want to grow new
• 25:12
  artists. You alluded to this, but I want
• 25:15
  to ask because another of the key points in the Music Benny
• 25:19
  Trust report that was about tours getting shorter, but also
• 25:22
  how some towns and cities are just falling off the geek
• 25:25
  circuit. When you and when you look
• 25:27
  through that list of places that always used to be part of, you
• 25:32
  know, an up and coming bands or you definitely go to Leicester,
• 25:36
  you might go to Wolverhampton. All these places though, is this
• 25:38
  something you've noticed and is this affecting you that people
• 25:42
  will come only so far, they won't quite make it to the South
• 25:45
  Coast and if they do it's Brighton and that's that's as
• 25:47
  far down. We're not going any further
• 25:49
  West. Thanks.
• 25:51
  No, Yeah, yeah, it's kind of that something that it's beyond
• 25:55
  the axe me because we when you grow an artist from like joiners
• 26:01
  to the next level, you know, the engine rooms or the 85 or the
• 26:04
  brook, we then don't see them again.
• 26:07
  Because if they just go straight into, you know, your Roundhouse
• 26:11
  in London or your your your Academy in Manchester.
• 26:15
  So the shorter these tours are becoming, then the less business
• 26:19
  that we we have. But it's also, it just, it's,
• 26:23
  it's destroying the entire ecosystem.
• 26:25
  And it's, there's an element to it where I'm like that there has
• 26:29
  to be these agencies and these booking agents and these
• 26:32
  managers have to take some sort of responsibility for rooting
• 26:37
  their artists into regional towns.
• 26:39
  And I'm not talking about going and playing in, you know, you
• 26:44
  know, they asked end of nowhere in Cornwall or you know, I know
• 26:47
  Plymouth used to be a place that had a bunch of venues and bands
• 26:50
  rarely go there. Exeter Cavern struggling.
• 26:53
  You know, I, I pay attention to what listings are in venues
• 26:58
  because we're all kind of looking at, you know, we're on
• 26:59
  this level playing field of going well.
• 27:01
  How are they surviving and how are they surviving if if we're
• 27:04
  struggling? But it's such a shame, isn't it,
• 27:06
  because you know, the audience is, there's usually an audience
• 27:09
  there and what's what was being one of the great strengths of
• 27:12
  the joiners over the years. I mean, I've followed bands
• 27:16
  who've toured, you know, routes through your place and it's some
• 27:19
  of the there. There was a really enthusiastic
• 27:22
  audit, I'd say for Catfish and the Bottle menus, which one of
• 27:25
  the hottest gigs I've ever been to.
• 27:26
  It was so exciting and they had such a brilliant time because
• 27:30
  they're on the cusp. So it's really it's, it's the
• 27:33
  bands or the bands are missing out, as you say as well.
• 27:36
  Because it's really, this is the point, isn't it, where it's
• 27:39
  still fun and you're, you know, you're moving up a level and the
• 27:42
  audiences are coming with you. But, you know, we're we're
• 27:46
  getting to the point where there's large swathes of the
• 27:48
  country where there's audiences, but we're not serving.
• 27:51
  We're not serving them this, you know, this is something which I
• 27:55
  think we you know, we which needs addressing certainly
• 27:58
  because, yeah, I mean, name some of the all the bands that have
• 28:00
  come through. You mentioned you know Vaccines
• 28:02
  played there Libertines a play that you've had so many bands of
• 28:06
  new over the. Year, Yeah, it's it's complete
• 28:09
  bananas when you look at it. But it's, you know, it's Steve
• 28:13
  Jack. Steve Strange signed Coldplay
• 28:15
  here on their second time here. And there were Rolls Royces in
• 28:19
  the street in Saint Mary's, which at that point in the
• 28:22
  2000s, Well, I think that was the year 2000.
• 28:25
  You know, this area was not the best, like, area to even have,
• 28:28
  you know, you get your wheels next, let alone park a bloody
• 28:31
  Rolls Royce down here. But it's yeah, that that those
• 28:34
  moments are being removed from the fabric of the band's journey
• 28:38
  and their story. It's like, you know, the manic
• 28:40
  St. Preachers got signed in the The
• 28:42
  Dirty backstage basement here, though.
• 28:44
  They signed their first major record deal, you know, to say
• 28:46
  Coldplay get picked up here. And then there's bands that, you
• 28:50
  know, in COVID, we found more Flyers about like, you know, at
• 28:53
  the drive in played here after, you know, they only stayed
• 28:56
  together for that one record. They did Saturday Night Live
• 28:59
  famously and then kind of fell out and broke up.
• 29:01
  They played the show here for 5 lbs like on the last run.
• 29:05
  Green Day did their kaplunk release show here by accident.
• 29:09
  Like, you know, it's, it's it. And those stories just carry.
• 29:14
  On Stuart, Stuart had a question.
