Medway’s music scene remains precarious
Plus Mayor's charity trek stumbles, we review The Pumproom, our weekly events guide, news in brief, and more
At the end of 2022, the Royal Function Rooms closed, removing two live music venues from Medway’s scene. Nearly two years on, Medway’s music scene feels more precarious than ever. Further down, we have new of the Mayor of Medway’s charity trek across Medway that hasn’t quite achieved it’s aims, we review The Pumproom in Chatham, our weekly events guide, news in brief, and more.
Medway’s music scene remains precarious
It’s been nearly two years since the Royal Function Rooms closed its doors, removing two venues and one recording studio from Medway’s cultural scene.
Of course, venues closing up and down the country is nothing new. The Music Venue Trust estimated that 125 grassroots venues, 16% of them all, closed in 2023.
Medway has never quite had the venues one would expect. For an urban area of over 280,000 residents across five towns and surrounding villages, we have no mid-sized capacity venue that touring bands of a certain size can visit.
The Royal Function Rooms on Star Hill somewhat filled that gap, offering a 200-capacity space in Rochester’s town centre, with a smaller club underneath for smaller shows. Both spaces were well used until they weren’t. Two years later, both venues remain empty, though at least Ranscombe Studios, another casualty of the closure, has found a new home in Intra.
All of our usable venues are the most grassroots of grassroots venues. Poco Loco in Chatham almost singlehandedly holds the live music scene in Medway together, putting on several gigs every week. Beyond that, things start to look somewhat sparse.
Excellent promoters like Careful Now, The Platform 3 Club and The Big Cheese Company put on excellent shows at The Oast Community Centre in Rainham. The latter puts on the odd show in the Nags Head in Rochester or the Analogue Music record shop. Every now and again, an interesting gig might appear at Three Sheets To The Wind in Rochester.
All of this is something, but the shortage of venues inevitably means compromises have to be made. Most venues most commonly used in Medway aren’t step-free, rendering them inaccessible to some potential audience members. This is not a criticism of those venues, as most will be struggling to do what they can with limited resources, but an issue with the lack of support to make our music scene more accessible for all.
Small gigs are the foundation of a thriving scene, but Medway has to work with few suitable venues and an utter lack of larger ones. Without those venues, how does any band step up to playing a larger show or getting a support slot with a touring band passing through?
Sadly, the problems run deeper than just venues. Bands we’ve spoken to report significant issues finding suitable rehearsal space in our towns. The nature of these spaces is challenging. They tend not to make much income, but they do make a lot of noise, so finding an appropriate space in an accessible location is difficult. Bands end up going outside of our towns to practice or making do with home studios that many bands won’t have the resources to access.
Rochester has a record shop now, which is great, but only one shop sells instruments across all of Medway. Opportunities to engage with and meet fellow musicians remain low. At the most basic level, schools are cutting music from curriculums.
With years of Medway Council actively stifling the scene and no one having much money to experiment with anything new, we are left with fragments of a scene rather than anything coherent. The issue of supporting a music scene is complicated. There is no magic bullet that one organisation can put in place to make everything come together.
Undoubtedly, not everyone will share such a pessimistic view of the situation. People who attend large shows at the Castle Concerts might not see the problem. But without the grassroots end of the music scene being supported, the future artists of those larger shows have nowhere to nurture their talents in the first place.
Medway has a long and storied music history, and for all of the problems, incredible people are trying to do incredible things here. Whether it will continue to be enough remains to be seen.
Mayor’s trek across Medway stumbles
Shout out to the Mayor of Medway, Marian Nestorov, who spent his Monday walking all the way from Hoo to Rainham to raise money for his chosen charities. Unfortunately, the, ahem, exercise hasn’t perhaps quite been as successful as he might have liked.
The event was to raise money for Medway Culture Club and the Halpern Charitable Foundation and saw the Mayor and supporters who joined him visiting all five Medway town centres as well as extra stops at locations like Chatham Dockyard, Priestfield Stadium, and for some reason Twydall Shops even though they weren’t on the route.
Unfortunately, four days after the event, the fundraising from the walk has still only reached a grand total of £455, less than half of the £1,000 target. This is perhaps made worse by the fact that the vast majority of donations are from Nestorov’s fellow Labour councillors rather than the wider community.
All of which is something of a shame, particularly given the phenomenal artwork that was put together for the event. The collection pot remains open, so if you’d like to help get the Mayor a little closer to his target and support two Medway charities in the meantime, we’re sure he’d be very happy to receive your support.
Shameless self-promotion: I (Ed) will be speaking at Goldsmiths, University of London, in a couple of weeks on the state of local news and what can be done about it. I’m on a panel with the editor of BBC’s Local Democracy Service and the managing director of Social Spider, who run a set of local community news outlets in London. The event is open to students, staff, and members of the public, so if you happen to be around New Cross on 17 October, feel free to come along. More details here.
In brief
⚓ Local naval historian Chris Sams recently wrote about the impressive Slips at Chatham Dockyard.
⚫ Chris Bath, the lead architect of the Rochester Riverside project, passed away last week at the age of 43. BPTW, the firm he was a partner in, paid tribute to him and his work.
