Drowned in Sound

Films, Portishead, and how the people who went to those countryside raves in 1993 ended up voting Reform

"My brothers are 20 and they're always like 'we are so cooked.' And I'm just like no we're not. There's hope but you just gotta believe, you gotta believe in something." That quote accidentally captures Music Declares Emergency's strategic shift from awareness to action. After five years of "No Music On A Dead Planet" the Hope Over Fear campaign is building action hubs in grassroots venues - real physical spaces where fans, artists, and local communities organize around the climate crisis. In this episode, PVA front-person and MDE Campaigns Manager Ella Harris explains how the campaign works, why music fandom is inherently empathetic practice that translates to organizing power, and how she balances making escapist art (PVA's intimate new album No More Like This) with building climate infrastructure. The conversation tackles touring economics (trains cost £150, flights are just £30), why even festival headliners need day jobs, artists' fear of speaking out, and what £500 million in carbon offset funds could actually fix if redirected toward infrastructure. This is about hope over fear. Real-life organizing over digital despair. Infrastructure over individual guilt. This podcast is brought to you in partnership with Qobuz, the ethical music streaming platform. Visit drownedinsound.org/playlists to discover new music in Hi-Res lossless quality and start your 30-day free trial at qobuz.com/dis. Edited by: Josh Craggs at Dubble Audio Chapters 00:00 – Introduction: No music on a dead planet 02:10 – Wearing multiple hats: PVA and Music Declares Emergency 05:00 – Music fandom as an empathetic practice 07:30 – From merch to movement 10:45 – Action hubs and the future of grassroots venues 15:30 – Touring economics, energy costs, and structural limits 19:00 – Artists, activism, and the fear of speaking out 24:30 – Nature, creativity, and why hope needs infrastructure 31:00 – What £500 million could fix in the music ecosystem 35:00 – AI, empathy, and what human music still does best 38:30 – Outro: Depth, not breadth Continue the Conversation: Head to the Drowned in Sound community to chat about the topics in this episode. Subscribe: Get weekly essays, interviews, and insights from the Drowned in Sound newsletter - exploring music, culture, and resistance. Links & Resources: Music Declares Emergency - Learn more about the No Music On A Dead Planet movement, the Hope Over Fear campaign, and how artists, industry, and fans can get involved. Music Venue Trust - Support and protect the UK’s grassroots venues The Green Rider - Ideas for ‘green’ clauses for inclusion as part of your tech or hospitality riders. Hope Over Fear Campaign - The campaign funding real-world action hubs in grassroots venues, focused on collective climate action and community organising. No Music On A Dead Planet - The global artist-led movement connecting music, fandom, and climate justice. About the host: Sean Adams is the founder of Drowned in Sound, an independent music publication championing underground and independent artists since 2000. DiS explores how music fans discover their collective power through journalism, podcasts, and community organizing. Related episodes: - Tori Tsui: "How Music Fans Became Climate Activists" (Brian Eno, Billie Eilish, Fossil Fuel Treaty) - Giles Bidder: "Why Festival Headliners Still Need Part-Time Jobs" (101 Part Time Jobs, touring economics) - EarthSonic Live: Music, ecology, and collective action from Manchester Museum About Ella Harris: Ella Harris is the front-person and vocalist of London post-punk/electronic trio PVA, whose second album 'No More Like This' (produced by Kwake Bass) explores desire, devotion, and emotional indentation through trip-hop-influenced soundscapes. As Campaigns Manager for Music Declares Emergency, she leads the Hope Over Fear campaign, establishing action hubs in grassroots venues across the UK and Ireland. Previously, she founded Group Therapy Collective during lockdown, releasi

