1. The Difficulties Faced by Independent Music
Venues, a Case Study : Suki10c
Introduction
Independent music venues are often the platform used by emerging artists to present their work
to the public and so because of the plethora of emerging artists compared to big name stars,
there are a vast amount of independent music venues to accommodate them. ‘This variety of
venues is crucial not only to [the artist’s] career development but to the cultural lives of
audiences across the country.’ (Behr, Brennan & Cloonan, 2014)
Birmingham is home to many independent music venues that work alongside some of the larger
corporately owned venues in order to provide this city with a rich and heterogeneous sound.
One such independent is Suki10c of Digbeth, which is to be the focus of my study. Digbeth is
renowned in Birmingham for being the home of creativity and art as can be evidenced by the
volume of independently owned shops and music venues that are situated on a backdrop of
brightly colored graffiti. It boasts a number of music venues of which the Custard Factory and
Rainbow are the most well known.

2. Known as a Digbeth landmark, Suki10c ​(pronounced suck it and see) ​is ‘at the heart of
independent, creative clubbing and music in Birmingham’ (Design My Night, 2014 [online]) and
is said to be ‘one of the city’s more ‘underground and urban venues.’ (Design My Night, 2014
[online]) ​Suki10c is a joint venture between David Whittall and Laur Beech that involved
transforming a derelict pub. The transformation began in 2012 with the doors to the venue
opening on June 1st later that year. Since then, Suki10c has been the home of the
underground, hosting an ‘array of live music from many up and coming d&b, dubstep, hip­hop,
house, breaks, techno and grime DJs.’ (Design My Night, 2014 [online])
I am interested in observing the way that this club operates as business can be tough for
independent music venues, given that they usually do not have the large amounts of disposable
income that corporate/chain venues have. I want to know what difficulties Suki10c faces as an
independent in comparison to those faced by corporately owned venues and how this affects
the club’s practices.
I have chosen to base my research on Suki10c because it is a venue that has great potential yet
I feel that is underrated in terms of its success. This can also be said for a number of other
independent music venues and so in my exploration of the issues Suki10c faces I may be able
to understand the reasons behind the lack of commercial success generally seen by other
venues ­ which could in turn, point out some of the ways the success of such venues could be
improved.
I will use a political economy approach to analyse my findings as I am interested in the social
and power relations that affect Suki10c’s practices. In order to gain the necessary information I

3. interviewed venue owner David Whittall who was able to tell me first­hand what it is like to run
an independent music venue. I also performed three ethnographies on a variety of nights held at
Suki10c in order to broaden my research.
Suki10c
‘Music venues in general, are cultural places, cultural spaces. It’s not just a money making
commercial venture ­ it is all about cultural expression.’ (Appendix A)
As I sat talking to David Whittall inside the graffitied former pub now known as Suki10c, it
became clear to me how passionate about the place he is as we chatted, often animatedly, and
yet in depth for well over an hour. During our conversation there were many interruptions from
deliveries and numerous phone calls, proving that the life of an independent venue owner is all
go.
The following sub­headings aim to summarise my findings whilst placing them in context of the
wider live music industry.

4. The One Man Show
It was amazing to discover that a business such as Suki10c is currently being run by one man
and has been for the past two and a half years. When asked about his management structure
David laughed saying ‘I do everything’ (Appendix A). In total there are 6 people working with him
at the club and it is clear that with such a small number, David spends almost all his time
working for the club ­ something that I expect to be more common with independently run music
venues than in those corporately owned.
Starting Out ‐ You’ve Got to Have Money to Make Money
Before even thinking about gaining commercial success the first big problem for an independent
music venue owner arises ­ starting up. The idea of opening a new independent music venue is
a daunting one when you consider the costs involved, especially as this money is most likely to
come from your personal bank account and not from that of a big corporation as is the case with
corporately run venues. In the case of Suki10c the startup costs were larger than most as the
building was left empty for over 3 years allowing scrap thieves to break in and ‘rip it apart to get
all the metal out’ (Appendix A) This meant that it cost David £45,000 to set up. Investing so
much capital into a venture of this nature causes instant problems as without a return on this
sum, independents can quickly go under.

5. Debt
‘Thing with big chains is it’s ​easy​ for them to go bankrupt; to call in the receivers. Anyone who’s
relying solely on them, that chain, that’s end of story for them.’ (Appendix A) As an example
David uses the Institute repossession in 1995 to demonstrate that when a corporate business
gets in debt, they take as much money as possible in order to try and cover their debts and
when that fails, they close that particular club leaving many small companies out of pocket.
This is something that an independent venue owner cannot necessarily afford to do.
Prior to owning Suki10c David was involved in the running of several large events around
Birmingham, most notably ‘Drop Beats Not Bombs’ and it was after one of these events in
November 2007 that he lost £25,000 in one night. Due to huge production costs paired with a
smaller than expected crowd, a lot of money was now owed and he had to remortgage his flat in
order to pay off his creditors. This is one of the major differences between independent and
corporately owned music businesses who in this situation could have ‘just gone and written it off
and walked away from it’ (Appendix A). It is also very clear that debt can affect independent
music venue owners more personally, causing them to remortgage in this case.
Debt can also arise when legal action is required in order to keep a venue open. Birmingham
City Council caused Suki10c to fall into debt when they warned that they were going to issue a
noise abatement order following a complaint. Intent on keeping the club open, David ‘had to get
specialist solicitors involved. That cost £4,000.’ (Appendix A) The issue was that he did not have
the £4,000 to pay them and there was ‘nothing left in the bank’ (Appendix A). Over 2 years,
David has managed to slowly pay off this debt and £7,000 more using the income generated

6. from the club as well. For many independents who cannot rely on financial backing from a large
corporation, debt can seriously stunt business.
Licensing
‘There are several areas with a huge impact on live music that don’t necessarily refer directly to
it, and these cut across local and UK remits.’ (Behr, Brennan & Cloonan 2014) Licensing;
something that affects every single music venue whether independent or corporately owned. All
music venues are required to purchase a premises license with which they must stipulate what
their licensable activities, such as playing music, will be. As part of the process they are also
required by the council issuing the license to ‘pay for an advert to appear in a local newspaper
and that costs a huge amount of money.’ (Appendix A) As previously mentioned, finance, or
lack of is often the biggest problem that independent music venues face and so factors such as
the costs involved with licensing ‘can make the difference between a healthy and a struggling
local live music scene’ (Behr, Brennan & Cloonan, 2014)
Noise Abatement Orders

