Music Features

Adam Foster, promoter, The Horn

The Horn - reborn again!

The Horn in St Albans has never really been somewhere you'd go for a quiet pint.

For many years it has been the only place where you can see live music on most nights of the week and was also well known to locals as somewhere where you could get a beer for a long time after drinking up time in the plethora of drinking establishments in the city and where listening to a band was just a bonus! I don't mean that the pub were doing anything illegal by this though - they have a late licence!

Adam Foster promotes Clubhorn

Up until now though, the venue was mainly known for cover and tribute bands, although this wasn't their entire line-up. They often played host to cult artists such as the wonderful Bad Manners and Paul Young's Los Pacaminos Tex Mex band, together with some Sunday acoustic nights when anyone could get up on stage and do a spot.

But now it is set to become THE place to go and see live music in St Albans, if not for the whole of Hertfordshire and further afield. New promoter Adam Foster has only been in place since the end of May but has already started to turn the place around, not by stopping completely what had gone before, but by bringing in a wider range of bands to attract a wider audience and cater for more people.

We caught up with him as he prepared for the launch night of his first major venture - Clubhorn, St Albans first Indie club night - to ask him what his plans were for the venue.

What attracted you to this job?

Adam: I saw that this was an opportunity for a venue that needed a creative touch perhaps. I felt that maybe the line-up had been neglected somewhat over the years. It was very good at what it did but it was quite limited and when I was approached by the owner I saw it as a good challenge.

What do you think was wrong with it before then?

Adam: I don't think there was anything massively wrong with it I just felt that it only catered for a certain audience which was really limited in the town. There's not a huge population there, and you can't always put on the same type of music every night because you couldn't expect the same people from the town to support a venue seven nights a week.

So we had to diversify and that's where I think my speciality is going to come in - to bring a wider range of acts through. I think it's important to target a lot more people in the town rather than just specifically people who want to come and see the covers and the tribute bands. These are great, but I think it's just important to cover a lot more than that!

And there are not that many places where you can see live music regularly in St Albans are there?

Adam: We have almost the sole responsibility in the town apart from the odd one off event at the Alban Arena and the under age shows at the Pioneer. This is the only place for over 18s to come and watch live music regularly and it's our responsibility to the town.

So, if we are setting ourselves up to say we have the responsibility to provide live music entertainment then we've got to cater for as many tastes as possible, and not just a safe crowd that are going to come and put a lot of money through the bar, because it's not just about that. I think it's important that we maintain a standard of quality and diversity.

So what are your plans for The Horn then?

Adam: Clubhorn is the first thing, a weekly Indie club night with some big touring acts, kicking off with Giant Drag. The club night is going to be every week with discounts for students and drinks offers, which will just widen the scope for the venue and its appeal to different sections of society.

What I'd really like to do is get is a sense of community down here, with bands feeling like they belong in a place like this. I think at the moment a lot of people feel quite alienated from the place and come down when they've got a gig here but they don't necessarily come down just to hang out and see good bands and meet like-minded people.

That's my long term goal, to get a real sense of community here for all bands whether you're playing thrash metal or you're a singer songwriter with an acoustic guitar.

There are reasons for all of these people to talk together and meet because they're all trying to get the same thing - an audience to listen to their music. I think if we can get that sort of feel down here then it's going to be a lot better. At the moment it's all kind of fractured and I think what I'd like to do is have a number of events here throughout the week that all kind of gel.

So that it will be seen as THE place to come, especially for local musicians?

Adam: I think it's important that all the local acts feel that they're NOT just part of the trade for the venue but actually they're welcomed here and I'm not sure that that's really been the case.

Local bands generally have been brought in just as a support act for a tribute act or something, or they do the Battle of the Bands. I think what I'm trying to do is provide platforms for local bands to actually play with much bigger touring artists and get a lot more experience.

I think I'm also broadening the horizons of the media coverage that we get so again the local bands that are involved here benefit from the extra work that we're doing.

I just think that we can do a lot more for local bands. It's important to listen to local musicians and find out what they'd like from the venue because I've noticed that a lot of the local bands that come and play here don't come and watch bands as well.

When I ask them why, it's because we haven't been putting on the kind of bands that they want. They feel that we're catering for a much more mature clientelle. Again it comes back to broadening the horizons of what we put on here.

A good example of what you're doing is at the launch night of Clubhorn where Giant Drag are headlining and there's local band as support - Luton's Pirate Radio. Tell us about Giant Drag.

Adam: Giant Drag are based in LA but are over here specifically to play T in the Park and the Latitude Festival. Their latest album, [Hearts and Unicorns] came out on a subsidiary of Colombia records and is a major money signing. They are touring all through Europe but they're not doing any London shows so we've got the closest show for those people in the South East - Northampton is the next closest.

They're a two piece and have got a lot of coverage in all of the daily nationals as well as the music media, such as MOJO, Kerrang, NME and The Fly and have had rave reviews all over the place. We're very lucky to have them.

