Music Venue Trust is a UK Registered Charity which acts to protect, secure and improve UK Grassroots Music Venues for the benefit of venues, communities and upcoming artists. Their ‘Own Our Venues’ scheme aims to secure the long-term futures of such venues by directly tackling the issue of ownership.

The first venue purchased by Music Venue Properties, the independent Charitable Community Benefit Society, created by Music Venue Trust is The Snug, a 100 person capacity venue in Atherton, Greater Manchester. The official launch of The Snug took place in the morning of October 4th, and included the unveiling of a commemorative plaque.

Music Venue Properties announce first venue purchase with shares bought by the live music community! @SnugAtherton has become the first acquisition under #OwnOurVenues scheme!

Official Launch Event held today at The Snug to Celebrate new ownership +unveil a commemorative plaque! pic.twitter.com/HmDamLlrRl

— Music Venue Trust (@musicvenuetrust) October 4, 2023

The event was attended by many of those who had a direct impact in bringing this initiative to life, including Mark Davyd, CEO and Founder of Music Venue Trust, The Snug’s owner/operator Rachael Flaszczak, John Whittingdale, Minister for Creative Industries, Claire Mera-Nelson Director of Music for Arts Council England, Rhoda Dakar & Chris Prosser of the Music Venue Properties Board. Local musicians were also in attendance – Ivor Novello winner Jamie Lawson and 16 year old Jennifer King who is a shareholder in MVP.

The venue’s current operators have signed a ‘cultural lease’, which is an innovative agreement specifically created by MVP to guarantee that, as long as The Snug operates as a space for grassroots live music for their local community, they can enjoy the use of the building.

When commenting on the subject of the recent acquisition, Managing Director of The Snug Rachael Flaszczak said “The Snug being purchased by Music Venue Properties means everything to me, my team and our community, as it allows us to continue to provide this very important space to up & coming artists for many years to come.

We now feel secure and confident to plan ahead knowing the venue is in safe hands with people that have a shared vision of the future of new music. To be the first of many serves as a light of hope that the preservation of Grassroots Music Venues can be done when people pull together to make things happen, and The Snug can keep showcasing the cultural life within our community.”

Riding the high of the scheme’s first purchase, The Snug will no doubt pave the way in the security of many UK Grassroots music venues.

Music Venue Trust released a statement blaming the state of affairs on the ownership of music venues, noting that it’s not typically in the hands of people who actually seem to care about music.

“Everything we deal with eventually comes back to the same core problem. That problem is ownership …. All the other problems and challenges that grassroots music venues face eventually come back to this core point: No grassroots music venue in the UK is sustainable or resilient, no venue can have 100% confidence in its future, no venue can continue to support musicians and bring music to our communities for decades to come, unless the music venues are owned by people who want them to be music venues.”

MVT Statement on the Closure and Permanent Loss of @Nambucca_Live #THREAD
The possible loss of the iconic Nambucca grassroots music venue, which faces permanent closure on 14 May, is a terrible blow to Giles and the incredible team there.. pic.twitter.com/sErz2nduZA

— Music Venue Trust (@musicvenuetrust) April 26, 2022

Nambucca is due to close on May 14^th, and has already received a good bit of support on social media, with Frank Turner tweeting that the news “hurts my heart”.

This hurts my heart. https://t.co/sP2WzFDRm0 — Frank Turner (@frankturner) April 26, 2022

The venue’s own statement notes that they’d “tried everything we can to keep Nambucca going, but the reality of the past few years have made it untenable, what with mounting bills coming from every direction.” However, they still plan to “go out with a bang!” through the remaining weeks they have left, asking people to keep an eye on their socials for any future events.

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A post shared by Nambucca London (@nambuccalondon)

Nambucca isn’t the only music venue closing though. You can read here about The Leadmill in Sheffield, whose closing announcements brought waves of support in the industry, with the likes of Arctic Monkeys coming to their aid on social media.

Some have tried to address the problem of ownership that Music Venue Trust brought up. Having been boarded up four years ago, there have been attempts to bring back The Ravensbourne Arms pub in London as a live music venue owned by the community. The efforts have been supported by big names, including Jools Holland and Fontaines D.C., and it hopes to build a “safe, inclusive, all-day space that puts the local community – the entire community, in all its glorious forms – at the heart of everything they do.”

Meanwhile, if you fancy visiting Nambucca for the last time before it’s gone, you can follow them on social media here to see what surprises they have in store just before the end.

But they’re not going down without a fight. The Leadmill has asked people to share “your best memories that we can gather to help show them reasons why #WeCantLoseLeadmill“. Arctic Monkeys have been helping in their own way, reposting the picture seen below on Instagram.

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A post shared by The Leadmill, Sheffield (@theleadmill)

The group have a bit of history helping out the venue, what with last year raising over £100,000 for them (as well as other independent grassroots music venues) through a raffle for frontman Alex Turner’s black Fender Stratocaster, something that was crucial to those early Arctic Monkeys gigs.

At the time, Rebecca Walker (Leadmill’s general manager) said that “That’s an insane amount of money and will go so far to securing not only the bricks and mortar of venues, but also their key members of staff …. To them, it’s just a guitar but to us it’s a lifeline – it’s a matter of whether a venue can stay open or not.”

 

 

 

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A post shared by Arctic Monkeys (@arcticmonkeys)

Sadly it doesn’t seem to have been much help in the long term. Facing eviction in a year’s time, Leadmill’s current managers accuse their owners of using a “cheap, shabby, sly and underhand way of doing business“, “destroying our business by evicting us“ and intending “to profit from the goodwill and reputation built up over those 40 plus years“ by their own efforts.

Despite the owners of the site claiming it means only a change of management, not its end as a music venue, there are still a lot of harsh feelings in the air. You can read Leadmill’s full statement here.

On some slightly happier news, Arctic Monkeys should be due for some new music later on this year, with their next album reportedly being almost ready to go. The band’s drummer, Matt Helders, said last November that “It was a bit disjointed how we had to do it, and there are bits to finish off, but yeah, it’s all in the works.“ It’ll be a well-anticipated follow-up to 2018’s well-received Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino, so keep a lookout for that. As for live dates, you can look at their website here, with gigs at Reading & Leeds and Electric Picnic coming up.