🏆 Nominations are now open for the 2025 Pride in Medway awards. This year, the awards feature a refreshed set of categories for local people doing good things to be highlighted.
👨🎨 The New York Times interviewed Billy Childish this week, which seems like an excellent opportunity to promote our interview from earlier this year.
Out to Lunch: The Pumproom
In which Steven Keevil assesses the lunch options available in our towns. This week, he’s been down to The Pumproom in Chatham…
Part of the Copper Rivet Distillery, the Chatham Dockside establishment providing high-quality gin, The Pumproom can be found behind the Odeon as you drive towards Chatham Marina. They have their parking area, and the building itself is impressive to walk around. The inside is just as impressive, with the restaurant providing a good view of the river and the waiting team friendly and attentive.
They offer a two-course lunch for £22. I had crispy belly pork with an apple and octopus bulgogi for a starter. For the main, I had sauteed minute steak Diane. I swapped the skinny fries for triple-cooked chips, which came with a Caesar salad. When a dessert course was just an extra £3, it would be rude not to. I had caramelised chilled coconut rice pudding, passionfruit sorbet, and blackberries.
Sadly, I must start with a complaint. The meal came with bread served with Marmite butter. My complaint is that this was so nice and they didn’t serve enough of it. The starter was indeed crispy and delicious when combined with the sauce. I don’t know what bulgogi is, I’ve Googled it, and I’m still not sure. The steak was tender, well cooked and delightful with the sauce. I was very happy to have ordered the triple-cooked chips. The salad is undoubtedly one of the best I’ve had doing these reviews: Simple but full of flavour, with a nice dressing and top-quality croutons. The dessert was a bargain with a great mixture of flavours and chilled at the best temperature for rice pudding.
With all this quality food for just £25, The Pumproom is an essential option for lunch in Medway.
Events this week
🧟 Cineworld in Strood is screening Zombieland tonight (Fri 4 Oct) as part of its Horror Season. Most horrifying, the film is marking its 15th anniversary, making us all feel incredibly old. Tickets £5.
🎨 Rochester Art Fair is at the Corn Exchange this weekend (4-6 Oct). You can browse and buy a wide range of visual art and interact with the artists behind it. Tickets £7.
🧑🏾🎨 The Black Art Hub’s Intersectionality exhibition begins today (Fri 4 Oct) and runs until the end of the month at the Halpern Gallery at Nucleus Arts’ Chatham site. Showcases work from Black British visual artists and poets from across the UK. Free.
📜 Medway History Showcase is being held tomorrow (Sat 5 Oct) at the Royal Engineers Museum in Brompton. Exhibitions from local organisations, heritage sites, universities, and more, and a packed lineup of history-related talks. Free, booking required.
🎸 Legendary Medway musician and artist Lupen Crook will perform at The Oast Community Centre in Rainham as part of The Platform 3 Club tomorrow (Sat 5 Oct). Grinners, Lovejoy, and The Pastel Waves round out the lineup. Tickets £8.
🍄🟫 Intra Arts in Rochester is holding a Fungus Day tomorrow (Sat 5 Oct) to celebrate UK Fungus Day, which is apparently a thing. All-ages event where you can draw fungi for a glow art installation, learn how to identify mushrooms and look at them under a microscope. Free.
📽️ Get Out, one of the finest horror films of recent years, is being screened by Cineworld in Strood on Wednesday (9 Oct) as part of their Celebrating Black Talent strand. Tickets £5.
More Authority
Urban explorers find ways into abandoned or hidden parts of the world, and Medway is full of fascinating nooks and crannies to explore. With the help of local urban explorer Kim Hargreaves, we looked at some of Medway's abandoned spaces and how to go about the practice as safely as possible.
Urban exploring Medway
Urban exploring is the exploration of man-made structures, usually abandoned ruins or hidden components of the man-made environment. We spoke to Kim Hargreaves, a Medway-based urban explorer, about where she has visited locally, how she got into urban exploring and what advice she would have for somebody considering doing it.
On Sunday, our interview is with Medway musician and potter Sarah Crouch. We discuss her musical personas, living on the River Medway, selling her pottery worldwide, and lots more.
Remember that our Medwayish shop contains a wide range of Medway-related gifts and products designed by local creatives. We have books, mugs, t-shirts, prints, and other fun bits and pieces. Check it out!
Footnotes
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Music that soundtracked the creation of this edition: The Suburbs Have Ruined My Life by Great Wight, Driver by Adult Mom, and Love Keeps Kicking by Martha.
Agree about Medway music scene , but our brilliant Medway bands are resilient and find a way with the help of our great promotors , and of course Jim still helping to produce great records . When I’m a millionaire I’ll find a way of getting the function rooms up and running
Regarding Medways music scene I would like to mention the Ship Pub near the strand who have been supporting many small bands including the Zac Schultz Band for a number of
Years .Bands play at the pub at 4 nights a week at least and it's a varied mix ? Problem is venues need punters to pay to turn up and watch to make it work and that involves money .
Any events I have have been to excluding pubs are around the 25 pounds mark, glassbox .gfc .
There is a pretty good lively music scene here supported by local pubs . Ship .Cannon . Dewdrop .Ash Tree . A2 Brewers and Eagle for example .Get into those and support the local live music scene