• 29:17
  Well, we're kind of follow us on because you were talking about
• 29:19
  filling rooms and we're going to ask like how, how have audiences
• 29:21
  been? I mean, you mentioned 14 to 8
• 29:23
  year olds fizzling out, which sounds worrying, but how have
• 29:25
  you been finding audiences? We need to have shows on.
• 29:27
  I mean, is there still are people's, is demand still there
• 29:30
  to kind of come out and see bands?
• 29:32
  I think, I think the demand is there, it's just the financial
• 29:37
  worry. So, you know, we've all got
• 29:39
  families with kids and we have to see it from their
• 29:42
  perspectives. If they're struggling to make
• 29:45
  ends meet at home, the last thing on their mind is
• 29:47
  disposable when come to go on a night out.
• 29:50
  So you know, there's we've seen a shrink of about 30% on shows
• 29:59
  here. So historically there'll be
• 30:01
  bands you have your staples that come to join us every year and
• 30:04
  sell it out and they're happy to exist at this level and they
• 30:07
  don't need growth like the, you know, that they figured out a
• 30:10
  way to make it work. They play enough small venues
• 30:13
  and you know, they don't pay any merge rates and stuff like that.
• 30:15
  So but now we're seeing that those bands that historically
• 30:18
  sell it out every time and now coming back and doing 160
• 30:22
  tickets. So there's like this forty
• 30:24
  person drop off and you're going, Oh, well, where where
• 30:28
  have those people gone? And, you know, no one really has
• 30:32
  the answer because it's, there's a fact there's, there's factors
• 30:35
  of everything. It's like the younger kids are
• 30:37
  attracted to the bigger thing. So if they want to go to Oasis
• 30:41
  at Wembley Stadium, they're more than happy to pay £250 for that
• 30:46
  because they want to go to the bigger thing.
• 30:48
  But the problem is that there's, those kids aren't working their
• 30:52
  way backwards. It's, it's, they're going to
• 30:54
  these bigger shows and arenas and things and, and that's it.
• 30:59
  And then the conversation comes up about ticket prices and then,
• 31:02
  you know, everyone starts saying it's too expensive to attend
• 31:04
  these gigs. And I was like, yes, at that
• 31:06
  level it's, I agree, it's too expensive for families and you
• 31:10
  know, 1618 year old kids to, to attend, but they can go down the
• 31:15
  road and go to a show for £10. But the problem is, is the
• 31:19
  attention. How do you get these kids
• 31:23
  attention with us? Yeah, it's always fun because it
• 31:29
  I just I'm jumping in because you mentioned MVP and it's
• 31:33
  probably a good point to come back to it.
• 31:34
  Music venue properties, by the way, that's what MVP is and
• 31:39
  acquired. The joiners think it's November,
• 31:42
  wasn't it? This is part of their owner
• 31:44
  venues campaign where anyone can invest in it.
• 31:47
  You can basically buy shares, which so you buy, so you buy
• 31:52
  shares and owner venues. We essentially buying shares in
• 31:55
  all the venues that buy. You've got a tiny, you've got 1
• 31:59
  brick of every of every building they're bought.
• 32:01
  So you've got, you know, bits of all these.
• 32:04
  But with a pub in Newport, you've got a brick there.
• 32:06
  We've never got a brick at the joiners.
• 32:08
  What, what practically what prompted the interest?
• 32:12
  Did you go to them or did they come to you?
• 32:14
  Because obviously the idea is basically if we, if we own the
• 32:17
  venue, then we can take away some of the, well, we hopefully,
• 32:21
  you know, you don't have that landlord moment where all of a
• 32:24
  sudden they say you're out in three months, the lease is up or
• 32:27
  the rent is up. So that obviously helps with the
• 32:31
  finances. But it is about bringing venues
• 32:34
  into, you know, into community control.
• 32:36
  But what, what happened? What was the story?
• 32:38
  Did you, did you phone them up and say we're we're done unless
• 32:40
  someone someone helps us? Yeah.
• 32:43
  So it got to, this has actually been going on for a year.
• 32:46
  So the venue is officially purchased like I think October,
• 32:50
  end of October this year. And then we celebrated it in
• 32:52
  November, but it was actually October 2024 and the landlord
• 32:59
  was like, well, the leases are. So we're going to look at
• 33:02
  turning this into either commercial or the I was like,
• 33:06
  cool, let's just try and get this through as quickly as
• 33:08
  possible. But then there was, you know,
• 33:11
  the building had to be surveyed all the legal side of things.
• 33:15
  And there was there was the landlord structural engineer,
• 33:18
  and then there was our structural engineer and then
• 33:20
  there was MVP structural engineer.
• 33:22
  And they were all trying to value the building.
• 33:26
  Obviously, the building's over 200 years old, so it's built in
• 33:29
  like 1810. So there's so much damage on the
• 33:32
  roof that needs to be fixed. So there was drones flowing up
• 33:35
  there so we could take a picture of everything.