7. When asked if he had experienced issues with the Birmingham City Council that would affect
his business negatively David’s simple response was, ‘from day one.’ (Appendix A) And it
seems he is not alone. The Music Venues Trust held Music Venues Day this year in London
where a very popular topic of discussion was the issues that surround noise abatement orders
where they discussed how independent venues can set about changing the legislation that
allows for so many of them to be issued. ‘Part of the issue here is a clash of cultures between
live music and council administrators, whose job is to protect residents but who can sometimes
lack a sense of how a small venue operates.’ (Behr, Brennan & Cloonan, 2014) Therefore it is
clear that within the political economy of Birmingham, the council has a large amount of power
over independent music venues and ‘it is these independents that are most sensitive to the
interpretation of what constitutes unacceptable noise, and how officers balance the concerns of
residents and businesses. (Behr, Brennan & Cloonan, 2014) Corporate venues on the other
hand, tend to have enough money to position themselves outside of residential areas such as
Broad Street, thus avoiding this problem to an extent.
The Catch 22
It is clear so far that the biggest problem for independent music venues is finance, as David
explains ‘​there’s so much I could do with this place if I had £250,000’​(Appendix A) but due to
lack of funds this is not possible in the short term. Independents can often find themselves in
a catch 22 situation; they can only expand and improve their business and book big acts with
a lot of money, and they can only get this money from people attending their nights. The

8. problem arises when you consider that the audience are not likely to come unless the club has
made these improvements and booked these big acts. It is a vicious circle. With the financial
backing of larger wealthier companies, corporately owned venues seem to be able to escape
this cycle once they become established.
Combatting the Limitations
There are many limitations facing independent music venues, but that does not mean that the
owners are not finding ways to combat them. Thornton (1995: 138) states that ‘flyposting and
spray painting are effective means for rave organisations to gain a higher profile and draw a
crowd.’ They are also a fairly cheap method of advertising that independents like Suki10c can
use to draw a crowd without paying hundreds for large scale marketing. As money is limited,
David explains that he has to ‘come up with​ ​alternative ways of doing things’ (Appendix A) and
gives the example of buying a projector. This is positioned so that it can project onto the side of
the white building opposite, working as a useful promotional tool.
Independents can often operate at a loss and so I asked how David goes about combatting
these financial problems to which he replied ‘the only way to get through is to rack up loads of
debt and then talk nicely to people’ in the hope that agreements can be made so that money
can be paid back very slowly, but paid back nonetheless.

9. Another way independent venue owners across the country are trying to combat limitations is by
trying to bring into legislation the agent of change principle whereby residents that move into an
area with an existing music venue cannot make noise complaints as the venue was in place
before them. If successful this could spell a brighter future for many independents as the volume
of noise abatement orders will undoubtedly decrease.
It’s Not All Doom and Gloom
After reading about all the problems independent music venues face, you may question why
people still bother, but there are also many advantages to running one too. Firstly, they can be a
‘space for creative expression’ (Appendix A) with which you are free to do what you like as there
is not, as is the case with corporately run venues, someone higher up making all the decisions.
With this creative freedom, events such as anti­war protest parties can be held as the
independent venue owner is not restricted by the political positioning of a larger corporation who
may wish not to associate themselves with such things.
Independents are also more adapted to breaking up and coming artists in comparison to
corporately owned venues, who often prioritise ‘commercial, safe music’ (Appendix A) in order
to get the largest amount of people in so that they may sell them drinks and charge entry, thus
making money to please their shareholders. David explains that the difference between these
types of venues is passion; a corporately owned venue’s ‘only passion is profit’ (Appendix A)
and so they will be less likely to take risks booking in acts that may not deliver a return. For this

10. reason independents are more likely to book unknown acts purely because they like their music
and they think it deserves to be heard by others.
Also, what Suki10c has in common with many other independents is the fact that it is a
‘destination venue’ (Appendix A) which means that the people that attend don’t just stumble
across the venue whilst on a night out, they have chosen to go intentionally. It is because the
‘mainstream dickheads’ (Appendix A) do not stumble across the club that David claims he has
‘never had a fight in the venue’ (Appendix A) as opposed to some of the corporately run venues
in Birmingham who have experienced serious violence and stabbings.
United Digbeth
Within the club ecology of Digbeth, Suki10c is placed alongside other independents such as
Unplug, Lab11 and PST whom it can be said, are all in competition with the more established
venues in the area including the Custard Factory, Rainbow and the Institute (corporately owned
by MAMA & Company). Cohen (2007:112) tells us that ‘most music entrepreneurs spoke of the
benefits of working in close proximity to others involved in related activity.’ However, I
discovered that this is not always the case. The Birmingham Music Network was set up for just
these reasons with the aim of ‘​working with the local music community to stimulate growth,
inspire, and share knowledge’​ (Facebook, 2014 [online]) and yet many of the venue owners in
Digbeth are unable to attend the meetings due to their busy schedules, so it may not be working
as well as originally hoped. It is not that the venues are not willing to work with each other but

11. the simple fact that ‘everybody’s got their own agenda and their own adjectives’ (Appendix A)
and their time is ‘really taken up.’ (Appendix A)
Audience
‘In addition to being a culturally designed physical space, a club is a socially defined space
where a crowd can make or break the occasion.’ (Rietveld, 1998: 173) Fortunately, David
believes that the crowds he gets at Suki10c make the nights what they are. It seems that due to
it’s independent nature, and specialisation in underground music, Suki10c has a more personal
relationship with it’s audience who regularly engage with the club’s various event pages on
Facebook. He explains that it’s the little things that make a difference to an independent venue’s
audience. For instance, 15 hours were spent putting up christmas decor at Suki10c and David
recalls ‘responses from everyone on Facebook saying “wow it looked amazing, it was
completely transformed.”’ (Appendix A) The intimate relationship that this club has with its
audience might mean that the audience themselves feel a sense of ownership over the club, so
that small efforts to improve it are better appreciated than in perhaps a bigger corporate club. ‘A
fragile moment of a sense of belonging to a community is thereby set up, which needs
protection.’ (Rietveld, 1998: 175)

