When a band makes it big, in this scene, they sometimes lose their hardcore fans. The ones who were there from the start, the ones who saw said band in their local pub in front of seventeen people, bar staff included, they sometimes runaway the second their band makes it big. It almost sounds like "making it big" is a dirty word, because we're the alternative scene. We're alternative so a band should not become famous, you know. They should not get into top 40, and they shouldn't be on the radio, and they shouldn't play big venues. In a minute, you will hear a cry, someone will call them sell outs, sell outs because their latest single is on daytime radio, sell outs because they're supporting an über-famous band you don't like, sell outs because their album is battling with pop's most recent sensation for a number one spot on the top 40. Making it big is something no one wants to see their favourite bands do. 

I have been guilty of this, you know. I didn't want my favourite bands to play massive venues. I frowned when people I didn't like became fans. You should have seen my face and my general attitude the day I saw hordes of people asking Joe James, formerly of Blitz Kids, to take selfies with them after the band had supported All Time Low in Paris. Who were they to want pictures with them, they weren't there when they couldn't afford petrol to go play in Bournemouth in the winter of 2011, they have never heard Sell Yourself, they will never know who Billy and Eddie are. Get your newbie hands off my favourite bands. You're not a real fan.

Thank fuck I have stopped being an elitist piece of shit.

Not everyone who wants their favourite band to stay on the small level is the elitist piece of shit I once was - thank God for that. I understand why you wouldn't want your favourite band to ever become big. Arenas are pretty overwhelming and their drinks are overpriced. When your favourite band headlines the O2 Arena, the chances of meeting them are slim to none. The shows are less sweaty and a different kind of intense, and the sense of proximity has been taken away by the barrier, the seven hundred security guards and the twenty photographers pressed in the pit. There's nothing like a smaller, more comfortable, three hundred cap show. You're close enough to your favourite band, chances are, you will run into them at the bar, in the off-licence down the road where they'll be buying Pot Noodles before driving to the nearest Travelodge (that is, if they're lucky enough to stay the night in a Travelodge and not on someone's floor, or worse, in their van) or in the venue toilet. Everyone will know the words to the songs and there will be no barrier. What's not to love.

I stopped wanting my favourite bands to stay at the comfortable three hundred cap venue and Pot Noodle level when they all broke up due to financial difficulties. The day you hear the bassist of one of your favourite bands say to your face that "there's only so much the fans can do" as they're embarking on a farewell tour, it puts everything into perspective. I might enjoy a small show and a chat around a fairly priced beer more than a night out at the Barclaycard Arena in Birmingham with twenty thousand people, but what's comfortable for me might mean the death of my favourite bands, and, in the long run, I'd rather not talk to them than see them being a cashier at their local Tesco because the being in a band thing didn't work out and they couldn't sustain themselves. 

You see it constantly, if you look around. There's people who miss old times when their favourite band's newest music video reaches a million views on YouTube. There's people who, like I have done, look down on newer fans who would dare talking to the band they've liked first, as if being there since the EP they've badly recorded in their mum's basement made you a better fan than being there since you heard one of their tracks on BBC Radio 1, squished between Little Mix and Meghan Trainor. There's people who complain and whine at the sight of an arena tour, because it means they've sold out now they're not playing the 2 Pigs in Cheltenham anymore and they're only doing the Motorpoint Arena in Cardiff.

The day my favourite bands started dropping like flies and I ended up attending six farewell shows in the space of two years, I decided I wanted every single band I loved to become big. I want them to headline big shows, and I want them to have decent meals before and after they play, not crisps sandwiches and two packets of Haribos shared between six people. I want them to have pyro and fireworks and confetti cannons. I want them to be supported by the music press. I want them to be paid enough to live off music. I want them to not have to do a couple of extra shifts at their local pubs in between tours. I want them to become household names. I want to stand in the middle of crowds where everyone will know their names and the lyrics of their songs. I want them to sleep in beds when they're on tour, not on someone's floor, and not in their van. 

I don't want them to have to announce they're breaking up because they don't have enough money.

I've known that for years, but I've only recently started putting it into words. I remember the times when we all dreamt of going to Reading & Leeds, because in 2010, they had a day headlined by blink-182, who were sharing a stage with Paramore, Weezer, All Time Low and You Me At Six. Since that summer, us music fans have wanted our favourite bands to play festivals in France, too. We would look at the Reading & Leeds line up and hope this or that band we loved would be added to the Rock en Seine line-up as it was the same weekend. In between an indie-pop band and a DJ, we prayed to read You Me At Six or Young Guns. It's finally happening - Bring Me The Horizon have played Rock en Seine last year, Don Broco are scheduled to appear at Lollapalooza Paris (alongside Lana Del Rey or Red Hot Chili Peppers) and Main Square Festival (alongside System of a Down and Biffy Clyro) next summer. We're getting there. And when they walk on those stages, I want every person who doesn't know them to be blown away the way I was when I saw them for the first time.

I don't like bands to keep them for myself. I don't like bands to be the only person who's listening to them or who's seeing them live. Being squashed against seventeen thousand people is more pleasant than standing on my own in a basement with another ten people, looking at my feet because I'd be too scared to make eye-contact with them. Music is everything, in my life - once again, I don't think you need me to say it. It's at the front, back and centre of everything I am, of my social life, of my creative mind. It's what makes me feel alive, it's comfort, it's salvation, it's happiness, it's everything. I want everyone to feel the way I feel when I listen to my favourite bands. I want everyone to stand in the middle of a crowd in their hometown and see their favourite band play to seven thousand people. I want everyone to be able to stand in a venue and hear hundreds of people echoing the chorus I've been singing along to for years. I want everyone to be able to experience how nice the guitar player or the frontman of that band is. 

A band making it in the big leagues comes with its inconveniences, of course it does. It comes with shows in arenas, packed trains home and £5 pints that aren't even pints. It comes with seeing people online calling the frontman "daddy" and saying things like "If (insert band member's name) punched me in the face, I'd still thank him for his time" or "I wish (insert band member's name) would fuck me so hard I can't walk for five years". It comes with confessions Twitter acounts and imagine Tumblrs. Not that I read them anyway. I was once sent a Mallory Knox fanfic, I read two lines and closed the page as it was too awkward reading a work of fiction about people I kinda know. It comes with seeing them stood next to someone who might not know every word to every song. These things are a small price to pay to see my favourite bands walk one step further away from the break up for financial reasons. I can deal with hearing someone call the members of a band I love "daddy" if they buy merch, support the band, spread the word. What I have at heart when I love a band is not my personal satisfaction anymore ; what I have at heart is the bigger picture. I can easily close my eyes on every fanfiction in the book if it saves my favourite band from breaking up.

I don't want anyone to go through the pain of their favourite band having split up because they can't afford being on the road any longer, and I sure as hell don't want to have to go through that pain, that frustration and that anger again.