“Overall, operators have done a remarkable job to reopen their venues safely, and they need support to keep doing that” Mark Davyd, Music Venue Trust
hard enough, then more challenges just seem to build up and affect us in different ways. “What does concern me slightly is that venues nationwide were reporting similar levels of success when we first reopened, but by mid-September, owners in smaller cities and towns were saying that things had gone back to how it was pre-pandemic or, in some cases, worse than they were pre-pandemic. Bristol, along with a few other cities, seems to still be doing very well, but if there’s a broader downward trend it may well come to us eventually.” Official reports on the state of the UK’s nightlife sector make for worrying reading, too. In the past few weeks, the Night Time Industries Association (NTIA) have published a report linking close to 90,000 nightlife job losses to the pandemic, while fellow industry group UK Music estimate that one in three British music industry roles have been lost to the Covid-19 crisis. Both organisations have expressed concerns that many of those lost jobs could be gone for good, amid a 46% drop in the sector’s contribution to the UK economy in 2020.
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LOUD Bristol
In Bristol, venues of all shapes and sizes are still struggling to find and keep staff, Brexit is still affecting the supply of everything from cans of beer to CO2, and the potentiallycrippling introduction of Covid passports is still being mooted in parliament. It’s also worth noting here that while government support did eventually arrive last year in the form of the £1.57 billion Cultural Recovery Fund, some grassroots venues were offered next to nothing – or, in some cases, literally nothing – to help keep them afloat. In a bid to relieve the strain on independent venues, organisations nationwide have been campaigning for support for the nightlife sector since the very beginning of the pandemic. The Music Venue Trust have been instrumental in fighting for emergency backing, both at government and local level, and have played a pivotal role in securing the futures of beloved grassroots venues nationwide. The team directly supported several key venues in Bristol alone, through tireless campaigning and financial support. Speaking to LOUD, the organisation’s CEO Mark Davyd says
that although there are positives to take from a nationwide reopening, times are still hard for venue teams up and down the country. “Delivering every single show is an entirely new level of risk management for the whole team, exacerbated by the things you can’t control, such as Covid illness among artists or crew,” he explains. “The looming threat of a poorlyconsidered ‘Plan B’ being installed by the government without listening to the sector is still a genuine worry. Overall, operators have done a remarkable job to reopen their venues safely, and they need support to keep doing that.” In any case, grassroots venues are vital components of their local economies, as well as their surrounding communities. They allow people the freedom to create and experiment, providing opportunities for new generations of artists and contributing to a rich cultural offering for music lovers of all ages and backgrounds. IDLES started out at The Louisiana, Eats Everything cut his teeth at Basement 45, and Batu got his