12. Wider Music Industry
“Look at the big big music labels and the artists that they sign, where do they come
from? They start at a grassroots level in small venues like this. You know people like
Borgore, one of the biggest dubstep artists in the world, he used to come and play for us
for £50 and stay at my mates house on the sofa. People like that, they start at a small
level. If those small venues aren’t there, where do those artists come from?”
Appendix A
Small venues such as Suki10c have the unique ability to ‘provide both performance and social
spaces for rising acts. ‘They feed into an area’s ‘local character’ – its musical history – in a way
that makes them difficult to replace. This social aspect of independent venues, along with the
relationships that derive from it, is the seed­bed from which a town or city’s musical reputation
grows.’ (Behr, Brennan & Cloonan, 2014) Therefore it is clear that in the wider ecology of the
music industry, independent venues play a significant role. Although there are many varied
routes into the industry, many of the acts that sell out large venues still start out performing at
small independent venues. The role that an independent plays involves ‘building an audience up
for an artist’ (Appendix A) so that when they are scouted by larger music businesses such as
record companies ‘they’re not just launching an unknown quantity onto the world, they’ve
already got that grassroots audience.’ (Appendix A)

13. The Bigger Picture
It is clear then that without small independent music venues, the music industry as a whole
would suffer and so this calls into question the treatment of independents. If independent
venues play such a necessary role in showcasing the next big stars, then why to date are there
so many factors that limit their success? ‘Policymakers need to pay more heed to the economic
and cultural contribution of smaller venues. Local regimes often focus their attention on major
developments whose key beneficiaries are larger businesses.’ (Behr, Brennan & Cloonan,
2014) Venues such as Suki10c can be of much importance to a city and the development of it’s
local identity as found by Cohen (2007: 38). She stated that ‘music provided an occasion and
focus for social gatherings and social interaction, sometimes leading to social mixing and an
exchange of musical styles and influences. Music thus played a central role in the production of
individual, collective and local identity within the city.’ This is important as without these different
local identities, areas would likely be more homogenous in musical taste.
Conclusion
My research suggests that there are a wide number of limitations that stand in the way of
Suki10c, indicating that the market for independent music venues is a tough one to succeed in.
But, although independents may face many limitations, it is often the commercially successful
that are limited creatively.

14. In terms of the political economy of the city, I would suggest that the majority of the power
resides with the council who can sometimes be the difference between success and closure.
Additionally, David believes that ‘huge organisations should be giving a percentage of their
profits to the small venues to keep them going’ (Appendix A) and so it can be said that lack of
financial support from some of the businesses that rely on independents for their success is also
impeding those same independents.
I could argue that although Suki10c is perhaps not obtaining the commercial success that it
deserves, it’s value within the community, within Birmingham music culture itself is far too great
to put a pricetag on. After speaking to many people who have attended nights at the club and
after reading conversations that people have had about it online it is clear to see that people are
passionate about it. They feel they have some connection with the club itself. This perhaps, may
be the difference between a lot of independently run clubs as opposed to corporately owned
chains ­ although they may not sell the cheapest drinks, or get the biggest names to perform,
people care about them more because they are unique to the city’s culture; you will not find
another Suki10c.
Appendix A
Whittall, D. (2014). ​Running Suki10c.​ ​Interviewed by Emma Moore. Suki10c, Digbeth,
Birmingham. 10/12/14 18:00.
Transcript:

15. Emma: So basically my question is about like independent music venues versus like commercial
music venues like walkabout and revs, that type of stuff and my question is, to what extent is
like limited in gaining commercial success while it’s operating as an independent music venue
based in Birmingham. So that’s the question I’m aiming to answer, and I’ve got questions that
like if you answer it’d help me answer that basically. So erm, first things first, for someone who’s
never heard of Suki, just really quickly, how would you describe it?
Dave: um it’s um an underground um, the way I’d describe it is it’s a space for creative
expression. So however people interpret creative expression and I’m open to whatever people
want to interpret that as. It’s um underground music, unsigned bands/singer/songwriters, er
graphic artists, painters; anybody that wants to do something creative, it’s there for them.
Emma: So erm when you set it up that was 2012? Or was it 2011? Because I think it was on the
Facebook page saying it opened in June 2012?
Dave: yeah it’s 2012 yeah cause it’s been 2 and a half years now.
Emma: It seems like it’s been longer like it feels like it’s been open longer for some reason. It
feels like something that should have always been here. Yeah like so initially why did you
decide to set it up?
Dave: Well I had always wanted to have my own club, um see I started going out clubbing when
I was like 12 years old but that was like it was a Saturday afternoon disco like 1978 um and it
was like you know Saturday night fever, that’s the kind of thing that.. it was a disco with disco
music.. um yeah so there was that and I was involved in all sorts of things like I was in the cubs
and the scouts and so I then got into the Birmingham Gang Show in the 70’s which was like
onstage at the Birmingham Hippodrome. It was like, outside of London it was the biggest Scout
production in the country. It had like really famous people involved in the production side of it
and I loved that and it was all like you know singing and dancing and like proper big
performances and I loved it and did that for like 3 years. Um and then when I got a bit older
when I was like 16 I was b­boy, I was breakdancing and travelling around the country
breakdancing and body popping. We were on tv doing.. so music’s always been a big part of
what makes me me. And I’d been promoting, I’d worked in.. life takes you off in different
directions so I’ve been a restaurant manager working in kitchens for about 11 years. Erm I was
working at a place called Stoodi Bakers on Broad Street. I was the kitchen manager there. Erm
and I was at university doing my degree in hospitality management..
Emma: Where was that, was that in Birmingham?
Dave: When I was there it was UCB. Birmingham college of food and UCB which.. UCB was the
Perry Barr campus so there’s a lot of things that have changed over time.
Emma: Yeah cause I think it’s in the city centre now isn’t it.

