Music Venue Trust (MVT) has joined forces with Hearby to launch the UK’s first-ever aggregated gig listings, using data from more than 900 venues across the country.

The gig guide, dubbed “the AirBnB of grassroots music experiences”, already lists more than 10,000 shows and almost 3,000 acts in the coming quarter.

The organisations say this is a major step forward in making sure that music fans can easily find and attend the best gigs no matter where they are in the country.

Hearby will also host MVT’s Venue Directory which has moved online for the first time since it was first printed, allowing its members to regularly update their profile and keep their following in the know.

“WE AIM TO MAKE AN IMPACT – TO GET A FEW MORE PEOPLE TO A LOT MORE SHOWS”

“We started Hearby because a lot of the live music we tend to go see is not aggregated anywhere,” Hearby CEO and co-founder Gary Halliwell told IQ. “And it just seemed like such a ridiculous friction in this era of search that people couldn’t find live music in their communities. And that is as a drag on the livelihoods of artists and the viability of venues.

“We aim to make an impact – to get a few more people to a lot more shows. We’ve created a fun live music discovery experience with new pathways into finding a great night out and we are expanding our footprint by rapidly distributing the powered-by-Hearby experience to newspapers, travel and tourism channels.”

Hearby describes itself as an AI-driven organisation with “a mission to map all live music taking place across the planet”. It uses modern technologies such as data visualisation, machine learning, and interactive maps and widgets to list events from live music venues from arenas to grassroots businesses.

Get more stories like this in your inbox by signing up for IQ Index, IQ’s free email digest of essential live music industry news.

‍