Tag Archives: North East

3 years of running Sofar Sounds North East

I can’t believe it is coming up to three years of me running Sofar Sounds North East, the past three years have absolutely flown by!

I organised my first Sofar Sounds in October 2022 at Alfie & Fin’s in Tynemouth, and without giving much away, the upcoming October show will make for a nice full circle moment. On the line-up in 2022 was the mesmerising Marie Naffah, who’s become a close friend and who will be performing much bigger stages next month as she’s heading out on tour supporting Newton Faulkner! I’m glad to say she’ll be joining him in Newcastle too, so you’ll be able to catch me down the front at the NUSU.

In our first few months we also had the incredible Peri Rae perform, who recently performed at Boardmasters Festival, and many other festival stages this summer. In March 2023 the incredible Duncan Covey performed at Zapatista, who’s only just come back from a cycle tour around the world! Lewis McLaughlin captivated at one of our living room shows and is back in the north east next month as part of his upcoming tour. Porcelain are about to headline The Grove, and Lilla Shy has been touring the UK and Europe and isn’t showing any signs of stopping anytime soon.

CRANE HOUSE just released their debut single ‘Cuban Heel’ and The Hope The Fear are about to head out on a headline tour. Through Sofar Sounds, and LLIVELY Music, I’ve been able to support so many venues, promoters, organisations, artists, and have had the support of an amazing team of volunteers and it’s brought an incredible amount of magic to my days. I’m grateful for the love and support, and the near future!

Highlight on… Sunderland

I recently attended a talk on The Importance of the Creative Sector in Placemaking. One of the speakers that day was Shain Shapiro who wrote a book on the importance of including the creative sector in decisions made by local councils on building regulations, licences and many more topics that seem completely unrelated to the arts. He highlights how they are all very much interlinked, the book gives a great insight into what makes a city economically successful, and what makes people move to it as well as away from it. One of the terms that makes many returns is ‘Music City’, and just recently I read about Sunderland’s plea to become one. 

Sunderland Music City might sound strange to some ears, if in the north east, then why not Newcastle? To me, it makes a lot of sense. The creative scene within Sunderland seems much more compact, which also makes it more tight-knit, there is more collaboration, there seems to be less bad blood and competition, because those within the creative scene in Sunderland understand the importance of supporting one another, while in Newcastle there is always another ‘clique’ to join. If that is good or bad is not up to me to decide, although I know what I personally prefer. Either way, I thought that now would be the right time to highlight some of Sunderland’s incredible creative spaces. 

Independent, The Fire Station, and The Peacock are undeniably influential venues that have paved the way for many artists to come to the city, cafe and live venue Pop Recs might be less obvious, but its 200 cap events space has a fantastic and unique feel that after having set foot in the building just once, never left me. There’s The Ship Isis, Otto and The Bunker, smaller spaces for the emerging artists, and NAME Sunderland, a breeding ground for those eager to learn, grow and develop into artists with experiences within all assets of the music industry. Sunderland University houses the radio studio of Spark Sunderland who are incredible at challenging the north east scene, and Abject Gallery which is managed by Breeze Creatives, is an open space for creatives within the arts. 

Festivals and live events taking place in Sunderland include inner-city festival Waves, Kubix and Monument Festival, all three managing to bring big names such as Everything Everything and The Kooks to the north east. Aside from that there is the team at We Make Culture who bring creatives together by supporting their development, and enhancing creative confidence and wellbeing. All in all, Sunderland has a lot going for it, and hopefully their aim to join the Music Cities Network will be successful!