16.
Dave: But so I was doing all of that. Um and it got the point where I’d started going out to the
Que club and I was like I’d love to do this. I was like right I’m gonna give it a go so I put an event
on and er that was at the Institute.
Emma: Was that the drop beats event?
Dave: No no no this one was called circle tribe and this was in november 1995 when I first
started planning it and it was supposed to happen in January/February ‘96 and the 2 weeks
before it was supposed to happen, I went passed the venue and this was after I paid all my
deposits and paid for the venue and paid for everything else and er there were workmen
boarding the nightclub up and I was like what’s going on here?
Emma: Where was this was that at the Institute?
Dave: the Institute yeah
Emma: So what was that about then?
Dave: So basically the people who were running it at the time hadn’t paid the council, um and
they had loads and loads of bills outstanding and so it had been repossessed and..
Emma: And obviously they were taking money and still trying to cover the debts..
Dave: yeah, yeah. So I lost everything.
Emma: So you didn’t get any of that back?
Dave: Nope. No that’s what happens when companies go bust, when it’s limited (ltd)
companies.
Emma: Surely there’s some legal issues, surely you could get it back?
Dave: It’s terrible. It really is terrible. Well you know like small companies get screwed and you
get these huge companies and when they go bankrupt, because they’re limited companies, an
entity in itself, it’s the limited company that is liable for the debt and once it goes bust you don’t
get any of the money back that’s owed to you. And it is terrible. It can destroy small companies,
it can destroy them.
Emma: yeah cause they’ve not got the funds to back it
Dave: When especially if they’ve relied on a single supplier like a single big organisation like you
were saying about the difference between independents and small independent venues and big

17. chains and that is one of the things. Thing with big chains is it’s, you know I wouldn’t say they do
it lightly but it’s easy for them to go bankrupt. To call in the receivers and anyone who’s relying
solely on them, that chain, that’s end of story for them.
Emma: Mmm it’s horrible. So yeah you decided to set up Suki then after..
Dave: Nope, that was.. I then managed a few bands and I organised a few live band events
around Birmingham. Weekly live band gigs. There was one at a place called carpe diem where I
put 3 bands on and had a dj afterwards and one of the djs came to me one day in 1998 and he
said.. well basically his dad owned a nightclub which isn’t there anymore which was called
Bonds Nightclub which is where Miss Moneypenny’s started and they had nothing booked in
and he said do you want to do an event next week and I was like alright then! So we printed one
invitation, they weren’t flyers they were invitations and then we photocopied loads of them on to
card, cut them out and went and gave them to people and said there’s this party next week, this
is your invitation and the queue was all the way down the street and it was only like the top part
of the club which was what we were using. It was only small like maybe a bit like this really.
(suki10c) Umm and it was heaving. It was supposed to be a one off and Justin said right umm..
turned all the music off.. and said we’re going to do it again next week. Oh okay! Alright then
cheers Justin, okay we’ll do it next week then and that then went on for about 8 months and
then it became, it just got bigger and bigger and we ended up going downstairs and using the
rest of the club and erm.. it was just pretty,pretty immense. It was called boogie down brum and
that’s why I’m called Boogie Dave because of that night. So, did that but then through doing
that, you know, we kept booking djs to come and play and you start getting a reputation and
your network expands. That came to an end and then there was a place called Sputnik which
was a tiny little like 50 capacity bar. We used to go dj there every week, every Friday night
cause it was downstairs and we always used to go. we didn’t get paid for it but we got drinks so
we’d all get absolutely hammered and because it was downstairs we’d fall down the stairs so we
called it tumble down. Then from tumble down, that bar got closed down and we were like oh
we’ve got to find somewhere else and the academy had just opened in Dale End and so we
approached them about doing Friday nights in the bar of the academy which is now just
reopened as, is it Swish? Well that was the academy and that’s where we were doing Friday
nights for months and months and months and then… It was just before, yeah so the invasion of
Iraq was 2003. So we were doing that in 2002 and the was the whole thing of the attack on the
world trade centre and there was this… Everybody knew the americans were going to invade
iraq, it was going to happen and there was the whole thing about the weapons inspectors and
there was just this public opinion about it. One of our friends Ian Norton, his mum is Carol
Norton and she at the time was the chairwoman of the national CND, campaign for nuclear
disarmament. They were with like the stop the war alliance. There was like this groundswell of
opinion against any kind of war. We’re all sat in that club in that bar one night having a game of
pool and we were like let’s do a protest event and that was how drop beats not bombs started. It
was like the campaign for nuclear disarmament, they wanted to back it. They wanted to be able
to connect with younger people. We were like we want to do this event… I went down to the

18. institute which by that time was up and running again and the guy managing it was the same
guy managing it when I’d tried to put that night on and it all went tits up.
Emma: So were you a bit wary then?
Dave: No no no his name’s John Eaton and he was sound. It was never his fault, it was the
people above him. I went and spoke to him and said look we want to do this protest event with
campaign for nuclear disarmament… he was like I used to be a member of campaign for
nuclear disarmament, I used to go on protests and whatever, yes you can have the club. So we
were like okay cool, bearing in mind that we had this weekly Friday night event where we’d have
about 50 or 70 people turn up and I phoned up djs that we’d booked for different things and I
messaged all sorts of random people, magicians from channel 5, Mark Little from Neighbours
and I said look we’re gonna do this anti war event. It’s free, we can’t pay you, will you come and
be part of it? And it was just like loads of people were like yep we’re gonna come. We’ll be part
of it. We’ll be involved and so we got these flyers printed and went and handed them out
everywhere and like I say we were having like 50­70 people on the Friday night and we were
like right okay, loads of djs, loads of different rooms, how many people do you reckon will
come? Oh I don’t know, 400­500? We opened the door and there was 2000 people outside and
it was like wow! Massive queue of people came in and it was just the most amazing night, the
energy and the…
Emma: So there was enough room for everyone in there then because I know sometimes they
shut off some of the rooms to make it smaller?
Dave: Yeah I mean at that club yeah. The reaction from people was always positive as well but
like I say we were having on a Friday night between 50 and 70 people so we weren't expecting
that many people.
Emma: Word of mouth gets round I guess…
Dave: It was the whole thing about don’t attack Iraq and then it just… That was supposed to be
a one off event and like last year I did the 10 year anniversary
Emma: Yeah I saw it on the facebook page, I stumbled across it.
Dave: Yeah so 10 years and it was just like …
Emma: Did you do it in the Institute again?
Dave: We did the following September, because people were saying on the night you can’t not
do another one you’ve got to do another one so I was like yeah okay! And then it just got bigger
and bigger. The biggest one was like 10,000 people over 3 days, you know, it was just like this
huge beast.

