MVT Cribs: Everywhere At Once Festival preview

Last month, beloved Glasgow venue The Flying Duck announced they’d have to close their doors at the end of May. The Music Venue Trust (MVT) immediately published a statement encompassing the heartbreak punters around the city were feeling. “In its current form since 2007, with roots stretching back to 1991, The Flying Duck has long been embedded in the city’s DIY scene. It has consistently provided a platform for emerging artists, nurtured local communities, and created space for the kind of underground culture that so often shapes what comes next.”

Established as a UK-registered charity in 2014, MVT's mission is to protect, secure and improve grassroots music venues exactly like The Flying Duck, so with the absence of Glastonbury on our festival calendar this summer, they've reimagined a camping festival as Everywhere At Once, with artists set to perform in local grassroots music venues across the country from 26 to 28 June.

"When we're having a mental health crisis at the moment in the UK, the festival is about being with other people and improving our lives," Music Venue Trust's campaign and comms manager Toni Coe-Brooker tells us on a sunny morning over Zoom. "The whole purpose is more the social outcome by being part of a community." Everywhere At Once festival's purpose is to fill over 400 grassroots music venues with punters keen to enjoy the sense of community a scene offers though live music just a short trip from their doorstep.

To name a few gigs from the weekend's line-up: VLURE, a Glasgow three-piece whose music is propelled by their love of electronic beats, will play Stirling's Tolbooth (26 Jun); alt-folk artist Jo Mango will release her latest album The Lightswitch at Saint Luke's in Glasgow (26 Jun); and in Bathgate, the phenomenal Scottish soul singer Brooke Combe will play Purple Orange Arts Venue (26 Jun). “I'm so honoured to be involved," Combe tells us. "I've made my way through some of Scotland and the UK’s best independent venues from King Tut's to Barrowland Ballroom.” Without the infrastructure of local music venues to practise her craft, becoming the touring musician she is today would have been ten times harder. "I love the small intimate gigs, the atmosphere is always great," she says. "I can’t wait to play in Bathgate, we’ll have a ball!"

Brooke Combe @ Barrowland Ballroom, Glasgow, 19 Apr. Image: Serena Milesi

"We are over the moon to be involved with Everywhere At Once," Michael Mathieson, co-owner of Purple Orange Arts Venue tells us. "We put on around 15 to 20 original acts every month, platforming everything from younger artists starting out, open mics and older musicians in bands. We think our venue is really important for the area to get people out into a small but vibrant music scene. We recently had our licence changed to allow 16 and 17 year olds into our shows, as well as under 16s with an adult. Even just in the last two weeks we have seen a slight increase of gig-goers coming into the venue."

Mathieson’s work at Purple Orange exemplifies Coe-Brooker's point that " the festival's really beautiful and unique in itself, because it's a nationwide celebration of grassroots venues. The whole point is that people are not gonna be travelling to one festival. This is about celebrating the incredible and unique artists, communities and venues that already exist in their own towns and cities." Curious about MVT's work with the local Scottish music scene, Coe-Brooker reassures us: "It just makes total sense that Scotland would be included, especially with such a huge membership up in that one nation in itself." 

Stina Tweeddale (aka Honeyblood), is MVT's Scotland coordinator and oversees the charity's work in the country alongside the Scottish steering group, which meets every six weeks. One of the key issues MVT's Scottish branch has been lobbying to achieve is accessible public transport for gig-goers. To achieve this goal, Coe-Brooker shares: " We've been working to help the public transport go later into the evening so people can actually attend shows and watch the headliner before the last bus goes home." In MVT's five-point plan for the next Scottish Parliament, to remedy this issue, point four includes a pilot late-night services programme until 3am in key routes serving venues in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

Back to the main event, Everywhere At Once, in large part due to Tweeddale and the steering group's direction, is decentralising the major metropolitan areas in Scotland. "By working with venues and artists across Scotland, Everywhere At Once can showcase the diversity of Scotland's music scene while ensuring support and visibility reaches communities beyond the major cities," says Tweeddale. "It also reflects MVT's long-standing view that grassroots venues are far more than just places to put on gigs; they are essential cultural spaces that nurture future talent and ensure communities have access to culture wherever they live."

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Everywhere At Once takes place at grassroots venues across Scotland and the rest of the UK, 26-28 Jun – find out more at everywherefest.com
Find out more about Music Venue Trust at musicvenuetrust.com