00:00Good morning. My name is Phil Hewitt, group arts editor at Sussex Newspapers. Always great to speak to Harry White. Now, Harry, you must be so proud. You have created something truly terrific, the Hammerdown Festival. We've got the eighth festival this year in the 10 years of its running. It is Sussex's largest rock and metal weekend. And it's a big year, isn't it? Happening in Brighton. Big year because you've got that crucial second stage. What difference does it make?
00:30That's the biggest change this year. So adding a second stage is really, really crucial because it means we can give a lot more slots to local up and coming talent. And yeah, yeah, we really are proud of what we've done 10 years in the making. We finally got to a stage where we can add that that second stage now.
00:50And it feels like you're doing it brilliantly. It's continuous. You don't choose between bands. You just knit between the two stages.
00:56Absolutely. Yeah. So having no clashes means that we're not going to upset anybody who's a fan of two bands playing at the same time. You really can, if you wanted to, watch bands for the entire day.
01:07And on either day, the music is continuous all day long from 11, 20 in the morning.
01:12Yeah, 22 hours of music over the weekend. It's a long, long day of lots of live music.
01:18Well, so sitting back then, what is it that you've achieved with this that you've created over this time?
01:24It's a community, Phil. That's what it really is now. There are so many people who come out to our events, not just this one, but some of our other events throughout the year.
01:33And they are so passionate about what we do. The Hammerdown family, there's T-shirts that people wear that say Hammerdown family on them.
01:43And everybody's part of this little community that we've built.
01:46And what I get a sense of every year as we get to bigger and bigger venues is there's a sense of pride in the room because, you know, people can say that I've built it.
01:55But I haven't really because I'm not starting a festival in Chalk for the first time with 850 people.
02:01It's all the people that have bought tickets to the smaller ones that make this affordable and doable and achievable.
02:06And so all of those people create a buzz and a sense of pride because they were there at the small one five years ago or whatever.
02:14And that, I think, is everything. And anybody new that comes into the room, it's electric. It really is.
02:19But that probably explains why you are sounding so chilled about it.
02:22You work the whole year for this. You were saying this year's festival, you're going to enjoy the bands, aren't you?
02:28I'm yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. My thing is always to be at the front for every band.
02:34I've done that forever. But because I'm still working, I'm running around like a madman when there's the changeovers.
02:40But this year, after speaking to a couple of other festival bosses, they said, just enjoy it.
02:46You know, you work the whole year to do it. Just watch the bands. Don't worry about what's going on.
02:50You've hired a team for a reason. Let them do the job over the weekend.
02:54You've put 363 days into it. Enjoy two of them.
02:58Oh, fantastic. Well, it sounds a brilliant achievement. Well done to you, Harry.
03:02Just confirm for me then the dates and the venue is when?
03:07It is July the 19th and 20th across two venues, Chalk and Dust, next door to each other in Brighton.
03:13Doors are from 11 a.m. Music runs all the way through until 10 p.m.
03:18You can get day or weekend tickets from £40.
03:21Perfect. Congratulations. Lovely to speak to you. Thank you.
