As the mania around them was erupting in early 1963, the Beatles toured the UK supporting Helen Shapiro, including shows in Wakefield, Taunton and Hanley (now amalgamated as part of Stoke-on-Trent). In late 1971, as their untitled fourth album was released, Led Zeppelin roared around the country, including stops in Preston, Bournemouth and Salisbury. Gathering a head of steam in 1994, Oasis performed in Tunbridge Wells, Derby and Newport. Promoting his debut album in 2011, Ed Sheeran stopped off in Keele, Falmouth and Aberdeen.
But over the decades, most of these regional cities and towns steadily fell off the touring map as focus turned to the bigger cities, often those with large student populations. By the early 2000s it was contracting further due to a mix of rising costs, venue closures and tour support from record labels drying up as CD sales collapsed.
Opportunities to see grassroots acts are shrinking: in October, the Music Venue Trust (MVT) reported that acts played on average 11 shows when touring smaller venues in 2024, compared with 22 three decades earlier. But, speaking to live music business publication IQ earlier this year, Denis Desmond, chairman of Live Nation UK & Ireland, said that the touring map was expanding: “Compared to 2015, we’re hosting events in 40% more towns across the UK – showing that demand really is nationwide.”
A curious bifurcation now appears to be reshaping UK touring. Acts over a certain size frequently over-supply a handful of major cities (mainly London, Manchester, Glasgow and Leeds), or tour the regions as a novelty – Jake Bugg’s recent Your Town tour, CMAT’s pre-Glastonbury warm-up run – while smaller acts venturing deeper into the provinces can often only do so under straitened conditions.
As part of the Delgados’ 2023 reunion tour, Emma Pollock played Brighton, London, Manchester, Sheffield and Glasgow. She is also touring as a solo act in October and will visit Hull, Perth, Aberdeen and Sale as well as several of the major touring cities. “To be as profitable as possible means that you play in front of as many people on the one night as you possibly can – and that pushes you into the cities,” she says. “As a bigger artist, you will stick to the cities; but as a smaller artist, you are sticking to the clubs.” That means venturing off the beaten track – venue capacities may be smaller, but audiences are often hungrier and more appreciative.
Calum Miller is owner of the 350-capacity PJ Molloys in Dunfermline. “Bands are finding it better to just do one large headline show than 10 Scottish shows,” he says. “Once a band gets to a [certain] level, they would rather do Barrowland [in Glasgow].” But this may be a short-sighted move when it comes to nurturing a fanbase: doing “nothing for six months before that in Scotland [is] putting all their eggs into one basket”.
The brutal truth behind this is often economic, with associated costs such as crew, petrol and accommodation currently going through the roof. Confining tours to the biggest cities theoretically seems the less risky option, but could be a false economy. “Booking agents have responded to that cost pressure by reducing the length of tours – in some ways in quite a nonsensical way,” argues Beverley Whitrick, COO of MVT. “Accommodation in major cities is more expensive than in smaller towns and cities.”
Some agents and promoters have been accused of targeting short-term gain over the kind of long-term development that acts can gain from honing their craft in smaller venues. “It’s profit that’s prized above the cultural experience,” Pollock says with a sigh. Agents, who negotiate fees for their acts from promoters who often front most of the risk to put on the shows, “are pretty guilty of just chasing the money every single time”.
MVT says that 25 grassroots venues closed last year and 200 were at serious risk of closure. New venues are opening, but it takes time to become established, while others need to reclaim lost ground. Gareth Barber took over the running of Esquires in Bedford a decade ago when it had, he says, “fallen off the map slightly” and wasn’t seen as a main touring venue. He has rebuilt its standing to draw in more tours, including a pre-Glastonbury CMAT and upcoming dates from Ibibio Sound Machine and former Kraftwerk member Wolfgang Flür.
“I don’t think that touring provincially is particularly risky,” he argues. “The audiences actually want it that little bit more.” Catering to under-served audiences can be good long-term business. Both Ed Sheeran and Sam Fender, in their early touring days, played small clubs and beach bars in Cornwall, for example, and built up enviable fan loyalty there. Plus, Barber says, “we hear from tour managers that merchandise sales on the shows here are much higher than they are in some of the cities.”
Will Greenham is bookings manager at the 260-capacity Cornish Bank in Falmouth. He says the team opened the venue four years ago, in part as a way of getting promoters and agents to take their acts further west than Bristol (almost 200 miles away). “Some agents just don’t bother answering the email,” he says of the regular frustrations and challenges of getting acts to play there. “If they came, we would sell out and the venue would do even better. If they come to somewhere like Falmouth, they will get the most real experience. You’re so far from London. People down here will give you the best night.”
The venue also has flats “with amazing sea views” for touring acts to use: Squid are among the acts to have done residencies there. “They were Airbnbs before we took the building on, so we quickly demolished that with loud music!” Greenham laughs.
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They’re not alone. Sybil Bell, founder and chief executive of Independent Venue Week, says small venues around the country are going through a quiet revolution to make things better for touring acts. “They really take care of the artists,” she says. “There are so many cases [in the past with venues] where people [running them] just become a bit complacent. It would be a damp, shitty, horrible dressing room. People have really upped their game.” She cites Mal Campbell, who runs the Trades Club in Hebden Bridge, as an example of a venue owner going the extra mile for acts, helping them load in and ensuring they are properly fed and looked after.
MVT is lobbying to have £1 from each ticket for UK arena and stadium shows go to support small venues, but involvement so far, from acts like Enter Shikari and Sam Fender, has been voluntary. Whitrick says one of MVT’s plans for the money is to keep helping venues (many of them regional) renovate to become materially better for touring acts. “If money is invested in grassroots music venues to put in a self-contained flat, that would help touring artists,” she says. “So much money goes on hotels, buyouts [of meals] and all the other costs. An initial investment could have a massive impact on so many artists in the longer term, enabling more touring because you’ve immediately taken down some of those cost lines.”
Independent promoters in the regions are diligently working to extend the touring circuit, but it also requires the backing of the bigger names in the live industry. “It’s just about agents being more open to putting in more shows,” says .
Notably, a variety of acts are putting in the hard yards regionally. Richard Hawley’s latest tour has stops in Weston-Super-Mare, Margate and Worthing. Snapped Ankles will perform in Saint Leonards, Bradninch and Gloucester. The Unthanks will visit Kingston, Worcester and Colne.
One supposed “risk” of this strategy is ticket cannibalisation: some in the live business fear that playing two nearby towns might see the larger venue pull ticket sales away from the smaller venue, not believing the two can coexist.
Miller insists this is a damaging myth that needs to be dispelled. “Would you rather play one night in Glasgow to 600 people or play to 500 people in Glasgow and 250 people the next night in Dunfermline?” he asks. “There’s a whole fanbase in Dunfermline that are not travelling to your Glasgow show.” Just ask the Beatles or Sheeran: it’s a leap of faith worth taking.