It is difficult to imagine the Manchester scene of the late-1980s and early-1990s being replicated today. The music industry has changed beyond recognition, as have the ways in which we discover and consume music. There are fewer venues for emerging bands to play, punters have less disposable income to spend on tickets and beers, and we have more music available at our fingertips than we could possibly listen to in a lifetime.

Yet one thing has endured: the ability of a city, a venue or a shared sound to bring musicians together and give rise to a scene. For anyone who has spent time in Manchester over the last ten years or so, the emergence of another such community will come as little surprise, with an endless list of live shows to choose from on any given night. Students arrive from elsewhere to study, fall for the city and decide to stay, nurturing their own creativity while supporting that of the musicians around them.

are among those who have rooted themselves in and shaped Manchester’s cultural landscape over the recent past. Alongside , they helped establish No Band Is An Island, a musical and activist community that brings together emerging artists and political voices. For a generation of musicians, including singer and bassist , it offers a way to connect their creative ambitions with a wider sense of social responsibility.

The connections between Manchester’s emerging bands are deep. share a rehearsal space with , while , whose lead guitarist Harvey O’Toole is also the lead singer of Wyatt, are part of the same wider network. Musicians move between projects, appear at one another’s shows and find themselves sharing stages. Beale has even stepped in to play tambourine for Pyncher on a couple of occasions, including a now legendary garden party gig organised by friends.

That sense of overlap was particularly apparent at a 2023 Christmas show at Withington Public Hall, where , backed by Reuben Haycocks and Paddy Murphy now of Westside Cowboy, and all played. Martial Arts played the same venue just the night before, supported by Lennon Gallagher’s band Automotion, with many of the same attendees. I put to Marson and Beale the idea that these gatherings might be a significant point in time for the musicians involved, a little like the Sex Pistols’ famous Free Trade Hall gig. The wider network of connections between the bands, already evidently strong at that point, has continued to develop since.

No Band Is An Island has helped give that community a focal point. Established almost two years ago, the project brings musicians and audiences together for events that combine live music with political and activist causes. The nights are non-profit, with proceeds going towards the causes they support.

For frontman Marson, the idea grew out of a recognition that plenty of musicians in Manchester shared similar political views but could struggle to find the time and space to engage with them properly. He explains that the events provide a platform for people with a deeper understanding of particular issues.

“It’s an opportunity to get people in front of an audience who are much more educated in their fields than musicians trying to educate people about politics,” he says. “There are a lot of musicians in Manchester who share the same views and want to be politically active. But the amount of time it takes to sift through the noise, educate yourself about what’s going on and find a way to communicate what you’re thinking can be quite difficult.”

The political organisations involved vary between events. Marson mentions working with civil disobedience groups, as well as having Green Party speakers at previous nights. The format allows the music to sit alongside conversations about issues that matter to the people organising and attending. For Beale, the atmosphere that develops as a result is a major part of the appeal.

“It’s a great night. It feels almost like being at a protest. There’s a really great energy in the room,” he says.

Some of the band’s favourite gigs have taken place at No Band Is An Island, partly because the events give artists across Manchester a reason to come together. Beale sees a different kind of relationship developing between musicians when they share a space for a common cause.

“Rather than everyone passing each other in the corridor, sizing each other up and wondering what gigs everyone has coming up, it feels more like catching up with your friends. Everyone’s lifting each other up.”

That sense of solidarity is particularly relevant in a scene where bands can be competing for the same audiences, venues and opportunities. Westside Cowboy’s recent trip to the United States offers an example of how one band’s progress can be celebrated by those around them without a sense of competition or animosity. Beale says the shared rehearsal space means the two groups are regularly in contact, and that the ethos of No Band Is An Island has helped shape their relationship.

“Because the nights are for a good cause, everyone gets behind them. It creates a bigger picture of what you can do with your music,” he says. “A lot of it is centred around community and unity. Because that’s what the nights are centred around, it extends into how you interact with each other as well.”

For Marson, the project has also provided a way to approach the relationship between Martial Arts’ own music and politics. He acknowledges that the band’s early songs often dealt directly with political subjects, and that this could create pressure to find the right words.

Organising No Band Is An Island has helped the band think about how they can contribute beyond their lyrics. Marson says they have come to see their actions as an important part of the political character of Martial Arts.

“We’ve often said that the band, the music and the language are quite political, but we always want to let the actions speak loudest,” he says. “That’s what No Band Is An Island is about.”

He is careful about positioning the group as spokespeople for a particular movement. Instead, he sees the project as a way for musicians to take responsibility for their own role in building the kind of society they want to live in, while giving a platform to people whose expertise can help communicate specific messages.

“Everyone has their own role in trying to build the kind of society they want to see. It’s about musicians taking on that role for themselves, too. We don’t necessarily have to get on a soapbox, but we can share that platform with people whose message we want to spread.”

Although No Band Is An Island has become an important part of the band’s activities, Marson is keen to maintain a distinction between the project and Martial Arts themselves. He says the two can exist alongside one another, allowing the band to write and perform what they want while continuing to organise events with a wider purpose. The people involved change from one event to the next, and Beale describes returning after time away playing shows as “almost like coming home”.

He says the band wear No Band Is An Island badges and T-shirts when they play elsewhere, recommend acts for future events and bring stories from the road back to the project. The nights have become a regular opportunity to catch up with other musicians and hear what they have been doing.

That connection with the city has developed over several years. Although the members of Martial Arts arrived in Manchester from elsewhere, Marson and Beale both say it has become home. Marson mentions that he and bandmate Matty have lived together for three or four years, with Matty originally from South Shields and Marson from the Midlands.

The band’s musical identity has developed through a similarly organic process. One of the most distinct features of Martial Arts is their three-guitar lineup, although Marson explains that it was never part of some grand plan. Having previously played in a band that managed just one gig before the pandemic, Martial Arts gave him his first proper opportunity to perform live regularly. He was asked to sing after the other members had seen him at open-mic nights.

“First and foremost, I’m a guitarist. I was never a singer. I got asked to sing for this band because the lads had seen me doing open-mic nights,” he explains. “That was essentially the interview process.”

Marson says he was initially terrified at the prospect of singing, particularly without having an instrument to occupy his hands. Playing guitar became a way of making the role more comfortable, while the other members had also learned the instrument and were keen to play. A trip to see another local band then helped convince them that three guitars could work.

“We went to see a band called Slim at Withington Public Hall. They had three guitars and bass, and I remember thinking how great it sounded,” Marson recalls. “They had a track called ‘145’, which we used to have on in the car all the time. I think that gave us the confidence to realise that three guitars could sound great.”

The arrangement has since become closely associated with Martial Arts. Marson has experimented with putting the guitar down and fronting the band, and says he would like to return to that at some point. For the time being, though, the group have invested so much time in working out how to write and perform with three guitars that it has become an integral part of their sound.

“You never want to be restricted. I suppose we’re happy with it. We play guitar-based music, so why not have as many guitars on stage as possible?”

Beale adds that the guitar is a common thread between the members, even if they play different instruments in the band. He plays guitar as well as bass, while drummer Tom can play guitar too. Their shared enthusiasm has helped make the three-guitar setup feel natural rather than an obstacle to work around.

Their influences, meanwhile, stretch well beyond any single scene or genre. Martial Arts have previously been associated with the post-punk movement that gathered momentum in the years before their formation. Marson recognises the importance of that wave of bands, particularly those associated with the Windmill scene, in making a new generation feel that starting a band was an exciting possibility.

“They made you feel like you could be in a band. They made you feel like bands were coming back,” he says.

There are self-confessed traces of Sonic Youth, Bloc Party and Interpol in the group’s sound. Marson says the band are now trying to move towards something more melodic, while retaining the intensity that characterised some of their earlier material. He describes the direction they are exploring as a combination of anger and melancholy, with an underlying sense of euphoria.

“There’s always been a euphoric side to the band’s sound, but it’s difficult to place that entirely within what we already know,” he says. “If you listen to ‘Pit Stop’, from the EP, which is the final track, that’s also what we close our live shows with. It feels like a full-body release, everything coming together in one go.

“It can be melancholic but euphoric at the same time.”

Beale offers a useful comparison between two of the band’s tracks. ‘Too Much Fun’ represents the heavier side of their writing, with its tempo changes and unusual structure, and he associates it more closely with the band’s earlier material. ‘Before the Fire’, by contrast, “has a jangly, bouncy” quality. The difference reflects the range of music the group have been listening to and the directions they are exploring.

Beale points to Gilla Band and Fontaines D.C., alongside Dry Cleaning and English Teacher, as some of the acts that have caught the band’s attention. The Windmill scene has been an important influence, but he also stresses the role of indie and pop music in shaping their approach. The Strokes, The Velvet Underground, Bob Dylan and The Beatles are among the artists the members have grown up listening to.

For Beale, those older songwriters offer lessons in how to write music that can endure beyond a particular scene or moment.

“We’re trying to put those influences into a contemporary frame with the guitars we’ve got,” he says.

That combination of melody, politics and post-punk influence is something Beale wants the band to explore further. He sees pop music as a particularly effective way of communicating ideas, and says Martial Arts are keen to move further into that territory. Getting the different elements to work together has taken considerable effort, however. The group have spent months refining their sound and working out what should come next.

“Hopefully, it’ll result in the best music we can give people because of all that work, but it hasn’t been easy,” he says.

The writing process itself is largely practical. Marson jokes that the closest the band get to studying music is using a track recorder app on someone’s phone. None of them are particularly academic about music, and much of their progress comes from spending time together in the rehearsal room. With five members and three guitarists, there are plenty of ideas to work through.

Beale says the group can often have several competing ideas for a single track, making it a matter of deciding which parts actually serve the song. He estimates that they spend around ten hours a week in their lock-up, between rehearsals, preparing for shows, meetings and calls. Sharing the space with Westside Cowboy also keeps them connected to the wider Manchester scene as part of their everyday routine.

For Martial Arts, Manchester has provided the surroundings in which the band have grown, alongside a network of musicians who share their enthusiasm for playing and organising. No Band Is An Island has given those connections a common purpose, while the band’s own music continues to develop through the influences and ideas they bring into the rehearsal room. As they prepare to take their next release further afield, that sense of belonging remains an important part of their story.