TSC Behind The Corona | Clubs & Promoters
With the global coronavirus pandemic, the music industry, as we know it, is being challenged. The life-threatening disease and the enacted social distancing is resulting in the cancellation of live shows, depriving the whole music industry of one of their main sources of income, and music lovers of an escapism ritual that was deeply engraved in their routines.
Amongst others that cannot physically do their job, the Clubs, Promoters, and DJs, are particularly fragile and we hope with these series of interviews and articles, to raise more awareness on why and how you can support your local music community.
To support the clubs and promoters you can consider:
- Not asking for refunds on tickets bought
- Donating to their crowdfunding campaigns
- If you cannot afford to donate, share their crowdfunding campaigns with your network
The music industry needs our help! On the other side of this crisis, a lot of great quarantine music awaits us, to be blasted on your local club’s speakers.
You can support some of Copenhagen’s local clubs on the following links:
Support Culture Box on GoFundMESupport Ved Siden Af on GoFundME
In part one of our TSC Behind The Corona interview series, we spoke with:
- Tim Andersen – DJ, Producer, label owner and co-owner of Culture Box club
- Ian Bang and KIPP – DJs, radio hosts and part of the CPH Deep Collective, which is behind the IG60 event series
- Jerome – partner at Malmö based Backyard Sessions festival, and Deep House Sweden
read part two 'tsc behind the corona - djs'
How has the coronavirus pandemic affected you?
Culture Box
Just like any other venue, we are suffering right now. Culture Box is a non-profit venue and we don’t have a huge bank account to get us through all this. Despite the support options from the Danish Government, which we are currently looking into, this will be extremely costly for the club and makes it very hard and challenging to come through.
CPH Deep
The CPH DEEP collective has also been forced to postpone our events, which has been challenging since this year we wanted to upgrade our parties. We’ve been working very hard to get everything into place securing specific venues, designing and customizing our setup for these specific places. It’s always a challenge to get the exact bookings you want for the party, so it’s been quite the hassle as the venues and artists haven’t all been available for the new dates. So let’s just say that there has been a huge amount of administrative work and planing going on to get things on track for when the ban hopefully gets lifted.
Backyard Sessions
We had quite some events in the pipeline for 2020 as well as our yearly festival, but we have cancelled all of them for now as we don’t know when this crisis will be over. It takes too much time to do all the preparations and we feel it won’t be fair to involve our team of volunteers to spend their time on events that could be cancelled last minute. It is also difficult to involve our venue partners as they are going through tough times as well, and some of them are temporary unemployed.
What measures have you taken in the aftermath of the pandemic? How do you plan for the future?
Culture Box
We have launched a crowdfunding campaign which is running as we speak. We are also looking into what support options work for us. However, it’s not like we can send everyone home. There is still a lot of work to be done behind the curtains.
CPH Deep
Well we have been trying to deliver content on our Social media supplying livestreams from our studio and mixes from different artists from around the world, as well as interviews on our blog at cphdeep.com. We’re trying our best to still keep relevant and of course we’re keeping a close look out for what the authorities say, so when possible we can communicate a new date for our IG60 party, and be ready to rock n’ roll as soon as the ban is lifted.
Backyard Sessions
It is really difficult to plan anything for the near future so we are drawing some plans for the end of this year and starting preparations for 2021. Backyard Sessions as an organisation is relatively safe as we don’t have people on the payroll, but we of course have our fixed costs related to running a business throughout the year.
Are you in dialogue with the local municipality and government? Are they on your side and have they reassured you and your team, that they will support you in this?
Culture Box
We are indeed. They can’t make too many promises at this stage, but they seem to understand reality and want to help the rest of cultural life as a whole.
CPH Deep
We’ve been in dialogue with our partners and they’re understanding of the situation. Our experience is that everyone is on board trying to get the best out of a difficult situation. We haven’t looked in-depth at the different help packages from our government, and unfortunately it’s questionable if we qualify for help, so naturally it puts an economic strain on us, but we’re working hard to find solutions.
Backyard Sessions
We are still in contact with the local municipality and we try to keep up to date with sponsors, but we also realise that there are people out there that need more support at the moment so we try to keep a low profile.
Most importantly for the clubbers and music fans – how can they support you in these hard times?
Culture Box
Please consider a small donation to secure the future of the club. If your budget is tight, please support us by sharing the link and tell your friends about it. Most importantly, please make sure to support when all this is over so we quickly get back to how it was before COVID-19 hit us.
CPH Deep
Our IG60 Resurrection party is ready to go into action when possible, so buying a ticket really helps us stay alive.
Their support when we open up society again is critical. All of the culture scene is really in a holding pattern, just waiting to see when any “congregation” of people can gather again.
buy tickets for IG60 Resurrection
Backyard Sessions
For us it is very important that our followers take care of their relatives and loved ones first now. As said, these are difficult times and we love what we do, but health always goes first. So please support healthcare and people in need first.
Anything you’d like to say to the clubbers and the electronic music community?
Culture Box
Stay healthy and optimistic. Keep supporting each other and be part of our scene. Unity is what makes this special.
CPH Deep
It’s imperative that if you know and like any small artists (not the big ones with millions in the bank, they’ll survive), to go and buy their work – f**k streaming services, they don’t mean s**t to artists unless they have gazillions of streams. Buy their music and merch on bandcamp, they need it for lack of income from gigs right now. The same regarding clubs and eventmakers. If you can spare a little something, go support the GoFundME’s of your favorite club. If you can afford not to get a refund for your presale tickets, let them have that and they’ might be able to pay their bills through this hard time, and be able to be “our church” again when society opens up again for all night dancing “mass” 🙂
We hope everyone stays safe and come back stronger than ever, celebrating music and cultural experiences alongside great company!
Backyard Sessions
Stay safe and don’t be reckless. We’ll be back in full force as soon as we can! <3
Thank you for the interview Culture Box, CPH Deep and Backyard Sessions!
If you want to make sure you can go clubbing once we are back to our normal lives, you can support some of Copenhagen’s clubs on the following links:
Support Culture Box on GoFundME.
Support Ved Siden Af on GoFundME.
Cover Photo Mantas Hesthaven
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