The Snuts are targeting a fourth Top 3 album with new album Joy In Short Moments, released via their own Happy Artist label with Virgin Music.
In a piece written for Music Week, frontman Jack Cochrane offers a first-hand account of the challenges facing the grassroots ecosystem and the obstacles preventing independent acts from breaking through. Following the publication of the Scottish Music Industry Association’s (SMIA) first nationwide strategy for the country's music business, he also looks at the barriers facing Scottish artists looking to break through...
Parked up at Worthy Farm, Glastonbury 2024, stage beaten and weathered from arguably my band's biggest show to date on The Other Stage, some 15 years in the making, I find myself playing a game of role reversal with a journalist.
The question I pose to him, I keep plain and simple: “At the UK’s biggest and most prolific festival, why do you think I can count maybe six Scottish artists who have been booked to play on a bill of over 3,000 acts?”
Even though I was aware it was not the journalist's responsibility to provide me with a justification, I remember feeling flat and disappointed at his nonchalance.
Scotland as a nation has been consistent and direct with its contribution to the UK’s impact on music globally. It's Calvin Harris, Paolo Nutini, Biffy Clyro and Lewis Capaldi. It’s the Bay City Rollers, Simple Minds, Deacon Blue and Texas. It’s Amy Macdonald, Sheena Easton, Lulu and Susan Boyle, just to name a few household names.
It’s only looking back now, that I see my band were one of the lucky ones. We were able to follow a traditional route in music. Skip class and play music with your best friends in school and then play every pub, miners' club, bowling club and cricket club in the district until someone in a city finally takes notice.
Even 15 years ago, independent music venues were underfunded and dwindling. Now, in comparison, it's a near apocalypse.
A classic battle between talent and opportunity is ever present inside music in Scotland
Jack Cochrane
We released our first record in 2021 and were informed by our record label at the time that it was the first debut album for a Scottish band to reach No.1 in the charts in 15 years. It already feels like we could well be waiting another 15 years to see a Scottish band do the same.
It’s not for a lack of abundance or talent. The birth rate of bands and artists in Scotland feels like one born every minute, but I would argue the new barriers they have to face present themselves daily.
A classic battle between talent and opportunity is ever present inside music in Scotland. It’s not only a lack of venues standing in the next generation’s way. There is a clear lack of infrastructure across the board. From agents to managers and labels there are so few working here in comparison to our neighbours south of the border.
The music industry is a harsh and complex place to be for established artists, never mind fresh faced, wet behind the ears newcomers. Artists need investment to thrive and survive, it really is as simple as that.
With touring costs having increased by an average of 40% since the pandemic, a 10-date sold out tour of grassroots venues across the UK costs at least three times more than the revenue it generates, with average losses between £3,000-£7,000 at this level. With over 940,000 people living in relative poverty in Scotland – that’s 17% of the population – a career in music, or even thinking about a career in music, is a luxury only the very privileged can afford.
If my band hadn’t been picked up by a management team down south and then signed to a major label in London, there is no way on earth we would have been able to build the fanbase we have here in the UK and globally. I ask now how often do similar opportunities present themselves to young artists here at home?
Alongside my bandmate Callum Wilson and longstanding managers Callum Read and Adam Harris, we decided to set up a record label in Scotland – Happy Artist Records. It is designed to be a safe haven for emerging artists and provide them with the tools and investment needed to kick on inside an industry that is becoming an ever more terrifying and hostile environment for the next generation of potential stars.
Surely it's time for the Scottish and UK governments to once and for all show they actually value the billions generated annually by the music industry and to support the next generation of festival headliners.
