Music

Sisterhood of sound: 10 years of Saffron

Founded in Bristol in 2015, Saffron is a non-profit organisation working towards gender equality in the music industry. A decade on, its founder and one of its alumni reflect on its successes and what still needs to be done

Moyah: Sound of survival

Listen: Bristol Unpacked – from Wigan to LA, via Eastville, with Bristol Northern Soul Club

Music

Blazing the fire: Sound system culture through the generations

Sound system culture arrived with the Windrush Generation and took root in St Paul's and Easton, where speaker stacks became monuments to belonging, resistance, and Black identity.

A group of people dancing together in a nightclub with pink walls

Features

Joy as resistance: Inside the club night changing Bristol’s queer scene

People Just Do Something

Listen: People Just Do Something – Sound against the system – punk, rave and Dave from Faithless

After the crowdfunder: how can cultural spaces not just survive, but thrive?

In Bristol and elsewhere, campaigns to safeguard arts venues’ future are commonplace – and regularly smash fundraising targets. But the hard work doesn’t stop there.

Vladimir, vapes and defending democracy: when the Cable met Pussy Riot in BS3

Celebrating the subversive, we spent an evening with the legendary Russian dissidents to get behind the balaclavas to discuss all things protest.

‘He was our godfather’: Bristol musicians remember Mark Stewart

It’s a year since the Pop Group singer, a revered figure of the post-punk era, died aged 62. Beyond the uncompromising legacy of his own releases, his influence remains etched into his home city’s musical DNA.

When words fail: Meet the Bristol group nurturing male musicians’ mental health

The Seed Sessions project combines counselling and music mentoring to help young men express themselves. We heard from its founder, one of the participants and a counsellor working with the group about the power of music as a therapeutic tool.

Listen: Love Her – how Weekenders made space for women’s music

As part of this series of podcasts about underrepresented parts of Bristol’s history, this is a homage to Weekenders, a women's music night that started in the late 90s.

‘Crazy summers, days of rage’: how Beezer’s camera immortalised 1980s Bristol

Long before the ‘Bristol sound’ label was applied to the potent sonic brew bubbling from the city in the 90s, Andy ‘Beezer’ Beese moved with the bass-heavy beats of the 80s to photograph the era's pulses, parties and protests.