Liverpool Sound City is a hugely respected 3-day international music, media and technology conference and live arts and music festival that takes place in Liverpool every May. The festival is focused on the zeitgeist and looking forward, intent on bringing the best new music, film, art and more from all over the world to Liverpool. The primary convention focus is on bringing together a vast array of creative and digital industries business professionals, artists, music, film and art fans to enjoy today’s best new music and chart the future course of the music, digital and creative industries. We recently chatted with Ticketing and Sales Co-Coordinator, Alex Simmonds about the festival, the general booking process and what artists can expect this year.
What's your musical/professional background? How long have you been working for Liverpool Sound City?
I started promoting local club nights at the age of 16 in the town where I'm from. When I turned 18 I applied to the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts to study a degree in Music, Theatre and Entertainment Management. There I learnt the academic side of management as well as gained practical experience, it gave me the chance to work with companies such as Universal Publishing, In the City Music festival as well as continuing to run my own events. In 2010 I joined the Liverpool Sound City Team as Artist Liaison and Marketing Assistant, I'm now working as Ticketing and Sales Co-Coordinator for the festival as well as our new venue the Epstein Theatre.
Tell us a bit more about Liverpool Sound City.
Liverpool Sound City is a massive metropolitan Music Festival, Conference and this year Expo that takes over all the best music venues in the city center for 3 days in May each year. This year’s festival is on the 17th, 18th and 19th of May. It caters to a range of musical tastes from up and coming artists to big headliners from all over the world. This year we've got Professor Green, The Temper Trap, Alkaline Trio, Death in Vegas, James Vincent McMorrow and White Denim headlining amongst 300 other bands. It's a great festival and there’s a massive sense of community around it whether you're from Liverpool or not.
What's your general booking process?
Our artists are booked through our artist booker who's great, he's really on the ball with up and coming artists, for example last year we had Ed Sheeran playing 2 nights to a 300 capacity audience. We also have around 100 unsigned artists that play the festival each year. We run band applications through Sonicbids and this year had over 2000 applicants. Members of our team individually listen to these. It's a big job but if you enjoy music a really fun one.
Give an example of a recent artist you selected. Why did you select them?
I recently picked a Canadian band called Kestrels. The first song I heard was called The Light. It immediately stood out to me as it had great build up and a really catchy chorus. They use a lot of distortion and get some really great sounds from it. I'm really looking forward to watching them live this year.
What's the most memorable performance you've seen at Liverpool Sound City?
My most memorable performance at Sound City has to be Fucked Up last year. I love those guys. We had them playing in a 500 capacity venue called the Kazimier. The venue has a balcony around all the sides where people can stand. If you've ever seen Fucked Up live you'll know how mental Damien Abraham is. He was climbing swinging round the balcony above the audiences heads while singing… it was awesome!
Do you have any other advice you'd like to share with bands that want to play Liverpool Sound City?
Like I mentioned before we get a hell of a lot of applications all different styles of music. You need to think that the person listening to the applications could have listed to 100 bands that day. I know its cliché but we really like originality something that makes us think ‘these guys are awesome, we need them to play!’
Sounds awesome, right? You may not be able to play this year, but you can attend. Get tickets for Liverpool Sound City here: http://www.liverpoolsoundcity.co.uk/products
And be sure to check out these awesome Sonicbids artists playing this year:
