Lemon Grove club nights Propaganda and Damn Good Tuesdays have been stopped for the foreseeable future, Exeposé understands. Student club nights at the Lemon Grove are currently facing changes due to low turnout since the beginning of the 2018-19 academic year.
Propaganda, a club night which other University Student Unions like Lincoln and Bristol host, was launched at the Exeter Guild venue at the end of Freshers’ Week this September. The club nights contain, according to the Propaganda website, “around everything from Arctic Monkeys to The 1975, Paramore to Ed Sheeran, The Killers to Pale Waves and much more” and have been running across the country for over a decade.
The night was introduced to the Lemon Grove after it was shut down during the 2017-18 academic year, again, as a result of low turnout and so the venue could be renovated. A removal of the stamp system on Saturday nights early last year, alongside changes to the DJ roster, did not help save the club in its state at the time.
Despite good turnout during arrivals weekend this year, the club struggled to attract the numbers it has in previous years.
Despite good turnout during arrivals weekend this year, the club struggled to attract the numbers it has in previous years.
“The numbers fluctuate week on week but have remained consistently low”, said one student who had been at Propaganda this year. “We’re talking less than Saturday Night Lemmy last year here. The clubs in town for example, they’ve capitalised on the Lemon Grove’s poor performance. We had promoters from Unit [Unit 1] and that in the Ram during Freshers’ Week.”
A representative from Exeter’s Students’ Guild said the following when asked about the changes to the club’s schedule:
“Following on from the changes in the Lemon Grove last year, we have been working with a number of promoters and third parties to put on an exciting and varied program of live music, events and club nights in the Lemon Grove. Part of this is trying new nights and seeing what works and is appealing to Exeter students.
“[we] continue to change the schedule and frequency of events and the third parties we work with until we find a set of nights that is a good fit for our members” – Guild REPRESENTATIVE
“As part of this process we have [changed] and continue to change the schedule and frequency of events and the third parties we work with until we find a set of nights that is a good fit for our members. The Damn Good nights have been put on hold whilst we look at if the type of events is a good fit and we are in discussions with the team at Propaganda to look at the schedule of events to increase the availability of Saturday night slots to other promotors and types of event.”
Promotional flyers, posters, and window adhesives were used to promote the new nights at the start of this year. For Propaganda, material stated that it would be ‘every Saturday’.
