The first gig I remember going to at The Exchange was the Deadpunk Bank Holiday Special in 2014, as I was coming to the end of my first year at university in Cardiff. I grew up in the countryside near Bristol, and while I enjoyed living in Cardiff, Bristol’s music scene was beginning to pull me home. After an emotional day seeing The Front Bottoms for the first time, gigs started to bring me back to Bristol a handful of times every month, lending a dull familiarity to drunk late night trains and that maudlin post-gig feeling. The Deadpunk Special in particular — and I’m not the first to say this — was too much of a pull to ignore. Every year it fell exactly between my deadlines. My English Literature deadlines fell on the Friday of the bank holiday, the Saturday was the show, and the following bank holiday Monday were my philosophy deadlines. A more sensible student wouldn’t have gone for a full 12 hours of train rides, punk music and binge drinking. But, I went every year without fail until the final Deadpunk Special.
During my time in university I went to gigs at venues in Cardiff — places like Gwdihw and The Moon/The Full Moon and Clwb Ifor Bach, as well as DIY Cardiff’s yearly all-dayer “Da Iawn Fest” — but in Bristol my commitment to The Exchange became almost religious. And it isn’t an undeserving or an illogical commitment. Gigs at The Exchange were the first time I saw bands like ONSIND, Martha, Great Cynics, Pup, WOAHNOWS, Petal, Bangers, Shit Present, Caves, Doe, Fairweather Band, Petrol Girls, Tigers Jaw, Foxing, Austeros, Honeypot and Probably Not and more recently bands like AJJ, The Hard Aches, Camp Cope and countless others — so many artists that I came to gigs not intending to see but surely discovered and fell in love with. And although going to gigs at The Exchange encouraged me to start listening to music in a particular scene, it has never been about conformity — having to act a certain way or dress a certain way or listen to certain things in order to fit in. It’s the kind of place that, I think, discourages strong divisions between bands and genres and is all about fostering great music. I was not the kind of person who grew up addicted to his headphones. It wasn’t until later in life that I began to engage with music in a deeper and more fundamental sense, and The Exchange was an indispensable part of that awakening.
Around the same time, I was beginning to start a band with two friends from school — in large part inspired by the sense of a thriving creative community we’d begin to glimpse at The Exchange. We began meeting up in Dom’s living room and playing some quite awful cover songs and some pretty ill-formed originals. It was a weird setup. I played acoustic guitar and Max, a guitar player by trade, played bass very badly. For certain songs we swapped and I played bass where he played guitar. We took it in turns singing. In one memorable cover of Cage the Elephant’s “Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked,” Dom played drums and bass guitar at the same time. Our equipment sucked and we sucked pretty badly, too — but it was a lot of fun. A year later we were trying to write an original set of songs for a friend’s festival, Inglefest, inspired mostly by the bands we’d been going to at The Exchange at the time. More than once me and Max had talked about how, maybe in 5 years, if we were extremely lucky, we could play The Exchange, and then we could die happy — that was when we’d have properly made it. Not just as a band, but in life. It was a pipe dream in the truest sense, for us.
The band that became Toodles eventually played our first “real” show in Bristol a few years ago and our friend Will messaged The Exchange’s email address to invite them to the show and Iwan Best decided to come along to our little gig in a tiny venue called The Hatter. At almost zero notice, to a band no one had ever heard before, a guy leading a life where he worked at a venue and listened to bands every night of the week, he decided “what the hell” and came along anyway. He was perhaps the kindest, friendliest, most genuine person we’d ever met and his generosity — and the generosity of everyone we’ve met since — has been the thing that’s kept us going. We were not a good band. I’d argue we’re still not a great band. But at the time, we were young, enthusiastic musicians with a passion for live music — and that’s all that we needed to be in the good books of people like Iwan, and later the majority of our friends. He wanted to put on shows and go to shows and we wanted to play them. That’s the sort of community The Exchange nurtures. Without it, we wouldn’t be a band right now. That’s no great loss to the world of music, but we’re not the only ones. Without venues that nurture young bands, there is no scene. The encouragement and kindness of the people who work at The Exchange and contribute to it, led inevitably to Max’s band Little Baby Sharks. It led to an EP that we recorded in the studio underneath The Exchange, mixed and engineered by a talented friend we met there. It’s also kept us going through hard times. The Exchange employs Max (God knows why) and at times when I’ve been in financial difficulties, have given me the odd shift. They support our band, launched our first record, and have always found the space to put us on the bill and in their words and deeds have always made us feel welcome.
This is one example. It’s not great loss to the world if our band didn’t exist, but communities like the community that exists around The Exchange create and nurture dozens of young musicians and other creatives and without that support network, it wouldn’t be happening. It’s given us so much, which is why I’ve decided to give back.
As you may be aware, The Exchange is currently going through a transition to community ownership in order to secure its future. Venues all over the UK are under constant threat of closure, and we don’t want that to be on the cards for spaces this important to Bristol’s scene. You can find out more information about buying shares or making a one off donation below. The share offer ends on the 31st. I’ll be buying my share shortly before then. The Exchange has given me far more than I have given to it, in terms of support, community, friendship, creating a safe and welcoming space — in its ethical and community-focused approach. And it’s time that I should give back.
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