LOOKING BACK AT MELODIC DISTRACTION
It’s no secret that arts and culture in this country have taken a battering in recent years. Successive Conservative governments have diminished their value through years of chronic underfunding, which has been further exacerbated by the Covid pandemic and subsequent cost of living crisis.
All this has created an environment that is proving increasingly difficult for independent venues and organisations to operate in, with many taking the tough decision to close their doors for good. Liverpool has been no exception to this nationwide issue, and in September 2023, local independent radio station and music venue Melodic Distraction ceased broadcasting and closed. Operating since 2015, the station survived Covid, studio closures and even a fire-bombing – but the current economic climate was just too big a hurdle to navigate.
The station’s impact on Liverpool and North West culture cannot be underestimated. From humble beginnings on the Baltic Triangle’s Jamaica Street, the station grew to become one of the city’s most important cultural hubs, playing a massive part in platforming North West culture to a wider audience. At the heart of Melodic’s ethos was the desire to promote local talent and culture – “broadcasting the sounds and stories of the North West, to the world.” In an industry that is heavily Southern-centric in its coverage, the importance of this was massive. Melodic challenged this narrative, spotlighting the incredible creativity taking place in Liverpool and its surroundings, giving those responsible for it a medium through which to promote their work.
Melodic made a concerted effort to reflect the rich diversity of the North West’s music scene in its programming. Whilst the station initially had a strong electronic focus, this broadened into a truly eclectic tapestry that welcomed hosts of all different genres, sounds and styles. In doing so, Melodic provided opportunities for those on the broader reaches of the musical spectrum, whose tastes catered less to mainstream trends, to reach their audiences, build new ones and forge connections with other like-minded creatives. Similarly, the station was also fundamentally dedicated to improving its diversity and worked year on year to achieve this. It committed itself to a Keychange Action Plan in 2019 to work towards a more equitable gender balance on its airwaves, and worked with the Black Music Coalition to create a more inclusive environment on the station. Melodic also made concerted efforts to represent and champion disparate communities from across the North West, collaborating with a number of local organisations, charities and community leaders. This was to aid in their community outreach and provide them with a platform with which to champion their work across the city, including the LIMF Academy, Where Are The Girlbands?, Sahir House, Toxteth Community Radio, Arts Emergency, Comics Youth, GYRO YPAS and Africa Oyé.
Not only that, whether you were a beginner or an established DJ, Melodic created a nurturing environment that catered to all abilities. Thanks to the skill and dedication of Melodic’s radio producers, the studio was a relaxing space for people to deliver their shows in, try new things and explore their creativity. This acted as an important stepping stone for several hosts, who then went on to grace the airwaves of the likes of Rinse FM, NTS and the BBC. The addition of regular host meetups and free-to-attend workshops with industry experts sought to upskill attendees, with free resource packs compiled on everything from formatting USBs to live-streaming.The Melodic team worked tirelessly to ensure that even the global pandemic didn’t restrict this. Faced with the daunting prospect of imminently closing the studio for lockdown, the team created a live broadcasting guide and drove cables, microphones and other broadcasting equipment across the city, so that Melodic hosts could pre-record or broadcast their shows live from home. This provided a vital creative outlet during those drawn out months of isolation, allowing the community to take on a new lease of life. People religiously tuned into the breakfast show each morning, talking in the chatroom, sending in tune requests and entering competitions during, what could have otherwise been, an incredibly lonely time.
Across its eight year existence, Melodic created paid work for local creatives through collaborating with DJs, graphic designers, videographers and more. From curating club nights at Liverpool’s much-loved independent venues, to hosting stages at national festivals including Gottwood and We Out Here, there was always an abundance of exciting opportunities. These culminated in Eurovision in May 2023, where Melodic was entrusted with curating the DJ lineup for the Eurovision Village stage. Local DJs and artists were invited to play at one of the world’s biggest cultural events on a festival stage with a capacity of 25,000 – truly a once in a lifetime experience! The role of Melodic Bar cannot be understated in this sense, either. As a free-to-hire venue, it gave promoters, collectives and individuals a space to launch and nurture nascent events and new ideas, with few financial risks attached. Events such as Hidden Poets, In Fine Style, Deep Swing and Connecting To The Source flourished in this environment, becoming regular fixtures in the music calendar across the city. The programming team at Melodic Bar can be commended for the diverse range of events they staged at the space, with panel discussions, dance classes and film screenings just as likely to occur as live music or DJ sets. Uplifting and investing in Liverpool and the North West’s creative communities was central to Melodic Distraction’s ethos, and was one of the key impacts the organisation had on the city.
Ultimately though, in this writer’s opinion, the greatest legacy of Melodic Distraction is one that is harder to quantify or qualify numerically. The fostering of a community and community ethos is not one that you can measure in any physical terms, but exists firmly in the realms of sentiment and feeling. Namely, the feeling of belonging to something bigger than oneself. Ask those who were involved what they felt the greatest contribution to the city’s cultural scene was, and the answer would most likely be “community”. In providing a physical space where disparate groups from creative scenes and movements from across the region could rub shoulders with one another, the station created a positive climate of collaboration and camaraderie between local artists, event organisers and collectives – an environment that can be argued to have strengthened the wider scene as a whole. Former Station Manager Nina Franklin summed it up perfectly in an interview with Liverpool Audio Network back in 2020: “It’s all about being part of a family. It’s the people that make it – perhaps you become good friends with the folks who present a show either side to you. Perhaps you end up making songs together, working together, or starting up a project together! Suddenly, a whole network of people who are deeply invested in the scene in Liverpool are around you, and you’re a part of it.” That community spirit was evident when Melodic was forced to move studios during the pandemic. The community stepped in and made a massive contribution towards the station’s Kickstarter to fund the construction of its new studio space, without which it would have closed. Melodic brought people together in a positive and unifying way. It created friendships and improved the wellbeing of those involved in it, imparted skills and opportunities to local creatives and worked towards the strengthening of culture in the North West.
The loss of Melodic Distraction has been keenly felt by Liverpool’s music lovers and there is an undeniable void left in its absence. But there is still a lot to celebrate about the city’s music scene and culture. Liverpool continues to be a hotbed for house music, with producers and DJs such as Dowd and the Zuku collective making waves nationally. Parties such as P.L.U.S.H and organisations such as Queensway embody the city’s community spirit and bring artists from across the city’s music scene together. Venues such as the Kazimier Gardens and Q U A RR Y provide opportunities to launch new projects and program events tailoring to diverse clientele. 24 Kitchen Street and meraki continue to host high quality nights, putting Liverpool on the UK clubbing map with their bookings. The city’s jazz, hip hop and grime scenes are undeniably exciting – with the likes of Ni Maxine, Bop Kaballa, Black Borough and Olvine releasing amazing music last year alone, whilst local champions Liverpool Hip Hop Festival marked 50 Years since the birth of Hip Hop with an exhibition at the Liverpool Museum.
All of Melodic Distraction’s radio shows and magazine articles are archived on their website. You can also look back at their 8 year journey via their Instagram.
Written by Toby Taylor [Former Head of Programming at Melodic Distraction and Co Founder of In Fine Style and Poolside Pumpers]
Photos by Daniel de la Bastide
