Heavy Pop announce 'Friends With Benefits' tiered membership scheme

The organisers behind Reading’s award winning multi-venue charity event Are You Listening? Festival, aren’t going to let a small factor like a global pandemic stop them from continuing to bring the best and brightest talent to the area in the future.

Are You Listening? Festival and it’s sister outdoor festival Down at the Abbey which launched last September in Reading Abbey Ruins; are both the music children of Reading based independent music promoters Heavy Pop.

The impact of Covid-19, national lockdowns, social distancing have all played their part in having a devastating and potentially long-lasting effect on live music industry and the wider music community. The promoters who previous guests include such names as Royal Blood, Wolf Alice, Idles, Anna Meredith and Gaz Coombes were unable to run either of their festivals in 2020 and all their live shows since March have been either cancelled or postponed. As a result they’ve lost 100% of their income for this period.

However, despite the challenges this year has thrown at them. Heavy Pop have launched a brand new, tiered membership scheme called Friends with Benefits to help them charter the difficult times ahead. The rather ingenious scheme allows members access a whole host of benefits from as little as £15 (Listener) with the top tier (Ambassador) coming in at a mere £40.

Benefits to members include: 10% discount with local indie business partners, advance ticket discount codes, door price discounts, regular draws to win free gig and festival tickets to their events and more.

Heavy Pop promoter / festival organiser Dave Maul explains, “As many people are aware, COVID has an massive impact on live music organisations such as ours. We wanted to create a membership scheme that gives something back to music fans rather than a simple donation model. This scheme will help us through this challenging period and help us to continue to support the local community, deliver stand-out cultural events, and find the artists of tomorrow.”

You can find out more about Friends with Benefits and Heavy Pop’s events here.