No gigs please, we’re British!

I’ve noticed a bit of a worrying trend of late, there seems to have been a sudden increase in venue closures, or at least there has been down here in ol’ Brighton town. Now I can only speak for Brighton (and I will) but I’m fairly sure that these aren’t isolated incidents.  Gig turn out in the UK has been on the decline for a while now, or at least it appears that way to me, and although not all of the venue closures in Brighton have been down to poor turn out alone (shockingly bad management, scene politics and the council have all played their parts in this little drama) it has no doubt got at least something to do with it.

All of this has got my frazzled grey matter creaking and there’s a couple of issues that I think deserve to be brought up. I’m no expert of licensing and health and safety laws (but since when has that stopped anyone from getting their penny’s worth?) but one of the most striking issues seems to be the incredible one-sidedness of the noise abatement laws. The most recent venue to fall by the wayside is the live music institution that is The Freebutt (go on, get it out of your system now) Some of you may have heard of this place, some of you may have even played there; The Freebutt has played host to a lot of bands over the past twenty odd years who have gone on to enjoy a decent amount of fame, the more indie orientated among you might be interested to know The Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs played their first UK gig here and Guy McKnight of The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster was a barman there for a number of years. It’s The Freebutt and the venues like it (most of which have now gone) that made Brighton such a vibrant place to be and despite the recent refit leading to many cries of “it aint what it was in my day, Sonny” from the older gig goers the ‘butt was still an important landmark on Brighton’s cultural landscape.

So anyhoo . . . a lovely estate was built around this long standing venue a few years ago and as you would expect the residents started complaining about the noise that they were both shocked and horrified was coming from the venue they had just moved next to, so to be fair this hasn’t exactly come out of the blue. One persistent compliant has led to the place changing hands a couple of times in recent years which has in turn led to the council turning the “well, they knew the venue was there when they moved in” argument on it’s head and using it against the new owners, “well, you knew there was a noise abatement in place when you took the venue on.” What now? Well, The Freebutt have had their limiter (that’s a thing that turns the electrics off once the noise goes over a certain level) reset to 94 decibels. To give you some idea that’s roughly 4 decibels louder than a domestic food blender, I could trip that with a good shout! The venue state that it was previously set to 105 decibels but to be fair I get the distinct impression that it either wasn’t working or it had been bypassed. This means they can’t have anything that involves drum kits or amplified instruments, effectively shutting the venue down without physically shutting it down. Score one to the council.

Nothing particularly new or surprising there, since the 2003 licensing laws came into effect this is a story that folks all across the UK will be familiar with. However, this particular example gets interesting when you scratch the surface and look at the wider picture… The guys at The Freebutt (never gets old does it?) ran an online petition that, to date, has been signed by 4,752 people and as a result of no longer being able to put on live music The Freebutt’s management claim to have been forced to make 14 members of staff redundant, here’s their full press release, it makes for some interesting, if a little biased, reading. Now there’s two sides to every story and as the council have pointed out in their press release a peaceful home is sacrosanct, but it does seem that the wishes of one person have been put before the wishes of nearly 5,000 others and has resulted in 14 people being left unemployed in the middle of one of the worst economic crises to hit the western world ever! It’s interesting to note that The Green Party were voted into parliament in Brighton with 16,238 votes, the amount of names on The Freebutt’s petition is creeping close to a quarter of that. (*edit* I’ve actually just realised that the number of names on the petition is actually way over a quarter of the votes The Greens gained in the general election!)

“So what? I don’t live in Brighton” I hear you say. Well, what this proves is that one persistent and determined complainant can effectively shut down a venue against the wishes of the wider community, and these laws are in effect across the UK. The more sceptical among you might suggest that once a venue closes down the surrounding house prices go up and so as a direct result does the council tax, I wouldn’t know about that, I’m sure that all councils have the best interests of it’s beloved citizens at the fore of all their decisions. The fact is that with falling record sales (yes it’s that old “downloads took our juuuurbs!” spectre again) ever increasing alcohol duty, the proposed increase in PRS fees, higher cost of living, ticket touts and the million other portents of doom that are looming on the horizon music in the UK can ill afford this rather hefty nail in it’s already sturdy coffin. Brighton has started to become the feeding ground of dodgy pay to play (boo!) and battle of the bands type promoters (hiss!). Take that as a warning, as more independent venues close the easier the pickings will become for these musical scavengers.

I don’t have a solution to this, I’m just pointing out a rather glaring issue, all I can suggest is to not sit idly by and watch live music die under a swath of red tape, maybe write to your MP, knock up a witty t-shirt or even better get off your arses, go to the gigs and prove how important live music is. Yeah do that,  that might help.

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You might also want to have a look at the “Save The Freebutt” Facebook Group. If you live in Brighton you might want also to visit the service review section of the council’s website, if you don’t live in Brighton then have a look at your council’s website for a similar section.