Picking up where Part 1 left off, DiS returns to its conversation with Giles Bidder. Not to talk about how musicians survive, but about how stories travel, how listeners connect and what it really takes to build a music podcast in 2026. In this second instalment, Sean Adams turns the lens on the medium itself (yes, we’ve gone meta). Drawing on nearly 600 episodes of 101 Part Time Jobs, Giles reflects on the craft of interviewing, the ethics of editing, and why the best conversations often need space to breathe. This is less about hustle and more about care: how to hold people well, how to listen properly, and how to build trust over time. The conversation ranges from standout episodes and “slow-burn” storytelling to what it feels like to make work that actually helps people navigate their lives. Giles speaks openly about bad bosses, fear-based workplaces, and the quiet anger that fuels his show (as well as the small, human moments that make it worthwhile). A love for radio runs through this episode: Giles describes producing Shaun Keaveny’s Community Garden Radio as a lesson in warmth, humour, and emotional intelligence on air. From there, the pair broaden out into why podcasts have become such a powerful space for connection, especially for people stuck in boring jobs, long commutes, or lonely routines. Visit https://drownedinsound.org/playlists/ to discover new music in rich Hi-Res lossless quality and start your 30-day free trial of Qobuz at https://qobuz.com/dis. Edited by: Josh Craggs at Dubble Audio Chapters 00:00 - Intro01:30 - Standout episodes and “slow-burn” editing03:20 - When to cut vs when to let a story breathe05:10 - What makes a “good” episode in hindsight07:00 - Work gaffs, embarrassment, and shared vulnerability12:00 - Bad bosses, anger, and fear-based workplaces14:00 - Why people are quietly quitting18:00 - Why podcasts work on boring journeys21:00 - Community Garden Radio and the art of warmth22:30 - What great broadcasting feels like24:00 - Power, responsibility, and attention25:30 - Why trust matters more than reach27:00 - Outro Continue the Conversation: Head to the Drowned in Sound community to chat about the topics in this episode. Subscribe: Get weekly essays, interviews, and insights from the Drowned in Sound newsletter - exploring music, culture, and resistance. From scout-hut gigs to the economics of touring, DiS sits down with Giles Bidder - host of 101 Part Time Jobs for an unsentimental look at how creative lives are actually sustained today. In this first instalment, Sean Adams talks to one of the UK’s most quietly compelling broadcasters about the hidden labour behind music culture. Over nearly 600 episodes, Bidder has built one of the most humane music podcasts around, asking artists, writers, and comedians not about their success but about the jobs they’ve done to survive. Giles explains how 101 Part Time Jobs emerged as both portfolio and refuge: a way to make sense of a patchwork career, rediscover belonging, and document how people navigate a system that rarely works in their favour. Along the way, the conversation takes in touring economics, merch, sync, class, and why even bands who play the Roundhouse still need “normal jobs. What emerges is a stark but generous thesis: music is socially priceless and economically precarious. Until that gap closes, culture will continue to run on grit, goodwill, and vast amounts of invisible labour. Visit https://drownedinsound.org/playlists/ to discover new music in rich Hi-Res lossless quality and start your 30-day free trial of Qobuz at https://qobuz.com/dis. Chapters 00:00 - Intro 01:26 - Sitting in the “other chair”: Giles as guest, not host 04:05 - Ska/punk origins, micro-prejudices, and how scenes teach you 07:45 - Why 101 Part Time Jobs began: Universal Credit, lockdown, stability 08:55 - Human curation and introducing unknown artists 11:25 - The myth of “making it”: Roundhouse bands with day jobs 13:55 - Why meaningful art can s

Fresh from touring stadiums with Depeche Mode, DiS meets electronic music pioneer to discuss her past, the present, and the future of music. This is part of Drowned in Sound’s 25th anniversary series in which Sean Adams continues the anniversary series by sits down with some of our favourite acts of the past quarter century. Kelly Lee Owens is very much one of those artists, who has featured in DiS year end lists and awards and playlists since releasing her debut EP. The episode starts on the education that comes from working in record shops and becomes a wide-ranging conversation about how music communities form, fracture, and sometimes regenerate. Moving across North Wales to London basements, from pressing white labels by hand to playing for 75,000 people with Depeche Mode, Kelly Lee Owens traces a path through all corners of music: the shops, venues, teachers, collectives, community centres, and accidental mentors that shaped her, her music, and her career. Sean and Kelly chat about their working class roots, the discipline of DJing as storytelling, and the economics of grassroots music. Kelly Lee Owens reflects on why she now deliberately plays shows in places artists rarely go, why she sees music as a form of healing as much as entertainment and why community matters more than scale. If there’s a thread running through it all…it’s this: music isn’t a product or a pipeline. It’s a relationship. And like any relationship, it needs time, space, and care to survive. Visit https://drownedinsound.org/playlists/ to discover new music in rich Hi-Res lossless quality and start your 30-day free trial of Qobuz at https://qobuz.com/dis. Edited by: Josh Craggs at Dubble Audio Chapters 00:00 - Introduction 02:00 - Record shops as education and community 05:05 - Obsession, discovery, and how taste is formed 10:00 - The early 2010s shift: risk, hedonism, and electronic culture 13:05 - DIY culture, SoundCloud, and pressing your own records 15:00 - Human curation vs automation and playlists 22:10 - Playing huge rooms: Depeche Mode, confidence, and scale 26:05 - Returning to small places: community shows and access 29:00 - Grassroots collapse, class, and structural inequality 32:10 - What £500 million could fix in music culture 42:05 - Music as healing, frequency, and emotional space 48:25 - The future: rebuilding value, community, and care 50:15 - Outro Continue the Conversation: Head to the Drowned in Sound community to chat about the topics in this episode. Subscribe: Get weekly essays, interviews, and insights from the Drowned in Sound newsletter - exploring music, culture, and resistance. Links & Resources: Music Venue Trust — protecting grassroots venueshttps://www.musicvenuetrust.com David Byrne — How Music Workshttps://davidbyrne.com/books/how-music-works Fabric London — venue history and cultural importancehttps://www.fabriclondon.com Piccadilly Records (Manchester)https://www.piccadillyrecords.com Pure Groove Records (London)https://puregroove.co.uk Kelly Lee Owenshttps://kellyleeowens.com Stop Making Sense — Talking Headshttps://www.talkingheadsofficial.com Cocteau Twinshttps://cocteautwins.com The Knife — Silent Shouthttps://theknife.net Warehouse Project (Manchester)https://www.thewarehouseproject.com Neuadd Ogwen / Bethesda community venuehttps://neuaddogwen.com

What if swifts sound like metal bands and rivers fly through the sky? This backstage look at EarthSonic Live reveals how music makes climate science accessible through music, field recording, conservation, and creativity.