New stretch target
Secure Nightshift's future for the next few years. Expand our free-to-access online archive back to 1991 and hopefully bring back the Oxford Punt showcase of new Oxford music talent.
A fundraiser to save Nightshift post-Covid & continue championing Oxford's grassroots music scene and artists and fight venue closures
by NIGHTSHIFT MUSIC MAGAZINE in Oxford, England, United Kingdom
Individual prize draws are not promoted or endorsed by Crowdfunder. See Terms & Conditions
Secure Nightshift's future for the next few years. Expand our free-to-access online archive back to 1991 and hopefully bring back the Oxford Punt showcase of new Oxford music talent.
Beginning in 1991 as CURFEW and relaunched in 1995 under its current moniker, NIGHTSHIFT has championed new bands and musicians, from Oxford and beyond, and fought for grassroots gigs and venues in Oxfordshire, from our comprehensive monthly gig guide to campaigning against venue closures.
The magazine’s aim has always been to encourage more people to go to gigs and to hopefully give artists just starting out a leg up onto the ladder to success. In that time we have given the first ever reviews and interviews to RADIOHEAD, SUPERGRASS, FOALS, STORNOWAY, YOUNG KNIVES and GLASS ANIMALS among so many more. NIGHTSHIFT wants Oxford music fans to be proud of their music scene’s success stories, and those artists to be proud to come from Oxford’s music scene.
For those 30 years NIGHTSHIFT has always been free, in print and online, and reliant on advertising revenue to sustain itself. The Covid pandemic has meant that a significant proportion of that revenue base has been eroded – cornerstone venues like The Wheatsheaf have been lost, while festivals, recording studios and shops have suffered financially so that their marketing budgets have been significantly reduced. NIGHTSHIFT, a magazine that has so often sailed close to the wind financially, faces an incredibly difficult task if it is to relaunch and continue to support Oxford’s music scene. A music scene that itself needs to regroup and rebuild – to hold onto those surviving venues and locate new gig opportunities for the years to come.
And so now we are launching our first ever crowdfunding campaign, to raise enough money for NIGHTSHIFT to start again and hopefully continue being a part of that rebuilding. Without hitting our target the magazine will not be able to afford to relaunch and continue to support Oxford’s music scene.
As part of that crowdfunding we have been given some incredible prizes by those artists, venues and festivals that we have championed over the years and by buying prize draw tickets, for yourself, your family or your friends, and thus donating to our restart campaign, you could win a unique Oxford music prize. You can enter as many different draws as you like or enter a draw multiple times to increase your chance of winning.
First and foremost to pay our monthly printing bills, which is by far and away our biggest outgoing – our long-time printers themselves are a small family-run company that has suffered hugely during the pandemic and we’re committed to remaining loyal to them. Also, distribution costs to get the magazine out to venues, pubs, shops, cafes and theatres around Oxfordshire; web hosting costs to maintain, and hopefully expand our online presence and provide a free-to-access archive of Oxford music history; we’d like to properly reward our excellent photographers who contribute so much colour and action into our reviews. And stamps aren’t cheap these days either; we get through quite a lot of stamps. The longer term aim of course is to return to a state where NIGHTSHIFT can be self-sufficient and explore new advertising and sponsorship opportunities.