19.
Emma: So did you do 3 nights because you didn’t have the capacity to fit everyone in on one
night or?
Dave: Originally it was just 1 night, each time we just did it for 1 night. More and more stages, it
kind of changed the clubbing landscape of Birmingham because the Custard Factory, you had
the medicine bar and then I started doing events where I’d have the medicine bar, the lake
would be drained with a marquee. The road outside the Custard Factory would be closed and
there’d be a marquee there. The little oval pool was drained with a marquee over there. The old
library, the north yard, it just got bigger and bigger. You know the warehouse at the Custard
Factory now, that big venue…
Emma: Yeah
Dave: That was just a factory space and I approached the custard factory and said let me use it
and they were like .. alright then. So we went in there and we just put staging in and sound
systems and lights. So it just went on and on and became this massive thing and every event
lost money. It never ever made more than it cost to do, to put on. Then in November 2007 we
lost £25,000 in one night.
Emma: Wow… Is that because you weren’t charging people to get in or anything were you…
Dave: No well when we started it was free and we were expecting people to contribute so we
had people with buckets saying pay donations and it worked out the average donation on that
night, the very first one was 40 pence. 40 pence per person and we were like right okay next
one we’ll charge £1 in. So we did and less people came than the first one but it was still, erm I
think it was 1,200 people. But yeah so it just went on and then in May 2007, that’s when we had
10,000 people over 3 days but it was 5 stages on each day. Then we did in September the
opening night of the Que club and that was heaving, absolutely rammed. But then did
November and like in the September this guy got involved. He was like I’m a businessman and
I’ll help you manage it so that it’ll make money and then he was like if you’re going to do it in
November, you’ve got to charge £20 a ticket. So when it was 12 stages, but to the general
public it was like well in May you charged £15 a ticket but that was for 3 days, you could have
come for every one of those 3 days and all they saw was November it’s £20 for one day. But it
was 12 stages, it was enormous. But it just went from on the Saturday night in May we had just
under 5,000 people came and the Saturday in November it dropped to 1,200. But the production
costs had carried on going up. So it cost a fortune and I​ ​had to remortgage my flat to pay all the
people off. Like I was saying, big companies, they’ll have just gone and written it off and walked
away from it. But I couldn’t do that because I wasn’t a limited company. It was never set up as
that it was just like jumping on a wild horse and holding on. That’s what it was like, it just carried
on going and going I should’ve in hindsight said right I’m not doing this anymore, I’m stopping
now. But because I was so wrapped up in it and everyone was always talking about it and
asking like when’s the next one and people saying they wanted to come and dj or whatever.

20. Bearing in mind that 12 stages, 9pm til 6am ­ that’s 9 hours, on 12 stages that’s like 108 hours
of acts and all of those acts, and we’re not just talking about 1 dj on each stage, it would be
multiple live acts you know, like bands. The one at the Que club we had a 40 piece classical
orchestra that did drum and bass, the London Breakbeat Orchestra. I just went out looking for
the most amazing things I could find so that people would have an amazing time but while they
were having an amazing time they were being... the message drop beats not bombs was being
planted in their subconscious. It’s what brands do like Smirnoff and Bacardi they do these
events not because…
Emma: ...and you have a great time and you associate it with the brand.
Dave: Yep, yep it’s all about product placement and so the product I was placing was an anti
war message ­ that’s what it was all about. So yeah, it was an experience.
Emma: So from that did you then think right I want to get my own venue.
Dave: No like I say I’d always wanted my own venue and basically when I was out doing those
nights and flyering and whatever, I would be flyering in town and I would walk down here and
see this place with the to let sign outside and it was shut for about 3 and a half years. So for 3
and a half years I was walking past this and I kept thinking you know like I want my own place,
one day one day. And then Krios who is the guy in the picture behind the bar, he was like part of
drop beats crew and he was involved in everything we did and he was killed in a car crash. That
was the point where I was like…
Emma: …. Life’s too short
Dave: Yeah, I mean I was with him on the Wednesday and then on the Sunday, like he went to
London for his birthday and on the Sunday he was driving from London to Hastings and a car
crashed into his and killed him and I was like … Everything’s gone, in the blink of an eye. So
don’t just talk about it, don’t just think I’ll do it next week, I’ll do it next year, I’ll do it whenever
cause something will happen and you’ll never have done it. So then I just phoned them up and
was like look, i’ll come look at the place. Walked in and it was like a bombsite, it was just unreal.
It had been broken into by scrap thieves and they ripped it apart to get all the metal out and
yeah it was just err… and like when I walked in, cause they hadn’t told me any of that had
happened, that it had been broken into. So I thought oh just a lick of paint and I’ll get some of
my artist friends down and we’ll make it look different and when I walked in I was like wowwww.
Fuck. And I thought no, there’s no way I can do this and I said to the guy I said this isn’t what I
expected, I didn’t know that it was going to be in this state and he said well someone at the
office should have told you about this and just as we were about to leave he said to me, there is
an insurance payout when the place was broken into and all the damage done, the insurance
company paid for all the damage and he said rather than do the work and leave it empty, that
money is in a holding account so that when a new tenant comes in, they get that money. It’ll be
released to them to do the work and I was like oh okay and off I went thinking I’ll just get a

21. builder in, just get a quote. So I did, I got this builder in he was like oh yeah just sort the toilets
out and do this and that and that’ll be like £12,000 and the amount that was in the holding
account was £25,000 and I was thinking that leaves me money to do all the decor and money to
buy stock, I can do that. So then I was like okay I’m interested and I kept phoning and emailing
the agent and he was like oh I’ll get back to you next week and this went on for a year and then
I phoned up and they said that agent had left the company. So I was like what’s going on and
they said okay there’s a new agent dealing with it now. I spoke to him and he said there are 15
other interested parties so they asked all of us for letters of intent so I had to give a proposal of
what I intended to do blah blah and a friend of mine Laur, I’d spoken to her about it. She’d said
that she was interested in opening a club and I was like look do you want to come in on this with
me and she said yes and um we put the proposal together and the guy turned round and he
went out of everyone I’ve spoken to, you’re the person I want to give the place to. I was like
wicked! Then we got a builder in and he went like… £80,000 it’s going to cost to do this…
Emma: So who was this first guy working for cheaps!
Dave: His view of what we wanted, I think he just misunderstood what work was going to be
involved. And that person that came in and said £80,000 was actually Laur’s uncle and he does
bars and clubs. So we were like jesus, 80! Where are we gonna get £60,000 from? So I then
approached a builder I knew and said look this is how much money we’ve got, it can’t be any
more than this. And he came to have a look and was like £25,000? Eventually though it ended
up being £45,000.
Emma: Well you halved it!
Dave: Yep, and everyone asks how we did it for that much money, and the fact that we also did
it in 6 weeks from the moment we got the key to the moment we opened was 6 weeks. It was
just non stop. It was an amazing experience.
Emma: Okay so how do you operate with the delegation of roles, I mean would you say you’re
like management…
Dave: I do everything
Emma: Okay so how many people do you have working with you?
Dave: There’s about 6 on the crew
Emma: So being an independent music venue owner, problems would you say you face
businesswise?
Dave: Erm the biggest thing really is finance, not having the resources to do stuff. There’s so
much I could do with this place if I had, say I had £250,000 it would be a completely different