Hopefully we can now get the reputation that The Horn is one of those venues that DOES get the big bands. No one will know how or why we got them but they'll come down and enjoy it anyway.

What sort of music do Pirate Radio play and how did they get this brilliant gig?

Adam: I guess it's rooted in punk but it's been re-worked with quite a modern sound. There are only three of them and they're still dead young, they came through our Battle of the Bands competition and in the first four weeks that I'd been here they excited me more than anything else. Straight after they played I said "I know you know about Giant Drag, if you want to play their show you can do it!"

They were so excited when they turned up here and it was that enthusiasm that I really wanted to harness to the venue and get people excited about coming down here. What I saw in that one band was everything I was looking to achieve, so I'm using that and hoping that they'll tell a lot of other people that there's a venue here with quite an open mind about music.

And this all happened just because they were a young band playing Battle of the Bands. They turned up and played one show and walked out with a gig like this. Things like this can happen - that's the way this industry works.

Yes - it does seem to be a lot about networking and who you know?

Adam: Yes, but it's not just about who you know, it's important to get out there, you've got to convince people that you're worth coming back to see. There's no doubt about that, but yes, often getting that foot in the door is just being in the right place at the right time.

Giant Drag

If I see talent like that I certainly want to foster it and keep it within the venue and push it out to any of the shows I might be doing elsewhere as well. 

A lot of people will be very pleased to hear you say that!

Adam: I hope so. My main focus is The Horn and it's essential that we get this place working but I do other shows as well. I've got the last Saturday of every month at Clockwork in Islington, which is another 250 capacity venue and I do stuff at KoKo and Scala and South by South West in Texas so if you're a good band and we get on well the likelihood is that you won't just be playing here, there is the opportunity for me to put you in shows all over the country.

Then if you get a label and are doing well, there's South By South West as well, so there really are a lot of opportunities for local bands to develop themselves within the industry.

What else will happen at Clubhorn nights?

Adam: We've got DJs and drinks promos. I think it's important to have quite a party feel. The whole thing is that it's a club night with bands on. I'll be DJing, I've got another couple of DJs who play in London as well and I'll be inviting bands to come and do guest DJ slots as well. That's really the running order of the event - come down and have some cheap drinks. It's not about taking a lot of money off people, it's about offering value for money and seeing something that you'd normally have to go to London for. This will be on your doorstep at least once a week.

Will it be on the same day every week?

Adam: It will be on different days in July because I've started it with a lot of shows already pre-booked from the previous promoter but come August it will be every Thursday. Then, if it gets really popular, from January onwards it will be every Saturday. But I've got to make sure it works for the people in St Albans and the venue and the promoters. If it works for the people of St Albans and the surrounding area, as it builds we'll just get bigger and bigger bands in.

What bands have you got coming up?

Adam: The Heights, Mohair, Lady fuzz and the Oxfam Glamour Models. They did a show in Leeds recently and the singer cracked his head open on the bass player's bass and the photos ended up on the front cover of the NME. They had a much bigger picture on there than the other bands that were on there at the same time - Radiohead, the Foo Fighters and Guns' n' Roses - all million selling bands. I kind of figured that that was a good profiling artist. We want to be a pace setter and a trend setter rather than having to play catch up with a lot of the venues that are doing this sort of thing.

Then there's Lethal Bizzle, who hit the headlines recently because he came out against David Cameron's comment about black music causing gun crime. Lethal Bizzle has spent the last two or three years actively campaigning against gang culture and gun crime and yet bizarrely Cameron name checked him as someone who was a real problem. Bizzle wrote an open letter to one of the broadsheets and to NME, basically saying to David Cameron that he hadn't looked beyond the colour of his skin.

It can't be bad for Lethal Bizzle to have this great profile but ultimately he's not a gangster rapper and not someone who advocates violence. He takes that style of music and uses it to talk to these people about how there's another way. I think that's crossed over now into a mainstream culture and that's why I think it's going to be a really exciting show to have down here because in that scene he's a real up and coming name.

How would you describe your own taste in music?

Adam: Varied. I've got this little phrase I use, "do it like you mean it", and I think that sits true for my music tastes. It could be something really beautiful and fragile or it could be a wall of sound, some intense thrash metal that's really, really brutal. I like anything in extremes that pushes my buttons and tests me and challenges me. I like to be challenged by music. I hear so much music that when I listen to it purely because I want to sit and listen to something on my stereo, it's really got to push me quite hard.

I have to have quite a broad understanding of music to be able to promote events successfully to different audiences but where my own personal tastes are
concerned, I think I just work in extremes.

Do you have a favourite band?

Adam: I think probably more than anything else it would be Black Flag, a punk band that Henry Rollins fronted in the 80s. The first time I heard them, it just totally changed my life and the way I thought about music - the kind of power and energy you can get from music and the inspiration and motivation from a song. Black Flag have totally been my inspiration.

