The UK has a brand new print music title on its hands.
Christened Shownotes, the magazine is a unique collaboration between Drowned In Sound and Music Venue Trust, and proudly declares itself as “the first national print title dedicated to celebrating the UK’s live music scenes.” Alongside interviews, each issue will feature over 500 gig recommendations.
From today (November 2), 50,000 copies of its 64-page debut issue are set to be distributed to fans for free from 500 live music venues across the UK. It will start its life as a quarterly publication.
Gracing issue 1 are alt.metal legends Deftones, with additional features taking in Manic Street Preachers, Nia Archives, Chvrches and Horsegirl, among others.
The team behind the magazine have previously held editorial roles at Rolling Stone UK, VICE, The Independent, Drowned in Sound, Negativland, Fest and more. Here, its founding editor Hannah Ewens tells Music Week more about how it came together, the team behind it, and what we can expect going forward…
How did Shownotes come to life? And how did the collaboration between Drowned In Sound & Music Venue Trust happen?
“Sean [Adams] and Tom [Venvell] at Drowned in Sound and MVT collectively came up with the concept of a print music magazine supplied in grassroots music venues for free. One section of the magazine would include listings – seeing as it's easy to miss gigs happening near you these days – and generally encourage music fans to go to their local grassroots venue more. Then I was hired as the founding editor, came up with the editorial vision for it, working off some early concepts by Sean. Have you ever tried to name a music mag in 2026? It’s pretty difficult. I liked the playfulness of notes on a show, aka music analysis, as well as 'show notes' being a term already in podcasting and fashion.”
How hard was it to make sure it would be available in 500 MVT venues?
“MVT was very helpful in this respect, and as you can imagine, most venues would love to have a great free music magazine to stock. I believe the only reason a venue couldn’t agree to take part was a lack of physical space. Our production co-ordinator Kate Jeffrie helped ensure magazines were shipped all over the UK, as we want people in towns and cities everywhere to have a chance of getting a copy. From Issue 2, we’re hoping to also stock it in some stores, too.”
What has the opportunity to edit this and be a part of the grassroots venue cause meant to you personally?
“I've always loved print magazines, and started out at lad's mags, Dazed and Kerrang! My favourite job to date was being part of the launch of Rolling Stone UK, imagining that iconic brand for a UK audience, and bringing Bring Me The Horizon, Charli XCX, The 1975 and more in for big campaign moments. I had thought that perhaps the print ship had sailed for me in the Substack era – but apparently not! Live shows are an IRL analogue experience, so they really suit being discussed and celebrated in print form. On a separate note, I do feel sad that live music has become a luxury experience for many music fans in this economy, particularly if you want to go to a stadium or arena show, so the thought of a) encouraging people to seek out cheaper, smaller shows at special venues and b) gifting people a free (!) magazine was genuinely quite exciting.”
Can you tell us about the vision you have for the magazine?
“The MO is for the mag to be bursting with the energy and spontaneity of live shows. Gigs are unpredictable so we could be too. We’re a zine if a zine were made by the best culture writers and music photographers in the world. Our creative director Raissa Pardini is very into typography, colour and zine-references in her work, too. A lot of music discourse occurs around live shows, and you can tell a lot about music culture and culture more broadly by studying gigs, so I don’t think we’ll run out of material despite being slightly niche (and I think some of the print music mags still around in a digital, video-first climate are the niche ones!). Interviews with us will provide a space for artists to talk more about performance, collaboration, creativity, and being human. Writers can pitch weirder, more esoteric stuff here, involving illustrations, collages, experiments, whatever really. I still feel very open about what Shownotes could become.”
The thought of encouraging people to seek out cheaper, smaller shows at special venues and gifting people a free magazine was genuinely quite exciting
Hannah Ewens, Shownotes
Your debut issue is out today, can you give us a taster of what's inside?
“Shownotes is genre-agnostic, so once Deftones were secured for the cover (one of my favourite bands so that was amazing), we wanted to make sure we had enough representation of different sounds. If you're an amazing live performer, you make sense for Shownotes. So everyone from Audrey Hobert and Charli XCX to PISS and Nia Archives is discussed or spoken to in Issue 1. We got Shaad D'Souza to write about his gigs of 2026, Emma Garland goes deep on about live auto-tune and Kate Jeffrie argues the case for casual gig-goers to arrive early to see the support act. I have a rambling essay illustrated by Chris Lloyd, the gig sketch artist, about where people 'go' when they see live music. Craftnotes will be our regular behind-the-scenes series that involves a writer speaking to the artist and their whole creative team to show how their album was translated into a live experience. I wonder a lot about that process when I've loved an album and then gone to see the tour for it months or a year later. The human-curated listings section is quietly my favourite bit because it's so useful and well-executed with different voices. Deputy Editor Arusa Qureshi and Kate put that together.”
What would your message be to the music industry reading this?
“I would absolutely love for managers and PR teams to help us get wonderful A list artists on the cover. And equally put forward artists for in-depth profiles that focus on their live shows, and life as a performing artist. Issue 2 is out in early February, and Issue 3 in about May, so we'd be looking to feature artists touring while the issue is 'on stands'. We're not strictly part of the album promo campaign, which is freeing for everyone involved, but we can help sell tickets for artists and be part of their world-building for fans. Though we are champions of everything IRL, I'd encourage anyone to share images and video of our magazine if you come across it in the wild! If you're a support act, please take a picture with the back of the mag, which is a "I support the support act" poster to accompany Kate's piece and tag us on Instagram at @shownotesmag.”
Finally, in the spirit of the mag – could you shout out your own personal favourite grassroots venue that you love and that you want to encourage people to go and support?
“I can't totally believe that MOTH club is a real place – it's a fantasy land, a veritable utopia of programming. It was under serious threat because of proposed luxury flats but I just read today that they’re safe again. Also, The Joiners in Southampton was a big part of my teenage years; shout out to them. We have a feature in the listings section which gives you a menu of suggested grassroots venue shows you can go to for the price of a sold-out stadium or arena show, so definitely check that out.”
Photo: Emilia Pare
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