22. place. So much extra work would be done but I’ve got to bide my time and build up a little bit of
money and then do something else..
Emma: It’s like I was saying to someone the other day it’s like a catch 22 like you can only get
like big names or crazy stuff done if you get huge amounts of people in and…
Dave: and then how can you get the people in without … It is definitely catch 22. But, it’s also
that people like this venue for what it is. It’s got no airs and graces, it doesn’t try to be anything
more than it actually is. It’s not trying to be a superclub. It’s a little underground venue for parties
of 30, 40, 50, 60, 100. That’s it.
Emma: yeah so that leads on to one of my other questions; how would you feel if say the club
wasn’t in your hands and it was turned into a commercial club?
Dave: I don’t think it would be able to, it’s not big enough.
Emma: Mmmm but if they tried to do that but on a small scale, like you were saying you love the
underground aspect, it is what it is and I’d imagine that would be like a nightmare for you like
you wouldn’t want it to be like that because it would lose everything that it’s about
Dave: I don’t think it would be able to, I don’t know
Emma: Because I think that yeah people respect it for what it is
Dave: some people hate the place too! They’re like I’m not going there it’s all dirty, they want to
be going to clubs on Broad Street.
Emma: Different tastes I suppose. So back to the problems I’ve written here that finance could
also cause problems with things like awareness because you’ve not got money for lots of
advertising
Dave: Yeah, you have to think of different ways. You’ve got to come up with​ ​alternative ways of
doing things, like the projector. I spent £500 on that but £500 on flyers would be 4 or 5 different
runs of flyers and that would be your money gone whereas that, I can project over there, what I
want, when I want and it’s always there. Stickers, we’ve done stickers before and it is also word
of mouth. This grows by word of mouth without lots of money spent on marketing.
Emma: Yeah cause like before I approached you last year with DHD I always noticed the
building and thought it looked really cool and took pictures of it and stuff..
Dave: But you still didn’t know what it was
Emma: No like…

23.
Dave: That’s what I like, that intrigue about it, people are like what is that?
Emma: I know I just thought oh it’s just some cool building that’s been graffitied, I don’t know
what they do. But yeah like I’ve obviously told people about it like that how Fraser knew and so I
think the word of mouth works in a good way, like only the people who want to be here because
they’re interested come here.
Dave: Yeah like the thing is with Suki10c, Suck it and see means to try something new and see
if you like it. But a lot of people interpret it as being rude.
Emma: Would you say regulation­wise like issues with say council licensing, have you had any
issues that would affect your business negatively?
Dave: From day one. The noise nuisance complaints that’s been a massive… Like I was in
London yesterday for the small venues trust venues day 2014 and they got like 150/160 venues
from all around the country. Went down there and that was amazing but everyone was talking
about er issues with noise. Noise abatement orders. They’re trying to bring into legislation this
thing called agent of change and that’s basically a concept whereby , cause there’s loads of
venues that have been there for like 40,50,60 years and then you get developers come and buy
a building next to it or across the road and redevelop that into apartments and then when people
move in they complain about the venue, the noise from the venue and it’s like well hold on, that
was there first. You are the agent of change. And what they’re saying is that if its an agent of
change concept, those people cannot complain about the noise from a venue that already
exists. It’s there, you know about it when you’re going to buy your property and before you move
in there so how can you make a complaint about the noise and venues like this and​ ​music
venues in general, are cultural places, cultural spaces. It’s not just a money making commercial
venture it is all about cultural expression. Look at the big big music labels and the artists that
they sign, where do they come from?​ ​They start at a grassroots level in small venues like this.
You know people like Borgore, one of the biggest dubstep artists in the world, he used to come
and play for us for £50 and stay at my mates house on the sofa. People like that, they start at a
small level. If those small venues aren’t there, where do those artists come from?
Emma: Yeah I was literally reading this earlier like in articles because it’s just a stupid situation
to penalise the people who are on a lower level and then like have the bigger companies
succeed because they don’t get anything without these smaller guys..
Dave: Yep, that is exactly what was being said yesterday. One of the things that was being
suggested was that… because they had all sorts of people there. They had a couple of MPs, a
few different organisations they had some big agents there um and they were saying that all of
these people, these big agents, that they are successful and like you’ve got big arena tours and
and record labels and they’re all successful because of these tiny little venues. You know, you
build an audience up for an artist and then those people come in and take them but because

24. they’ve already got that grassroots audience they’re not just launching an unknown quantity
onto the world. They know people relate to that artist and there is something there and so they
then make huge amounts of money. They were saying yesterday that those huge organisations
should be giving a percentage of their profits to the small venues to keep them going. Every
single person that was there was saying similar to me like I haven’t paid myself yet in 2 and a
half years and there was other people going yeah I haven’t paid myself yet for 18 months, I
haven’t paid myself for a year but we all do what we do because we love doing it whereas
further up they do it to make money.
Emma: Yeah because if they didn’t get paid for 2 years I bet they’d be kicking off
Dave: Yeah… it was a good day. A lot came out of it and I can imagine there’ll be some erm..
Emma: Cause I was reading about all the noise abatement orders and stuff, didn’t the council
threaten you with closure at one point?
Dave: Yeah a noise abatement order. Problem with a noise abatement order is if they issue a
noise abatement order, the dickhead up the road who’s always complaining, he will then ask for
our license to be called in for review because his objective is to get us closed down.
Emma: Why?
Dave: Because he just doesn’t want us to be here. He doesn’t even live there he owns the
hostel. But yeah so they were going to issue a noise abatement order. I had to get specialist
solicitors involved just to stop that from happening, that cost £4,000. And I didn’t have the
£4,000 to pay them. I didn’t tell them that, I just said look you know, I need you to represent us
and they went into meetings with us and they were fantastic and then erm then Laur left the
business because she’d just had enough of everything. They were sending the invoices to
Laur’s house not to me here and I never contacted them cause I was just trying to get through
like… This place it would be like there would be nothing left in the bank at all and I would have
to take the last £200 of my own money that I had and go and buy stock for the next night, that’s
how it was. Now it’s 2 and a half years down the line and now we’re building up stock levels,
we’ve got quite a lot of stock. We take enough money to be able to pay all the bills, like that
£4,000, I said to them look I don’t have the money to give you, can we do a monthly payment
plan and fortunately they said yes. So that was the only way I got through that paying them
monthly. I had about £4,000 of rent arrears and like I managed to pay all of that off. I had the old
security firm that we used I owed them £3,000, I’ve paid that off so you know, it’s been a long
hard struggle, really hard but if you fall at the first hurdle, why did you bother in the first place?
That’s the way I look at it.
Emma: There’s no point going that far to just give up type of of thing.
Dave: Yep

25.
Emma: Erm so just Suki is your main source of income but do you have any other work outside
of Suki?
Dave: Nope
Emma: So your acts who you get in here, where do you find them? Do you look online and
approach people?
Dave: The majority of the events that happen here are external promoters. Like I said I used to
promote events all the time but doing this… If you’re going to promote an event you have to be
able to go out there and be handing out flyers and going to all the different events there are
giving flyers to people at those events to get them to come to your event. I can’t do that, I’ve got
to be here all of the time so I can’t do that I can’t do my own events. Every now and again I will
do my own event but it’s very few and far between.
Emma: So like the dj destruction thing that’s on this weekend, is that your own?
Dave: That’s in house yeah. The very first year we did a dj destruction competition and I was
like right, I’m going to do that every year​ ​because it gives something back to people. There’s
only going to be one winner but every one of them has got the opportunity to win that money.
Emma: Yeah and they get the chance to play and be part of it
Dave: Yeah and it’s something that I will carry on every year.
Emma: So that’s an annual event, are there any other annual ones?
Dave: Nope apart from the birthday event so that’s like the 31st of May is when we opened so
around that point would be like the… this year we had the 2nd birthday so next year will be the
3rd birthday. And there’s always the Boogie Dave birthday and our christmas party.
Emma: So weekly events am I right it’s just Thor and the sunday i and i is it?
Dave: The acoustic night which was wednesdays.Sunday i and i that was years ago.
Emma:Oh was it, I was reading this online you see and I was like oh I haven’t heard about that
one, maybe it’s new.
Dave: We tried it and it was a sunday reggae session and nobody came, no matter what we did
nobody came. So yeah the sunday i and i, we actually made a newspaper because it was based
on the sunday times, it was the sunday i and i.

26. Emma: So yeah is it just weekly now it’s just thor?
Dave: Thor and then the acoustic events but that’s now having a break until January next year
and that will be on sundays now because we tried it on weekly wednesdays and people just
didn’t come. But that was an external promoter as well.
Emma: Yeah cool so it’s mainly external people that come in and approach you and..
Dave: Yep, hire the venue and I also currently have a court case ongoing with PRS (performing
rights society) They came on the day that we were opening and said to Laur, if you play music
you have to have a PRS license and if you’re opening tonight you need to sign this contract with
us now or else tomorrow once you’re open it’ll be more expensive, the license that you have to
pay. So she signed it and everything and they basically misrepresented the facts to her and that
will be my legal defence because I’ve had argument after argument with them saying we don’t
owe you anything and they’re like but you’ve signed this contract and I’m like no, you said if you
play music you have to have a license. That is not the way it is. You only need to have a license
with them if you play music that they’ve been authorised by the copyright holder to collect the
royalties for. That is not the same as if you play music. I’m saying to them we’re an underground
music venue, the artists that come and play here, they’re not member of PRS. The music that
gets played here is not PRS members music and they’re like oh well it will be and I’m like no you
can’t say oh well it will be. But then additionally as I said to them, I nor any of my staff, play any
music, we don’t. We hire the venue out and we sell alcohol. It’s the promoters that come in and
they’re like oh but you facilitate it. That’s not the law. If you’re saying anyone that facilitates it
then my landlord has to have a license from you, Birmingham City Council have to have a
license from you because they issue a license to play music so they should be getting a license
from you do you know what I mean? They basically go to businesses all across the country and
rape them for money. They don’t generate any money they just take money. You go to a
hairdressers and they’ll have a PRS sign because if a hairdressers plays the radio they have to
have a license to play the radio which I think is outrageous. The radio has already paid for a
license to play the music so why then does the little hairdresser have to pay again? This is what
gets me, the dj buys the music so at that point the artist and the label and everyone else has
been paid for that item they’ve produced. They way they manipulate it is that anytime that then
gets played they’re owed money because it’s being played. It annoys me, so we’ll see what
happens when we go to court. Fuck them.
Emma: Okay so differences between Suki and and a commercial/corporately owned venue,
what do you think independents can do that chains can’t do?
Dave: They wouldn’t break up and coming artists. Their priority is commercial, middle of the
road, safe music. That’s what they do. Their priority is to sell alcohol, that’s the only thing that
they’re interested in. Just taking as much money as they can. They have shareholders, it’s all
about the bottom line. It is about the bottom line here but it’s also about a passion for what we

27. do. They don’t have a passion at all. Their only passion is profit and that is the biggest
difference.
Emma: So you’ve got up the road Custard Factory and the Rainbow, how hard is it, do you think
it’s hard to work in relation with them or do you compliment each other?
Dave: There’s been conversations before about all of us as Digbeth venues we should be
working together to do this that and the other but everybody’s got their own agenda and their
own adjectives and our time is really taken up doing what we do and it’s really difficult, like even
going to London yesterday it was so difficult to actually get that organised for myself to be able
to go and do it and its the same with like… There’s something called the Birmingham Music
Industry Group that Birmingham City Council kind of set up. It was supposed to be venue
owners, anyone involved in music in Birmingham was welcome to be part of this group. But like
they would arrange a meeting and it was like like ugh god I’ve got to get to that meeting…
Emma: Yeah,can’t make it type thing…
Dave: Um… but I think the number of venues there are in Digbeth now, it makes the whole area
a more attractive proposition for clubbers to go to..
Emma: Definitely yeah because it’s kind of like say like the Shoreditch of Birmingham. Like
people think of Shoreditch and think like oh yeah culture and art and cool little venues and stuff
like that and I think Digbeth’s kind of the same in Birmingham,
Dave: Yeah you’ve got us, Lab 11, Boxxed, Custard Factory, Rainbow, PST, Unplug, Institute,
got all these places in and around the same area. I think it’s good.
Emma: Do you think it’s possible for an independent to achieve commercial success while not
selling out and becoming less authentic or more mainstream?
Dave: Well you see that’s the issue isn’t it like the majority of people see the Rainbow as having
done exactly that. It used to be just a small pub on it’s own and then it opened another little bit
and another little bit and as it got bigger and more successful, more commercial, now it has to
have because of the size of it, it has to have commercially successful events because if it
doesn’t it’s got huge bills to pay…
Emma: So it’s kind of like you’ve got to weigh it up a bit, so yeah like I was saying earlier,
independents often operate at a loss or just breakeven so to combat this, have you found any
ways of combatting this?
Dave: Erm well the only way to get through all of that was just to rack up loads of debt and then
talk nicely to people and get to the point where like I say I’ve managed to pay it off.

