I am back with another list.

This time talking about something I love – small concerts. The feeling of sharing special music with a group of only a couple hundred people is so special. Knowing you probably fought tooth and nail for those tickets before they sold out. Here are my favourite, and most sentimental venues, for these small shows.

Honourable Mention: “Resident Records, Brighton”

I wasn’t sure that “Records” really counted in this list, they’re kind of their own genre of Live music. But I had such a lovely time at “Resident”, I just had to talk about it. Back in November, Baby Queen was record-store touring her debut album Quarter Life Crisis, and my friend Katy and I went to check it out. Katy’s an avid BQ fan and so her excitement poured on to me, and I was buzzing! We were in the lovely cobbled side streets of Brighton made up of residents, armed with a meal deal, and in a small little store with lots of space to stand with others. Bella played about eight songs from the album, discussing each one, interacting with fans and really making the small space her own. It all honestly made me love record store shows more than I already did!

3. “The Loft, Southampton”

Kicking off nice and local.. literally. I left the University of Southampton’s Mayflower Halls as a silly little fresher and arrived at The Loft less than five minutes later. I was there to see “NOAHFINNCE”, whom I had never heard of before that afternoon but knew of his support act and thought it was the perfect opportunity to catch a show in Southampton, with some music I may at least recognise. I got there and realised how small it truly was. You could get from the bar to the stage in probably less than 20 steps, and the merch stand to the door in less than 30. It made for a lovely atmosphere, and meant everyone could see no matter what. It was my first experience of a mosh pit, and lord did I NOT participate, but the room being so tiny, it could have meant everyone had to get involved unless you just stuck to standing at the bar. It was a lovely show all in all, and a great venue in an excellent part of Southampton’s live scene.

2. “The Social, London”

By day, and above ground, The Social is a small bar and pizzeria with lots of indie music love in it, but come down the stairs and you have one of the oddest layouts of a gig I have ever seen. Split sort of half and half to an accessible seating space leaving a long space behind it, with a bar right at the back and a merch stand just down the stairs. The standing space is so narrow that a maximum of four people can fit before being thrown into the seated area. I saw pop-rock boyband New Hope Club there in 2023, and they had said they knew it was weird to play a tiny place like this, but their management had been bartending there for years, so it felt like a nice venue to play as they were establishing their feet on the ground for the year of live music to come. It has since transpired that they’ve left their management, and therefore we can maybe look back at this show as an homage to those people, as they didn’t play a show in London after that. The vibes themselves were great as NHC’s live shows always are. They lend themselves to the smaller venues and love the interaction. (George’s glare at me calling them old… maybe not) On the whole, a lovely little venue!

1. Lafayette, London

My first ever under-1000-person show, and my all-time favourite! Back to New Hope Club for this one, but this time a year earlier at their acoustic tour, launching their brand new start ahead of double release ‘Getting Better’ and ‘Girl Who Does Both’. I have most definitely recounted the ABC-s incident on The Edge before, but if you haven’t read that one, we sang the entire alphabet with the band … for absolutely no reason! Honestly, one of the biggest reasons I feel that small venues just are absolutely excellent for vibes is that you get a sense of an artist’s personality. They know it as smaller crowds, so they’re less nervous about mistakes and are more open to trying new things, NHC whacked out an awesome cover they’d been practising in the car for us, and it was fantastic! I just love the more friendly environment of a small concert, and Lafayette is such a beautiful venue to do that in. Lots of artists play there – I highly recommend it if you can get tickets!