Click the YouTube link below to watch the full 30 minute podcast.
Matty Lacey is the manager and founding director of Come Together NE, an arts service that has raised over £2000 for the NHS through an online festival during lockdown.
Come Together NE was set up as an arts collective in late March, with the intention of bringing together musicians, artists, production members and other arts related individuals to provide a base to allow creative members to work together. However the COVID-19 crisis and subsequent lockdown caused Matty to take Come Together onto an online sphere, where the music festivals he had once hoped to bring together in Newcastle’s local venues turned into live streaming events. Fortunately this provided the Come Together NE collective with an opportunity to raise money for the NHS at a time when it’s funding and PPE resources were seriously lacking.
The digital festival was held on the Come Together NE Instagram page from 3-5 April. It featured acts such as Matty Oliver, Palm Beach and Bethany Elen Coyle, as well as 15 other independent artists. The money raised proved that the festival was a success and remains as an influential component to the local scene and as a testament to the strength of online festivals as a way of giving musicians an audience during the lockdown period. The success of the initial festival also gave way to allowing Come Together NE to host other live streams such as the Live Easter Stream. This featured Come Together mainstay Keiran Bowe, Laurens Court and Ryan Robinson.
Overall Come Together NE has proven that it can remain as an important service for local musicians and production members as a method of uniting, strengthening and promoting talent in the local scene. Matty urges that those with capabilities that can help strengthen the service should come forward and lend their efforts to the cause. This gives Come Together NE an exciting future for the Newcastle scene.
In the podcast, Matty talks about his inspiration for Come Together as a way to bring creative individuals together at a time when Newcastle’s local scene has been stuck in limbo. He also delves into his beliefs of how the local scene should be brought together and how online festivals could translate to a post-lockdown world. He also may or may not reveal the silver-dollar question of which musician he believes to be a tin man under their skin.
Watch the full 30 minute podcast on YouTube below.
A link to Come Together NE’s Instagram page is also available, their next digital festival will start at 5pm on Friday 8th May.
Creative individuals should also get in touch with Matty via the Come Together NE Instagram page to get involved with the platform's productions.
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