• 33:37
  And then, you know, the schematics of all the floors and
• 33:40
  the beams, and the wood is like 150 years old under the mosh
• 33:44
  pit. So it's now bent like this when
• 33:47
  you actually look at it. So that needs to be replaced in
• 33:51
  the summer. So, yeah.
• 33:52
  So there was a lot back and forth and everything came
• 33:55
  through. And I said, look, look, if MVP
• 33:58
  doesn't take it, then the the venue's that doesn't happen.
• 34:03
  The venue's essentially done because he will just sell it for
• 34:07
  development. There was, there was some very
• 34:10
  tense moments of him not communicating for months to try
• 34:14
  and get more money out of us, the things.
• 34:17
  And yeah, me and Matt and the other guys at MVP and MVT were
• 34:23
  having conversations for hours about how to get around this
• 34:26
  without it, you know, falling out of our hands.
• 34:29
  We had to be quiet about it for professional and then try to
• 34:33
  protect it. And then eventually we came to
• 34:35
  an agreement because there's a lot of damage on the buildings.
• 34:38
  It's going to need like 2 or 300 grams worth of repairs but then
• 34:43
  that will be fine for the next. It'll be protected and and
• 34:46
  secure like forever structurally for the next like 40-50 years or
• 34:52
  whatever. So.
• 34:53
  Wow, it's just. Sounds so nerve wracking though,
• 34:57
  yeah. Yeah, we got it over the line
• 34:59
  thanks to everyone's efforts. And yeah, now it's, it's in the
• 35:03
  hands of the community, which is ultimately that from day one
• 35:07
  when I came in here in 2013, that was all I wanted was to
• 35:12
  join us, just to stay as they join us.
• 35:14
  And we were still in debt from all the way up until COVID.
• 35:20
  It took me until February 2020 to pay off the previous owners
• 35:25
  debt of that 67 grand. And then the month after was was
• 35:31
  locked down. Crumbs, I was slacking the
• 35:34
  teeth. Yeah.
• 35:35
  Completely bonkers. You couldn't write it.
• 35:37
  And I was like, cool, at least we're back to zero.
• 35:40
  And then that happened. Do you, do you, do you feel more
• 35:45
  optimistic? I mean, given, you know, some of
• 35:47
  the challenges, which it doesn't matter who owns the venue or
• 35:51
  who's booking the venue, these these there's a lot of things
• 35:55
  that need to happen in the culture of grassroots touring to
• 35:59
  make to, you know, to answer some of the problems and the
• 36:02
  challenges. But do you feel now more
• 36:05
  optimistic? Obviously now?
• 36:07
  Well, at least you know, the possibility you is shutting down
• 36:10
  next week has gone away. That gives you some sort of
• 36:13
  stability, I imagine. Does that make you hopeful for
• 36:15
  the future? Yeah, 100%.
• 36:18
  It's more like, you know, the, the, the worry in the summer,
• 36:21
  like once the sale went through, you know, and Matt phoned me and
• 36:24
  was like that it's signed. It's you know, it's done and
• 36:28
  it's like this huge relief off of your back, which is like, you
• 36:32
  know, for like 810 years. Then like at any point at that
• 36:37
  point before the MVP deal came in, the joiners was just like a
• 36:41
  month to month date where on paper you're going, well, I can
• 36:45
  afford to pay. There were months save when that
• 36:48
  where I did, there was summers where I just didn't pay myself
• 36:51
  for three months because there was no money.
• 36:54
  So it's like I just work for free constantly.
• 36:57
  So you're just volunteering your full time job as a passion
• 37:00
  project to in order to keep the venue afloat.
• 37:04
  Because if you're the venue operator, you're aware that if
• 37:07
  you take money out the venue, you're just going to put it
• 37:09
  further and further in debt. So now I don't need to do that.
• 37:13
  But yeah, in terms of planning for the future like the building
• 37:15
  is totally secure and and MVPS amazing and all the people that
• 37:19
  have invested absolutely amazing and I hope they one day maybe we
• 37:24
  can give them all a brick each when we do the refurb.
• 37:30
  That's that's that's what I'm in it for.
• 37:32
  An actual brick with your initials etched into it.
• 37:37
  OK, perfect. That's that's what that's that's
• 37:39
  what we want. I think we're we're out of time.
• 37:42
  Thank you so much for talking to us and for giving us, you know,
• 37:46
  such a well, you know, for such clarity on, you know, what it's
• 37:50
  like sitting at your desk, which it sounds like you do for hours
• 37:56
  and hours and hours and hours. It's not as you've just heard,
• 38:01
  dear listeners, it's not an easy gig.
• 38:03
  This Ricky, thank you very much. We wish you all the.
• 38:06
  Best. Thank you.
• 38:06
  Thank you.