Blossoms: Huddersfield's The Parish

Music Venue Trust - Stockport's finest remind us all why it's so important to look out for the smaller music venues

By Tom Adams 7th July 2023

"Has anybody not seen us before? Lucky bastards! We've been polishing this shit out for ten years..."

...joked frontman Tom Ogden following their opening track, ‘Honey Sweet’. The chances are many of the lucky 275 in attendance had seen the band before - just at least not in this part of West Yorkshire. In between headline shows in Manchester and Leeds and not long after collaborating with Rick Astley at Glastonbury’s Woodsies stage, Blossoms are a band who can say they’ve made it. Four albums deep, their own documentary film and a podcast too, the Stockport quintet have come a long way since their smaller music venue days helped them make a name for themselves just a decade prior. Now dropping at a rate of one a week across the UK, it’s time they and the rest of us give a little back to the grassroot music venues now on their knees.

This year Blossoms are celebrating their tenth anniversary, yet having never played in the town of Huddersfield, it seemed a fitting time for their first visit. As each of Tom, Charlie (Salt), Josh (Dewhurst), Joe (Donovan) and Myles (Kellock) begin the famous intros to their old time indie classics: ‘There’s a Reason Why’ and ‘Charlemagne’ to an ecstatic crowd just centimetres away in the cosy Parish attic, it feels like an authentic gig experience worth fighting to keep hold of.

The reality is the Parish was almost forced to permanently close back in 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic before a crowdfunder raised almost double the initial target of £25,000 required to save it. Thankfully, this is predominantly the reason Blossoms played the intimate upstairs music room of a Huddersfield pub: to help save some of the UK’s remaining smaller music venues from just surviving.

Having launched the campaign last month, The National Lottery teamed up with Music Venue Trust to cover the production cost of 150 gigs across 130 venues running through to September, seeing the likes of: Cat Burns, Bloc Party, Sam Ryder and more join Blossoms in promoting the importance of grassroots music. The Music Venue Trust’s United By Music Tour also allows each ticket buyer to bring a guest free of charge with the proof of a Lottery product. Encouraging more people inside venues such as the Parish effortlessly boosts financial and social profile, whilst in-turn providing a unique gig opportunity for many established artists in what must feel like a truly memorable occasion.

Following support from Huddersfield university student and singer-songwriter, Josh Quaye, the Stockport five-piece began to work their way through the whole back-catalogue of Blossoms’ discography in their black and white shirts, 80s-esque flares and distinctive long dark hair. It’s undeniable the band are perfectionists brimming with all the charisma of a seasoned top of the bill performer.

“It’s incredibly sweaty in here… it’s not a good look for the band” Ogden comically admits towards the end of the set, on form as ever. But it’s the warm, stuffy enclosed gig rooms such as this one that feels the most natural, zero phones in sight and everyone present singing along to every word. As each track smoothly feeds into the next, it becomes more and more clear Blossoms are an exemplar example of a band once a product of smaller music venues across Greater Manchester and now consistently major additions to any of the UK’s biggest music festivals each year.

But by playing and becoming recognised via smaller venues when they were given a chance, it has never felt more urgent to protect generations of live music and communal feelings of camaraderie than it has now, because after tonight’s gig at the Parish pub, it is so blatantly obvious these are the kind of places worth fighting for.