Anton Lockwood talks to eFestivals

eFestivals spoke to Anton Lockwood, the Event Director of Dot to Dot Festival which this year takes place in Nottingham, Bristol and Manchester. Lockwood is the Promotions Director of DHP Group who are based in Nottingham and the owners of Rock City, Rescue Rooms, Stealth, and The Bodega Social Club in Nottingham as well as The Thekla in Bristol.

How's the organising of Dot To Dot going?
It's good, we've just got to the point where we have decided when and where everyone is going to play, we've confirmed the last few bands, and we've got a big promotion push ready for when the students come back from Easter.

Are there any big surprises to announce?
No, not really. Dot To Dot is really all about new bands, and what we think is going to be the next big thing.

Who are the hot new acts that Dot To Dot fans should check out?
Well, all of them. Of the latest acts we've announced acts like Swimming, a band from Nottingham that are getting quite a bit of excitement generated about them at the moment. Niki & The Dove, Various Cruelties, are also bands a lot of people are talking about. That's who we go for the kind of bands people are talking about.

You are also a promoter in Nottingham. How is Nottingham's live scene looking these days, is the recession effecting it any way?
Dot to Dot's in three cities, not just Nottingham , but it's pretty good, I think we're in a phase at the moment where we are finding that 'Club Nights' are doing spectacular business, where as live shows are finding things a bit harder. It's probably because people are being a bit more cautious with their money, and if you go to a club night you know you're going to hear all the songs that you want to hear. So, they're a little bit less inclined to take a chance on an unknown live band. Which is why something like Dot To Dot is so good, because you can come and see lots of bands in one go without having to spend the whole time just checking out one or two bands.

We recently did an event called Hit The Deck festival, which is the same sort of idea as Dot To Dot - lots of venues and lots of bands with a wristband that allows you to move around and see them all, and that sold well. It was much more of a rock kind of thing, with We Are The Ocean, and Comeback Kid, and that kind of thing.

How did the inaugural year of Dot To Dot in Manchester go?
It was good, it was hard work, a lot harder than we thought it was going to be to be honest. In Manchester there's so much more going on, and it's such huge market for live music. I suppose it's the second city in the country in terms of live music, and there was so many more things going on, and we found we had to work a lot harder than we expected to get the Dot To Dot brand over in Manchester, whereas in Nottingham it was relatively easy to really get it out there.

What we've found though is this year's Dot To Dot Manchester is already flying, ticket sales wise, ahead of last year. I think this year is going to be really, really successful, perhaps it just took a year, and the work that we'd done last year is really paying off for this year. People know what it is a bit more now, and are more into it, I think.

Any plans to expand it further into other cities?
Never say never, we want to get Manchester completely solid and it looks as though we've accomplished that. Then we will see how that develops really. I don't know that we're going to go rushing into other cities, but it's certainly not something that we'd discount.

Are you intending to expand the three events in terms of the number of venues used?
In the three cities we're not going to dramatically increase the capacity anywhere. There's a few changes, like were using Sound Control in Manchester now instead of FAC 251. But, they're relatively minor changes, and I think the size feels about right, if you go any bigger you end up with one huge venue, and loads of small ones and it skews the mixture of the festival a bit too much.

How do you perceive festivals in general will fare over the next few years?
I think it will be hard work. I mean look at Leeds and Reading, it must the first year in god knows how long where it's not just sold out straight away, and you can still buy tickets now. They've got a strong line-up and a great history, and normally would sell out, and it's not happening.

But is this just a return to the less hyped days I remember, where tickets would be available to buy on the day for most festivals?
It's certainly heading more towards that, but V and Glastonbury still sold out straight away, although Glastonbury isn't on next year so you've got that extra demand this year. We've certainly seen that with ticket sales for gigs as well. There was a time where you put a show on sale and it sold out straight away. Now, you find you put a show on sale, and it starts to sell tickets, and it sells more towards of the end of the day, that's a bit more what it used to be like.

As a promoter is this trend something to worry about?
As a promoter there's always plenty of things to worry about, but I don't think live music is going to dry up, or festivals are going to die. I do think people are going to have to work harder to sell their tickets, and that's overall not necessarily a bad thing, because it means events really have to think about what they're doing and what they're providing, and at what price.

I do wonder about Leeds/Reading, it's a fantastic event but it's basically £200 a ticket, and that's quite a lot. The price does become a factor, these days people can't afford to go to everything, they do have to pick one thing. Obviously VAT going up doesn't help, but people still need to be sensible with ticket prices, and making sensible offers for artists will help keep it vibrant.

Do you think it has started to spiral out of control, and become too costly to put on events?
Yes, I'm all in favour of health and safety, and all that, but now for festivals, not so much indoor festivals like to Dot To Dot, they have to spend so much money, aside from the artists, the police forces want their cut, and all that. I think it does get a bit much.

I'm involved with the Concert Promoters Association and our response to PRS who were doing a consultation, with a view we felt to putting their fees up, we told them all they were doing was driving up the cost to the customer and not trying to help the industry any. Songwriters may get another 2-3% or whatever, but that would 2-3% of a smaller pie because it would make it more expensive for everyone. We seem to have prevailed on that one anyway. It seems PRS have realised they have a lot to learn, to understand what's going on in the industry, and things like that. I get the feeling they aren't going to push anything through quickly, and they want to take everyone's views on board.

They also seem to be addressing some of the issues, things like Latitude festival where they were trying to charge PRS on the whole of the ticket sales when blatantly quite a big chunk of the bill isn't live music, it's theatre and poetry and all sorts of other things. I think that is being looked at now I think.

My final question is what advice would you give to Dot To Dot visitors so that they can get the most out of their visit?
Wear comfy shoes, and drink plenty of water. It's not actually as bad as that sounds, I mean when you go to Glastonbury, you have to walk 20 miles. Really, the worst one for walking is Bristol, and that's just because of the venues being a bit more spread out and it being a bit hilly. So, just have fun, do a bit of research, check out all the bands on Myspace, if that's still going, or Bandcamp or Soundcloud, or whatever your favourite thing is. Get there early, and check out some new music.

The multi-city, multi-venue Dot to Dot festival takes place over the last bank holiday in May. The festival will take place from Saturday 28th May until Monday 30th May in various venues. Bristol hosts the event on the Saturday, with a similar event the day after in Nottingham, and the Monday night is the turn of Manchester to play host.

Tickets are £30 for Bristol or Nottingham, and £25 for Manchester. To buy tickets, click here.

NOTE: over-18s only.

For more information on the existing events, click here for the Bristol event, and here for the Nottingham event.

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