Do you think that the number of people wanting to see live music is declining or on the up?

Adam: I think that the number of people wanting to see live music is growing but I think the way they want to go and see it is changing.

This year in the absence of Glastonbury music festivals have become ten a penny. When I first started going and watching bands ten or 15 years ago it was very much the kind of bands that were playing Glastonbury or the V-Festival or the Reading Festival then. It was really alternative culture, but now that's become mainstream culture and instead of it being people like John Peel supporting it, they get Zane Lowe and Jo Wiley. All of the big guns come out to broadcast and big corporate guns turn out to the events and live music has become such a massively big business.

It's a lot easier to go and see a band in a big environment. The small intimate shows in venues like this [The Horn] are dying out because they [the bands] can get paid so much more money to play bigger events. Gone are the days when a band would turn up and play a venue two nights back to back just because it was a great show. But I'd rather play to 500 people two nights running than 1000 people at once. There's a lot more intimacy and a lot more interaction with your audiences that way, but I think those types of shows are fewer and further between.

You've said a bit about how you are picking bands but how can a new band impress you to give them a gig?

Adam: The first thing for me that's paramount (and maybe this wasn't the case so much in the past) is to just write bloody good songs. Just be really good. I'm using My Space now as a massive source of information, but although I look at NME and other taste maker magazines I'm very confident in my own opinion of what a good band is. I'll do the research - I'm doing 90 hour weeks at the moment! - but if your songs are good enough and you've contacted me then I'll check it out and I'll be back in touch.

I think just having enthusiasm for what you do and a belief is also good. If I say to you it's not quite right, don't just sit there and go "oh right", ask me why. If you really care about your band and the music you're making you should be wanting to ask me why you can't have the gig?

But don't be belligerent about it either. You have to accept that sometimes you're not going to be quite good enough and there are things that myself or the sound engineers down here can tell you. Talk to us, you can learn from us - we learn from people every day. If bands can sometimes step back from their egos a little bit and listen, then the bands would grow a lot better.

So, I'd say approach the venue with an open mind and see how you get on.

And be able to take constructive criticism because it can get worse?

Adam: Absolutely, Simon Cowell gets a rough time because people cry but you're getting into the music business, you're not selling fruit and veg. It can be pretty brutal and ruthless.

He's usually right as well isn't he?

Adam: He is actually and I guess that with the number of records he's sold, the guy's not wrong. It's all an act but ultimately you will have people talk to you like that and worse. And if you can't take it from a local venue saying it's not quite right, but what about doing this, then you might as well jack it in because you're just going to get swallowed up in this industry. It is a tough one to crack and you've got to be really thick skinned. If you can't cope with it, it will do you in, so it's better to learn now.

So what really drives you mad about bands?

Adam: Ego .... and .... organisation! They've got too much ego and not enough organisational skills. There's absolutely nothing wrong with believing in yourselves, it's essential, but, don't be rude with it.

Also, a lot of the more traditional bands that we've had down here have been really rude to me because they don't like the way the club's going and the fact that I'm broadening its horizons. I'm not pulling shows away from bands but one band that came to us recently - well, if I never saw them again I wouldn't have a problem with it at all! They had just the rudest most obnoxious, over rated over inflated egos I've ever come across ever!

If you've got a show, come down, be cool, be nice. We're all working towards the same end result which is for everyone to enjoy your music. If you're not going to work with the venue on that then you're already shooting yourself in the foot.

If you could pick any bands in the world at the moment what would be your dream gig line up?

Adam: Ummm - there's a band called Lightning Bolt that I would definitely have to get from the States, PJ Harvey would definitely have to be on there, and Bromheads Jacket - who are actually playing here in August - and Post War years who are playing here too. They are two of the most exciting bands that I have seen - full stop. Then there would be The Automatic, a really exciting band that have just done the NME tour, and Forward Russia.

I'm almost not keen on the big stadium bands because I just feel they've lost a certain amount of the excitement and the magic that they had when they weren't playing to big audiences. There's something really engaging about an emerging band that I struggle with somewhat when I've heard 8 or 10 albums from an artist.

I suppose that when bands are still really hungry for it they really push themselves and that's what I like. That's the kind of bands I would have down here as my dream festival because they all want it more and they've still got that hunger.

What's your ultimate ambition?

Adam: My ambition for The Horn is that it becomes widely regarded as the number one venue in Hertfordshire bar none and that we are always considered by the agencies as a "good gig" for their breaking artists. I also hope that the local community starts to trust this place again and will turn up just on the off chance that they're going to see a good band rather than coming down for a specific thing they've read about in the paper. If in a year's time I've got that trust back then I'll be really happy.

My personal goals are just to do more of the same really, only bigger and better, who knows, let's see how we get on here first!

Name an unusual fact about yourself

Adam: I find tropical fish ever so relaxing. It's nice just to switch off. I'm quite a fish freak, I've got two lovely great tanks and I've got UV lights in them - I've pimped up my fish tank!