28. Emma: This is a bit less serious, does suki have like a motto or what does it stand for?
Dave: Like i say, suck it and see because it means try something new.
Emma: Cool so regular acts you’ve got like 4 right? Ant and Disgrace and…
Dave: Ant and Disgrace, Rancid and Fingers yeah I mean they’re the only people that we really
have here on a regular basis.
Emma: Yeah do they work just here or do they work at other venues?
Dave: Disgrace does, Disgrace is at Bodega all the time and Green Room he works at.
Emma: So do you have any connections with music businesses in Brum?
Dave: In term of promoters?
Emma: Any kind of links with any businesses
Dave: Because I’ve got like a huge network of contacts. I’ve been promoting for 20 years so I’ve
got a massive network of people that you know, when you’re out flyering you just build up
contacts and then… It’s like being… Coca Cola is the biggest brand on the planet and yet you
still see Coca Cola marketing and they put branding everywhere even though they are the
biggest brand on the planet. It’s the same kind of thing with this game. If you’re known for 12
months and then you stop doing what you’re doing everyone will forget about you and no­one
will remember you. As long as you’re constantly doing what you’re doing and you’re constantly
out at events and like I say for 20 years that’s what I was doing and so you’re then remembered
because you’ve implanted yourself into people’s minds…
Emma: Yeah you’ve got a background and stuff. Okay so like you’re promotional material like
your flyers do you make it all?
Dave: Yeah I do photoshop
Emma: So what nights have you stopped doing, you said the sunday i and i because people just
didn’t come. Are there any other nights you’ve stopped doing for particular reasons?
Dave: Yeah the wednesday night acoustic for the same reason because people don’t come so
we’ll try it on sundays next year and see what happens.
Emma: So who would you say you’re main competition is?

29. Dave: It’s every other music venue in Digbeth, PST, Plug, not really Lab 11, um the Rainbow
because now they’ve opened they’ve got Spotlight and NextDoor..
Emma: Almost at the end now so partners and collaborators, who’s your work partner did you
say?
Dave:Vinnie is my business partner now. I did have Laur but it just got too much for her like…
Emma: Yeah fair enough so is there any other collaborators or are you just a one man show?
Dave: Yep pretty much! Apart from my delightful colleagues.
Emma: So licensing­wise, I don’t know a lot about them but I know there’s a lot you need to
get…
Dave: Yeah you have to have a premises license and you have to put on your premises license
what you licensable activities will be. So playing music is a licensable activity, dancing is a
licensable activity. It’s like if we weren’t selling alcohol or playing music or anything and people
were dancing we’d need to have a license for people to allow them to dance on the premises.
It’s the same license serving refreshments after 11pm is a licensable activity.
Emma: For every license you have to pay?
Dave: It’s one license but you have to stipulate, a licensed premises..
Emma:So the license you have to apply for it and that’s from the Council?
Dave: Yep and you have to pay and as part of that license process you have to an A4 blue
sheet of paper with your license application on the outside of your building for a 28 day period
from the day you submit the license application and you have to pay for an advert to appear in a
local newspaper like the Birmingham Mail and that costs a huge amount of money. It’s part of
the system and it’s just such…
Emma:That’s weird because I can’t imagine that many people read those sections of the
paper…
Dave: Exactly! How many people read it it’s like why why why? Well you need to notify people. I
need to notify people that I’m applying for a license, who reads them?
Emma: No­one cares, apart from the people issuing the license

30. Dave: It’s so they can tick a box and be like oh he’s done that and it just costs you money to do
it. This is the thing it’s like the setup costs to go into this kind of business are so big, it’s like why
do you have to pay for that?
Emma: It’s like we were saying earlier, at the end of the day if there was no grassroots and they
all collapsed because they couldn’t perform you wouldn’t get the rest of the live performance
industry stuff…
Dave: Exactly it’s that old saying about you’ve got to have money to make money. If you don’t
have the money in the first place there’s absolutely no way of.. although saying that I didn’t have
any money to do this and I’ve managed to do it and that’s what people find amazing is that that
actually happened.
Emma: There should be more help for independents because there’s nothing without them. But
erm so yeah how do you find being in Digbeth?
Dave:That’s a tricky one because where we are, and you know yourself, it’s difficult to get
people to come to this specific location. I like where we are because we’re out of the way and
your mainstream dickheads aren’t going to find us. They’re not just going to stumble across
us,it’s what’s called a destination venue. You don’t just find us you are determined to go to this
venue, that’s how you come here and I’d rather it be like that because then in the 2 and a half
years I’ve had this place we’ve never had any like major incident, never had massive fights.
We’ve never had a fight in the venue.
Emma: As opposed to all the major clubs out there who are kicking people out every night. Erm,
okay so last question, basically my original question because it sounded like you had an answer
for it at the beginning? So my question was to what extent is suki limited in gaining commercial
success whilst operating as an independent?
Dave: I wouldn’t say we’re limited… Commercially successful I see that ultimately what I want is
for us to be open every day of the week and have​ ​something on every night and have people
constantly in here every night of the week, that to me would be the commercial success that I’m
out to achieve and that is achievable but it’s going to take a long time to get there. Like each
small thing is an achievement to us, like this christmas decor, we’re so proud of that. Me and
kitty did this last week and the sense of achievement its like wow look what we’ve done. A
commercial venue wouldn’t have that same passion for it. They would pay some company to
come in, put some christmas decor up and that would be the end of it to them and that’s all that
they would be bothered about. But that is the difference between something like this and a big
chain is that we have passion for it and all the responses from everyone on Facebook saying
like wow it looked amazing it was completely transformed and we’re like it’s not changed that
much but the things we’ve done, they make a massive difference to people.

31. ‘The birmingham music scene has evolved into a fractured and dissonant beast and finds its
overall strength from that underlying diversity; a plethora of wide ranging distinct musical scenes
that rarely cross fertilize. The city is ripe for a melodious explosion unrivalled in its history.
Watch out Britain, Birmingham’s heart is beating very loudly.
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