Interested in performing live as a grassroots musician and in the process of reaching out to local promoters? Don’t skip Indie In Town UK, these London-based promoters offer a healthy dose of indie gigs and make sure all performing artists are well cared for! Read the entire interview on Music For The Misfits.
Hi! Could you introduce yourself and what you do, what does a day in your life look like? Jelle: “My name is Jelle, and I’m a music manager and concert promoter. Together with Marieke I organise an indie night called Indie in Town in London. We also host events in Amsterdam and are starting to branch out to Berlin. A day in my life is usually a lot of emailing and calling people. During the day I work at the office of the management company, and in the evenings I have time to discover new bands, advance shows, or spar with Marieke.”
Marieke: “My name is Marieke and I do several freelance things. I mainly work with independent labels and distributors, but I’m also a photographer, content creator and work at live shows. Together with Jelle I organise Indie in Town events in London. A day in the life looks like: do a bit of work, get a coffee, go for a walk or run errands, do some more work, eat food, go to a gig, do my Duolingo.”
Could you introduce Indie In Town and what the organisation does? Jelle: “I started Indie in Town with my twin brother Thom about 8 years ago. We promoted by-monthly gigs in Amsterdam where we booked three new indie bands, a DJ and an art expo. Now that I moved to London we promote gigs in Amsterdam and London. This way we can get British bands a platform in the Netherlands and Dutch bands a platform in London.”
Marieke: “What Jelle said! Here in London, we’ve had some line-ups with all UK bands, but we were very passionate about getting more Dutch bands to come and play at our events. So collaborating with Dutch Music Export was a great way to make that happen.”
What and or who inspires you to do what you do as Indie In Town? Jelle: “It’s always really exciting to meet new artists and get to know them better. We always meet up with the bands in the weeks before the show to shoot a promo video, and that really helps forming a connection with the bands. We’re there on the night and I cook for everyone. It’s a lot of fun to discover new bands and make new friends.”
Marieke: “I definitely think we’re good at adding some Dutch hospitality to our shows, making sure there’s some food and drink for the bands to enjoy, meeting them before the show so we can get better acquainted. We actively promote the gigs on social media, and we bring mini stroopwafels to the gigs for the crowd to enjoy. So it’s small things that make Indie in Town shows a bit more special, I think. And I’m really glad we can help Dutch acts play more shows here in the UK, because Brexit has definitely made that more difficult and more expensive.”
What do you think makes Indie In Town successful and how do you make sure it stays successful? Jelle: “I think the connection with the artists makes it successful. We really want to treat artists better than they usually get treated. We hope to grow to venues that are a bit bigger (400 cap maybe, we’re at 150 now), but we don’t have to make any money doing this. It’s really a passion project.”
Marieke: “I think it has been great trying out different things with our events last year, to see what works best and what we like to improve on. I really like the small community that’s starting to take shape as well, with our friends coming to the shows, the past bands that have played at our shows, friends of friends. Some of our friends also put on their own gigs, so who knows, we might do some more collabs in the future.”
