20 years of Eat Your Own Ears
London-based independent event promoter Eat Your Own Ears ( EYOE ) is celebrating its 20th anniversary with a show across three stages at Depot Mayfield in Manchester on 19 November . Tom Baker , EYOE founder and co-founder of Field Day festival , tells Access about his launch of a new festival and record label this year .
Words : Christopher Barrett
Despite no longer having anything to do with the Broadwick Live-owned one-day event , Baker ’ s passion for festivals remains undiminished . In June this year he was behind the launch of the Sands festival at Dreamland in Margate . Focused on electronica , jazz and soul music , the event saw performances from acts including BICEP , Floating Points , The Comet Is Coming and Elkka .
Tom Baker launched Eat Your Own Ears ( EYOE ) 20 years ago , promoting shows at the 93 Feet East club venue on Brick Lane , east London . Initially partnering with indie labels including Rough Trade , Mute , Warp and Domino to promote gigs by fledgling acts , the promoter played a key role in helping to boost the early careers of numerous artists , including Florence + The Machine , Four Tet and Hot Chip .
In 2007 , Baker co-founded the Field Day Festival , which has evolved into the 25,000-capacity event that was staged at Victoria Park this year .
Sands festival
Congratulations on reaching your 20th anniversary as an independent promoter . Does it feel like a major landmark ? I ’ ve never really done anniversaries before , I ’ ve always wanted to look forward rather than back , but 20 years is a milestone to be part of this world . It felt important to do something to mark it , and staging an event outside of London was an exciting prospect , especially with The Warehouse Project .
How formative was your time at 93 Feet East ? It is where Eat Your Own Ears started , it was built from there . It was always about working closely with record labels and presenting their recent signings and more established artists .
I built relationships with artists and started to work with booking agents . One of my first headline shows was Clinic , who was signed to Domino . The well-known agent Russell Warby taught me how to present a costing , which was a whole new way of working for me , and from then on I became a more traditional promoter in the sense of promoting headline artists .
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